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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

#221

Post by tuwtuwtuwtuw »

TeeMassive wrote: post #191

"prestigious team of online disinformation experts" Not being the devil's advocate here, but "online disinformation" is not a credentialed field. That's like calling yourself a "truth expert". Also the prestigious part is bogus at best. If they are then they sure don't make the headlines often.

I'm not following your reasoning here. There are people working with the topic that is online disinformation. I know Swedish government have some teams who analyze disinformation campaigns, as an example. Are you saying that people who work with this area cannot be experts on the area?

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#222

Post by [deleted] »

godelski wrote: post #197
pastacacioepepe wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need a formal conspiracy when you have an elite with converging interests.

There's a joke from a comedian I forget if it is L̶o̶u̶i̶s̶ ̶C̶K̶ George Carlin o̶r̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶. But basically is along the lines that you don't have explicitly collude when you all come from the same backgrounds. The interests are aligned already. It's pointing out that representatives need to actually be from representative populations of people. But he did it in a funny way, this comment really isn't. Edit: thanks lo…

[deleted]

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#223

Post by golergka »

sonicanatidae wrote: post #119
93po wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The few very large unis i looked into all made massively more money off investment returns than any operational income. the year i reviewed for the university of texas system showed they could have charged zero tuition that year and still make a profit there are absolutely kickbacks for people in control of those endowments choosing specific investment options with their many billions of dollars

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.

This just means that's what their customers, who pay the tuition, care about more.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#224

Post by golergka »

xattt wrote: post #211
dehrmann wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Teacher pay rarely raised There's an oversupply of most PhDs, so there's no need to raise their pay. And that's for professors. Grad students that teach are practically free.

> There's an oversupply of most PhDs Which PhDs are in undersupply?

AI researchers, by the looks of what tech is willing to pay for them.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#226

Post by jlg23 »

bko wrote: post #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…

> Maybe as an aside, but why should this research be done at university level?

In this specific case: Because it started there and institutions that claim to be neutral or to use scientific methods should not stop research because they are paid to do so.

In the general case: When speaking bad about big actors, reputation and a big budget for lawyers can make a lot of lawsuits go away before they even start.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#227

Post by akaij »

say_it_as_it_is wrote: post #57

Why was Harvard dedicating resources to investigate Facebook in the first place? What kind of academic research was it conducting? "Our hypothesis is that Facebook censored right-wing disinformation campaigns" doesn't have academic value.

Interesting to see lines drawn around academic value.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#228

Post by lo_zamoyski »

bko wrote: post #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…

> So we should look for smaller individuals and groups to conduct research.

Maybe. And maybe not. I think you need both. The larger, public institution is the lightning rod. They get all the attention, but also all the scrutiny. Smaller groups are difficult to track. The more you have of them, the more difficult it is to account for their methods and funding and so on. So you pit the smaller groups against the large public institution. The smaller groups are the chihuahuas barking at the bulldog.

Instead of eliminating the big institution, you subject it to higher standards and scrutiny. More severe punishments for bad behavior, and perhaps also better rewards for good behavior.

Re: Ousted propaganda scholar accuses Harvard of bowing to Meta

#230

Post by sertbdfgbnfgsd »

gessha wrote: post #190
sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who would pay for this? Random people like you and me wouldn't pay for something they're gonna use twice in their lifetime, and lawyers surely have something like this, possibly integrate with all the other tools they use.

> lawyers surely have something like this Not a lawyer and not familiar with their systems but based on my knowledge of other industries I’d say it’s not guaranteed they have a solution. Could be good ol sticky notes and manual calendar events.

This is really really naive.
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