Sure it would be if they put it as a hard coded story on the top of everyone’s news feed. The alternative proposal isn’t that they magnify it to favor the R’s, just that they let people use the platform as they want without any new special political intervention. Let them talk about Hunter, Kardashians, whatever. If Hunter’s antics are popular, let them be.
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I’d be OK with that if the platform’s algorithms did not create political intervention. The algorithms amplify – they take something (true or false, or likely and more often with elements of both, but with a particular political slant) that appears to be popular (real or manipulated, i.e. with bots) and make it even more popular by putting it at the top of everyone’s news feed.
Twitter banned people from sharing the links to the Hunter NYP story. It wasn’t about them amplifying it. They normally only used that level of censorship for child porn.
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When you say “sharing”, do you mean posting? Isn’t a bunch of people accounts posting the same thing what causes amplification?
If we’re gonna get technical, I suppose if they had another way to suppress amplification without bans, that would be better.
No, they didn’t. They changed course only when it was clear that the public wasn’t going along with their recommendations anymore.
I criticized them for taking way too long to change course and keeping kids out of school WAY longer than nearly every other country.
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The problem here is that your definition of the evil “amplification” is “making it available for others to read”.
People sharing a story has absolutely nothing to do with algorithms. I havent bought your argument about the algorithms - which does have merit, although I disagree that there is an inherent bias - because it really isnt about algorithms, it’s about silencing people who believe things you think are false as you just made clear.
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How would investigating the origins of covid bring about repercussions we should be worried about with our allies? I figured they might care to know as well.
That’s just an arbitrary definition of social media though. The days of social media just consisting of users sharing cat pics have been over for a while. Social media is where people get their news just as much, if not moreso, than professional news media sites. Ask anyone running a legit news media website today (including legacy media) if facebook and twitter are integral to their reader/viewership and they would all respond that they are. CBS couldn’t even keep up a twitter boycott for two days.
Are you in favor of removing section 230 protections for social media sites? Do you want them to somehow distinguish corporate news from grandpa’s xenophobic rant/the gender studies major’s meltdown about misgendering - heavily regulating the former and leaving alone the latter? Or do you want them to heavily regulate everything, essentially making them a hollow shell of their former selves? Or something else? What exactly is your solution?
No, my definition of amplification is putting it at the top of everyone’s feed.
I was thinking along the lines of it potentially being the result of US-sponsored research. And even if that’s not true, China could make it true. Our own govt would be blamed.
I want them to somehow distinguish actual news from false or slanted personal opinions and to be responsible for amplifying it (not for simply making it available). Perhaps it would be sufficient to allow sharing with friends, maybe even followers (though I’m uncertain about this), without putting it at the top of everyone else’s feed, i.e., no amplification. If something is good enough it’ll spread person-to-person exactly like word of mouth, no computer algorithms necessary.
Now you answer a serious question: Do you not think that there is a problem with political polarization? Do you not think that social media is responsible (in large part, if not entirely) for it? Do you think we should allow a free-for-all, like glitch99 seems to, by letting every nut say whatever they want and have bots retweet it to make it appear at the top of everyone’s feed? What’s your solution?
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That clearly does not reconcile with the quote I was replying to. If you’re opposed to algorithms that artificially inserts the article on pages to get maximum views, then prohibiting the article’s subject matter and banning accounts that post it arent even on your radar as possible reactions. Yet that’s the go-to response. You arent opposed to algorithms amplifying a story, you are opposed to algorithms amplifying stories you disagree with.
Yet you’ve been so adamant that it’s a one-way street. The prolonged problems for business owners and staff come when the supposed “truth” is amplified.
Do you agree with actor Mark Ruffalo that the government should take over Twitter to accomplish this?
As a worldwide ‘public square,’ this app should be heavily regulated for misinformation & spamming by hostile interests,” Mr. Ruffalo said in a Thursday Twitter post. “If Elon cannot do that with his ‘company,’ it should be seen as a public utility under governmental supervision. This system unregulated will be more deadly.”
I can agree with this. It’s why they keep saying this, it makes it seem like a no-brainer common sense thing.
The problem is the standard that’s been set as to what’s considered “misinformation” and “hostile interests”. They dont like to dive into that, because it quickly becomes clear it is a highly subjective and biased standard that is often more about advancing (or protecting) favored political agendas. Labeling something as misinformation because it contradicts or takes away from your own message is the opposite of objective moderating.
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Nowhere in his quote does he mention a government takeover. It’s akin to saying Edison (the electric utility co) was taken over by the government. Last I checked it was publicly traded.
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No, you miss the point. I’m not sure why you keep going on and on about the validity of the laptop. Forget the laptop - Twitter chose to limit eliminate reporting on a topic that they didn’t like and said they thought it might be false. If you didn’t agree with them, you were stuck in twitter jail.
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There didn’t used to be nearly so many people purposely being obtuse (not intended to apply to @scripta).
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For a utility, the government determines the product and the price the business is allowed to sell. I call this a government takeover. You can quibble. Should the government force Twitter to become regulated as a utility?
Ruffalo was very specific – “heavily regulated for misinformation & spamming by hostile interests” (not for everything under the sun). And I tend to agree. But I also agree with glitch’s comment that it may be subjective. So I don’t have an answer, I just know that continuing to allow it is not good. And I believe that disabling the amplification is a solution, even if not the solution.
If anything they said included a “thought it might”, it would’ve been slightly less egregious. Instead they unequivically declared it to be false information, omitting the “thought” and “might” parts entirely.
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