This is a pretty typical story: find fault with Big Tech, try to alert the appropriate people in the firm, get fired. Julia Carrie Wong’s excellent article for The Guardian shows a data scientist, Sophie Zhang, find blatant attempts by governments to abuse Facebook’s platform, misleading their own people, in multiple countries. Of course […]
Tag: media
Reduced Facebook? Australia is the lucky country
Whichever side you are on with Facebook imposing a ban on Australians sharing news content, this says it all about the level of intelligence over at Menlo Park. In Australia, Facebook has not only de-platformed legitimate governmental bodies and non-profits, it has de-platformed itself. Maybe taxing these companies would have been easier, and […]
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A refreshing piece on diversity in our mainstream media
Two fantastic items in my Tweetstream today, the first from journalist Jehan Casinader, a New Zealander of Sri Lankan heritage, in Stuff. Some highlights: As an ethnic person, you can only enter (and stay in) a predominantly white space – like the media, politics or corporate leadership – if you play by the rules. […]
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In the ‘I told you so’ department: Facebook purges left-wing, anti-war accounts
Further to my Lucire op–ed on January 8, and my blog post on January 11, I hinted that this could happen. From the World Socialist Web Site: On Friday, Facebook carried out a purge of left-wing, antiwar and progressive pages and accounts, including leading members of the Socialist Equality Party. Facebook gave no explanation […]
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Like communist dictatorships, Google and Facebook threaten Australia
You know the US tech giants have way too much power, unencumbered by their own government and their own country’s laws, when they think they can strong-arm another nation. From Reuter: Alphabet Inc’s Google said on Friday it would block its search engine in Australia if the government proceeds with a new code that […]
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Who’d like to ask the hard questions of Wikipedia as it turns 20?
Well, that was a rather sycophantic interview with Jimmy Wales, co-founder of Wikipedia, on Radio New Zealand, as the online encyclopædia turns 20. So I was rather excited when a Tweeter said he was going to interview Wales and asked for questions from the public. I responded: Why did your co-founder Larry Sanger accuse […]
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This was the natural outcome of greed, in the forms of monopoly power and sensationalist media
I did indeed write in the wake of January 6, and the lengthy op–ed appears in Lucire, quoting Emily Ratajkowski, Glenn Greenwald and Edward Snowden. I didn’t take any pleasure in what happened Stateside and Ratajkowski actually inspired the post after a Twitter contact of mine quoted her. This was after President Donald Trump was […]
Facebook leaves up over 95 per cent of hate speech; ‘embarrassing to work here,’ says ex-staffer
Buzzfeed’s article, on departing Facebook staff who write ‘badge posts’, wasn’t a surprise; what was a greater surprise was just how long it took for such news to surface. Badge posts are traditional farewell notes at Facebook, and not everyone has had rosy things to say. One wrote, ‘With so many internal forces propping […]
Bring back humour to all, please!
Nigella Lawson saying 'Microwave' like this has made my Christmas already pic.twitter.com/ByXTDVIloq — 🍯 (@EtceteraWithEst) December 8, 2020 Very humorously, Nigella Lawson mispronounced microwave, only to have Those Who Have No Humour get up in arms and Ms Lawson having to clarify that she indeed knew how to pronounce the word the Tory way. Maybe […]
COVID-19 infections as percentage of tests done, December 7
It’s hard not to be in a bubble sometimes, especially when that bubble is safe in the southern hemisphere and away from wars and COVID-19. With TVNZ having a New York bureau, we of course hear about how poorly the US is doing with COVID-19, and we also hear from the London bureau, where […]
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