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Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

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Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#21

Post by simpaticoder »

n8m8 wrote: post #6
everdrive wrote: post #4

This makes me wonder why people put up with targeted content whatsoever. I actually have a friend who works in game development, and he has a real chip on his should regarding the current attitude that the discoverable customer base has. For instance, he sees a lot of people who think developers are pushing things down people's throats, are making games bad or annoying on purpose just so that users get frustrated, et…

Good point. Has me thinking: In any field, over time, there's R&D for it to become more effective. How this progression might apply to marketing: 1. Printed ads, newspapers, billboards, magazines -- You can explain your product and show a picture of what it looks like to demonstrate the value to customers 2. Television ads, black and white -- We can demonstrate the value to customers so well! 3. Wait a minute, if we…

>We've gone from "Demonstrate the value of our product" to "Create an illusion of our lifestyle"

Scott Galloway occasionally mentions that he thinks most consumer spending is irrational and marketing spends purpose is to make people buy irrationally. Anecdotal observation supports his observation, most strikingly in fashion, where people buy the branded item that costs 100x (or more) than the equally useful unbranded item. Many other examples exist, of course, in almost every market. I tend to agree with Galloway that the goals haven't changed, only the marketing tools (and their effectiveness). Any increase in irrational behavior can be linked to tool efficacy and not to the motivation of the firm, which has remained constant.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#22

Post by delichon »

ceejayoz wrote: post #12
delichon wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To change the first amendment such that it no longer applied to the speech of political parties would amount to a revolution. Even if it were somehow accomplished without violence, it would deeply change the form of government.

Revolutions are the norm in the American setup. The first peaceful transfer of power from one party to another is sometimes called the "Revolution of 1800". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1800_United_States_presidentia... Every constitutional amendment changes our government. The people who wrote the mechanism in expected this. I doubt they expected us to just... stop amending.

To say that every election and amendment is a revolution may be true in some sense, but it isn't near the colloquial definition. Neither, strictly speaking, would removal of political speech protections by the approval of 38 out of 50 states be an actual revolution, but that's a lot closer. And I doubt it's possible.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#23

Post by cjs_ac »

gchamonlive wrote: post #15

At this point, whoever opposes big tech regulation is in favor of these kinds of abuses happening. Here in Brazil there is a big discussion around this regulation but for other reasons, like the social media algorithms pushing child abuse content to potential pedophiles. The criticism against these regulations are all valid and need to be discussed, because we also don't want to create these mechanisms at the governm…

> we also don't want to create these mechanisms at the government level only so the next authoritarian president can use them for their own personal agenda

There's nothing stopping this hypothetical authoritarian president from creating this after they come to power.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#24

Post by molszanski »

cjs_ac wrote: post #23
gchamonlive wrote: post #15

At this point, whoever opposes big tech regulation is in favor of these kinds of abuses happening. Here in Brazil there is a big discussion around this regulation but for other reasons, like the social media algorithms pushing child abuse content to potential pedophiles. The criticism against these regulations are all valid and need to be discussed, because we also don't want to create these mechanisms at the governm…

> we also don't want to create these mechanisms at the government level only so the next authoritarian president can use them for their own personal agenda There's nothing stopping this hypothetical authoritarian president from creating this after they come to power.

It’s much easier to abuse existing oppression machine than to build it from scratch

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#25

Post by guelo »

everdrive wrote: post #14
NickC25 wrote: post #9

It's very sad, and very telling that our biggest corporations have become suckups to the reactionary side of the right wing and continue to carry the water for the most degenerate and attention-seeking members of said right wing. None of these nutcases offer true help to society (note: neither do the extreme leftists, just so we're clear that I'm not team red or team blue), and it does no good that our corporations a…

The extreme flip-flopping of the major tech companies provides a few small possibilities that don't paint a good picture no matter how you look at it: - They never believed in progressive causes, and were just siding with what they believed was the social majority. (and so when they perceive the social majority has changed, they immediately follow and would follow _any_ social majority.) - They don't agree with the c…

I think a lot of it has to do with the loss of labor power among the tech workforce. For example Google employees used to cause a ruckus when execs sold to militaries, now everyone stays quiet because they're afraid to lose their jobs and execs are emboldened to make an example of anyone that causes trouble.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#26

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 »

jerrygenser wrote: post #10
NickC25 wrote: post #9

It's very sad, and very telling that our biggest corporations have become suckups to the reactionary side of the right wing and continue to carry the water for the most degenerate and attention-seeking members of said right wing. None of these nutcases offer true help to society (note: neither do the extreme leftists, just so we're clear that I'm not team red or team blue), and it does no good that our corporations a…

Corporations are picking the side that's in power. If team blue is in power they would pick blue. Corporations are (usually) not moral or inherently politically motivated other than to the extent of optimizing short term shareholder value.

You are being reflexively downvoted, but I am not certain as to why. The assessment strikes me as accurate. Few corps I worked for were willing to go on a limb 'for a cause'. The exceptions were smaller companies where owner had a much bigger say and could effectively align goals with their beliefs.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#27

Post by pen2l »

Reddit is one of the most potent places where opinion-shaping has been happening. I've been getting ads for Reddit everywhere recently (even thought I've been a reddit user for about 20 years).

r/worldnews is pretty tightly controlled, it's a default subreddit meaning 50+ million people see the posts submitted in this subreddit, and most critically, the ensuing conversation in comments which goes only in one direction. Frankly I'm impressed this all was pulled off so seamlessly.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#28

Post by ToucanLoucan »

normalaccess wrote: post #18
ToucanLoucan wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The amendments aren't god's laws passed to George Washington on Mt. Rushmore. We can change them if we feel it's appropriate. Commenter isn't making the case that the action is illegal, he's saying it's dystopian that the Government is making such blatant use of targeted media. And I agree.

But they are the best set of laws invented by humans so far for self governance. No kings, no popes, no dictators. As flawed as the current system is, the laws are good even if the people executing them are trash. You can change lots of things much higher up in the system without taking away our God given rights enshrined in the founding documents to fix these kinds of issues.

Hell of an assertion to make when the laws have given rise to an administration that, by virtue of loading the courts, have effectively mimicked the exact sort of power plays one expects from a dictator, up to and including allusions from the leader about not having the next election.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#29

Post by delichon »

normalaccess wrote: post #19
delichon wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first amendment prevents prohibiting it by law. If one party decided not to use social media to get their message out, the other party would get a huge advantage. Even if the parties agreed to leave that battlefield (a nice fantasy), they couldn't enforce it on their own candidates. So it would require a revolution or divine intervention to stop.

This is true, it's an unfortunate race to the bottom of the attention economy. The only real solution is educating people about the trash tactics that are used to manipulate them.

Knowing how, why, when, and about what you are being manipulated unfortunately does little to prevent it. Knowing that encourages people to do the same to others in self defense.

I'd love to be wrong. If you can find evidence that learning the techniques provides some immunity from them, I'd be happy to see it.

I'm well aware of how I'm being manipulated with regard to the murder in Charlotte, yet it still presses my buttons. The same is true when a beautiful women asks me for anything. Self awareness has little effect on primal motives.

Re: Weaponizing Ads: How Google and Facebook Ads Are Used to Wage Propaganda Wars

#30

Post by bee_rider »

delichon wrote: post #3
footlose_3815 wrote: post #2

Maybe a month ago, I started getting bombareded with every element of the right wing media ecosphere on Facebook. "Trump for President", Ben Shapiro, JD Vance, and piles of dogwhistle-named Facebook pages who are reaching for every way to feel relevant. Just recently, all of them, in-concert, started trying to focus on the lady who stole that Baseball at that game. All they are talking about for the last week. Promot…

The first amendment prevents prohibiting it by law. If one party decided not to use social media to get their message out, the other party would get a huge advantage. Even if the parties agreed to leave that battlefield (a nice fantasy), they couldn't enforce it on their own candidates. So it would require a revolution or divine intervention to stop.

Displaying ads might be constitutionally protected speech. But, other parts of the process, like running a giant surveillance network, doesn’t seem to be particularly protected. If anything, running a giant surveillance network would be a violation of the fourth amendment if it were done by the government and the fourth amendment were interpreted as broadly as the first couple.
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