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Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

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Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#511

Post by JohnBooty »

prudhvis wrote: post #223

I have no idea what happened during the early 2010s. I grew up during the late 90s (born in late 80s) learning about the internet and its philosophies. Allowing Free speech still is the hill I'd like to die on. But the new generation of people, even here on HN and the internet hacker personalities I used to align with have turned so pro-censorship that I don't believe I'm in a proper reality/timeline anymore.

    But the new generation of people, even here on HN and the internet 
    hacker personalities I used to align with have turned so pro-censorship
I was born in the 1970s and I can tell you why I flipped.

The (hopelessly naive) ideal many of us had was that, by breaking down communication barriers, we'd create an egalitarian "marketplace of ideas" and the best ideas would win. And by "best" ideas we generally meant principles of equality, science, and so forth.

Regardless of what you feel needs to be done... I'm sure you can agree that hasn't been achieved. Probably more like the opposite.

The problem is that by amplifying all voices, we've simply created another "might makes right" situation. Unfettered online discourse is dominated by those who yell the loudest. This includes a large number of woefully misinformed people, and genuinely malicious actors such as (for example) the hordes of paid internet trolls funded by America's rivals in order to sow discord and disinformation during our 2016 elections.

In effect, we've replaced the staid and conservative corporate self-censorship of decades past with something that is quite frequently worse.

I mean, free speech sure sounds good, but in reality it means that your racist uncle ranting about chemtrails on Facebook gets to be heard right alongside people who actually know what the fuck they're talking about.

I unapologetically do not know what the solution is.

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#512

Post by 8note »

holler wrote: post #73
hackinthebochs wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been pretty vocal about being against censorship from social media companies. But with the stakes being as high as they are this close to an election (not just this particular election, but any election in general), I see no problem with social media companies deciding they will not be a party to the spread of misinformation intended to sway the election. These companies are not neutral communication platforms…

With the stakes being as high as they are, wouldn’t we want to know if there’s a crumb of truth to the allegations? A President beholden to shady foreign actors doesn’t sound like a good idea. Likewise if it’s false then let that come out. The bigger problem is that journalists/newspapers are no longer the arbiters of truth, and instead the distributors are.

Is it meaningful whether the story is true or not? The existence of Trump's presidency says Americans don't care about corruption or whether the president is beholden to shady foreign actors. Maybe that's a good argument for the natural born citizen ship requirement to be removed from the presidency?

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#513

Post by claudeganon »

hartator wrote: post #326
sailingparrot wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New technologies brought new challenges. There was no social network in the 2000s and before. No retweet button, no "curated" timeline that showed you what you "like". YouTube did not try to push more videos like the ones you watched previously until the mid 2010s. Free speech does not have the same meaning as before. Before it just meant that you could say whatever you wanted. Now people use it implicitly to mean th…

> I believe free amplification is terrible It's exactly what they were saying at the invention of the printing press. Amplification becoming too cheap. Maybe being on the side of censorship is always being on the wrong side of history no matter the issue. Can you remember one time in history where we now like "thanks god they censor these thoughts!"?

The printing press was also used to fuel deranged, antisemetic hysteria in the form of Martin Luther’s widely-disseminated book, On the Jews and their Lies. So, I guess some things really never do change:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_antisemiti...

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#514

Post by octoberfranklin »

adventured wrote: post #233
Tallasatree wrote: post #214

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. We've been watching this happen for a few years now, and some of us are actively paving the road.

It's not good intentions. The tech giants are attempting to throw an election and they don't care who knows at this point. For the 2012 election Facebook execs bragged about illegally assisting the Obama campaign by giving them practically the entire FB social graph, for free. That violates federal campaign finance laws. Nothing was done about it and you'll never get anyone on HN to go near talking about that fraud,…

> Facebook execs bragged about illegally assisting the campaign

I'm sure Chinese tech companies would brag about illegally assisting the CPC. And be happy to have the chance to do so.

BigTech is preparing us for a Chinese-styled political system. They've decided it's inevitable and "if you can't beat 'em, be the first to join 'em".

This has nothing to do with liberal vs conservative. There will be one party left standing and right now it looks like it will be the blue one not the red one, that's all it is.

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#515

Post by mmmeff »

tunesmith wrote: post #507
rayiner wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re mischaracterizing how free speech was viewed in the recent past. “Free speech” (as a cultural value, I’m not talking about the first amendment) was about the marketplace of ideas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marketplace_of_ideas . It meant a free market in ideas, where the dominant ideas arise from competition. What you call “amplification” is just something that makes the marketplace more efficient—it allow…

You're defining "dominant ideas" as the ones that make people the angriest and get the most clicks! That's not the same as quality. That's entirely how those amplification algorithms exist!

We need to invest in education to vaccinate the population against deception via clickbait.

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#516

Post by mattchew »

prudhvis wrote: post #223

I have no idea what happened during the early 2010s. I grew up during the late 90s (born in late 80s) learning about the internet and its philosophies. Allowing Free speech still is the hill I'd like to die on. But the new generation of people, even here on HN and the internet hacker personalities I used to align with have turned so pro-censorship that I don't believe I'm in a proper reality/timeline anymore.

A little older than you, but same basic experience.

I also don't understand how the tide turned so swiftly against freedom of speech, and in favor of authorities deciding what people should be allowed to hear or read. But it did turn, and I don't see the trend reversing.

While I don't like the prospect of an increasingly censored society, it will be interesting to watch the struggle between the big platform censors and those who want to say banned things. I expect this will only escalate over time.

Anyway, just wanted to say you're not alone. Watching some of your cherished values be discarded by society is something you have to accept as you get old, I'm afraid.

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#517

Post by crocodiletears »

borvo wrote: post #114
tengbretson wrote: post #14

I think the key mistake was that the NY Post didn't cite "anonymous sources." That would have made it bulletproof.

These anonymous sources you mention are only anonymous to the readers. Typically a story from an anonymous source will be verified with multiple other sources, perhaps also anonymous, to make sure that the media source is not getting played. Here we have Hannity's former assistant writing a "sensational" story in a tabloid rated as the least credible news outlet in NY. Also, they apparently tried to keep their source…

I've long-since stopped listening to anonymous intelligence officials. Any time you get their quotes, you've got to flip a coin to decide whether it's a legitimate leak,or an attempt to direct the media narrative without putting the organization's reputation on the line.

Anonymous officials ready to support any given narrative seem to be a dime a dozen anymore.

Unless the leaked information is accompanied by an insurmountably huge collection of documents outlining a complex tapestry of affiliations, interests, and events such as the alphabet agencies are want to produce, I typically assume it's the latter.

The NYT doesn't get a pass from me just because it used to be great, and do the work requisite to earn its sterling reputation.

I honestly wish I could provide citations where they've fallen here, but most of them come from The Intercept's podcast (Intercepted, I recommend it), where Scahill's opening rants regularly take aim at publications across the spectrum's use of anonymous officials, and the questionability of the claims they cite, and it would be far too exhausting and disheartening to record them all. As petty as some of them have been, it's just background noise, anymore.

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#518

Post by dionian »

sailingparrot wrote: post #264
prudhvis wrote: post #223

I have no idea what happened during the early 2010s. I grew up during the late 90s (born in late 80s) learning about the internet and its philosophies. Allowing Free speech still is the hill I'd like to die on. But the new generation of people, even here on HN and the internet hacker personalities I used to align with have turned so pro-censorship that I don't believe I'm in a proper reality/timeline anymore.

New technologies brought new challenges. There was no social network in the 2000s and before. No retweet button, no "curated" timeline that showed you what you "like". YouTube did not try to push more videos like the ones you watched previously until the mid 2010s. Free speech does not have the same meaning as before. Before it just meant that you could say whatever you wanted. Now people use it implicitly to mean th…

> While I believe free speech is a good thing, I believe free amplification is terrible.

This is so abusable. Even the best of intentions won't stop it from being abused horribly. I value twitter much less. The same thing is happening there that happened to the declining legacy media.

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#519

Post by hooande »

Why couldn't twitter say "we will delete any tweets that are critical about a certain person"? is there a law against that? is it morally wrong?

It seems that if they wanted, they could say "we want Candidate X to win and will do whatever is in our power to make that happen". What would people do then?

Equal time laws don't apply to twitter any more than they do to your blog. There is nothing stopping them from acts of outright censorship for any purpose they choose.

The nature of social networks is that some platforms will have more users and exponentially more value than others, so it seems like there isn't choice in the market. We as a society have to decide if "having the most users" is equivalent to the physical infrastructure connections that currently designate utilities and monopolies.

Having to tolerate political censorship is an obvious tradeoff. But if we go full Section 230, we could wind up with a situation where US companies are hobbled and replaced by foreign competitors. Or where American companies stop improving their service because they enjoy the advantages of a utility/monopoly.

It's actually a new and difficult social question that requires a lot of thought. I think I know what side I'm on.

Re: Twitter and Facebook's action over Joe Biden article reignites bias claims

#520

Post by liquidify »

sailingparrot wrote: post #264
prudhvis wrote: post #223

I have no idea what happened during the early 2010s. I grew up during the late 90s (born in late 80s) learning about the internet and its philosophies. Allowing Free speech still is the hill I'd like to die on. But the new generation of people, even here on HN and the internet hacker personalities I used to align with have turned so pro-censorship that I don't believe I'm in a proper reality/timeline anymore.

New technologies brought new challenges. There was no social network in the 2000s and before. No retweet button, no "curated" timeline that showed you what you "like". YouTube did not try to push more videos like the ones you watched previously until the mid 2010s. Free speech does not have the same meaning as before. Before it just meant that you could say whatever you wanted. Now people use it implicitly to mean th…

There have always be who are so fragile that they can never handle freedom. I feel sorry for you.
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