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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

#351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading your comment felt like that hearing Anakin saying he knows what's best for the people better than they do. As soon as you start assuming you know more than the people and that you have a right to censor the information they can access because it's bad for them, you become a tyrant. Am I the only one who finds this rotten? I want to read disinformation, tell me the sky is green I don't care, I can stitch stori…

I don't like censorship but I also know that I am not unbiased/intelligent/non-human enough to not fall for disinformation. And so will anyone, if they are honest about it. Not every time but we will fall for it. And foreign operations like that should not have the freedom to be conducted on US soil and in US media. I think labels that say who has determined something is disinformation, produced by whom, and why they…

But you seem to suffer from some kind of delusion that government is somehow less biased and more intelligent, and free of human faults than you?

What in all of human history, would make you think that?

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

#352
post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government proved insider trading. >I'm not going to claim to be an american law expert, but when the agencies can just say "nope" to evidence against them in said court of law, it becomes hard to claim strong legal protections. I may be wrong and misunderstanding the law, but it does seem like that. And as a shot in the dark here I doubt it got any better after the patriot act. This is nonsense. In your example…

is it a conspiracy theory because they said it was? you don't know and neither do I, it does sound like he thought that asking the NSA for what he has a right to ask for, a warrant to give up data, wouldn't impact his chances of renewing government contracts, but it seems it did and they were dropped and the stock plummeted. Could be the other way around and he expected it and did commit fraud, I don't know and won't…

It's a conspiracy theory because Nacchio was actually guilty of insider trading regardless of what the NSA may have done.

From the court decision which you didn't bother to read:

>Even if the classified information were presented and established what he said it would, it could not exonerate Mr. Nacchio as he claims. Essentially, Mr. Nacchio argued that undisclosed positive information can be used as a defense to a charge of trading on undisclosed negative information. We disagree. … If an insider trades on the basis of his perception of the net effect of two bits of material undisclosed information, he has violated the law in two respects, not none.

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

#353
post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also an anthromorphization fallacy argument. "Twitter" is a company, not a private individual. If the FBI contacts "Twitter" then they're not talking to any one individual, in fact there's no requirement that be the same person at all. So Twitter cannot be threatened or threatened with implied threats - it's a limited liability corporation, there's no individual who can be overly inconvenienced or have any emoti…

You really think an AG or similar can’t have a little brunch with a C level executive resulting in a mandate on operational guidelines in response?

Yes, I absolutely think that. Because how the heck are you going to keep that going as a company wide mandate? Where's the directives that things are now this way? Where's the weirdly timed corporate memorandums?

Corporations are not people: you can't "tell" a corporation to do something, because the people who make it up are a mercurial, constantly varying group. Even if the owners know something, the employees don't: training materials have to be updated, policies modified etc. You can't "imply" a threat to a corporation, because how do you "imply" the threat to all the people who have to actually implement the desired action? How do you replace staff who are not in on "the implication"? You can't: somewhere and somehow you would have to have internal emails, training and onboarding materials.

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

#354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d like to think this site of all places might be populated with very intermittent dissenters willing to be or at least support activists trying to change that, with the internet and technology as their tool. It’s always jarring to discover the extent to which it’s not.

Bitcoin is people striving for financial self sovereignty. “Crypto” is a bunch of people trying to get rich using some cool new technology they nobody understands. See how much bigger the second is than the first.

That vision of bitcoin died somewhere around 2017, back when blocks filled, commerce ground to a halt and nobody in charge thought this was a problem.

Because the people that were in control already figured that what they wanted to use the system for is to buy low and sell high for huge profits, and so it didn't matter if the network didn't perform well for regular commerce. You don't need a lot of TPS if your ideal scenario is to ever make two.

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

#355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is a limited govt. No govt agency can do anything for which it isn’t explicitly authorized. The FBI is not authorized to be ensuring private companies adhere to their policies. If a agent is being paid — with taxpayer dollars - to check on Twitter and give it ‘advice’ on how to run itself, that agent is acting outside the scope of his authority. It’s an abuse and misuse of power. It doesn’t matter what the ‘gr…

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.

[dead]

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

#356
post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I could see a world where ‘see if it violates your own policies’ is a code for extortion with plausible deniability. That's not the world we live in. If you reply with "Blow me", the FBI will do nothing.

You think. Senator Markey: “Fix your companies or Congress will.” https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/senator-ed-markey-tell...

The Congress is obviously a completely different entity than the FBI.

If the Congress wants to force companies work with the FBI, they have the absolute power to do so.

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

#357
post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Threats of regulations or hefty fines can definitely inconvenience the company’s owners, who have a stake in the company’s future. And importantly, if the individuals using the platform are (hypothetically) being silenced by government agencies levelling threats against the company unless it complies, this could be seen as tantamount to censorship.

The imagery you and others are trying to invoke is one of burly men in black suits turning up on your doorstep at the family home. Twitter doesn't have that. The employee handling the request doesn't own Twitter. If something happens to Twitter it doesn't happen to them except in a very abstract way (and the person who did fire them was Elon Musk in the end). Governments absolutely have a means to intimidate company…

You are very naive. Of course the FBI could target an individual at the company to do their bidding if they wanted. Hell, even law enforcement does similar stuff chasing drug dealers. In such cases the govt has no regard for the individuals safety or financial well being.

At the corporate level its also threatening because of the actions the govt could take against the corporation. Look at all Musks companies now undergoing heavy auditing since he messed with the FBIs twitter.

You have to be naive and only see the happy path and think the govt always has your best interests in mind to think otherwise.

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

#358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The process by which Trump was pushed off is concerning. It seems internal employee activism played a large role. That’s not good. While Twitter has a right as a private company to moderate based on internal popularity, it doesn’t build confidence. It seemed the professional moderators were saying “Trump is pushing the limits, but not crossing them” - the other employees were lobbying to get him banned. And they won.…

> The process by which Trump was pushed off is concerning. Trump tried to destroy our democracy. I’m not being hyperbolic. The evidence is all there and all from Trump’s mouth.

False, you are most definitely being hyperbolic.

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

#359

> The FBI was the primary link between the intelligence community and Twitter Being the primary domestic component of the intelligence community is overtly part of the FBI role, so that would be expected to be true with any domestic actor in the place of “Twitter”. Similarly, “major international public and private communication platform with a history of being used to recruit and organize insurrections and other act…

Are they supposed to be helping the CIA get around their mandate not to interfere domestically? https://nitter.moomoo.me/mtaibbi/status/1606701405443874816#...

> Are they supposed to be helping the CIA get around their mandate not to interfere domestically?

In that domestic in intelligence/counterintelligence is the FBIs job, and that they are expected to do it as part of and in close coordination with other parts of the intelligence community including the CIA, yes, but its not getting around anything since its exactly the way things are supposed to work.

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

#360
post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A:have you never heard of Occam’s razor? B:do you really think that someone with a criminal history would never go to a protest? Are they simply 1 dimensional characters in a play who cant go to a protest or agree with its cause because they are “bad” people? They couldn’t go because even if they didn’t agree, it hurt the government they disliked? They couldn’t have gone because they had friends going and it was a th…

> do you really think that someone with a criminal history would never go to a protest? 1. Just because some criminals attend protests, doesn't mean that is it typical. All 3 people that Kyle shot had criminal backgrounds. What are the odds of this happening in a random sample of all protests? Clearly this wasn't your average protest. White criminals protesting for black people's civil rights? 2. It is important to n…

What does point number 2 even mean in terms of your argument, it’s just tossed in there like it’s relevant. And your point 4 makes zero sense? How is protesting the governments abuse of civil rights a conspiracy?

For point 1, people willing to go out and do action are more likely to be criminals than someone who stay home. On top of that this is just large numbers making rare circumstances occur. You’d likely point to the birthday problem[1] as a shadowy conspiracy if this is enough to make you think of government involvement.

For point 3 you’re making the claim that he could have been an informant stretch to imply that he was. You have failed to outline how they would have been recruited or for what purpose. Show some evidence instead of making vague implications. Actually fuck, I’m even letting you get too much leeway there. Informants do not actively go out in public and start physical fights with people holding a gun. Even if he happened to have been an informant that would not imply the government put him up to attacking rittenhouse.

You’ve gotten too conspiracy brained if you look at rittenhouse event and conclude the government must have set it up. What would they have even gained?

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