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Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

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Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#531

Post by stOneskull »

blhack wrote: post #286

At this point: I wish they’d just take a stronger stance and ban everything they don’t like. Just ban the political party they don’t like, ban anything that speaks out against China, just ban it all. We need to go back to the web, where anybody could install Apache and off they went. Bandwidth is cheap now. BitTorrent exists. I hope google and twitter and Facebook and all the rest just hurry up with all this. Some ot…

> We need to go back to the web, where anybody could install Apache and off they went. Bandwidth is cheap now. BitTorrent exists.

the ISPs are a concern. these can turn into an even more dangerous monopoly. can there be a new internet? home antennas? or maybe a way to somehow remove ISPs from the equation. a free flow.

Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#532

Post by SuoDuanDao »

gamblor956 wrote: post #506
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It didn't start after Trump's election. It started with the "cancel culture" thing a couple of years before that and pressure on companies to participate in the war on crimethink. I tend to think that it contributed to Trump's election, because it has the effect of creating massive polarization. You can't segregate sites by viewpoint and thought filter everything in favor of one side or the other and expect it not to…

The modern polarization of the media began in the 1990s with Newt Gingrich...with help from his patron Rupert Murdoch, an ultra-conservative Australian who owned television stations, tabloids, and newspapers in the US, Australia, and the UK. Before them, politics was still very cutthroat but not polarized along party lines.

True - but something happened in the 2010's when Big Tech started taking sides in a way it hadn't before. I cannot picture Google doing this when it was still Google.

Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#533

Post by grumple »

This is a huge part of the reason why I think we should go with mobile-first web design rather than build native apps that have to go through these stores. I have to build and deploy a mobile app on iOS and Android for work and it's a) a pain in the ass and b) we're at the mercy of these two megacorporations.

If you can get by without a separate mobile app, do so. And if you need some functionality, consider pushing for that to be a part of the web standard and contributing to whatever projects can make that functionality accessible through the browsers.

Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#534

Post by tobias3 »

kolpazan wrote: post #12

This is my first comment in HN. This is the best productive podcast app ever. The developer is also so helpful with any kind of bugs I reported. I hope this is resolved quickly.

Podcast Addict shouldn't be banned for non-approved Covid content.

When I tested the version of Podcast Addict with ads, it started reloading ads in the background and going through my battery and data allowance. The developer wasn't able to figure out and fix the problem. Just did a quick search and the last time someone wrote about this problem is a year ago (on reddit). Maybe it is fixed now? I would be okay with an app being banned for such bug, btw. It's app bugs like this that cause the ever stricter background service restrictions on Android (until it's like iOS and just not possible anymore).

Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#535

Post by randallsquared »

acituan wrote: post #450
makomk wrote: post #446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? The New York Times does deliver news in Chinese about China. Has done for quite a while.

Didn’t know that, thanks for chiming in. My point stands though.

Does it? Are you just assuming that, or did you find evidence of it?

Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#536

Post by robertlagrant »

kwhitefoot wrote: post #515
dspillett wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> > asking a web browser app to remove references to all the websites and social media posts > Except usually a web browser doesn't include a index of sites, You go to a another site (Google/Bing) for that. OK then, it is like asking a search/video/advertising company to remove all such references from its search, and hosted videos, and other properties, and banning their apps & services until they do. I don't see th…

> I'll give Google that benefit of the doubt if they reinstate PcA immediately and apologise for their cock-up. Why? It's not as if no one in Google knew that this would happen. I don't think Grace Hopper's 'Better to ask forgiveness than permission' applies here. Google knew what they were doing when they instituted the rule and their behaviour suggests malice aforethought.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2018/06/19/forgive/

Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#539

Post by 5040 »

nyolfen wrote: post #472
emteycz wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think so? How do you know it's not the response to multiple attempts to put liability for content on platform owners like Google and Facebook? How do you know they did not respond strongly because most governments have declared state of crisis, which means more severe punishment, and punishment of things that would be OK otherwise (and of course nobody knows what that actually means, let alone all around t…

there can be more than one reason, but the censorship began in earnest after trump's election and before covid.[1] this isn't even a controversial position and i'm nowhere near the only person to have remarked upon it. [1] https://www.npr.org/2018/08/06/636030043/youtube-apple-and-f...

There were sweeping purges on Twitter after the elections. The official story was that these were 'bots' or 'trolls', but lots of good accounts got permanently deleted. It happened two or three times as I recall. You'd wake up and see that your follower count had mysteriously plunged overnight indicating another crop of bannings.

Re: Google bans Podcast Addict app over non-approved Covid-19 content

#540

Post by SkyBelow »

plorg wrote: post #401
blhack wrote: post #286

At this point: I wish they’d just take a stronger stance and ban everything they don’t like. Just ban the political party they don’t like, ban anything that speaks out against China, just ban it all. We need to go back to the web, where anybody could install Apache and off they went. Bandwidth is cheap now. BitTorrent exists. I hope google and twitter and Facebook and all the rest just hurry up with all this. Some ot…

There is indeed a problem here, and FAANG are being hamhanded and overaggressive in their response, but it's hard to find an overt bias that maps neatly onto the dominant (American?) political cleavage. Much more often (as here), these companies are 1) making decisions in a way that allows them to abstract away and thus ignore the nuances of individual cases 2) putting the burden of implementation on underpaid worker…

>but it's hard to find an overt bias that maps neatly onto the dominant (American?) political cleavage.

What about things like google search suggestions being manipulated to hide unfavorable suggestions, but only for certain candidates? I remember seeing this happening real time after trying it one day per a reddit post and then a few days later per another reddit post that such suggestions had stopped showing.

The invention of the tools may have been orchestrated well outside of political leanings, but once invented and handed over for employees to use their application has follow political leanings.

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