Stanford Internet Observatory wilts under legal pressure during election year The Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO), which for the past five years has been studying and reporting on social media disinformation, is being reimagined with new management and fewer staff following the recent departure of research director Renee DiResta. The changes coincide with conservative legal challenges to the US …
@Khaptain: you have no idea what I think. What I observe is that the Republicans are overtly weaponizing government against their political enemies and against the very idea of integrity if it threatens their power base and manipulation of the media, whether social or otherwise.
Your attempt at derailing the conversation through a false equivalency argument has been noted, however.
"What I observe is that the Republicans are overtly weaponizing government against their political enemies"
Projection much? Remember the dems who said if you elect us that they will 'get trump'?
"manipulation of the media"
Pretty much the entire media machine is running defence for Biden and his latest dementia addled gaffes.
And if you remember correctly Hillary was investigated, found to have done the things she was accused of but the feds decided not to go any further as they didn't think they could secure a conviction. And then nothing more happened.
Now with Trump he was investigated, found to have NOT done the things they tried to initially stitch him up with (election interference, campaign finance violation) so they concocted the most convoluted and deeply legally questionable charges to try and finally get a conviction.
I don't recall any GOP DAs or AGs running on the platform of 'we will get Hillary' or groups of has-been celebs making tiktoks saying Hillary needs to be brought to justice.
I find the whole "free speech" angle to this fascinating.
In older times "free speech" meant you are able to express your opinion without fear of beeing punished for it.
However you were also free to bear the consequences of your speech, e.g. others discussing your staments and call you an idiot or liar.
Today, the "free speech" argument is more and more used to supress discussion about statements one has made and to avoid the consequences.
Exposing wrong facts, dissenting opinions, even calling a liar a liar is free speech as well.
So in fact "free speech" in this case is used as argument to effectively limit free speech, not only of the political opponent, but also of neutral observers.
However, the fact that the US conservatives are using this tactic is quite understandable.
There simply is no longer any rational argument they could use to ask voters to vote for their broken agenda or their idiotic candidates.
Since their only tactic left is lying to the general public, suppressing dissent and neutral observers becomes essential...
The TDS is strong with this one!
Remember what the Biden admin said about inflation? It is transitory, it will pop up and go right back down, printing billions of dollars won't cause inflation? Remember any of that? All complete and utter bovine excreta.
Jenn Psaki has been caught red handed in her book by claiming Sleepy Joe didn't look at his watch during a dignified transfer, only after it was over. Well, you could fertilise your garden with that one as Joe is on video repeatedly checking his watch.
Or how about the whole 'you're not a horse' thing and now Chris Cuomo has admitted to taking ivermectin for long covid?
The public are being gas lit by the current admin and the likes of the SIO are running cover for them.
In older times "free speech" meant you are able to express your opinion without fear of beeing punished for it.
No it didn't. It meant that you could not be prevented from stating your opinion, i.e. thrown in gaol to stop you saying something.
You've always had to face the consequences of your speech, if what you said was, say, slanderous or inciting illegal behaviour, etc. You had freedom to speak, not immunity from what you said.
"You've always had to face the consequences of your speech, if what you said was, say, slanderous or inciting illegal behaviour, etc. You had freedom to speak, not immunity from what you said."
Unless you are a member of the political far left when you can not only call for violence against groups or individuals without any comeback but you can even perform said violence without consequences.
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Churchill certainly didn't say that, as he spoke English. He might have said "A lie goes halfway round the world before the truth gets its boots on", but there's no evidence he ever did.
https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/07/13/truth/
seems a fairly comprehensive investigation.
And as Churchill was an enthusiatic and skilled user of both true and false propaganda, and massive deceptions, I'm sure he would have embraced the opportunities offered by social media in wartime (and probably peacetime too - he was never a nice person).
The Stanford Internet Observatory was hardly a research organization. They were run by a CIA Fellow (Renee DiResta), were funded mainly by the US government, and existed mostly a front for government agencies to issue content takedown requests to social media companies. In other words, an intermediary for government censorship. The SIO existed to obscure government intervention of free speech.
If they were actually doing "disinformation research," I doubt anybody would have had an objection.
I dunno, you can believe your article, or you can believe the reporters who combed through actual Twitter internal communications (The Twitter Files) and can point to actual internal e-mails of this happening.
Here's a summary of the specific point in question by one of the Twitter Files reporters:
https://x.com/shellenberger/status/1801663101915341075
One of Musk's requirements for making Twitter internal communications available to journalists was that the journalists in question report their findings on Twitter. So you seem to have made a decision to keep yourself deliberately ignorant of the subject at hand.
Because the Stanford Internet Observatory has been proven to be tool of the US state security agencies. It is also particularly badly biased against anti-establishment figures and movements.
Listen to Glen Greenwald on "disinformation research" and you will get a good idea of why it is all nonsense.
People should really read the Twitter files posted on X by Taibbi, Weiss, Fang, Shellenberger, Zweig and Berenson before letting their fingers fly about who has been coercing censorship under threat of additional govt regulation. Hint: it wasn't Republicans. SIO was one of many organizations (FBI, CIA, CSIA, etc) that was utilizing direct and exclusive portals into social media companies to curtail what they deemed "mis/dis/mal-information" and promote Biden Administration narrative relative to election security, COVID severity, and the necessity of mRNA vaccination; all false. Republicans on Capitol Hill have been slow to respond to those 1A violations. Substantial arguments were presented in the Murthy v. Missouri before then Supreme Court. A ruling is expected in coming weeks. While I don't believe the case was argued as well as it could have been I sincerely hope that SCOTUS will rule that state coerced censorship which had turned social media into nothing less than a propaganda engine for the Biden Administration violates the 1st Amendment.
Not American kiddies. Most of the shitposters (either side of whatever "argument" they are crying about) are not Yanks, they are just shitposters. Treat them accordingly.
When in doubt, have a glance at their posing history. The shitposters stand out like a sore thumb.
How about the word of someone who was there?
https://web.archive.org/web/20240614113031/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/06/14/sunak-defends-biden-wandered-off-g7-event/
Here's the video you requested, clearly showing that anyone who claims Biden was randomly wandering off is a liar.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaETKH5XN4A
Does ElReg allow the removal of the "post anon" tag? If not, damn cats! —jake
Ah, context, yes. And now Rishi is a source of truth and facts too ;)
No, he wandered off. If you believe the 'fine people' or 'inject bleach' BS then I'm sticking to the Biden is a doddering old man who needs to be guided everywhere.
"Here's the video clearly showing that Biden is a liar."
See how that works ;)
Maybe just knowing what foreign govs are posting in your countries social media could have value? Funny to say "Dems did it" or "Repubs are at it again" when the more likely explanation is foreign actors are promulgating misinformation to help meet their own goals.. The amount of finger pointing and vitriol caused certainly shows this is effective... Frankly it is the GOVERNMENTS job to keep it's country safe from enemies, and usually Universities play some role at this, or at least historically that has been the case... The lack of critical thinking about this is frightening..
