Twitter to ban political advertising • Hacker News Board

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#811

Post by bjelkeman-again » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:08 AM UTC

kmlx wrote: post #776

akie wrote: post #739

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In America, we understand that there is absolutely nothing more dangerous than an entity that feels entitled to control what is true. It might make things easier, and it might actually produce better results so long as the entity doing so is competent and benevolent, but nearly every structure in America is meant to serve as a bulwark for the cases in which the entity in power is precisely the sort that you do not…

> Wouldn't it be great if you would have a powerful centralized body No. And i'm from Europe, the supreme "nanny state".

And Europe isn’t “one” thing. Finland works quite differently than Greece. I am very happy where I am in Europe.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#812

Post by claudiawerner » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:09 AM UTC

kortilla wrote: post #805

toxik wrote: post #792

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This to me seems not far from ayatollahs quoting scripture to justify their positions and policies. Surely thought has progressed in the last two hundred years?

> Surely thought has progressed in the last two hundred years? Nope, that’s not how it works. People consistently keep retrying ideas for government and economics over and over because they get tempted by promises while ignoring history because “this time it’s different”.

"This time it's different" was exactly the answer the liberals gave when propounding their system. It is also the answer mathematicians gave every time they tried to prove Fermat's Last Theorem. Contrary to popular belief, "this time it's different" is a very good way to go about progress, so long as there is good theoretical reason to believe there could be a difference in application.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#813

Post by navigatesol » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:14 AM UTC

chr1 wrote: post #771

akie wrote: post #739

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In America, we understand that there is absolutely nothing more dangerous than an entity that feels entitled to control what is true. It might make things easier, and it might actually produce better results so long as the entity doing so is competent and benevolent, but nearly every structure in America is meant to serve as a bulwark for the cases in which the entity in power is precisely the sort that you do not…

Why do you think the centralized body would say that to fox and not to cnn? After all if there are about 50% people thinking that fox spreads lies and 50% people thinking cnn spreads lies the decision of centralized body could go any way. It is better to let everyone speak and everyone to make their own decisions

One of the great ironies of the state of media in America: almost everyone agrees that Fox News is extermely biased and sometimes dishonest. Yet CNN, ABC, CBS, NYT and MSNBC are bastions of truth.

I mean, just a few weeks ago ABC posted a video from a Kentucky range and claimed it was fighting in Syria[0]. Is that simply horrible journalism, or a lie?

[0] https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/15/media/abc-news-error-video/in...

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#814

Post by kortilla » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:16 AM UTC

mthoms wrote: post #726

sacrificedcapon wrote: post #684

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do realize that saudi arabia, china, russia, etc all have laws in place to hold newspaper editors responsible for printing "truth" right? > This is what has kept our society well informed and critical thinking for a hundred years. What makes you think you are a well-informed and critical thinking society? Don't most danes think alike just like most saudis, chinese, russians, etc. Don't most danes think and believ…

Except that (1) The Danes who wrote those laws were elected by the citizens in a fair and open democracy. (2) The enforcement (presumably) falls on their judicial system. One that is transparent, progressive and highly respected around the world. (3) That Denmark has one of the lowest rates of corruption in the world. (4) That Danes are free to pursue information elsewhere (as in the entire internet) if they don't li…

> The Danes who wrote those laws were elected by the citizens in a fair and open democracy

Not really comforting to a slightly smaller minority that didn’t vote for them. A democracy is not a panacea and that’s why the US has the bill of rights to raise the bar on changes to fundamental rights.

> One that is transparent, progressive and highly respected around the world.

By whom? People in other countries don’t give two shits about judicial interpretations of laws in another country.

> That Denmark has one of the lowest rates of corruption in the world.

Corruption is orthogonal to government structure. Massively oppressive regimes can operate entirely inside their own laws and not be corrupt.

> That Danes are free to pursue information elsewhere (as in the entire internet) if they don't like whats available locally

Are they allowed to spread said information? If not, that’s not significantly better than the arrangement in China.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#815

Post by humanrebar » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:17 AM UTC

notafraudster wrote: post #555

humanrebar wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you promise to chop down all forests but are fine with trees, yes.

Does this follow? I run a site. I want to get rid of all fraudulent spam but allow legitimate commercial product advertisements. I train a model to tell the difference (or maybe I just make a human judgment call). It is better than guessing but worse than perfect: false positives and false negatives exist and expose me to criticism from interested parties. Your position is that this renders the concept of spam meanin…

If you're tying ribbons to trees in forests but not to other trees, you (or other interested folks) can correct any errors. And, if you actually wanted to be fair, you'd fix your mistakes yourself (or with your own resources) instead of expecting everyone else to clean up after you.

If you have robots chopping down forests, there's not much to do when they're wrong except apologize and explain that algorithms are hard.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#816

Post by dariosalvi78 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:21 AM UTC

moksly wrote: post #666

In Denmark we have laws in place that hold news paper editors responsible for printing truth. They don’t always succeed, but they try to, and when they do fail they admit it and apologise. This is what has kept our society well informed and critical thinking for a hundred years. It’s also allowed for different sides of things, because you can interpret things like socioeconomic statistics and facts differently and wr…

The definition of truth is quite a complicated one because truth is substantially a social construct. I wonder how this law works in practice. The main problem about social platforms, IMHO is not rubbish information, that's everywhere including printed press. The problem is plurality. Internet was supposed to actually solve this issue, but centralised, obscure and algorithmically controlled echo chambers have reintroduced it. The problem is, as always, when you put too much power into the hands of one entity...

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#817

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:24 AM UTC

dariosalvi78 wrote: post #816

moksly wrote: post #666

In Denmark we have laws in place that hold news paper editors responsible for printing truth. They don’t always succeed, but they try to, and when they do fail they admit it and apologise. This is what has kept our society well informed and critical thinking for a hundred years. It’s also allowed for different sides of things, because you can interpret things like socioeconomic statistics and facts differently and wr…

The definition of truth is quite a complicated one because truth is substantially a social construct. I wonder how this law works in practice. The main problem about social platforms, IMHO is not rubbish information, that's everywhere including printed press. The problem is plurality. Internet was supposed to actually solve this issue, but centralised, obscure and algorithmically controlled echo chambers have reintro…

[deleted]

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#818

Post by tsmarsh » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:25 AM UTC

moksly wrote: post #666

In Denmark we have laws in place that hold news paper editors responsible for printing truth. They don’t always succeed, but they try to, and when they do fail they admit it and apologise. This is what has kept our society well informed and critical thinking for a hundred years. It’s also allowed for different sides of things, because you can interpret things like socioeconomic statistics and facts differently and wr…

The Guardian has the motto: “Comment is free, facts are sacred”

During the rush to digital a section was launched “facts are sacred”

Hahhahahah

No it was “Comment is free”, that is what generated clicks and ad revenue

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#819

Post by cmrdporcupine » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:27 AM UTC

Invictus0 wrote: post #806

yoavm wrote: post #784

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But these really aren't the type of lies that people consider fake news. Yeah, all the things you've written are facts, and their interpretations are what we call opinions. I agree with you that all of these statements, since they're true, should be allowed without a question. People still need to think and be critical. I just took a look at a long list of lies by your current President. It has nothing to do with fac…

Every president has lied; they have reasons to do it. Maybe it's to avoid revealing classified information, or to gain a political or geopolitics advantage. It doesn't matter; lying is an essential part of statecraft. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/the-history-of-lies-on... Edit: I would appreciate if whoever is downvoting can please explain why they are doing so.

Yes, it does feel in large part that it's the crass and blatant nature of Trump's presentation that enrages, not just the actual content.

As a Canadian I 'preferred' Obama, who ran on the line "change you can believe in" -- but he led the US empire substantially the same as any previous... and so this "can believe in" line, it really expresses a truth. The substantial piece was not that America would change, but that you could _believe_ in the fact that it would change. Little actually changed in America, at least from a distance. And once people stopped believing in the change... one gets Trump.

Disgusting as he is, Trump really is "changing" America. And his lying is more transparent and blatant and crass, but also more theatrical and aggressive. It's weaponized.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#820

Post by atoav » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 11:31 AM UTC

ralusek wrote: post #685

moksly wrote: post #666

In Denmark we have laws in place that hold news paper editors responsible for printing truth. They don’t always succeed, but they try to, and when they do fail they admit it and apologise. This is what has kept our society well informed and critical thinking for a hundred years. It’s also allowed for different sides of things, because you can interpret things like socioeconomic statistics and facts differently and wr…

The lowest level of truth telling is stating facts, but even stating facts can be extremely manipulative. If I were to say: "2x as many white Americans were killed by police as black Americans in 2018." This a true fact. If I take note of the fact that black Americans only constitute 13% of the population, then I can say "A black American is 2.3x as likely as a white American to be killed by police." This is also a t…

In Austria we have a body that regulates this and it kind of works. We still have various levels of quality, but flat out lying is far less common than in the US or UK.

The body consists of a board of all media agencies and they self-regulate their behaviour and adhere to their commonly agreed principles (e.g. if you get facts wrong, people can demand follow-ups with a correction etc).

In my eyes the US has a ideological perspective on many issues, that are basically "solved" in other democratic nations (with gun-law beeing the most shining example). I accept that you cannot directly apply solutions that work in one nation to another without reflecting the differences in culture and law, but it happens all too often that Americans claim something can't be solved, while it works perfectly fine somewhere else, without having sacrificed neither democracy nor freedom.

When it comes to media regulation, it is a question of law and enforcement. If you don't trust your own courts to objectively judge what accounts to a violation and what does not or is ambiguous (like in your examples), then you have a problem with your justice system beeing influenced by politics and the principle of the seperation of powers is broken.