https://www.reddit.com/r/censorship/comments/1hffejc/do_transparency_bills_like_this_actually_fix/
created by chirag710-reddit on 16/12/2024 at 09:24 UTC
7 upvotes, 4 top-level comments (showing 4)
I’ve been thinking a lot about this new bill Senator Eric Schmitt proposed, the one about forcing federal agencies to report any deals or collusion with social media companies. It sounds great on paper, right? Transparency is good, sure.
But I can’t help feeling like these moves don’t address the deeper problem. Even if the government stops meddling, isn’t social media still a centralized system that controls what we see? algorithms bury what doesn’t serve their goals, and we don’t even know who’s pulling the strings most of the time. It’s like fixing a leaky pipe but ignoring the fact that the whole house is flooded.
Honestly I don’t know if i am being cynical, or are we just slapping Band-Aids on bigger problems here? I’d love to hear if anyone else feels the same, or if I’m missing the point entirely.
Comment by chirag700 at 16/12/2024 at 16:00 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I totally agree that centralised systems are still a huge issue even with transparency bills. We are at the mercy of algorithms and gatekeeper. This is why forums built on decentralisation are gaining traction and they give power back to the user. So recently I came across one which is known as Olas I think everyone here should check them out cause they are doing a brilliant job here and it is great for the community. I would say
Comment by munken_drunkey at 17/12/2024 at 02:15 UTC
1 upvotes, 3 direct replies
But how else could it work? The 1st amendment only forbids the government from interfering in free speech. A private business can be as opinionated or as unfair as it wants.
Comment by Fluffy_Philosophy840 at 17/12/2024 at 06:42 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I used to amend links to people about these things some time ago - and I’m just realizing how long ago it was… (of course most of these things are nearly impossible to find on line now)
In 2017 the House and Senate intelligence committees both (at the time both by each party so it was somewhat bipartisan) were looking into the Russian disinformation campaigns - which yes that happened. And they tasked an organization called - you just can’t make this up - the “Global Network Initiative” made up of social media companies common to the U.S. Canada the UK and EU (which were the same at the time) to ahhh “Do more” about misinformation and disinformation on the platforms. Not unlike what they do in other countries at the behest of those countries - like China, Jordan Or Saudi Arabia or say Russia. Where there are completely different versions of those apps isolated and fully censored.
In the U.S. however where we have the first amendment… But they can - compel those companies to comply… So they sent them all out looking for disinformation. To “identify- redirect and delete” And they didn’t have to look very much further than the 2018 midterms that were ongoing at the time… The identified - redirected and in a few cases deleted the accounts of a number of US politicians. And boy were they pissed! I can still hear Lindsey Grahams effeminate hissy fit in my heads. “Who elected you?!?” Dragging a sweaty Zuckerberg into public hearings. And Twitter and all the rest of them. And threatened the rewriting of section 230 of the CDA unless they complied. And knew that US politicians were not the “disinformation” they were tasked to be looking for and quashing.
That was also the first time I heard of AI and its potential use of scouring the internet minutia for content and communications not just for foreign actors- but domestic discourse as well. Prior the social media sites had no interest whatsoever in moderation of content and communications. Because it costs them money to do so. And of course stifles free speech… The seconds intent of them in the first place. The primary intent being making and maintaining MONEY. But with the threat of the senate rewriting of the business model of the internet and subjecting them to endless lawsuits for 3rd and 4th party content (to include this comment here). Instead of the ‘carrot on a stick’ method. Congress used the flip the table over and beat you with a bat method of gangster blackmail methods.
Lindsey Graham has a pseudo-sexual kink with dragging Zuckerberg specifically into congress for public flogging ever since. And the main reason Dorsey stepped away from Twitter. And the levels of censorship have expanded from election related to pandemic to general social discourse ever since. And yes political dissent and criticism was the first to go just shortly after banning certain foreign government sites like RT. But what’s worse is it fostered q-anon because that was somehow ‘protected’… And we had to wait for the largest source of mis and disinformation to leave the office of president for just Twitter account to be closed… And now Musk apparently doesn’t have to adhere to the DHS directives…
Anyway that’s the short version of the last eight years of social engineering and manipulation of social discourse.
Comment by StraightedgexLiberal at 17/12/2024 at 23:13 UTC
0 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Collusion is not a crime and Eric and his dumb Republican buddies spent a year suing Joe Biden and lost in the Supreme Court (Murthy v. Missouri)