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Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#151
Maybe as an aside, but why should this research be done at university level? Is it expensive or require their resources?

Obviously institutions are at risk of capture by special interests. We can call them non profit but doesn't stop the economics and human nature. Same is true for politicians so oversight could make things even worse as it would be even more centralized and easier to capture .

So we should look for smaller individuals and groups to conduct research. Being public also creates a financial incentive. If your research indicates something is a fraud or very harmful you can short the stock to fund your research

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#154

This isn’t unusual in academia btw. It’s an open secret that economics departments are bought the same way— a generous donation to the department in exchange for the donor hand-picking the department chair.

Invisible Hand indeed.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My partner works at a major U in the US. Top 200ish. They are solely focused on revenue. Teacher pay rarely raised, but that new upgrade for the stadium at a cool $120m, seems like a great idea. FFS, her dept went past the paper budget for one semester, about 5 years ago. The resolution? Do without paper until the next semester. That's what students insane tuition prices bought them. Apathy over education.

Why are they so focused on that? It seems like a great way to drive a school into the ground.

Honest graft.

Awards and recognition for leaders. Where ethics rules are loose, fancy trips and steak dinners, etc.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#158
post #139

500MM to avoid Harvard scrutiny - not a bad deal on 40MMM quarterly profit. It probably doubles as a tax deduction as well. Free market capitalism at its finest.

wouldn't 40MMM be 40 trillion (40M-million)...?

I believe that the M stands for "mille," or thousand.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#159
post #82

It makes you wonder how much the Zucherbergs influenced the 2020 election with "Zuckerbucks". They were cleared by the Feds, but then even that investigation becomes suspect with these large sums of money and influence. Conservatives claimed it went towards bolstering voting in largely Democratic regions, or in a biased distribution and application of the funds.

[deleted]

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#160
It fits a larger, apparently organized campaign to suppress any counter-disinformation efforts, in government, academia, and private organizations.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/09/23/online-...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/11/30/biden-f...

The U.S. government has stopped warning some social networks about foreign disinformation campaigns ...

...

University academics and disinformation research groups are also in limbo. Many are seeking affordable legal representation to defend themselves against mounting cases and reevaluating their communication with industry and the public.

“The trust and safety workers are gone. The relationships with external researchers is now gone,” said Anika Collier Navaroli, senior fellow at the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University and a former senior Twitter policy official. “And now this third piece of the actual information from the government is gone. … So we’re basically unprotected.”

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Think how crazy that is - who is in favor of disinformation? How can universities - even Harvard - set precedents of not protecting open inquiry or their faculty, which will not stop here, and even indirectly support disinformation, the main threat to their mission of creating and disseminating knowledge. And as usual, there is no leadership; the Biden administration's answer to all problems is to avoid confrontation at all costs.

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