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Twitter, SpaceX and Tesla are not newspapers/publishers. The reason for labelling news organisations' government affiliations is for the viewer/reader to unders
by yossarian1408 3y ago
Twitter, SpaceX and Tesla are not newspapers/publishers. The reason for labelling news organisations' government affiliations is for the viewer/reader to understand that there may or may not be bias, and where the funding is coming from.
If NPR's government contributions are embarrassing for the organisation, it might be best for them to forgo that funding. Additionally, if there's no influence/bias, then why does it matter that their funding is disclosed to the reader?
- kyralis 3y agoBecause the label has a connotation that is not accurate. Connotation is just as important as denotation when evaluating meaning and accuracy of statements. Engineers love to pretend otherwise - that's probably part of why we're engineers - but that doesn't make them right.
- Georgelemental 3y agoThe connotation is a product of how the label was inconsistently applied in the past. Consistent application of the label will solve this problem pretty soon, without requiring Twitter to make judgment calls that should be beyond its purview
- raxxorraxor 3y agoA connotation is subjective and should not matter. Public funding however is. In my country there are more or less trustworthy government funded news stations that are also flagged. At least on youtube. But I believe the label is more important than what some people fear other people would maybe perceive.
- dpkonofa 3y agoIt would simply be a connotation if Twitter's own documentation on what that tag means didn't explicitly state that the tag means that the source's editorial process may be influenced by the government organizations funding them. That's not the case for any of the current organizations that have gotten that tag.
- bob-09 3y ago[flagged]
- lostlogin 3y agoWhen Chinese and Russian state propaganda channels are getting the same label for a different situation, it’s a bit off. Your (and Elons) argument has shades of the famous ‘with us or against us’ line. Details matter.
- rjzzleep 3y ago[flagged]
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- daemoens 3y agoBecause the NPR receives almost no money from the federal government. Read the article. It receives less than 1 percent of its $300 million annual budget from the federally funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
- AlbertCory 3y ago[flagged]
- eppsilon 3y agoThen Twitter could label them "non-profit" instead of "government-funded" or "state-affiliated", both of which imply government influence or control.
- AlbertCory 3y agoSo I guess you haven't seen the Twitter Files, where the government did exactly that.
- PathOfEclipse 3y agoFrom Wikipedia: Although NPR receives less than 1% of its direct funding from the federal government, member stations (which pay dues amounting to approximately one third of NPR's revenue), tend to receive far larger portions of their budgets from state governments, and also the US government through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. 1/3 isn't 100%, but it's also far from insignificant.
- scarface74 3y agoAnd Fox News had a direct line to the White House and was influenced heavily by it. Was it not just as biased?
- hgsgm 3y agoThat's in reverse. Trump was Fox sponsored. Fox wasn't Trump sponsored. Fox doesn't need a "Fox affiliated media" label. Maybe it needs a "NewsCorp/Murdoch affiliated" label.
- d23 3y agoAs biased as Fox News is, it would be completely ridiculous to call it state-affiliated media.
- scarface74 3y agoHow much more “state affiliated” can you get than when Trump was in office he spent most of his day watching FoxNews and called it when he didn’t like the coverage and they acquiesced? This is not some conspiracy theory. It was very much out in the open. Even more recently, the house speaker gave Fox preferred access to the Jan 6th video.
- vuln 3y ago> This is not some conspiracy theory. It was very much out in the open. Do you have any evidence of this?
- mrastro 3y agoTons. See https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/11/29/here-are-all-the-times-were-pretty-sure-that-trump-was-watching-fox-news-as-president/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/11/29/h... among others. He literally live tweeted about the something related to FOX News segment as it was happening.
- d23 3y ago
- fundad 3y agoSpaceX and Tesla are not newspapers/publishers. Twitter is a media company, a publisher with an editorial voice that we have to assume is independent from the Saudi government or any government funding the owner's other businesses.
- nailer 3y agoI'd be fairly happy for Twitter to declare their own potential conflicts of interest. That doesn't mean Twitter shouldn't correctly label state funded media.
- bagels 3y agoTwitter is a publisher. Just like newspapers publish AP stories, Twitter publishes the latest memes from users.
- olivermarks 3y ago[flagged]
- HDThoreaun 3y agoSo? The government isn't the arbiter of what words mean.
- jachee 3y ago> globalists Oh look, a racist dog whistle.
- vuln 3y agoWhich race might that be?
- khochesh_kushat 3y agoGlobalist is at least in some circles a code word for Jewish.
- olivermarks 3y agoNot in the circles I move in.Sounds like paranoia to me...
- vuln 3y agoParanoia and projection.
- yellowapple 3y ago"Bill Gates and other globalists" Unless Bill Gates is Jewish (is he?), the context doesn't support this being a dogwhistle in this case.
- rbanffy 3y agoTwitter and its curation and targeting mechanisms make it very much a publisher.
- Diesel555 3y agoThey are not categorized as a publisher. They receive legal protections as such. This will quickly evolve into a section 230 debate. I do agree social media companies should be categorized as a publisher - or content providers, but they are not. I think changing section 230 would solve a lot of problems by removing very specific legal protections, which news companies do not receive, and help prevent clear issues such as knowingly promoting false information. There are those that disagree with me. Problems exist with any solution such as who should judge what should not be allowed and would the counter devolve into an organization that could control information dissemination? A valid point. I think the answer is already out there - a very low standard (or to say another way the high burden of proof required) current news organizations are held to by law, which most seem not to debate is too restrictive, or some line between nothing and that. There is a lot of academic discourse on this topic and I recommend researching 230 more. It’s a fascinating policy debate with pros and cons on both sides. It was written in 1996, the year the palm pilot and the Pentium 166MHz processor was introduced.
- rbanffy 3y ago> knowingly promoting false information. This in itself should be enough to remove media organisation protections.
- d23 3y agoNPR is not nor has it ever been state-affiliated media in any reasonable sense of the word. Is it a full stop, bald-face lie.
- skrowl 3y agoNPR was, quite-literally created by an act of the United States congress. It receives DIRECT funding from the United States government. Twitter was generous in changing the label from "State-affiliated" media (given that it was literally created by the US Government) to "Government-funded media". There is no possible argument against the "Government-funded media" label that makes sense. They're government funded. NPR's parent company, Corporation for Public Broadcasting, is also government funded. Neither of these funding points are debatable (aka Full stop).
- lamontcg 3y agoCorporations and institutions/foundations make up more than half of NPR's funding. And that exceeds the pledge drive funding, which collectively vastly exceeds the government funds they receive. When NPR runs their "ADM Supermarket to the World" spots, that is telling you who is really funding them and who to worry about exerting editorial control.
- MichaelZuo 3y agoAny entity created by an Act of Congress is by definition affiliated with the federal government.
- yufeng66 3y agoHudson's bay company is incorporated by English Royal charter in 1670. By definition it is a department store affiliated with the English king :)
- MichaelZuo 3y agoWith the Crown yes, not a particular individual. In fact there are still some families in Canada with noble titles, hearldry, etc., who are indeed affiliated with the Crown.
- guelo 3y agoThe label was "State Affiliated media" not "publicly funded".
- khochesh_kushat 3y agoThe label doesn't say anything about publishing or printing a newspaper, it says media. Social media is surely media?
- ramses0 3y ago"Sea Lion" comment/question. It's a distraction. http://wondermark.com/1k62/ http://wondermark.com/1k62/
- nailer 3y ago> > Why does it matter that their funding is disclosed to the reader? > It's a distraction. Categorizing an argument doesn't provide justification for that categorization.
- jmye 3y ago> If NPR's government contributions are embarrassing for the organisation, it might be best for them to forgo that funding. Ah, yes, the old "if I misrepresent the issue and assign a negative emotion to it, other people will see it as bad" trope. That's fun. Do you have any evidence they find the contributions "embarrassing" as opposed to finding the label an intentionally-misleading dog whistle? Or is that not something that occurred to you?
- kcplate 3y agoI don’t think this really answers the greater point that the commenter made though. Without the public funding, they wouldn’t have the label—-whether they deem it embarrassing or opposed to its perceived meaning.
- sonotathrowaway 3y agoIrrelevant and misleading. By Twitter’s own guidelines it’s not a state owned publisher.
- dragonwriter 3y ago> Twitter, SpaceX and Tesla are not newspapers/publishers. Twitter is a publisher, though (because of Section 230) they are not liable as a publisher for most of what they publish under US law.
- ideamotor 3y agoFunny
- hacktavist24 3y agoThis is true, but Elon Musk is, let's say, a producer of content that drives engagement on the platform that is Twitter. I'd say he gets enough tax breaks and such to qualify for a state shill label. That's not even considering his many years' long business affiliation with the Saudis, even before he decided to piss away 44 billion dollars to buy one of the world's largest megaphones.
- rakoo 3y agoTwitter chooses what to push in front or not, it absolutely is a publisher
- drtz 3y agoElon publishes commentary and opinions about policy and society to his Twitter account regularly. He probably has a much broader reach than NPR. To say he shouldn't be held to the same standards because he's not a "publisher" is laughable. Making NPR display its funding sources for all to see is a good thing (although "state-affiliated" was not the right label). Not making other high profile accounts do the same is pure hypocrisy.