8 ms·

This is a conflict of interest, which should erode the trust that anyone would have on twitter. The man is simultaneously responsible for editorial decisions, w

by noego 7y ago

This is a conflict of interest, which should erode the trust that anyone would have on twitter. The man is simultaneously responsible for editorial decisions, while also serving in a brigade that "uses social media platforms such as Twitter, Instagram and Facebook ... to wage what the head of the UK military describes as “information warfare”. Imagine finding out that the executive in charge of editorial decisions for Twitter in Hong Kong, is also serving in the Chinese military's department of "information warfare". As a Hong Konger, you'd have to be an idiot to continue trusting twitter at that point. The fact that Twitter is well aware of this, and didn't see a conflict of interest, makes me question their neutrality and effectiveness as a platform for online discussion.

krona 7y ago
As far as I'm aware, nobody is using Twitter as a reputable source of information.
- martin_a 7y ago
  Hahahahahaha. I think you couldn't be any more wrong on this.
- cameronbrown 7y ago
  Except almost every mainstream news source.. ever? Have you seen the amount of wrong information be blamed on Tweets?
  - stronglikedan 7y ago
    Perhaps this is why the mainstream news sources are considered by many (most?) to be disreputable now.
    - altendo 7y ago
      This completely disregards the number of politicians and newsmakers using Twitter as a platform to share information. The US President has been the first president to announce major policy changes over Twitter without any consultation with his own administration. News outlets cover Twitter precisely because people are making news on the platform. There is a lot of misinformation out there (especially from the President), and major news outlets make bad calls when running stories (affecting their reputation), but their insistence on using Twitter for news isn't a part of that.
  - Mikeb85 7y ago
    Which is why mainstream news is viewed as untrustworthy by most people.
    - skinnymuch 7y ago
      Yet that’s what most people still go by.
- onion2k 7y ago
  Millions of people believe they are.
- aezakmi 7y ago
  Imagine believing this.
bigYahnz 7y ago
Don't pretty much all these companies have some pretty questionable ties to governments? Faceberg had CIA funding(Q-Tel), right around the time they shut down a software project which had similar goals, no?
- captainredbeard 7y ago
  In-Q-Tel is the name you’re looking for, methinks.
- 9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
  Google also CIA, all the big tech companies are just shells for American interests anyway.
- cwkoss 7y ago
  I believe their auto-tagging feature (which was too good and creeped people out, so they reverted) occurred soon after this investment.
- Gibbon1 7y ago
  Good question why did the completely unknown but sociopathic Zuckerberg get enough funding to squash everyone else?
  - cwkoss 7y ago
    I believe Facebook already had social media market dominance before CIA invested.
  - skinnymuch 7y ago
    If Zuckerberg is so evidently a sociopath. What does that make people like Larry Ellison from a far? Or other individual tech giants who backstabbed other founders or early employees to their faces (Twitter founders, mainly Ev and Jack or Snap founders as examples)
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
rjf72 7y ago
Do you think that governments want and work to try to influence public opinion? I mean you don't need to rely on intuition here. As one fun example the current state of modern art is largely because the CIA used it as a propaganda weapon. [1] As the article mentions it was pushed heavily by their "Propaganda Assets Inventory, which at its peak could influence more than 800 newspapers, magazines and public information organisations." And governments in general seem more obsessed with information manipulation than ever before. Consequently, I find it only logical to assume that all social media is currently being heavily utilized by government level actors to push their various propaganda and agendas. If one is optimistic it even goes some way towards explaining the stupidity of social media -- propaganda is often quite ham fisted. Now pair this with AI. OpenAI recently demonstrated an AI capable of producing at least semi-workable longer form articles. This [2] is a toy version of that running on an intentionally crippled network. You give it the start of a writing prompt, and it completes the rest. I decided to give it part of what you wrote. In particular I gave it everything up until "Imagine founding out that". This is what was produced: "This is a conflict of interest, which should erode the trust that anyone would have on twitter. The man is simultaneously responsible for editorial decisions, while also serving in a brigade that "uses social media platforms such as Twitter, Instagram and Facebook ... to wage what the head of the UK military describes as “information warfare”. Imagine finding out that the man responsible for the military's response had once been paid an anonymous $300,000 fee to write an op-ed. How can you trust him to do his job without that knowing? Is there anything else that we can do? What can we do? We need a real-time response to any tweets or stories that are inaccurate or in breach of policy, where the facts are being misrepresented. I'm not an information manager but something needs to be done to stop this from happening, or at least give people an opportunity to understand what the fuck they are doing in their tweets." That paragraph has several glaring errors, but the produced speech is intentionally designed to be such. It's a toy model on a public site. Imagine the current state of the art. You could even create a neural network that is trained to detect human-like writing to automatically validate or reject the blurbs. This all becomes much easier if you restrict its training down to a specific agenda, and even easier still on a platform like Twitter where Tweets continued to be heavily restricted in character count. Emulating a human is much easier in shorter posts. I don't think we should ever start declaring one another to be bots, since that leads nowhere, but at the same time I would consider that things such as trying to get a feel for a consensus online may already be impossible. If it's not yet impossible, it will be soon enough. Yet another reason people must always remember to think for themselves, and only themselves... not that adopting a view because of its popularity would be logical, even if it was genuinely popular. Also a major reason to check any emotion at the door. I find it interesting that that random AI generated blurb was aiming to emotionally incite. [1] - https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-weapon-1578808.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-... [2] - https://talktotransformer.com/ https://talktotransformer.com/
thrower123 7y ago
Who has any trust in Twitter?
- StanislavPetrov 7y ago
  Unfortunately far too many people have blind trust in a wide swath of institutions, both in big tech and government.
- fjp 7y ago
  Twitter's moderation is all over the place, and it really seems like half a step from pure anarchy. I can see people equating that with it being a relatively free platform. From an American Twitter user's perspective, it seems like you can pretty much advocate all forms of violence and fascism as long as you maintain even the thinnest veil of acting like it's a political discussion.
- joe_the_user 7y ago
  Whether people trust Twitter overtly is not a decisive question. Twitter exists and has an impact. Information on what influences this impact is useful and important.
- pembrook 7y ago
  Exactly. Twitter is not an open protocol for sharing information. Thats what the internet is for. Twitter is just an advertising company that allows you to post content in exchange for hosting ads on that content. Who they hire, is their business. If you don't agree with their (inconsistent and haphazard) editorial policies, just host your content elsewhere. I think we need to stop giving Twitter so much power over the world by talking about it so much and start creating and using other platforms. Twitter has only 20% market penetration in the US.
  - throwawaymanbot 7y ago
    Spoken like a true Psyops-er. :p
notlukesky 7y ago
There are many examples of media outlets working for governments as weaponized tools all over the globe and as mouthpieces or instruments of foreign policy or even warfare. Twitter is just another broadcast tool like most media outlets. Examples of Twitter being used for US foreign policy goals are legion. Here are some from the Obama era on “regime change“ attempts in Iran with personal involvement and approval of Jack Dorsey: https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/17/world/middleeast/17media.html https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/17/world/middleeast/17media....? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jun/17/obama-iran-twitter https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jun/17/obama-iran-twi... https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-election-twitter-usa/u-s-state-department-speaks-to-twitter-over-iran-idUSWBT01137420090616 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-election-twitter-usa...

by noego 7y ago

krona 7y ago

As far as I'm aware, nobody is using Twitter as a reputable source of information.

martin_a 7y ago
Hahahahahaha. I think you couldn't be any more wrong on this.
cameronbrown 7y ago
Except almost every mainstream news source.. ever? Have you seen the amount of wrong information be blamed on Tweets?
- stronglikedan 7y ago
  Perhaps this is why the mainstream news sources are considered by many (most?) to be disreputable now.
  - altendo 7y ago
    This completely disregards the number of politicians and newsmakers using Twitter as a platform to share information. The US President has been the first president to announce major policy changes over Twitter without any consultation with his own administration. News outlets cover Twitter precisely because people are making news on the platform. There is a lot of misinformation out there (especially from the President), and major news outlets make bad calls when running stories (affecting their reputation), but their insistence on using Twitter for news isn't a part of that.
- Mikeb85 7y ago
  Which is why mainstream news is viewed as untrustworthy by most people.
  - skinnymuch 7y ago
    Yet that’s what most people still go by.
onion2k 7y ago
Millions of people believe they are.
aezakmi 7y ago
Imagine believing this.

bigYahnz 7y ago

Don't pretty much all these companies have some pretty questionable ties to governments? Faceberg had CIA funding(Q-Tel), right around the time they shut down a software project which had similar goals, no?

captainredbeard 7y ago
In-Q-Tel is the name you’re looking for, methinks.
9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
Google also CIA, all the big tech companies are just shells for American interests anyway.
cwkoss 7y ago
I believe their auto-tagging feature (which was too good and creeped people out, so they reverted) occurred soon after this investment.
Gibbon1 7y ago
Good question why did the completely unknown but sociopathic Zuckerberg get enough funding to squash everyone else?
- cwkoss 7y ago
  I believe Facebook already had social media market dominance before CIA invested.
- skinnymuch 7y ago
  If Zuckerberg is so evidently a sociopath. What does that make people like Larry Ellison from a far? Or other individual tech giants who backstabbed other founders or early employees to their faces (Twitter founders, mainly Ev and Jack or Snap founders as examples)
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]

rjf72 7y ago

Do you think that governments want and work to try to influence public opinion? I mean you don't need to rely on intuition here. As one fun example the current state of modern art is largely because the CIA used it as a propaganda weapon. [1] As the article mentions it was pushed heavily by their "Propaganda Assets Inventory, which at its peak could influence more than 800 newspapers, magazines and public information organisations." And governments in general seem more obsessed with information manipulation than ever before. Consequently, I find it only logical to assume that all social media is currently being heavily utilized by government level actors to push their various propaganda and agendas. If one is optimistic it even goes some way towards explaining the stupidity of social media -- propaganda is often quite ham fisted. Now pair this with AI. OpenAI recently demonstrated an AI capable of producing at least semi-workable longer form articles. This [2] is a toy version of that running on an intentionally crippled network. You give it the start of a writing prompt, and it completes the rest. I decided to give it part of what you wrote. In particular I gave it everything up until "Imagine founding out that". This is what was produced: "This is a conflict of interest, which should erode the trust that anyone would have on twitter. The man is simultaneously responsible for editorial decisions, while also serving in a brigade that "uses social media platforms such as Twitter, Instagram and Facebook ... to wage what the head of the UK military describes as “information warfare”. Imagine finding out that the man responsible for the military's response had once been paid an anonymous $300,000 fee to write an op-ed. How can you trust him to do his job without that knowing? Is there anything else that we can do? What can we do? We need a real-time response to any tweets or stories that are inaccurate or in breach of policy, where the facts are being misrepresented. I'm not an information manager but something needs to be done to stop this from happening, or at least give people an opportunity to understand what the fuck they are doing in their tweets." That paragraph has several glaring errors, but the produced speech is intentionally designed to be such. It's a toy model on a public site. Imagine the current state of the art. You could even create a neural network that is trained to detect human-like writing to automatically validate or reject the blurbs. This all becomes much easier if you restrict its training down to a specific agenda, and even easier still on a platform like Twitter where Tweets continued to be heavily restricted in character count. Emulating a human is much easier in shorter posts. I don't think we should ever start declaring one another to be bots, since that leads nowhere, but at the same time I would consider that things such as trying to get a feel for a consensus online may already be impossible. If it's not yet impossible, it will be soon enough. Yet another reason people must always remember to think for themselves, and only themselves... not that adopting a view because of its popularity would be logical, even if it was genuinely popular. Also a major reason to check any emotion at the door. I find it interesting that that random AI generated blurb was aiming to emotionally incite. [1] - https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-weapon-1578808.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-... [2] - https://talktotransformer.com/ https://talktotransformer.com/

thrower123 7y ago

Who has any trust in Twitter?

StanislavPetrov 7y ago
Unfortunately far too many people have blind trust in a wide swath of institutions, both in big tech and government.
fjp 7y ago
Twitter's moderation is all over the place, and it really seems like half a step from pure anarchy. I can see people equating that with it being a relatively free platform. From an American Twitter user's perspective, it seems like you can pretty much advocate all forms of violence and fascism as long as you maintain even the thinnest veil of acting like it's a political discussion.
joe_the_user 7y ago
Whether people trust Twitter overtly is not a decisive question. Twitter exists and has an impact. Information on what influences this impact is useful and important.
pembrook 7y ago
Exactly. Twitter is not an open protocol for sharing information. Thats what the internet is for. Twitter is just an advertising company that allows you to post content in exchange for hosting ads on that content. Who they hire, is their business. If you don't agree with their (inconsistent and haphazard) editorial policies, just host your content elsewhere. I think we need to stop giving Twitter so much power over the world by talking about it so much and start creating and using other platforms. Twitter has only 20% market penetration in the US.
- throwawaymanbot 7y ago
  Spoken like a true Psyops-er. :p

notlukesky 7y ago

There are many examples of media outlets working for governments as weaponized tools all over the globe and as mouthpieces or instruments of foreign policy or even warfare. Twitter is just another broadcast tool like most media outlets. Examples of Twitter being used for US foreign policy goals are legion. Here are some from the Obama era on “regime change“ attempts in Iran with personal involvement and approval of Jack Dorsey: https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/17/world/middleeast/17media.html https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/17/world/middleeast/17media....? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jun/17/obama-iran-twitter https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jun/17/obama-iran-twi... https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-election-twitter-usa/u-s-state-department-speaks-to-twitter-over-iran-idUSWBT01137420090616 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-election-twitter-usa...