save_ferris (u/save_ferris)

save_ferris commented on State-backed manipulation rampant on social media theconversation.com/trump... · Posted by u/docdeek

Dem_Boys · 5 years ago

Yes exactly!

And as you pointed out, some "bad actors" are not even bots, they are real people working on behalf of some organization.

It would be nice if more people were aware that the hyperbolic content they see on social media is possibly(probably?) either not a real person's thoughts, or has been influenced by some disingenuous source

save_ferris · 5 years ago

The problem is that many wouldn't believe it if they were told (i.e. "this is what big tech wants me to think"). This is essentially what happened when Facebook and Twitter informed users that had interacted with suspected propagandized content.

Particularly after this current purge, social media companies have lost most of their authoritative credibility. Combined with a political culture that embraces wild conspiracy theories, you'd just be adding fuel to the fire.

save_ferris commented on State-backed manipulation rampant on social media theconversation.com/trump... · Posted by u/docdeek

Dem_Boys · 5 years ago

Since the first day I meddled in creating online bots I've had the intuition that large scale manipulation was occurring. If a single developer can create a twitter bot in 4 hours that likes posts about a topic, then what could a large company, political party, or entire country do?

I've always thought "Well they're just manipulating online opinions" but the capital and blm riots have shown that online opinions can have real world impacts.

Family and friends often are distressed by the state of the world, where their view of the world is social media. But how much of social media is real? How many of the radical opinions expressed are made by real people? Of those real people, how many of them were influenced by bots or "computational propaganda"?

I believe that we, even really smart engineers, are easier to influence that we want to believe

save_ferris · 5 years ago

> But how much of social media is real?

One of the biggest problems with social media is the fact that social media companies are financially incentivized to keep the public at large from knowing. Twitter has long refused to answer exactly how many of its users are bots as a percentage of its user base, Facebook did the absolute bare minimum in cooperating with Senate Intelligence in 2017 relating to Russian propaganda, etc.

Kara Swisher said it best in an interview with Preet Bharara around the time of the Russian propaganda scandal: "The Russians didn't hack into Facebook and manipulate its servers. They were users of Facebook, they were users of Twitter. They used these platforms exactly the way they were designed to be used."

save_ferris commented on Visa and Plaid Abandon Merger After Antitrust Division’s Suit to Block justice.gov/opa/pr/visa-a... · Posted by u/0xedb

jamestimmins · 5 years ago

Whatever you think about Visa or this merger, this would be a major disappoint to Plaid's team members who thought they were in for a huge financial windfall.

If that applies to anyone here, my sympathies and best of luck figuring out what's next for Plaid. Hopefully the morale hit isn't too big on the team.

save_ferris · 5 years ago

The vast majority of tech workers that receive equity stakes in pre-IPO/acquisition companies don't ever see any financial windfall from their stakes. These guys will be just fine.

save_ferris commented on We need a new media system taibbi.substack.com/p/we-... · Posted by u/undefined1

jancsika · 5 years ago

Axois seems to do a decent job.

However, if you watch their interviews, for example, you quickly realize the problem isn't maintaining veracity as a fair source of news. The problem is if the reporters remain intrepid (as they currently seem to be), the people they interview-- like Ted Cruz-- end up looking like complete dumbasses. I'm honestly surprised they continue to get interviews with prominent figures.

That, to me, is the bigger problem. There are plenty of partisan pundits who feel comfortable appearing on the "other" cable news to play the wrestling villain. Nearly none of them will ever appear on Democracy Now, for example, because Amy will:

1. not negotiate ground rules for the interview in advance

2. ask occasional follow-up questions

Amy Goodman clearly sits pretty far on the left. But those two simple rules essentially made her as much of a nuisance to Bill Clinton as to George Bush. (And if you haven't heard it, go on youtube and watch her grill Clinton when he was attempting to campaign during Hilary's Senate run on Democracy Now.)

And that's the bigger issue. I don't really care whether some pundit reinforces my worldview or not. I care whether they fold under pressure when an intrepid reporter reveals they don't know what they're talking about. The problem with MSNBC/Fox/CNN is they don't usually (or even consistently) apply that pressure. (And sometimes actively suppress it, e.g., not telling their audience that one of their military analysts who is arguing for an invasion is also a board member of a defense contractor that would benefit from the invasion.)

Edit: clarifications

save_ferris · 5 years ago

This is so true, and it doesn't get discussed enough. Folks like Medhi Hassan and Jonathan Swan are a completely different kind of journalist than most of the folks that occupy the airwaves, and it's really frustrating to watch the news when you know people like that are setting a much higher bar than everyone else.

save_ferris commented on We need a new media system taibbi.substack.com/p/we-... · Posted by u/undefined1

Meekro · 5 years ago

The most popular podcaster right now is Joe Rogan, who does 2-3 hour interviews. Doesn't the popularity of his content suggest that Americans are very interested in higher level discourse, but have long been denied it?

save_ferris · 5 years ago

> Doesn't the popularity of his content suggest that Americans are very interested in higher level discourse, but have long been denied it?

This is probably true to degree, although Rogan specifically is a pretty polarizing example due to his proclivity for hosting guests that aren't always welcome elsewhere. It's hard to say how much of his popularity is due to his interview style versus his politics. I also expect that the demographic breakdown of podcast listeners aren't reflective of the country as a whole, it probably skews a bit younger.

Long-form interviews with political leaders aren't a new genre, I suspect they just don't get as much attention as the more soundbite-y forms of news, but I could be wrong.

save_ferris commented on We need a new media system taibbi.substack.com/p/we-... · Posted by u/undefined1

save_ferris · 5 years ago

Nonprofit news organizations are a thing and I've been incredibly positive about their future (full disclosure: I used to work for a nonprofit publication).

The nonprofit model encourages much more direct community engagement through conferences, festivals, and long-form interviews with local, state and national leaders.

A major hurdle that nonprofit and higher-quality news outlets face is that the major media players have dopamine-driven news down to a science, and it's a lot easier to consume a small and practically meaningless soundbyte than it is to sit and listen to a politician have a challenging discussion with an interviewer for an hour. The attention span of the average American isn't equipped for higher-level discourse as it's not nearly as exciting and rage-inducing as watching CNN/FOX/ABC/??? network.

save_ferris commented on Governments spurred the rise of solar power economist.com/technology-... · Posted by u/jakozaur

brendoelfrendo · 5 years ago

> It's frustrating to see that a private company's bad behavior wound up being a stain for the government like this.

Definitely! Sorry if I came across as defensive, I'm just used to people using Solyndra to criticize the whole program. On the whole, the DOE made a big impact. It's just disappointing that one bad actor reduced that impact by turning into a political hot potato.

save_ferris · 5 years ago

Not at all! Nothing to apologize for, I remember when that whole situation blew up very well. And I completely agree with you.

save_ferris commented on Governments spurred the rise of solar power economist.com/technology-... · Posted by u/jakozaur

brendoelfrendo · 5 years ago

I'm not sure your point in bringing up Solyndra; with that notable exception, the fed's investments in renewables turned a decent profit. It's actually a problem, in hindsight: the program was supposed to take risks on innovative ideas and companies that would be difficult to find via traditional channels, but Solyndra had such a chilling effect that the DOE stopped taking those risks.

save_ferris · 5 years ago

Yeah, I meant to add the caveat that it was one of the most publicly notable government energy investments for the simple fact that it ended up in scandal, since many aren't even aware that the government invests in companies like this. I wasn't trying to criticize the initiative.

> Solyndra had such a chilling effect that the DOE stopped taking those risks.

It's frustrating to see that a private company's bad behavior wound up being a stain for the government like this.

save_ferris commented on Governments spurred the rise of solar power economist.com/technology-... · Posted by u/jakozaur

socrates1998 · 5 years ago

The problem with this idea that we subsidized solar until it was profitable is not accurate.

Solar power doesn't pollute and I would argue that all other forms of power that do pollute aren't taxed nearly enough for it, with coal being the most obvious example.

Coal power sends an insane amount of carbon into the atmosphere. If we properly carbon-taxed coal, it would go out of business tomorrow. And that doesn't even get into the environmental destruction that comes from strip mining.

Strip mining is when coal companies buy a whole fucking mountain and then destroy it piece by piece to remove the coal. How the fuck is that not good for the environment and our society after the coal is gone?

So, solar power really is a lot of cheaper than coal when you consider all the negative externalities that it brings.

save_ferris · 5 years ago

Solar didn't magically just appear on the market at a lower price point than carbon-based resources though, it had to go through several iterations which required significant investment capital. This is usually where government agencies like DOE leverage their capital investment programs because private business aren't interested in paying for the R&D to solve those kinds of big problems without a guaranteed success.

Solar is only becoming cheaper today because of the research and capital that was put into developing the technology, not because it's inherently cleaner than coal. To your point, based purely on the market forces (i.e. excluding carbon taxes) coal is still a very viable option. And if the government is motivated to migrate businesses off of dirty energy resources, it also has a motivation to help develop alternatives that the market will accept.

Solyndra[0] was one example of a company that received government support to develop solar technology and became notorious for defrauding the government in the process.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solyndra

save_ferris commented on Stripe bans Trump campaign axios.com/payment-process... · Posted by u/benguillet

johndevor · 5 years ago

> Freedom of speech has nothing to do with newspapers or news, and never has done.

If somebody speaks in the woods, and there's nobody there to hear it, do they make a sound?

Yes, they technically have free speech, but in reality not really.

The purpose of speech is that you might persuade somebody else. If there's nobody to talk to, you might as well not speak at all.

save_ferris · 5 years ago

Freedom of speech as laid out in the 1st amendment protects individuals from being arrested or censored by the government for speech. It does not protect individuals who violate the TOS of a private company, nor does it provide blanket protection in all cases of speech. Inciting violence and making false statements of fact are not protected forms of speech under US law[0]

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech_in_the_Unite...