Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

techtransparencyproject.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 969 posts

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#221

Post by mikem170 »

betterunix2 wrote: post #180
Nextgrid wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point is that Facebook, Google and plenty of tech companies created this insurrection (damaging countless lives and relationships in the process), earned billions off it and are now claiming the moral high ground? Screw them. In this case, Parler doesn't sound that bad. At least Parler doesn't have billions of literal blood money and doesn't attempt to get into my life like Facebook does. If Parler should be held…

That is the equivalent of saying that someone with HIV created HIV -- after all, it was their body that kept producing more virus particles! QAnon and other BS is a virus that exploits the way platforms determine recommendations and whatnot. The insurrection was not created by Facebook; at most you can only say that Facebook should have been more aggressively policing extremists on their platform (and in fact they ha…

What about the fact that facebook has an algorithm they made deciding on what posts are presented each user, apparently tailored to drive engagement? They can feature all the controversial posts that stir people up for the clicks. Youtube is similar. One could make a case that these algorithms cause these problems, promoting conspiracies/etc for the clicks.

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#222

Post by betterunix2 »

cccc4all wrote: post #201
betterunix2 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the equivalent of saying that someone with HIV created HIV -- after all, it was their body that kept producing more virus particles! QAnon and other BS is a virus that exploits the way platforms determine recommendations and whatnot. The insurrection was not created by Facebook; at most you can only say that Facebook should have been more aggressively policing extremists on their platform (and in fact they ha…

What makes you say "both sides" argument is getting tiresome. What will you do to the other side? What is making you to take one side and against the other side?

One side is BS, that's why. That is the side which is whining about how an app that was created in order to provide a safe haven for people who are too extreme for other platforms is being treated different from those other platforms.

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#223

Post by rtkwe »

giantg2 wrote: post #178
rtkwe wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In site moderation it's basically a guarantee that you'll wind up with an extreme echo chamber, people self select in or out the site based on the content of that site. Unless your user group is extremely broad based and siloing is good enough that people aren't driven off the site by extremists then the group of moderators you select from is inherently pretty ok with the content of the site. It has a chance to work…

How is it different than real life? Look at the county by county map of the past couple presidential elections. You'll see that there is very much a delineation between people with different ideals resulting in echo chambers. We see this in stereotypes of country folks or city folks by the other.

There's a whole trial to present the evidence and how the law is supposed to be interpreted in a court case you can't really replicate in Parler's attempted moderation system. Also the pomp and dressing of state and law do a lot to change how people act. One of the big questions any prosecutor will ask is will you judge solely on the law and they will very quickly strike you if you indicate no or that you know anything about jury nullification.

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#224

Post by beaner »

TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #198
beaner wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is CNN, a broadcast television network, considered a broadcast medium for attacks and terrorism for promoting and defending violent riots, and for giving reach to similar statements of support and justification from congress members such as AOC and Nancy Pelosi?

Could you give some concrete examples? I think the scale of events resulting from a statement are taken into consideration. Terrorists have sprung up after being radicalized by what they heard from one politician or another, but we typically won't consider the politician responsible for those actions. This probably starts going into whataboutism territory, but doesn't this stuff tend to go both ways? I'd postulate we…

Examples are everywhere, you just have to not be in a bubble and be open to seeing it. I could keep going but you tell me, do you need more?

AOC: "The whole point of protesting is to make ppl uncomfortable." [-1]

Slate: "Non-violence is an important tool for protests, but so is violence" [0]

Vox: "Riots are destructive, dangerous, and scary — but can lead to serious social reforms" [1]

Pelosi: "we welcome the presence of these activists" vs "our election was hijacked" [2]

"CNN Promoted Charged Leftist Rioter Who Masqueraded As Reporter Despite No Credentials, Urged Assault On Capitol" [3]

Chris Cuomo: "Show me where it says that protests are supposed to be polite and peaceful" [4]

Supercut of news media justifying and excusing riots: [5]

Daily beast and salon writer Arthur Chu calling for explicit murder of people he calls Nazis: [6]

Difference in tone & presentation of NYT covering violent riots: [7]

Sally Kohn, USA today writer: "I don't like violent protests but I understand them" [8]

Kamala Harris: "Protests should not let up"

Maxine Waters "If you see anybody from that cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store... You get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them."

Nancy Pelosi: "I just don't know why there aren't uprisings all over the country. Maybe there will be soon."

Ayanna Pressley: "There needs to be unrest in the streets"

(I would agree that some of the politicians' quotes are a little weak, but in the name of consistency, these are at least worse than some types of language from Trump that would be called out as violence.)

[-1] https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1334184644707758080

[0] https://twitter.com/slate/status/1268415955937513473?lang=en

[1] https://www.vox.com/2015/4/30/8518681/protests-riots-work

[2] https://twitter.com/ConceptualJames/status/13484392324157521...

[3] https://thenationalpulse.com/breaking/cnn-promoted-capitol-r...

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAe86my9r7A

[5] https://twitter.com/tomselliott/status/1347302588434284544

[6] https://twitter.com/Malcolm_fleX48/status/134718628775795917...

[7] https://twitter.com/ConceptualJames/status/13470552229805506...

[8] https://twitter.com/DineshDSouza/status/1346927304073744388

More: https://thefederalist.com/2021/01/08/10-times-democrats-urge...

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#225

Post by betterunix2 »

Nextgrid wrote: post #194
betterunix2 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the equivalent of saying that someone with HIV created HIV -- after all, it was their body that kept producing more virus particles! QAnon and other BS is a virus that exploits the way platforms determine recommendations and whatnot. The insurrection was not created by Facebook; at most you can only say that Facebook should have been more aggressively policing extremists on their platform (and in fact they ha…

> That is the equivalent of saying that someone with HIV created HIV -- after all, it was their body that kept producing more virus particles! QAnon and other BS is a virus that exploits the way platforms determine recommendations and whatnot And just like with HIV, we now understand its method of propagation, know how to curtail it, and actually hold people criminally liable if they knowingly spread it. Why are main…

The problem with Parler was not that terrorists were using its platform. The problem is that Parler refused to even try to ban terrorists from its platform, which should surprise nobody given that Parler was created for the benefit of such groups. Facebook has never gotten a pass on this, in fact they have been widely criticized for failing to be aggressive enough in their efforts to moderate extremist content, conspiracy theories, and misinformation.

In a nutshell the difference is this: Parler was created as a safe haven for people and content that had been banned from mainstream platforms (and the majority of small, non-mainstream platforms).

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#226

Post by mbg721 »

Nextgrid wrote: post #220
godelski wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But how do you codify that in law? I clearly want some moderation (taking down illegal stuff, border line illegal, and etc) but if your choice is "moderate all or not at all" (as my understanding of pre section 230 is) then no one is going to moderate anything at all. I'm not trying to defend Facebook here, but I feel completely ignoring any of the nuance to the situation is disingenuous. It's not like you can modera…

I'm not talking about moderation here. I'm talking about the fact that Facebook promotes certain content in user's feeds (including content that these users have no direct relationship to - they're not friends with the author nor follow him) in order to generate "engagement". This should stop. Regarding moderation, it's true that you can't moderate billions of people with 100% accuracy, but you can discourage them fr…

There's something to this. The things people hate about Facebook aren't caused by some user sitting down and typing a post, and in fact that kind of content gets buried in the feed anyway. The problems start with "sharing the story at the top of the feed" and "your friend liked X article which is really an ad". It's a more aggressive version of 90s email chain-letters.

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#227

Post by ardy42 »

pokstad wrote: post #129
ardy42 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If people had called one another to prepare this, would we say that the phone was responsible for the attack? And would we try to ban phones? That's a moot point, because an attack like this can't realistically be organized via one-to-one communication. It needs a broadcast medium, which the phone network isn't.

Really? How did past revolutions and terrorist attacks get organized? You realize most of world history existed before the Internet, right?

> Really? How did past revolutions and terrorist attacks get organized? You realize most of world history existed before the Internet, right?

Yeah, of course. Broadcasting means one-to-many communication. Before modern technology, those things were organized using other kinds of one-to-many communication, such as in-person meetings, rallies, and through newspapers and other kinds of publications.

Movements aren't organized one-to-one like on a telephone, because that's a far slower way of spreading a message. It's also an unreliable medium, as the children's game "telephone" shows.

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#228

Post by Nextgrid »

mikem170 wrote: post #221
betterunix2 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the equivalent of saying that someone with HIV created HIV -- after all, it was their body that kept producing more virus particles! QAnon and other BS is a virus that exploits the way platforms determine recommendations and whatnot. The insurrection was not created by Facebook; at most you can only say that Facebook should have been more aggressively policing extremists on their platform (and in fact they ha…

What about the fact that facebook has an algorithm they made deciding on what posts are presented each user, apparently tailored to drive engagement? They can feature all the controversial posts that stir people up for the clicks. Youtube is similar. One could make a case that these algorithms cause these problems, promoting conspiracies/etc for the clicks.

This is exactly the argument that I'm making.

Unfortunately, the whole concept of "growth and engagement" (and their biggest implementations - Facebook, YouTube, etc) supports so much of our society today that I don't expect neither mainstream media nor politicians to attack it.

The reason we're attacking Parler and not the underlying evil is because Parler is an easy target while the other big implementation of said evil (Facebook) underpins the careers and livelihoods of many of the people who are in a position to ban it or reform our laws.

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#229

Post by Pfhreak »

loveistheanswer wrote: post #205
Pfhreak wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which government buildings? The police just left the east precinct... And who were the armed protestors, what were they armed with? In my experience it was umbrellas and loud voices. And keep in mind that the SPD did considerably more violence to a larger group over that time.

>Which government buildings? The police just left the east precinct Isn't the east precinct a government building? >And who were the armed protestors, what were they armed with? Raz the Warlord of CHAZ giving out assault rifles: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/raz-simone-guns/ >And keep in mind that the SPD did considerably more violence to a larger group over that time. How many people were shot within the protest…

> Isn't the east precinct a government building?

Yes, but your framing isn't genuine. Some protestors did wander into an abandoned building. I'm not sure whether any of them were armed. That's a far cry from "Armed protestors took over a government building."

> Raz the Warlord of CHAZ giving out assault rifles:

Again, your framing is clearly flamebait. I obviously don't deny that Raz was there, and that there appears to be a video of him giving a long gun to someone. (Singular.)

But calling Raz "the Warlord of CHAZ" is needlessly biased and inflammatory. Just say Raz Simone, or if you feel you need to clarify, add some factual clarification.

> How many people were shot within the protest zone by occupants of CHAZ versus police over that time?

Again, your framing lacks nuance.

The first shooting in the protests was by someone driving into a crowd who claimed to have a brother who worked in the east precinct.

The second shooting does not have a clear connection to the protest occupants. The Police chose not to help the shooting victim (and the reason for the shooting is unknown). This may have been protest related violence. It may have been non-protest related violence. It's unclear if the victim would have survived if the Police had made any effort.

The third shooting (which occurred outside of the zone) appears to be racially motivated, and according to the victim was allegedly at the hands of a white supremacist. It's unclear if this is related to the second shooting.

The fourth and fifth shooting (which occurred outside of the zone) have no details beyond someone getting shot in the arm.

The sixth and seventh shootings were of two teens who had reportedly driven an SUV through the crowds overnight, including through the park. Details are hazy, and it's not clear whether this was an act of self defense or something else.

So, on my counting there were seven shootings:

2 appear to be against protestors or racially motivated.

3 have no clear details that link them to the protest, and 2 of which did not take place in the zone

2 are allegedly in self defense, though the veracity of those claims is TBD.

Re: Capitol Attack Was Months in the Making on Facebook

#230

Post by Nextgrid »

betterunix2 wrote: post #225
Nextgrid wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is the equivalent of saying that someone with HIV created HIV -- after all, it was their body that kept producing more virus particles! QAnon and other BS is a virus that exploits the way platforms determine recommendations and whatnot And just like with HIV, we now understand its method of propagation, know how to curtail it, and actually hold people criminally liable if they knowingly spread it. Why are main…

The problem with Parler was not that terrorists were using its platform. The problem is that Parler refused to even try to ban terrorists from its platform, which should surprise nobody given that Parler was created for the benefit of such groups. Facebook has never gotten a pass on this, in fact they have been widely criticized for failing to be aggressive enough in their efforts to moderate extremist content, consp…

> Facebook has never gotten a pass on this, in fact they have been widely criticized for failing to be aggressive enough in their efforts to moderate extremist content, conspiracy theories, and misinformation.

Well now we have an issue where Facebook's unwillingness to moderate has blown up into large-scale domestic terrorism, so big in fact that it created a market for Parler to cater to.

So why are we still discussing Parler's ban (which I don't disagree with) but completely ignoring the core issue that Facebook initially caused this and should be banned too?

Post reply on HN