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First tweet: Vox saying face masks aren't the best way to avoid Coronavirus. Actually basically the mainstream view in the US at the time, and still arguable. N

First tweet: Vox saying face masks aren't the best way to avoid Coronavirus. Actually basically the mainstream view in the US at the time, and still arguable. Note how right now the states aren't mandating masks, they're mandating social isolation. Second tweet: Vox factually reporting the tech industry is eschewing handshakes. Tweet author editorialises that Vox is telling them not to. Third Tweet: Vox factually reporting that tech companies are providing 9million masks. Factually states that it's not enough to solve the problem. Tweet author contends that's not true - but provides no evidence . Fourth tweet: Author tries to claim Vox is responsible for Coronavirus. I find this hilarious, because we all know perfectly well, if that tweeter had found a Vox contributer tweeting that 4th tweet he'd be apoplectic. I'm sure this tweet thread has nothing to do with Vox's coverage of that tweeter and his previous attacks on the FDA: https://www.vox.com/2017/1/14/14276530/balaji-srinivasan-trump-fda-twitter-andreessen-horowitz https://www.vox.com/2017/1/14/14276530/balaji-srinivasan-tru...

foob4r 7y ago
Almost makes you wonder if balajis has a personal gripe with vox or recode or Ezra or Kara. Balaji is a crypto bro and epitome of technocrats who thinks just because they are (rich|famous|networked), they are experts on everything. Fact of the matter is, Balaji doesn't know any more about Covid than what is reported. He's using hindsight bias to claim that media reported was false.
- icelancer 7y ago
  >> Balaji is a crypto bro and epitome of technocrats who thinks just because they are (rich|famous|networked), they are experts on everything. Fact of the matter is, Balaji doesn't know any more about Covid than what is reported. He's using hindsight bias to claim that media reported was false. This is definitely not correct. Balaji taught bioinformatics at Stanford and has published papers in the fields of clinical/microbial genomics. As for hindsight bias, Balaji was promoting the use of masks very early.
- buboard 7y ago
  Whatever. Thanks to him i knew about Coronavirus and warned everyone back in February. You re making the exact same remarks that tech hating journos did If you re claiming the journos knew something he didnt, then it means they criminally misreported it
  - foob4r 7y ago
    > criminally misreported it What law dictates that?
- dang 7y ago
  Please keep personal attacks off HN, regardless of whom you're attacking. Maybe you don't owe crypto bros better, but you owe this community better if you're posting here. Your comment would be fine with just the last two sentences. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
joshuaissac 7y ago
I am not sure if the comment to which you are replying has since been edited, but the first tweet is a comparison of a Vox article from February, advising against buying face masks, next to a tweet by Vox's founder, saying he ordered his in February when they were available. I agree that that is not a reasonable comparison because the article was not written by the founder, but your commentary does not reflect the essence of (current) first tweet.
iateanapple 7y ago
> Vox saying face masks aren't the best way to avoid Coronavirus. Actually basically the mainstream view in the US at the time It was the mainstream view in the US because the media built the narrative that masks wouldn’t help...
- scott_s 7y ago
  They were reporting what the CDC told them.
  - sampsonitify 7y ago
    You report things that happen, e.g. crash happened on X road. You can report that "CDC says mask don't work" but if you write it as truth, which Vox stated in January, you are either a parrot or inept. If journalism is just reporting what others say, and not questioning what they say and the underlying assumptions, then it is at best just a weak form of Wikipedia, and at worst a propaganda mechanism. Journalists need to get some teeth back and challenge authorities rather than relying on what is said as gospel. Jounalists should have led the charge on all of this, starting with questioning Chinese numbers through to Masks and the assumptions of the modelling, rather than playing, to be kind, catch up and to be mean interference on people doing their job for them.
    - Traster 7y ago
      Mathematicians report 1+1=2. Where do you draw the line? At some point you need to draw the line and say "Actually, my article isn't an expose on the CDC." It's not the job of every journalist at every second to be challenging literally everything. At the end of February the US Surgeon General was not just telling people that masks don't help - he said: > U.S. Surgeon General @Surgeon_General Seriously people- STOP BUYING MASKS! >They are NOT effective in preventing general public from catching #Coronavirus, but if healthcare providers can’t get them to care for sick patients, it puts them and our communities at risk! I completely agree that someone should be questioning when the CDC says "Masks don't help", but firstly, you need to be really damn sure if you're going to second guess the CDC on the eve of a pandemic, and secondly, it's not everyone's job to be writing that story. Someone should, but for every earth shattering pullitzer prize winner, there's going to be 1000 articles that just adhered to the status quo and that's not neccessarily a bad thing.
AlchemistCamp 7y ago
It's fine if you disagree, but it would be constructive if you can at least disagree with what was actually written instead of your interpretation of it. Also, please keep in mind that "that tweeter", as you call him, taught bioinformatics at Stanford, has published papers in the field of clinical/microbial genomics and founded a biotech startup that sold for 375M. He's considerably more informed about the topic than any of the reporters sparring with him. https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228752554022068226 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228752554022068226 And yes, he does have an axe to grind with Vox: https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 As someone watching the whole thing unfold for months, from far away in Taiwan, I think he's completely right on this one.
- Traster 7y ago
  You want me to be fastidious in my representation of his tweets, but you're okay citing this guy who is literally arguing literally just about headlines of articles. He's not linking to the articles and talking about them - he's literally taking headlines and even then he's misrepresenting them. I'm fine talking about his qualifications, but I think it's unfair for you to talk about his biotech start up without talking about the fact that we're talking about a guy that basically wants to gut FDA regulations - regulations that, if they were in place in China, would have prevented this outbreak. And of course the fact that he was called out on that bullshit by... Vox media!
  - AlchemistCamp 7y ago
    > You want me to be fastidious in my representation of his tweets I want you to be honest in addressing what you disagree with. That's it. > this guy who is literally arguing literally just about headlines of articles. That's just not true. He's dug into the contents of the articles both in podcasts and threads like this one (very near what I just shared): https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447960008183808 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447960008183808
    - Traster 7y ago
iateanapple 7y ago
> Vox factually reporting the tech industry is eschewing handshakes. Tweet author editorialises that Vox is telling them not to. When you describe techies as terrified in the context of handshakes you make them sound terrified of handshakes which makes them look irrational to the average person. When you immediately follow that up with “experts” saying everything is fine you cement the view in the readers mind that tech people are acting irrationally.
- madeofpalk 7y ago
  Look, as a journalist, what are you supposed to do? You don't actually know much - its not expected that you know everything about everything (who does). So you do journalism. You investigate and replay back your findings. "Vox factually reporting the tech industry is eschewing handshakes" Is this a fact, or a lie? Did Vox fabricate this, or did they misconstrue and mislead? "“experts” saying everything is fine" Did "experts" say everything is fine, or did they not? Again, is Vox outright lying? Did they mislead by picking poor "experts"? I think that Vox.com's "assertive contrarian" tone-of-voice might have created some posts that look poor in hindsight (erring on the side of "not killing people" is probably for the best), but lets a) actually define the assertions against Vox's journalistic integrity and b) acknowledge that health officials were not exactly clear, consistent, and eventually correct.
  - JamesBarney 7y ago
    Vox got a lot wrong, and he goes through all they go wrong on his tweet. https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 But more importantly a week before the article came out, he said the article won't be about the very real risk of the coronavirus but about how tech guys are weird. And that's exactly the theme of the article.
  - phaus 7y ago
    Well if you want to be a useful journalist you start by not sensationalizing things or carefully framing facts in a way to push a specific narrative. Being a useful journalist is not profitable though, even when there isn't a pandemic.
rajup 7y ago
> First tweet: Vox saying face masks aren't the best way to avoid Coronavirus. Actually basically the mainstream view in the US at the time, Well, it was definitely mainstream after Vox reported on it.
specialist 7y ago
About those mask recommendations... Edit: Surgical masks vs respirators. Any advice omitting the distinction is suboptimal. Surgical masks are still useless. Best case is they serve as sneeze guards and visual reinforcement. N95 rated respirators are useful. And in short supply. Since healthcare workers desperately need them and most people don't, their use is currently weakly recommended. Face shields plus respirators are good. I'm not sure about shields and surgical mask combo. IMHO, Vox has been superior. Especially in comparison. They have explainers and podcasts dedicated to just coronavirus and COVID-19. Updated frequently. When the truth & reconciliation process starts, Vox is pretty far down the list of belligerents.
- AlchemistCamp 7y ago
  > Surgical masks are still useless. Not according to the research I've been reading: https://twitter.com/jeremyphoward/status/1249698787666399235 https://twitter.com/jeremyphoward/status/1249698787666399235
  - specialist 7y ago
    Great find, thanks. That review of the paper makes the distinction between protection and transmission. I admit I was only thinking about protection. Since I'm immunocompromised, I will continue to wear N95 respirators whenever I'm around other people. But per this paper, surgical masks are useful for "source control", at least partially thwarting infected people from spreading the virus. I'm super skeptical, because of old habits, but science is science. So the rest of you should start wearing surgical (or cloth) masks. Thanks.
  - prepend 7y ago
    I think it depends on perspective. There is not evidence that surgical masks useful in preventing someone from contracting covid [0]. Which makes sense because droplets can still be inhaled because air flows around the mask (unlike n95 respirators). Masks are very useful in preventing spread, thus useful for overall slowing the spread of the disease. [0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7118603/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7118603/
sampsonitify 7y ago
What is the role of journalists? The defence that "basically the mainstream view in the US at the time" seems to me the antithesis of why we need journalists at all. Far too much journalism is either weakly factual, where ideas like masks are taken prima facie and without much thought, or opinion pieces with an ideological bent. What happened to investigating ideas, to see where they lead? To questioning everyone, no matter their credentials? The role I would hope journalists would play is to hold people accountable, to question deeply the assumptions that "the mainstream view" entails. This Eric Weinstein tweet hit this home for me: https://twitter.com/ericrweinstein/status/1242981559017172993 https://twitter.com/ericrweinstein/status/124298155901717299..., which ends with: > Bring us the heads of the incompetent for removal.
- andrepd 7y ago
  It wasn't only the mainstream view in the US, it was the leading medical advice by the World Health Organisation. This isn't a matter of questioning politicians, but of trusting reputed experts and expert authorities on technical matters.
  - nopriorarrests 7y ago
    Are you sure that WHO is run by reputed experts and not by career bureaucrats whose motivation is mostly political, not medical? Because after the whole thing unfolded, it seems to be exactly the case.
  - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
    I don't think journalists need to distrust authority, necessarily. But good journalism would involve followup questions like: * Are masks ineffective in the sense that they don't reliably stop the spread of the coronavirus, or in the sense that they don't impact it in any way? * Taiwan and South Korea believe masks are effective and are handing them out to their citizens. Why do they believe masks are effective, and if it's not true what do we know that they don't? * Masks intuitively ought to work; I cough out the virus, but sometimes it'll get caught in the mask instead of going into someone's nose and mouth. What part of this story is flawed?

foob4r 7y ago

Almost makes you wonder if balajis has a personal gripe with vox or recode or Ezra or Kara. Balaji is a crypto bro and epitome of technocrats who thinks just because they are (rich|famous|networked), they are experts on everything. Fact of the matter is, Balaji doesn't know any more about Covid than what is reported. He's using hindsight bias to claim that media reported was false.

icelancer 7y ago
>> Balaji is a crypto bro and epitome of technocrats who thinks just because they are (rich|famous|networked), they are experts on everything. Fact of the matter is, Balaji doesn't know any more about Covid than what is reported. He's using hindsight bias to claim that media reported was false. This is definitely not correct. Balaji taught bioinformatics at Stanford and has published papers in the fields of clinical/microbial genomics. As for hindsight bias, Balaji was promoting the use of masks very early.
buboard 7y ago
Whatever. Thanks to him i knew about Coronavirus and warned everyone back in February. You re making the exact same remarks that tech hating journos did If you re claiming the journos knew something he didnt, then it means they criminally misreported it
- foob4r 7y ago
  > criminally misreported it What law dictates that?
dang 7y ago
Please keep personal attacks off HN, regardless of whom you're attacking. Maybe you don't owe crypto bros better, but you owe this community better if you're posting here. Your comment would be fine with just the last two sentences. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

joshuaissac 7y ago

I am not sure if the comment to which you are replying has since been edited, but the first tweet is a comparison of a Vox article from February, advising against buying face masks, next to a tweet by Vox's founder, saying he ordered his in February when they were available. I agree that that is not a reasonable comparison because the article was not written by the founder, but your commentary does not reflect the essence of (current) first tweet.

iateanapple 7y ago

> Vox saying face masks aren't the best way to avoid Coronavirus. Actually basically the mainstream view in the US at the time It was the mainstream view in the US because the media built the narrative that masks wouldn’t help...

scott_s 7y ago
They were reporting what the CDC told them.
- sampsonitify 7y ago
  You report things that happen, e.g. crash happened on X road. You can report that "CDC says mask don't work" but if you write it as truth, which Vox stated in January, you are either a parrot or inept. If journalism is just reporting what others say, and not questioning what they say and the underlying assumptions, then it is at best just a weak form of Wikipedia, and at worst a propaganda mechanism. Journalists need to get some teeth back and challenge authorities rather than relying on what is said as gospel. Jounalists should have led the charge on all of this, starting with questioning Chinese numbers through to Masks and the assumptions of the modelling, rather than playing, to be kind, catch up and to be mean interference on people doing their job for them.
  - Traster 7y ago
    Mathematicians report 1+1=2. Where do you draw the line? At some point you need to draw the line and say "Actually, my article isn't an expose on the CDC." It's not the job of every journalist at every second to be challenging literally everything. At the end of February the US Surgeon General was not just telling people that masks don't help - he said: > U.S. Surgeon General @Surgeon_General Seriously people- STOP BUYING MASKS! >They are NOT effective in preventing general public from catching #Coronavirus, but if healthcare providers can’t get them to care for sick patients, it puts them and our communities at risk! I completely agree that someone should be questioning when the CDC says "Masks don't help", but firstly, you need to be really damn sure if you're going to second guess the CDC on the eve of a pandemic, and secondly, it's not everyone's job to be writing that story. Someone should, but for every earth shattering pullitzer prize winner, there's going to be 1000 articles that just adhered to the status quo and that's not neccessarily a bad thing.

AlchemistCamp 7y ago

It's fine if you disagree, but it would be constructive if you can at least disagree with what was actually written instead of your interpretation of it. Also, please keep in mind that "that tweeter", as you call him, taught bioinformatics at Stanford, has published papers in the field of clinical/microbial genomics and founded a biotech startup that sold for 375M. He's considerably more informed about the topic than any of the reporters sparring with him. https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228752554022068226 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228752554022068226 And yes, he does have an axe to grind with Vox: https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 As someone watching the whole thing unfold for months, from far away in Taiwan, I think he's completely right on this one.

Traster 7y ago
You want me to be fastidious in my representation of his tweets, but you're okay citing this guy who is literally arguing literally just about headlines of articles. He's not linking to the articles and talking about them - he's literally taking headlines and even then he's misrepresenting them. I'm fine talking about his qualifications, but I think it's unfair for you to talk about his biotech start up without talking about the fact that we're talking about a guy that basically wants to gut FDA regulations - regulations that, if they were in place in China, would have prevented this outbreak. And of course the fact that he was called out on that bullshit by... Vox media!
- AlchemistCamp 7y ago
  > You want me to be fastidious in my representation of his tweets I want you to be honest in addressing what you disagree with. That's it. > this guy who is literally arguing literally just about headlines of articles. That's just not true. He's dug into the contents of the articles both in podcasts and threads like this one (very near what I just shared): https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447960008183808 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447960008183808
  - Traster 7y ago

iateanapple 7y ago

> Vox factually reporting the tech industry is eschewing handshakes. Tweet author editorialises that Vox is telling them not to. When you describe techies as terrified in the context of handshakes you make them sound terrified of handshakes which makes them look irrational to the average person. When you immediately follow that up with “experts” saying everything is fine you cement the view in the readers mind that tech people are acting irrationally.

madeofpalk 7y ago
Look, as a journalist, what are you supposed to do? You don't actually know much - its not expected that you know everything about everything (who does). So you do journalism. You investigate and replay back your findings. "Vox factually reporting the tech industry is eschewing handshakes" Is this a fact, or a lie? Did Vox fabricate this, or did they misconstrue and mislead? "“experts” saying everything is fine" Did "experts" say everything is fine, or did they not? Again, is Vox outright lying? Did they mislead by picking poor "experts"? I think that Vox.com's "assertive contrarian" tone-of-voice might have created some posts that look poor in hindsight (erring on the side of "not killing people" is probably for the best), but lets a) actually define the assertions against Vox's journalistic integrity and b) acknowledge that health officials were not exactly clear, consistent, and eventually correct.
- JamesBarney 7y ago
  Vox got a lot wrong, and he goes through all they go wrong on his tweet. https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1228447944287932416 But more importantly a week before the article came out, he said the article won't be about the very real risk of the coronavirus but about how tech guys are weird. And that's exactly the theme of the article.
- phaus 7y ago
  Well if you want to be a useful journalist you start by not sensationalizing things or carefully framing facts in a way to push a specific narrative. Being a useful journalist is not profitable though, even when there isn't a pandemic.

rajup 7y ago

> First tweet: Vox saying face masks aren't the best way to avoid Coronavirus. Actually basically the mainstream view in the US at the time, Well, it was definitely mainstream after Vox reported on it.

specialist 7y ago

About those mask recommendations... Edit: Surgical masks vs respirators. Any advice omitting the distinction is suboptimal. Surgical masks are still useless. Best case is they serve as sneeze guards and visual reinforcement. N95 rated respirators are useful. And in short supply. Since healthcare workers desperately need them and most people don't, their use is currently weakly recommended. Face shields plus respirators are good. I'm not sure about shields and surgical mask combo. IMHO, Vox has been superior. Especially in comparison. They have explainers and podcasts dedicated to just coronavirus and COVID-19. Updated frequently. When the truth & reconciliation process starts, Vox is pretty far down the list of belligerents.

AlchemistCamp 7y ago
> Surgical masks are still useless. Not according to the research I've been reading: https://twitter.com/jeremyphoward/status/1249698787666399235 https://twitter.com/jeremyphoward/status/1249698787666399235
- specialist 7y ago
  Great find, thanks. That review of the paper makes the distinction between protection and transmission. I admit I was only thinking about protection. Since I'm immunocompromised, I will continue to wear N95 respirators whenever I'm around other people. But per this paper, surgical masks are useful for "source control", at least partially thwarting infected people from spreading the virus. I'm super skeptical, because of old habits, but science is science. So the rest of you should start wearing surgical (or cloth) masks. Thanks.
- prepend 7y ago
  I think it depends on perspective. There is not evidence that surgical masks useful in preventing someone from contracting covid [0]. Which makes sense because droplets can still be inhaled because air flows around the mask (unlike n95 respirators). Masks are very useful in preventing spread, thus useful for overall slowing the spread of the disease. [0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7118603/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7118603/

sampsonitify 7y ago

What is the role of journalists? The defence that "basically the mainstream view in the US at the time" seems to me the antithesis of why we need journalists at all. Far too much journalism is either weakly factual, where ideas like masks are taken prima facie and without much thought, or opinion pieces with an ideological bent. What happened to investigating ideas, to see where they lead? To questioning everyone, no matter their credentials? The role I would hope journalists would play is to hold people accountable, to question deeply the assumptions that "the mainstream view" entails. This Eric Weinstein tweet hit this home for me: https://twitter.com/ericrweinstein/status/1242981559017172993 https://twitter.com/ericrweinstein/status/124298155901717299..., which ends with: > Bring us the heads of the incompetent for removal.

andrepd 7y ago
It wasn't only the mainstream view in the US, it was the leading medical advice by the World Health Organisation. This isn't a matter of questioning politicians, but of trusting reputed experts and expert authorities on technical matters.
- nopriorarrests 7y ago
  Are you sure that WHO is run by reputed experts and not by career bureaucrats whose motivation is mostly political, not medical? Because after the whole thing unfolded, it seems to be exactly the case.
- SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
  I don't think journalists need to distrust authority, necessarily. But good journalism would involve followup questions like: * Are masks ineffective in the sense that they don't reliably stop the spread of the coronavirus, or in the sense that they don't impact it in any way? * Taiwan and South Korea believe masks are effective and are handing them out to their citizens. Why do they believe masks are effective, and if it's not true what do we know that they don't? * Masks intuitively ought to work; I cough out the virus, but sometimes it'll get caught in the mask instead of going into someone's nose and mouth. What part of this story is flawed?