mostly harmless

Unfortunately, free speech on US social media officially ended yesterday;
the good people will no longer have to endure the opinions of those other 74 million.
Consequently, my own small contributions on US controlled websites shall remain mostly harmless ...

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Avi Loeb is publishing a book about Oumuamua, arguing that it is the object of an alien civilization.
Recently, SETI picked up a mysterious signal from Proxima Centauri and several strange monoliths appeared in different places.
Naturally, I wonder what to make of all those reports about UFOs and alien artifacts popping up now.

Perhaps they just don't want to miss the series finale of Earth, planet of the crazy apes ...

Elon Musk thinks that the most entertaining outcome is the most likely - as seen from their perspective, not ours, unfortunately.

14 comments:

CapitalistImperialistPig said...

Since when did free speech incude incitement to riot and libel?

wb said...

Perhaps we could have had a back and forth about this in the good old internet times, a more or less interesting debate about what just happened.

But not in 2021.
We know now what it means to be de-platformed: People are not just removed from twitter and facebook, they are blocked from amzon, shopify, uber, online banking etc. , they lose their job etc.

And should they try to complain about it on an alternative site, they will figure out that the big tech companies just shut down yet another competitor.

You win and I'll shut up.
It is your country not mine and I am only watching in amazement how things evolve ...

CapitalistImperialistPig said...

I can only guess that you have a much different idea of what just happened than I do. A President who has almost unlimited access to television and the newspapers had his access to twitter and facebook suspended, in at least one case permanently for violation of the terms of service. Violations included inciting a riot that intended to kill the Vice President, multiple members of Congress, and did result in the deaths of five persons, as well as widespread vandalism in the central institutional building of our government.

And I'm guessing this Nazi type behavior was not sufficient cause in your opinion to cut off this guys access to a privately owned medium of communication. I really don't understand the reasoning.

wb said...

>> much different idea
It seems that way - I guess you are not aware how many people have just been purged, cancelled or otherwise removed from twitter, youtube, podcasts etc. and how would you if you did not follow them?
This is not just about Trump, although it is quite amazing that twitter removes the current US president but not Khameini or the various CCP propagandists ...

wb said...

Glenn Greenwald about that ...

CapitalistImperialistPig said...

I'm not aware. because I don't tweet, instagram, etc. But these are all privately owned. What do you want? Government control of media?

wb said...

I hope that free markets will take care of the current media monopolies, but first enough people need to understand how dangerous they are ...

Lee said...

> but first enough people need to understand how dangerous they are ...

Roger McNamee, and I am sure many, many others, have been making that case for a while now. I haven't read his book but I don't think he believes that free markets by themselves are capable of fixing the problem and I agree with that. Companies are driven by profits and I've been around long enough to remember the ecological disasters that unregulated free markets were responsible for. I know he believes they are a major threat to democracy. I think he is right about that too. In my opinion social media companies are responsible for the precipice on which the United States now sits.

wb said...

Btw this how EU governments see this ...

Lee said...

> But not in 2021. We know now what it means to be de-platformed: People are not just removed from twitter and facebook, they are blocked from amzon, shopify, uber, online banking etc. , they lose their job etc.

Maybe this is a remote enough corner of the internet that a conversation could still take place without the participants being canceled or getting death threats. I guess there's no guarantee of that though. I do miss your knowledge and insights though Wolfgang and also your opinions regardless of whether I agree or not.

CapitalistImperialistPig said...

Let me see if I can get this straight.. A mob planned an assault on the US Capitol, and the murder of the US Vice President, Speaker of the House, and several other elected officials on social media, and you are crying because some of them lost their social media privileges. Most countries hang traitors rather than cancel their twitter.

Do you know of any specific examples of a person who suffered all these injuries you list without severe abuse of the law or rules of the medium? I would like to hear about it.

wb said...

@Lee I am aware that almost nobody reads my stuff, which is some protection, but who knows how things look in a few years? Surveillance gets better every day ...

@CIP I think crime should be judged in court and handled by the justice system and not social media monopolies and/or twitter mobs.
Perhaps I am old fashioned, but 'innocent until proven guilty' makes sense to me.
The people who stormed the Capitol are identified as we speak and will go to jail if they are convicted and then lose their free speech and other rights.

And if you want to learn more about deplatforming I suggest you use Google ... actually use duckduckgo, starpage or something like that instead 8-)

CapitalistImperialistPig said...

I do agree that the tech monopolies and media oligopolies are dangerous, but so is insurrection.

wb said...

I hope in a few years free speech apps based on blockchains will replace the big brothers ...

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