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The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

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Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#331

Post by hellfish »

spamizbad wrote: post #163
pannSun wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you miss [1]? The US govt. used its influence over Twitter to help sell its foreign policy (military interventions included) to the US and global audience. The only way you could not take issue with it, is if you're fine with govt. psyops/undisclosed propaganda. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34111071

I mean we allowed the alphabet agencies to cooperate with social media companies to fight "ISIS propaganda." -- what did you think would happen? Scorpion, frog, etc. If we had stood up to them in 2013, drew a line in the sand and said "No, a bunch of poorly edited snuff films aren't going to cause a bunch of American teens to join an Islamic revolution" these relationships wouldn't exist. By the way, we are currently…

> I mean we allowed the alphabet agencies to cooperate with social media companies to fight "ISIS propaganda." -- what did you think would happen?

I remember thinking earlier, it's kind of odd that teenagers "running off to join ISIS" was a widespread problem. In hindsight the shills probably blew that whole thing out of proportion to justify more agency scope creep

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#332

Post by landemva »

spamizbad wrote: post #159
mef wrote: post #9

I’ve been trying to read these Twitter files threads thoughtfully, and maybe it’s just a sign of the current average level of comfort with government involvement with social media platforms, but I’m generally not seeing much issue with the stuff being revealed. the worst thing about this particular thread seems like the govt agencies talking to Twitter about foreign influence are overreaching a bit (eg asking them to…

I feel like if someone made a bunch of threats on Twitter and then followed through with them people would be completely outraged why the FBI didn’t stop them. Anyway it’s interesting we are having this debate TODAY when after 9/11 and a decade later the adroit use of social media by ISIL the alphabet agencies were crawling all over the internet. Pandora’s box was opened years ago.

> people would be completely outraged why the FBI didn’t stop them.

I doubt people would make FBI change for the better.

Suspicions of people paying cash at flight schools and not seeming to want an airline career was reported to FBI several times before 9/11. FBI filed it.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fbi-was-warned-about-flight-sch...

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#333

Post by krapp »

ilyt wrote: post #320
RobLach wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not an abuse of power unless the FBI threatens repercussions. It seems like Twitter was more or less happy to oblige. I don't see what the hubbub is about.

For all we know it could be "you can play nicely and remove it when we tell you to "look into it", or we will look further into your company"

That's passing into "ignore your lying eyes and read between the lines" territory, which isn't an argument from evidence but an argument from political ideology.

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#334

Post by hellfish »

beej71 wrote: post #294
NaturalPhallacy wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The First Amendment: > Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. It's since been expanded through court cases to extend from congress to every government entity including local ones. The go…

This doesn't mean the government can't make requests to private companies, including the press.

Good idea, it's high time this practice gets banned

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#335

Post by tosc »

hermitdev wrote: post #91
tosc wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So every troll and bot farm should be able to have each tweet judged by a jury?

I'm not going to touch bot farm, but the problem with labeling someone a troll and thus is that is subjective and not clearly defined. There's a level of intent behind being a troll vs being thought of as a troll. Here, in the USA, we do have the right to freedoms of speech, press and association. These freedoms cannot be encroached on by the government without due process, and yes, that means it would need to go in…

Ok, this is fine, but that means we have to classify Twitter as press, with all of the responsibilities as a publisher that this entails.

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#336

Post by nickthegreek »

machina_ex_deus wrote: post #185
acdha wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you don't see anything wrong with the government forcing censorship on controversial political questions Nobody is saying that it wouldn’t be a problem. The debate is whether the Twitter Files shows anything of the sort, and begging the question like that calls into question whether you’re actually interested in a honest discussion.

Is that the debate? Because I think it's pretty settled the files show extensive collaboration of the FBI and Twitter on controversial topics, it shows many instances of twits censored by a request from the FBI. Am I moving the debate position or are you? Did you even read them? Many comments here accept the existing evidence as something normal. I disagree strongly.

First you said it was forced censorship, now you are stating it was extensive collaboration. Do you see that those are not the same?

Which of the removed tweets shows the FBI was acting in obvious bad faith? I just don’t see it.

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#337

Post by birken »

Vt71fcAqt7 wrote: post #248
birken wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll go one further... if even 1 single person (the person who owns HN), decides that they don't like the content of that comment, then they should be free to delete/censor the comment on HN and ban the person in perpetuity from HN. Your argument doesn't really make any sense because everybody here is talking about speech in the context of a walled garden owned by a company/person. That is a completely different situ…

>Your argument doesn't really make any sense because everybody here is talking about speech in the context of a walled garden owned by a company/person. Did you read GP? If they were talking about comapnies and not governments, it certainly was not made clear: >However, with the proliferation of the internet and social media, it has become easier for governments to monitor and regulate online content, and this has le…

> Where was GP talking about companies?

The initial comment says government has always used their influence through "newspapers", "television" and "social media", all of which have historically been non-government entities who take the government's input and decide if they want to follow it or not. There are obviously major historical cases in which private companies have defied what the government wanted them to do (NYT v Sullivan, NYT vs US, etc), but I'm sure there are countless examples throughout Twitter's history of the government asking for something and then not getting it, but I assume that isn't something those instances are not being highlighted that much as they don't fit the narrative.

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#338

Post by hellfish »

none_to_remain wrote: post #186
whatsu wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is true that governments have always had an influence on how we live our lives, whether through traditional media like newspapers and television, or more modern platforms like social media. This is not a new phenomenon, but rather something that has always existed in society. However, with the proliferation of the internet and social media, it has become easier for governments to monitor and regulate online conten…

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Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#339

Post by nkurz »

joshuamorton wrote: post #128
elurg wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I understand the FBI knew that the Hunter Biden story was real but encouraged everybody else to believe that it was a Russian hoax. Doesn't this count as lying? It's not just lying, it's explicit disinformation with an electoral goal. This went so far that major web platforms blocked all forms of disagreement and the public dismissed it as a conspiracy theory. It was highly effective. I hate Trump's guts bu…

Just to clarify, what part of the hunter Biden story was "real"? The hunter Biden story can mean everything from "a laptop was found with hunters nudes, and it's discovery was probably influenced by Russian state assets" to "hunters laptop contains proof of misdealings my the president". As far as I can tell, the first is more or less true and the second isn't.

I agree that the way the laptop was claimed to be found sounds incredibly suspicious, but I don't know of any current evidence that the laptop's "discovery was probably influenced by Russian state assets". When you say "the first is more or less true", are you including this part? If so, can you point to evidence linking the find to Russia?

For the second part, I'd also agree that the laptop does not contain clear evidence of wrongdoing by the president. It contains a lot more than just nude photos of Hunter, though. It's real in the sense that everything on the laptop is believed to be authentic. It offers insight of Hunter's business dealings, and I think hints that contrary to the president's claims, he was at least aware of some of the details of those dealings. As such, I think it's reasonable for people to want to inspect the contents and reach their own conclusion as to what it implies, rather than being prevented from doing so.

Re: The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter

#340

Post by fallingknife »

mhoad wrote: post #317
fallingknife wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I’d actually argue that the idea that the US tech ecosystem is almost exclusively ultra left leaning is the myth here. You’ve just presented that as some kind of a fact which is in stark contrast to thousands of threads filled with comments demonstrating the opposite.

Judging by the companies I've worked at and the people I know, it clearly is. This is biased towards the sv part of the industry, which is the largest concentration, though. It is also backed up by the data of who employees of large tech companies contribute to, which is overwhelmingly democrats.
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