Earlier quoted context omitted.
I honestly think you're missing the forest for the trees. It doesn't matter the actual reason massive, subtle opinion changes occur. Maybe it's the Russians. Maybe it's a liberal cabal. Maybe, as I suspect, most of SV doesn't know what the hell they're doing and are just faking it the best they can while they make bank. There is some effect occurring. Most reasonable commentators agree on that. Once that's settled, t…
Sorry, I don't buy it. If you (or the authors of this piece) want to have a conversation about data harvesting, do that. Subtly entwining that with conservative conspiracy theories isn't just an innocuous side thread of the conversation. This is clearly an attempt to hijack the conversation about data harvesting to amplify their totally unrelated message about supposed suppression of conservative speech. This is a ca…
You are concerned that this piece is wrong/misleading.
Ok. Great. Another person wrong on the internet.
Now, from a meta level, can you accept that the public discussion about data harvesting, like everything else is going to be politicized? And would you rather understand and engage people of all political persuasions by following their arguments, or are you happy just being in teams?
I like understanding both sides, seeing where they are going. That way I can have reasonable conversations with them.
Innocuous has nothing to do with anything. In fact, I'd argue that it's not innocuous. It's important. That's why we need to understand it.
You realize, of course, that both sides look equally nutty to the other, right? I'm watching it rain and friends of both political parties spin up the most fantastical explanations for why it's raining. I find that fascinating. I also need to talk to them about coming the hell in out of the rain, so I choose to understand first, then be understood.
Nobody's trying to soft-pedal anything. There's no whitewashing here. The perception is the reality. That's the way humans work. The causal, pseudo-scientific part of things? Different conversation entirely. Stop mixing them up.