851–860 of 1001 posts
“All censorships exist to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions.” George Bernard Shaw “Freedom of expression is the matrix, the indispensable condition, of nearly every other form of freedom.” U.S. Supreme Court Justice Benjamin N. Cardozo in Palko v. Connecticut "If…
YouTube isn't the government
I think we have to ask if this won't have a chilling effect on open discussion by moderate voices. I'm subscribed to the channel of an M.D. on YouTube who discusses COVID-19, vaccines, etc. He is very careful to (repeatedly) point out that he is vaccinated, he has personally vaccinated hundreds of patients, he encourages everyone to speak to their doctor and follow their recommendations, believing that the vaccine is…
> People are going to cheer that "wackos" will no longer have a platform. And if you deplatform wackos, you just create incentive to decry everything as wacko in order to ban it. The way to combat misinformation is in the free market of ideas and discourse. Not by banning it. That's just might-makes-right.
It's ironic (or maybe not?) that the comments section here is filled with exactly the kind of anti-vax misinformation that YouTube is trying to take down. To respond to one point I keep reading in here over and over: Getting and recovering from covid does not necessarily give you better protection from disease than getting the vaccine. 1/3 of people who get covid develop no antibodies at all, as compared to 0% of (no…
Someone want to throw out there a better way to combat disinformation than just armchair criticizing their decision? I almost feel like people are siding with the anti-vaxxers out of "principle". Just a no win situation. It's too easy for bad characters to screw up an entire system with little effort (look at trolls, spammers, etc). Either you moderate everyone and slippery slope down into censorship where the tools…
This isn't a new situation. Free speech debates are as old as civilization itself. The printing press was at least as disruptive as the Internet, precisely because relatively small players could sabotage power of huge organizations such as the Church relatively cheaply. I think that the old classical liberal principles still apply. A certain fringe of the population will eat any propaganda unthinkingly, domestic or f…
"In this narrative review, we develop an analytical framework to examine mask usage, considering and synthesizing the relevant literature to inform multiple areas"
So it's an analytical framework.... let's read on
"Randomised control trial evidence that investigated the impact of masks on household transmission during influenza epidemics indicate potential benefit, although we should be careful of assuming these results will transfer to SARS-CoV-2. In particular, influenza has an R0 (the basic reproduction number) of 1.4 (21) whereas SARS-CoV-2 has an R0 of 2.4 or more"
So they couldn't find an RCT about COVID specifically, and they're not confident prior studies will apply.
And really the nail in the coffin:
"There are currently no studies that measure the impact of any kind of mask on the amount of infectious SARS-CoV-2 particles from human actions"
Like... this is not a good study, or even worth talking about further.
[Edit: Perhaps those wielding the downvotes would care to elaborate on why my analysis of this study is wrong? Or is it just more gut feels? What a joke.]
Not sure if everyone has read the actual policy ( https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/11161123 ) but for those who hasn't: Don’t post content on YouTube if it includes harmful misinformation about currently approved and administered vaccines on any of the following: * Vaccine safety: content alleging that vaccines cause chronic side effects, outside of rare side effects that are recognized by health authorities…
And I have difficulties in matching this piece of news with the reported words of Matt Halprin: «YouTube will take down videos that claim such vaccines are dangerous».
And also wonder if this (possible) case fits within the «rare side effects that are recognized by health authorities» (the policy).
¹https://www.euronews.com/2021/09/29/slovenia-temporarily-sus...
With the traffic and gravity that YouTube etc have, they're almost as powerful news broadcasting tools as the classic news media. True, they're a private company and liable for some things, but they all try to squeeze out every last cent before a government intervention. Banning content like crypto, anti vax, gambling etc is understandable, but all the people without a voice will think they are silenced because they…
The issue is that a few corporations control a majority of global human communications, and are accountable to no one for their decisions of what to censor/promote. This is dangerous to democracy. If we do not subject them to the will of the people, they will eventually use this massive influence to make themselves immune to public scrutiny, and will one day be indistinguishable from an unelected branch of government…
I wish I could find the post now, but a few months ago on /r/science, research showed that people who didn't believe in global warming were more likely to change their minds when presented with balanced evidence for and against. YouTube has no idea how damaging this is to the cause. Folks who think that policy is a war do not understand people very well or are more interested in grandstanding and point scoring than c…
Not sure if everyone has read the actual policy ( https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/11161123 ) but for those who hasn't: Don’t post content on YouTube if it includes harmful misinformation about currently approved and administered vaccines on any of the following: * Vaccine safety: content alleging that vaccines cause chronic side effects, outside of rare side effects that are recognized by health authorities…
I feel like the efficacy is debatable. It reduces severe symptoms but more and more vaccinated are contracting it daily even in places of 95+% vaccinated so there's a good dialogue to be had here
That's what the world living with COVID looks like. Given the Delta's estimated reproduction number (5~8), there's no herd immunity achievable in a near future. Then make it less severe and transmissible so we can handle it without strict lockdown and overloading public health infrastructure. At least until we get a universal vaccine against COVID.
With the traffic and gravity that YouTube etc have, they're almost as powerful news broadcasting tools as the classic news media. True, they're a private company and liable for some things, but they all try to squeeze out every last cent before a government intervention. Banning content like crypto, anti vax, gambling etc is understandable, but all the people without a voice will think they are silenced because they…
It's interesting that a TV manyfacturer or a HDMI cable manufacturer is not expected to be liable for the content that streams through their products. But when it comes to YouTube, they aren't treated as just a vessel but as an actual source of content. I think the distinction is just the capability of each entity.
An HDMI cable is literally a dumb pipe, and the end-user controls both ends, fully.
(Whether or not they control what reaches the feed-end of that pipe is of course a different question.)