Brant Gaede Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 Left: mostly mindless herd. Natch! Right: mostly mixed bag, but the bad is bad. Us: men of the mind! I live it so I know it. --Brant sometimes I use my body Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brant Gaede Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 On the basic level everything is binary. Then complexity comes in on waves of empiricism. Nutz! --Brant the Randian hero is so basic he hardly moves--Galt's Gulch is a retirement home Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jonathan Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 I think that the core issue is Section 230 exemption. Ted brought it up back when he grilled Zuck. Zuck stiffened. A few of his circuits popped. He and da rest of da boyz want to keep their 230. They also want to be political and put their dirty thumbs on the scale. Nunes is the first step in finding out which they want the most. J Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 (edited) From Ars Technica: “He’s literally suing an imaginary cow”: Late-night hosts mock Nunes. Apparently the Devin Nunes' cow Twitter account now has more Twitter followers than Devin Nunes himself. "The Streisand Effect" may need a new cognate. Quote [...] A defamation lawsuit is supposed to identify false statements that damage a victim's reputation. Statements of opinion—to say nothing of obvious jokes—can't be defamatory. A number of the statements in the Nunes lawsuit appear to fall into this latter category. Other statements by Devin Nunes' cow make factual claims that could theoretically be defamatory. For example, one tweet cited in the lawsuit claims that "Devin Nunes used Leadership PAC funds on luxury vacay in his family’s native Portugal." Of course, this statement would not be defamatory if the statement were true or if the person who tweeted it believed it to be true. But beyond that, Goldman argues, the fact that the account is called "Devin Nunes' cow" could work in the defendant's favor. "I could see a variety of reasons why the courts would treat the account as not serious, not credible—as things that consumers in the information marketplace would discount," Goldman said. Defamation law is designed to protect people from false statements that actually damage their reputation. But are people really going to take it seriously when a fictional cow accuses Nunes of misconduct? Ironically, a key precedent here is Devin Nunes' ideological ally, President Donald Trump. During the 2016 campaign, then-candidate Trump tweeted that one of his critics, Barbara Jaffe, had begged Trump for a job. Jaffe sued Trump for defamation. But a judge dismissed the lawsuit, writing that Trump's Twitter feed was "rife with simplistic and vague insults" and that Trump and Jaffe were "engaged in a petty quarrel." Therefore, the judge concluded, "a reasonable reader would recognize defendants’ statements as opinion, even if some of the statements, viewed in isolation, could be found to convey facts." Similar reasoning could apply to Nunes' lawsuit against his cow (and against another parody account, Devin Nunes' Mom). While some individual tweets contain claims that could be interpreted as defamatory if viewed in isolation, the overall context—of an anthropomorphized cow slinging barnyard insults at Nunes—may lead the judge to conclude that no one would actually take the claims seriously. Edited March 21, 2019 by william.scherk "Truthful Hyperbole" and the attractions of the Black and White Fallacy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted March 21, 2019 Author Share Posted March 21, 2019 I don't understand the unfunny-these-days comedy world's mocking on the Nunes lawsuit. I could understand some mockery, but what we are seeing is an orchestrated fake news media campaign. Do these people really think public mockery is going to mean anything in court? Something's going on for this to be this orchestrated. And, as usual, the campaign is decided and implemented by a club of insiders--and you are not invited into the club. Michael 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Letendre Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 You understand it. They are next. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jonathan Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 28 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: I don't understand the unfunny-these-days comedy world's mocking on the Nunes lawsuit. It really is fucking weird. It's like, "Isn't it funny that we're saying that this fucker we hate is motivated by what we just made up, and therefore he's so petty and small so let's sneer at him, tee hee hee?" They're all acting like it's just the funniest shit ever. J 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon Letendre Posted March 21, 2019 Share Posted March 21, 2019 What would you have them do? They too will soon be facing similar enterprise–ending challenges. How to report, today, about the people who very shortly will be effecting your destruction in the court of public opinion and in courts of law? How should they act? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted March 22, 2019 Share Posted March 22, 2019 The Nunes Effect ... 23 hours ago, william.scherk said: Devin Nunes' cow Twitter account now has more Twitter followers than Devin Nunes himself. "The Streisand Effect" may need a new cognate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted March 22, 2019 Share Posted March 22, 2019 3 hours ago, william.scherk said: The Nunes Effect ... Sassy! A couple of weeks ago I saw an old SNL at 10pm before the news and the new SNL and it had Phil Hartman saying "sassy" or "Now that's sassy," in response to an interviewee. He was so good. I miss him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted March 24, 2019 Share Posted March 24, 2019 The folks at Reason come out swinging on the Nunes Effect ... "Devin Nunes' Lawsuit Against Twitter is an Attack on Every American's Right to Free Speech." Who knew? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted March 24, 2019 Share Posted March 24, 2019 Udderly fascinating. My great uncle Levy had one cow and he let me milk it. The way to milk was different from what I had imagined. He had some cats who would follow him into the barn when he was going to milk the cow and he used to squirt milk into their open mouths. It was funny because a lot of the milk just hit them in the face but they didn't seem to mind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted March 28, 2019 Author Share Posted March 28, 2019 I did not see this one coming! Dayaamm! The first real salvo with teeth against a social media giant from the Trump administration did not come from the antitrust people, the FCC or anyone like that. It came from Ben Carson! Seriously. That is not a fake Twitter account. This is the real deal. Now the left is going to get a taste of its own medicine in a way I know it never expected. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted March 28, 2019 Share Posted March 28, 2019 (edited) File under: Bad Ideas for social media ... Twitter is considering labeling President Trump tweets found in ‘violation’ of rules -- and a self-plug. I've figured out what are called Twitter Cards. In a nutshell, with some code on a web-page, you can 'pre-write or pre-populate content for a Twitter share' -- with images, video, summary text, and even audio contained in the tweet itself. When any surfer shares the web-page with a tweet, the code controls what will show. For example, using the WSScherk Block Evader account ... (these are just for the 'proof of concept' Test. They will be deleted and the space below will 'degrade gracefully' ...) I'll put examples inside a spoiler, since it is pretty dang boring. Spoiler -- I use Opera, which has VPN capabilities, for the WSScherk Block Evader account, and my Opera browser is kept un-updated by Twitter. This robs the Card use of a couple of textual quotes. Here is the way the Chrome browser latest Twitter instance does the job of reading the webpage code: I mean to use the Twitter Cards to make up quick pages promoting videos and articles -- with a bit of extra oomph. Just a bit more fussing with CSS for the final template ... Zzzzzzzzzz Edited March 28, 2019 by william.scherk Stumping for Twitter Cards ... fam Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted March 30, 2019 Share Posted March 30, 2019 On 3/28/2019 at 6:59 AM, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Now the left is going to get a taste of its own medicine in a way I know it never expected. I was thinking the same thing. I bet the left will start checking Ben's staff to see if a fair amount of white folks are in it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted April 12, 2019 Share Posted April 12, 2019 (edited) On 8/9/2018 at 10:46 AM, william.scherk said: On 8/7/2018 at 4:02 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said: the Fake Social Media Needs a definition? This is a decent investigation ... into hallmarks of 'inauthentic behaviour' ... Manipulating the YouTube Algorithm - (Part 1/3). From a thirteen year-old Youtube account called "Smarter Every Day." Has a nice Randian promise in the title, and the fella has racked up over 855 million views over the years, which means nothing, which is one of the chilling points he makes herein. Edited April 12, 2019 by william.scherk Cued up the video Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted April 13, 2019 Author Share Posted April 13, 2019 22 minutes ago, william.scherk said: This is a decent investigation ... into hallmarks of 'inauthentic behaviour' ... William, I got one minute into the video and stopped. I'm not interested in attacks from trolls nor that much bothered by them. I can handle those folks. I am interested in giant social media companies acting like big brother. If they are going to get our data for free and monetize it twenty ways to Sunday without telling folks what they are doing, and if they are going to get gigantic government contracts that nobody knows about unless you know where to look, they have no business censoring anyone. Besides, it's all about corporate sponsors at root with them. When you post videos like that one, I'm not interested. Bait and switch and all that... Bah... Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted April 16, 2019 Share Posted April 16, 2019 (edited) So, is this a surprise? "Misinformation about the Notre Dame fire spread quickly on social media" Casy Newton writes for the Verge: Platforms are once again caught flat-footed by conspiracy theorists. Quote [...] At BuzzFeed, Jane Lytvynenko shows how one Twitter account misrepresenting itself as CNN falsely stated that the fire was the work of terrorists, and how another misrepresenting itself as Fox News posted a fake quote from a Muslim congresswoman allegedly saying “they reap what they sow.” (She said no such thing.) Both accounts put “parody” in their bios, but their visual branding copied CNN and Fox News exactly, there was nothing evidently parodic about their tweets, and few people likely clicked to check their bios before retweeting them. On Facebook, a 2016 story about a plot to blow up a car outside the cathedral was linked from a site that regularly spreads Islamophobic misinformation, with no clear sign that it was totally unrelated to the fire. (Facebook’s story designs don’t make it clear when pages re-share older articles.) [...] Of course, it didn’t help that the president of the United States — while the building was still on fire — made these bizarrely conspiracy-tinged remarks: “”They think it was caused by, at this moment, they don’t know, but they think it was caused by renovation. And I hope that’s the reason. Renovation, you know, what’s that all about?” I don’t want to overstate the case here: none of this misinformation went truly viral, and I imagine that most people who read about the fire will find an accurate account of what happened. But it’s easy to imagine how the combination of irresponsible speechifying by an elected official, combined with platform-related mishaps, will empower cathedral fire truthers. And even if you think some level of conspiracy theorizing is inevitable after a catastrophe, it’s possible to wish social media companies didn’t so powerfully enable their spread. [...] Edited April 16, 2019 by william.scherk Replaced image Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted April 16, 2019 Share Posted April 16, 2019 (edited) On 4/12/2019 at 5:02 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said: On 4/12/2019 at 4:29 PM, william.scherk said: On 8/9/2018 at 10:46 AM, william.scherk said: On 8/7/2018 at 4:02 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said: the Fake Social Media Needs a definition? This is a decent investigation ... into hallmarks of 'inauthentic behaviour' ... Manipulating the YouTube Algorithm - (Part 1/3). [LINK ADDED April 16 -- WSS] When you post videos like that one, I'm not interested. Here is a sample of what the guy was talking about. Faked 'News' videos with large viewership -- served up by mysterious algorithms (from the shownotes): Youtube is a different place when you visit it "Incognito" ... [Added: 90 second excerpt from Smarter Every Day Youtube offering] Edited April 16, 2019 by william.scherk Added an excerpt from the video via Twitter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted April 16, 2019 Author Share Posted April 16, 2019 4 hours ago, william.scherk said: Here is a sample of what the guy was talking about. Faked 'News' videos with large viewership... William, I went ahead and saw the video you posted that I didn't see the other day. At the time, I imagined you were trying to present the idea that manipulation of results by the social media giants doesn't exist, it only exists by malicious viewers. If all you are talking about is spammers, though, yeah, the bots do exist and they do the things in the video. I even know where to buy some bots like that. And artificial views and all that. The process shown in the video of pumping out a large number of different videos with essentially the same content is called "video spinning," which came from article spinning, which was invented by a guy on the Warrior Forum about a decade ago. He invented a code to replace words at random within an article based on synonyms. Once you coded an article the right way, you would put it in his program, click and an article came out. Click again and a different article came out. Click again and a different one and so on. The idea was to trick Google into not thinking this was duplicate content (thus get better search engine rankings). Or, if you didn't want to write an article, you could get one off the Internet somewhere, spin it, then run it through Copyscape to make sure not enough was equal to the original to constitute plagiarism. This article spinning process is a common part of the arsenal these days in OMG's (one man gangs). The kind of video you showed above is an advance version of this. Instead of articles, you have different ways to manipulate different video outcomes. Also, the large viewership is not really that large--mostly bots or the followers of some celeb who got tricked into recommending one of these videos. The fact is, nobody watches more than once or twice. All the rest is artificially inflated. I just looked on Google and there is a free, low quality article spinner here. (There exist very high quality ones, too.) You don't have to code anything in this freebie since so many articles have been spun over the years, they already have an automatic bank of synonyms. Here is what the first five paragraphs of this post looks like spun once. (This way you will get an idea of what I am talking about.) I could spin it as many times as I want and it would be different every time. The idea in using these things is to clean up the ridiculous-sounding stuff before posting a particular version to a blog or site, but many people don't even bother. Quote I felt free to see the video you posted that I didn't see a few days ago. At the time, I envisioned you were attempting to introduce the possibility that control of results by the web-based social networking mammoths doesn't exist, it just exists by noxious watchers. In the event that all you are discussing is spammers, however, better believe it, the bots do exist and they do the things in the video. I even realize where to get a few bots like that. What's more, counterfeit perspectives what not. The procedure appeared in the video of siphoning out an expansive number of various recordings with basically a similar substance is classified "video turning," which originated from text rewriting, which was concocted by a person on the Warrior Forum about 10 years prior. He created a code to supplant words aimlessly inside an article dependent on synonyms. Once you coded an article the correct way, you would place it in his program, click and an article turned out. Snap again and an alternate article turned out. Snap again and an alternate one, etc. The thought was to trap Google into not thinking this was copy content (along these lines show signs of improvement web index rankings). Or then again, in the event that you would not like to compose an article, you could get one off the Internet some place, turn it, at that point run it through Copyscape to ensure insufficient was equivalent to the first to comprise written falsification. This text rewriting process is a typical piece of the stockpile nowadays in OMG's (one man posses). The kind of video you appeared above is a development rendition of this. Rather than articles, you have diverse approaches to control distinctive video results. Additionally, the substantial viewership isn't generally that extensive - for the most part bots or the devotees of some celeb who got deceived into prescribing one of these recordings. The truth of the matter is, no one watches more than a few times. All the rest is misleadingly swelled. For the record, here's the sales page for a rather low quality video spinning software. So I don't agree with the guy in your video about the psychological manipulation of users with these kinds of tools. The different users are attracted to these things based on polarities, which are engineered by keywords and the like, but they are not persuaded by anything. In other words, the same people who do a pro-Trump channel also do everything the same, but with an anti-Trump channel to pick up that part of the audience. They want you to click on ads and only that. They're not into "changing the narrative." The social media giants are, though. They do the real nasty behavior engineering. These same social media giants have to fight spammers at the same time. Those are two completely different issues. Just because bots exist, that does not mean, for example, the despicable collusion by the social media giants to deplatform Alex Jones because they did not like his popularity on pushing an agenda they do not share was justified. It was not justified, it was done by humans on purpose for political reasons, and it was despicable Bots also do not mean "muh Russians" elected Donald Trump. To be fair, I mostly take back my negativity about the first video ("Manipulating the YouTube Algorithm..."). It's not bad. If you are interested in seeing a bit behind the scenes re spambots, it's OK. However, and here's the rub... If you think this has any political influence or covert psychological manipulation (like the guy says at times) to make people vote differently, etc. it's quite misleading. Use common sense. (I say this to the reader, too.) Would anyone change their vote based on the robotic voiced video you posted? How many people do you know would even watch it to the end? Michael 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jonathan Posted April 17, 2019 Share Posted April 17, 2019 17 hours ago, william.scherk said: [Jane Lytvynenko:] Of course, it didn’t help that the president of the United States — while the building was still on fire — made these bizarrely conspiracy-tinged remarks: “”They think it was caused by, at this moment, they don’t know, but they think it was caused by renovation. And I hope that’s the reason. Renovation, you know, what’s that all about?” Hmmm. Conspiracy-tinged? WTF. So, in today's world, NOT coming to an immediate conclusion that no malicious intent was involved is to present a conspiracy-tinged mindset? Merely keeping an open mind and expressing hope that a devastating event was an accident is vicious? Speculating about possible causes that might be worth considering is now bad and kooky? J 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted April 18, 2019 Author Share Posted April 18, 2019 On 4/16/2019 at 5:09 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Just because bots exist, that does not mean, for example, the despicable collusion by the social media giants to deplatform Alex Jones because they did not like his popularity on pushing an agenda they do not share was justified. It was not justified, it was done by humans on purpose for political reasons, and it was despicable Bots also do not mean "muh Russians" elected Donald Trump. Paul Joseph Watson just said it more succinctly than I did: If you do not see the relationship between PJW's comment and mine (the one I quoted), then you are suffering from cognitive blindness. That's not an accusation. That's an epistemological statement of fact. And I believe the root involves the power of the core stories we accept and tell ourselves. Notice that AG Bill Barr just finished his press conference about the Mueller Report and, even after a two-year $30 million investigation using some of the country's A-team hostile-to-Trump legal talent, the Russian collusion hoax could not turn into reality and the fake news media could not pull off an effective gaslighting campaign of the country. Their gaslights finally ran out of gas. Yet the true believers will keep on believing and never see how poorly they look by comparison with their worse caricature of Alex Jones. But the nasty toxic part is that these cognitively impaired people all have the full covert support of the top management of the social media giants to not accept reality, but punish those who present reality instead. The next time you use mainstream social media, please keep that in mind. Go ahead and use the giant social media platforms since they do offer features that are useful, but, unless you like being covertly engineered to lie to yourself and live in a propaganda-laced fantasy, realize the nature of the people who own the platforms and operate them. Gaslighting only works on people who don't realize they are being gaslighted. Once they realize it, they stop being duped--that is, unless they have an aggressive core story cognitive impairment. As to these last, the true believers, now that their credibility with the public at large is shot to smithereens, I expect to see them move out of the mainstream and on to the fringe where they belong before too long. And I expect to see several who committed serious crimes eventually be prosecuted and land behind bars. Thank God. A two year run of a hoax by most of the mainstream media (the fake news media) and backed up by the mainstream social media was two years too many. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted April 27, 2019 Author Share Posted April 27, 2019 The irony that has occurred throughout all recorded history is now setting in. The people who call to oppress others are getting oppressed by the very people they empowered. The people who called for censoring the alt right on social media are now getting censored. Part of it is technical, as Tim Pool covers. But the other part of it is power, pure and simple. Once a person has power, he or she doesn't want a bunch of loudmouths and troublemakers around. Those folks are not good for an empowered person maintaining power, even if they are ones who helped empower him or her in the first place. Notice that the useful idiots are always among the first to be shot in any successful violent revolution. It's easy to see a correspondence with the social media's censorship revolution right now. You need belligerent fanatics to win a power-grab, but you need bureaucrats to keeps things running and keep your power after you have it. All throughout history, people who stay in power have known this and, to the eventual chagrin of the fanatics, have had no problem with it. The owners of the giant social media companies wish to appease the money people, not the ideological. This may have been different at first, but after a while, after they got and consolidated their power, they suddenly blow where the money goes. They are now the ruling class and they want to stay there. "Stability" suddenly becomes a virtue for them in judging--and executing--friend and foe alike. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william.scherk Posted May 2, 2019 Share Posted May 2, 2019 No so surprising, given the climate. Facebook clears its shelves of several notable counter-cultural icons ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted May 3, 2019 Author Share Posted May 3, 2019 President Trump just weighed in on the recent bans of conservatives on social media, especially Facebook. (I wonder what Farrakhan thinks about being the Token Black among that group? ) Good. President Trump needs to kick their asses hard. In our neck of the woods, the immediate kneejerk is that these social media giants are private companies and the government has no business telling them how to run their businesses. However, ALL of the tech giants enjoy--and have enjoyed--massive injections of government money, both in exclusive contracts and outright subsidies. That means taxpayers fund these things, at least in a significant part. So it is unreasonable--and probably illegal in the hands of a good attorney--to ban people from platforms they themselves helped to fund--and still fund--on the basis of their ideologies and religions. If people in O-Land and l-land want to use the "private companies" argument, it would be a good idea if they talked about actual private companies, not elitist crony corporations actively setting up a government-protected cartel and busting their asses to influence elections through covertly manipulating their users and banning voices they disagree with politically. If they don't want the government involved, then they should not take government money in such massive amounts. The "private companies" principle really dilutes as a principle when it is used to defend elitist government cronies over the citizens who are forced to pay for them through taxes. Michael 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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