Democrats paid Facebook to censor discussions about covid vaccines and Hunter's laptop.)

In the case of Twitter, I got the impression that they just did it by being asked and they did it for free. Maybe the investigative reporters left out
the money part, or maybe I just missed it, but that is the impression I got.


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Mike Powell wrote to AARON THOMAS <=-

Democrats paid Facebook to censor discussions about covid vaccines and Hunter's laptop.)

In the case of Twitter, I got the impression that they just did it by being asked and they did it for free. Maybe the investigative
reporters left out the money part, or maybe I just missed it, but that
is the impression I got.

That's probably what they can prove. Payments to a company can take many forms. "Tax breaks", Refunds for "research", etc. I highly doubt you'll find a note that says "censorship".

Just like you won't find a "donation" to the Clinton Foundation for "changing U.S. policy on xxx", yet I'm sure that happened too.


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Democrats paid Facebook to censor discussions about covid vaccines and Hunter's laptop.)

In the case of Twitter, I got the impression that they just did it by being asked and they did it for free. Maybe the investigative reporters left out the money part, or maybe I just missed it, but that is the impression I got.

I got that impression also, at the time, but I'm on the hunt for some unobvious motive. There's got to be a reason for their participation (facebook, twitter, etc.) I can speculate about it all day, because there are a lot of scenarios to consider, but that's a secret that they're keeping quite well.

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I got that impression also, at the time, but I'm on the hunt for some unobvious
motive. There's got to be a reason for their participation (facebook, twitter, >tc.) I can speculate about it all day, because there are a lot of scenarios to >onsider, but that's a secret that they're keeping quite well.

As Ron pointed out, it would be easy enough for them to get paid in some indirect form that would be difficult to isolate.


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I got that impression also, at the time, but I'm on the hunt for some >unobvious
motive. There's got to be a reason for their participation (facebook, twi >tc.) I can speculate about it all day, because there are a lot of scenari >onsider, but that's a secret that they're keeping quite well.

As Ron pointed out, it would be easy enough for them to get paid in some indirect form that would be difficult to isolate.

Yes. And the payment can potentially be non-monetary as well.

I read that the EU has recently passed a law that's "intended" to prevent harmful information from being distributed online.

What I read and what I understand are often 2 different things. In this case, I understand that the EU's intention is to deputize search engines with the authority to decide which content is "harmful" and which content is "safe," which IMO is the opposite of making anyone "safe."

Perhaps this is one example of the types of "payments" being made from government to the media. (Social media in this case.)

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Yes. And the payment can potentially be non-monetary as well.

Very true!

I read that the EU has recently passed a law that's "intended" to prevent harm
l information from being distributed online.

What I read and what I understand are often 2 different things. In this case, understand that the EU's intention is to deputize search engines with the auth
ity to decide which content is "harmful" and which content is "safe," which IM
is the opposite of making anyone "safe."

Perhaps this is one example of the types of "payments" being made from governm
t to the media. (Social media in this case.)

Could be. I believe it is this same law that they are threatening to use against Twitter because they have rejected their "deputy" status. The EU believes it to be mandatory to accept it.

I must admit that I didn't not use Twitter much before so it may have been
just as much of a cesspool then (just mostly left leaning), but it is
currently very rife with misinformation. One thing that bothers me about
it is that Elon complained about "fake accounts" when he tried to back out
of buying the platform. From first-hand experience, I can tell you there
are a bunch of fake accounts out there now. Some are set up to look just
like the real one, the only difference being the missing blue checkmark.

There is a fake Tulsi Gabbard account, a fake Lauren Boebert account, at
least one fake Trump account, and also at least one fake Elon Musk account.
In the case of Musk, that account is marked "parody," but they all use the same profile picture and other information as the legit accounts.

Facebook is also rife with recently-created fake accounts. I believe in free speach, but Twitter (and ALL social media) could fix a lot of the misinformation issues by using better account verification methods, and by being more vigilent with removing fakes.


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Perhaps this is one example of the types of "payments" being made from governm
t to the media. (Social media in this case.)

Could be. I believe it is this same law that they are threatening to use against Twitter because they have rejected their "deputy" status. The EU believes it to be mandatory to accept it.

I suspect that both Musk and the EU are full of it, and that they just want to create the illusion of them being at odds, to get conservatives to trust Musk's "Freedom of speech" X even more than they already do.

is currently very rife with misinformation. One thing that bothers me about it is that Elon complained about "fake accounts" when he tried to back out of buying the platform. From first-hand experience, I can tell

There's no way to protect people from ignorance. Do they think they're going to hold our hand while we browse the internet? They don't seem to mind when the news media lies to us, so what harm can a few Nigerian scam artists really do?

Important information should only come from the government (websites with .gov domains for example.) Anything that don't come from whitehouse.gov or yourstate.gov, should be discredited by our built-in BS detectors.

Or do we need to regulate businesses to accommodate all the Jeffs of the world?

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is currently very rife with misinformation. One thing that bothers me about it is that Elon complained about "fake accounts" when he tried to back out of buying the platform. From first-hand experience, I can tell

There's no way to protect people from ignorance. Do they think they're going t
hold our hand while we browse the internet? They don't seem to mind when the n
s media lies to us, so what harm can a few Nigerian scam artists really do?

My thinking is that fake accounts don't have the right of free speech and
can be used to lure minors into things so it is best if they are culled
out. A very recent example causing issues in Lexington is a Tik-Tok
challenge encouraging youngsters to try to hotwire cars.

Important information should only come from the government (websites with .gov
omains for example.) Anything that don't come from whitehouse.gov or yourstate
ov, should be discredited by our built-in BS detectors.

Yet there are those here, and many other places, who will tell you that the government is full of it and that is the last place you should look. Those people are often conservatives, so who do you trust?

Or do we need to regulate businesses to accommodate all the Jeffs of the world

I am not so concerned about adults as children, so I think it is worthwhile
to remove fake accounts while still allowing free speech.

That said, I do believe that many *REAL* people don't realize that a lot of what they say and do online is the modern equivalent to yelling "FIRE!" in a crowded theatre, which is not a protected use of freedom of speech.


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My thinking is that fake accounts don't have the right of free speech and can be used to lure minors into things so it is best if they are culled out. A very recent example causing issues in Lexington is a Tik-Tok challenge encouraging youngsters to try to hotwire cars.

I appreciate your concern for the children. But should the government be expected to protect children online? They haven't done a good job of that since day 1.

The government continues to fail to protect children in a variety of ways (school shootings, suggestive selling of sex change surgery, allowing suspected terrorists into the country, lowering punishments for pedophiles, etc.) So wouldn't it be suspicious and wouldn't it be a clear lack of prioritization skills for them to suddenly care so much about something pertaining to social media exchanges?

For those reasons, it seems clear to me that this is their reaction to concern about people discussing and discovering their evil plans.

It's like me saying "I'm gonna clean the bottoms of my sneakers today."

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No, I believe that social media companies should crack down on fake accounts. Not sure where this tangent came from.

I appreciate your concern for the children. But should the government be expected to protect children online? They haven't done a good job of that since day 1.

The government continues to fail to protect children in a variety of ways (school shootings, suggestive selling of sex change surgery, allowing suspected terrorists into the country, lowering punishments for pedophiles, etc.) So wouldn't it be suspicious and wouldn't it be a clear lack of prioritization skills for them to suddenly care so much about something pertaining to social media exchanges?

For those reasons, it seems clear to me that this is their reaction to concern about people discussing and discovering their evil plans.

It's like me saying "I'm gonna clean the bottoms of my sneakers today."

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No, I believe that social media companies should crack down on fake accounts. Not sure where this tangent came from.

You want social media to crack down on fake accounts, and the EU wants that also. But why should Facebook (for example) be held responsible for a fake account that hurts Shell Oil (for example) ?

If people go to shell.com, they can expect official word from Shell Oil. If they go to Facebook.com, there should be no expectation of official word from Shell Oil; unless someone is that much of an idiot, that they get all their facts from facebook.com

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Aaron Thomas wrote to Mike Powell <=-

I appreciate your concern for the children. But should the government
be expected to protect children online? They haven't done a good job of that since day 1.

But seeing how most people in gov't today are peophiles, that doesn't surprise me.



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Aaron Thomas wrote to Mike Powell <=-

You want social media to crack down on fake accounts, and the EU wants that also. But why should Facebook (for example) be held responsible
for a fake account that hurts Shell Oil (for example) ?

For the same reason credit card companies pushed responsibility for credit card fraud down to the retailers. The retailers are in a position to do something about it, while it's much harder for the credit card companies to do something.

Put the pain on the group that can actually do something and something will be done.


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