7 ms·

How exactly is press free amplification? How do I get my random opinion broadcasted to a newspaper audience? I would probably have to write an opinion column an

How exactly is press free amplification? How do I get my random opinion broadcasted to a newspaper audience? I would probably have to write an opinion column and send it to the journal, then they would read it, and decide whether or not they want to publish it. If it's the NYT for example, you can be sure that no matter how well written your piece is, they will never publish something that pushes the theory that COVID-19 is a plot by Bill Gates to put chips into everyone. But you can probably find a sketchy, low-audience journal that would. Well it's the same thing, a well known community was banned from Reddit to prevent them from using Reddit's amplification mechanism (/r/all etc), but they now have their own clone of it, with a smaller audience, that you are free to consult.

jorblumesea 6y ago
I don't agree with the comparison either, but, in the 16th century just about everyone could make a broad side and disseminate whatever they wanted. Literally, wars were started because of this. Similar to today's information age propaganda wars and disinformation, physical media was used in a similar way. There are some valid comparisons here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamphlet_wars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamphlet_wars
- ativzzz 6y ago
  Huh that's a cool comparison. I guess society will have a rough patch when a new, more accessible medium of communication is mass released to the public.
- JohnBooty 6y ago
  It's not an entirely inappropriate comparison. The similarities are obvious, and they are extremely relevant. However, relative to the days of broadsides, the barrier to entry for dissemination of ideas has decreased by orders of magnitude and the potential reach of such ideas has increased by orders of magnitude. It's like comparing slingshots and nuclear weapons. Yes, they're both things that let you hurt people from a distance.
blix 6y ago
"Free amplicfication" isn't about absolute lack of cost, it's about cost relative to older mechanisms. The printing press allowed information to spread much faster and more cheaply than having a monk write it by hand. It also allowed ideas that were not monk-approved to appear in print. When it first came out people were pretty upset about the incorrect ideas that propogated as a result. Eventually people with power figured out how to mostly control the printing press and so created the heavily gate-kept institutions you describe. The transitions our society is facing now echo these past struggles.
- JohnBooty 6y ago
  There are similarities with those past struggles, but the differences are significant. We cannot simply hand-wave some of them away as "the struggles every new medium faces." Printed materials were still pretty gate-kept. Sure, anybody could spend a modest sum and get a bunch of roughly-printed pamphlets printed up. You could walk around London and hand them out. People did, and I suppose some of these ideas got traction. And some of those ideas were even good. That was still a lot of money and effort, and it was still a lot of work to establish some kind of credibility so that your ideas might actually gain acceptance. Otherwise you were just a crazy person handing out pamphlets along with all of the other crazy people. Today, you can post insane and dangerous COVID-19 falsehoods to half of the freaking world via YouTube or Facebook and your message is indistinguishable from ideas presented by people who actually know what they're talking about. The gatekeeping America used to have was... not great. Network television's self-censorship was often stodgy, at best. But you didn't have absolute fucking lunatics screaming about chemtrails and Bill Gate's 5G microchip mind-control scheme racking up literally millions of followers. That is a PROBLEM. If you say to me that the ideal solution is to simply have a more educated populace, I wouldn't disagree. However, that doesn't solve things now. We need long-term solutions (education) as well as short-term ones (so we don't have the loonies electing other loonies who actually get to steer the most powerful militaries on the planet)
  - AnimalMuppet 6y ago
    > If you say to me that the ideal solution is to simply have a more educated populace, I wouldn't disagree. However, that doesn't solve things now. Even in the long term, how are you going to produce this more educated populace? Or rather, who are you going to entrust with the task? The same educational establishment that produced the current populace? But even if you can produce your more educated populace, you still have the problem that the Russian trolls aren't going to stand still. They're going to be better, too, by then.
partiallypro 6y ago
It's not a great comparison because both entities are regulated completely different based on what they allow on their platform/paper with exceptions to certain things. That's where people are getting confused. If you curate the news, you can be held liable for things published, if you don't you are allowed a pass (with some exceptions.) By stepping in actively censor a news story that has yet to be disputed, social media platforms have opened themselves up to being held liable for -all- posts.
- markdown 6y ago
  > By stepping in actively censor a news story that has yet to be disputed That's not why Twitter "censored" the news story. They removed links to a story that violated their published policies.
  - 75dvtwin 6y ago
    > They removed links to a story that violated their published policies. I am not sure that it matters 'why they censored'. Put it another way, I do not think it matters if they applied their own ToS rules correctly, incorrectly, selectively or whatever. I am not sure that their terms of service, allow them to claim protection under 47.230 [1] I am sure that the position that the fed government investigators will take. If Twitter folks (or their crowd-sourced moderators, or committees) gray-out/remove/comment on/hide/edit content that Twitter claims 'is not theirs' -- then it is hard to imaging they are compliant with the 'non-publisher' protections of section 47.230. Imagine if one is a for-profit business, claiming tax code for a non-profit organization. Their Terms Of Service mentions: 'Making the world better and being charitable. We do not do business with bad clients'. Does that make that business less criminally liable for claiming taxes of a non-profit? To me it does not. [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230
Orou 6y ago
For clarity, the printing press was for books. Newspapers did not come along until much later. Interestingly, the Catholic church was very concerned about the ability to mass produce literature and wanted to have control over what could be published. They didn't want just anyone to be able to publish a book. Imagine giving people a platform to speak out against the Church!
- treeman79 6y ago
  This is a major reason for Martin Luther and the Lutheran Church. There is an excellent hard core history podcast that somewhat relates to the topic.
  - krferriter 6y ago
    Yeah this one: https://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-48-prophets-of-doom/ https://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-48-prophe... It's a good episode. History is pretty gruesome.
beezle 6y ago
The "press" has historically not been neutral; political sheets/tabloids heavily aligned with specific parties or individuals were very common in American history until the 20th century. There was little, if any, notion of "journalistic integrity" - they were simply a way to get out what specific persons wanted heard.

jorblumesea 6y ago

I don't agree with the comparison either, but, in the 16th century just about everyone could make a broad side and disseminate whatever they wanted. Literally, wars were started because of this. Similar to today's information age propaganda wars and disinformation, physical media was used in a similar way. There are some valid comparisons here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamphlet_wars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pamphlet_wars

ativzzz 6y ago
Huh that's a cool comparison. I guess society will have a rough patch when a new, more accessible medium of communication is mass released to the public.
JohnBooty 6y ago
It's not an entirely inappropriate comparison. The similarities are obvious, and they are extremely relevant. However, relative to the days of broadsides, the barrier to entry for dissemination of ideas has decreased by orders of magnitude and the potential reach of such ideas has increased by orders of magnitude. It's like comparing slingshots and nuclear weapons. Yes, they're both things that let you hurt people from a distance.

blix 6y ago

"Free amplicfication" isn't about absolute lack of cost, it's about cost relative to older mechanisms. The printing press allowed information to spread much faster and more cheaply than having a monk write it by hand. It also allowed ideas that were not monk-approved to appear in print. When it first came out people were pretty upset about the incorrect ideas that propogated as a result. Eventually people with power figured out how to mostly control the printing press and so created the heavily gate-kept institutions you describe. The transitions our society is facing now echo these past struggles.

JohnBooty 6y ago
There are similarities with those past struggles, but the differences are significant. We cannot simply hand-wave some of them away as "the struggles every new medium faces." Printed materials were still pretty gate-kept. Sure, anybody could spend a modest sum and get a bunch of roughly-printed pamphlets printed up. You could walk around London and hand them out. People did, and I suppose some of these ideas got traction. And some of those ideas were even good. That was still a lot of money and effort, and it was still a lot of work to establish some kind of credibility so that your ideas might actually gain acceptance. Otherwise you were just a crazy person handing out pamphlets along with all of the other crazy people. Today, you can post insane and dangerous COVID-19 falsehoods to half of the freaking world via YouTube or Facebook and your message is indistinguishable from ideas presented by people who actually know what they're talking about. The gatekeeping America used to have was... not great. Network television's self-censorship was often stodgy, at best. But you didn't have absolute fucking lunatics screaming about chemtrails and Bill Gate's 5G microchip mind-control scheme racking up literally millions of followers. That is a PROBLEM. If you say to me that the ideal solution is to simply have a more educated populace, I wouldn't disagree. However, that doesn't solve things now. We need long-term solutions (education) as well as short-term ones (so we don't have the loonies electing other loonies who actually get to steer the most powerful militaries on the planet)
- AnimalMuppet 6y ago
  > If you say to me that the ideal solution is to simply have a more educated populace, I wouldn't disagree. However, that doesn't solve things now. Even in the long term, how are you going to produce this more educated populace? Or rather, who are you going to entrust with the task? The same educational establishment that produced the current populace? But even if you can produce your more educated populace, you still have the problem that the Russian trolls aren't going to stand still. They're going to be better, too, by then.

partiallypro 6y ago

It's not a great comparison because both entities are regulated completely different based on what they allow on their platform/paper with exceptions to certain things. That's where people are getting confused. If you curate the news, you can be held liable for things published, if you don't you are allowed a pass (with some exceptions.) By stepping in actively censor a news story that has yet to be disputed, social media platforms have opened themselves up to being held liable for -all- posts.

markdown 6y ago
> By stepping in actively censor a news story that has yet to be disputed That's not why Twitter "censored" the news story. They removed links to a story that violated their published policies.
- 75dvtwin 6y ago
  > They removed links to a story that violated their published policies. I am not sure that it matters 'why they censored'. Put it another way, I do not think it matters if they applied their own ToS rules correctly, incorrectly, selectively or whatever. I am not sure that their terms of service, allow them to claim protection under 47.230 [1] I am sure that the position that the fed government investigators will take. If Twitter folks (or their crowd-sourced moderators, or committees) gray-out/remove/comment on/hide/edit content that Twitter claims 'is not theirs' -- then it is hard to imaging they are compliant with the 'non-publisher' protections of section 47.230. Imagine if one is a for-profit business, claiming tax code for a non-profit organization. Their Terms Of Service mentions: 'Making the world better and being charitable. We do not do business with bad clients'. Does that make that business less criminally liable for claiming taxes of a non-profit? To me it does not. [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230

Orou 6y ago

For clarity, the printing press was for books. Newspapers did not come along until much later. Interestingly, the Catholic church was very concerned about the ability to mass produce literature and wanted to have control over what could be published. They didn't want just anyone to be able to publish a book. Imagine giving people a platform to speak out against the Church!

treeman79 6y ago
This is a major reason for Martin Luther and the Lutheran Church. There is an excellent hard core history podcast that somewhat relates to the topic.
- krferriter 6y ago
  Yeah this one: https://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-48-prophets-of-doom/ https://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-48-prophe... It's a good episode. History is pretty gruesome.

beezle 6y ago

The "press" has historically not been neutral; political sheets/tabloids heavily aligned with specific parties or individuals were very common in American history until the 20th century. There was little, if any, notion of "journalistic integrity" - they were simply a way to get out what specific persons wanted heard.