Facebook still has unintended bias (against conservatives) from living inside its own "Klein bottle" bubble

Senator Jon Kyl (T-AZ) has issued a “Covington Interim Report” concerning Facebook’s internal audit of whether it is biased against conservatives.  Note that the PDF was uploaded to a wordpress.com subsite – interesting to know that this can be done.  

  

Much of the apparent censorship seems circumstantial.  Well-intended policies to limit bullying, or to discourage the streaming of violent acts or hate, may be more likely to affect some conservatives in today’s political climate. Some of the content moderation would be viewed as acceptable under normal interpretation of Section 230.

For example, showing medical tubes attached to bodies would allow pro-life groups to present some additional material.

Politico describes the report in an article by Steven Overly. 

Politico mentions the non-profit “Color of Change”, as critical of FB for not recognizing hidden, stochastic dangers really dependent on race. I generally don’t get involved with groups that try to claim enhanced group-level oppression and focus on groups and not individuals.

  

Jon Kyl also has an article in the Wall Street Journal Wednesday, “Why conservatives don’t trust Facebook”. 

  

Facebook is so deeply in its pseudo-theological bubble that it can’t see out of it. “Bias doesn’t mean intent”.

I do think the issue I ran into in the fall of 2018 promoting my article on the power grid on my Facebook page had something to do with the belief it was “conservative”.  Also the prodding to run fundraisers for non-profits.

R. Derek Black's narrative; tribalism on the far Left shadows the far right with different parameters

Here are a couple of stories concerning R. Derek Black, raised and home-schooled by a white supremacist. 

  

The NPR story (Sept 2018) traces his own change of heart, once he left home, but explains the roots of the ideology. 

On Monday Aug 12, Derek had an opinion piece in USA Today, page 9A, about El Paso and how his origins think about the incident.

He says his own family isn’t guiltless, and neither is Donald Trump. He also says that the W.S. “movement” is in disarray and disintegrating into lone wolf actors.

But he also refers to the successive de-platformings and even payment processor and bank account terminations which have happened not only to organizations or groups but also to individuals sometimes believed incorrectly to be associated with the “movement”.  In fact, with the individuals involved, none of them (except maybe for Richard Spencer) advocate ethnic homelands (following the model of the Middle East).  A few of them, while conservative, actually have supported LGBTQ equality.

In the post yesterday, I talked about the ideas of Herbert Marcuse, and his idea that free speech is a kind of control for those already having privilege, and that being oppressed is a virtue that justifies revolution and taking back power. The idea sounds literally like the “dictatorship of the proletariat” in Leninism, and shows a parallel between European authoritarianism in World War II (Fascism v Communism) and a comparable shadow today, where various groups claim they are entitled to take what is theirs (although the extreme right has the additional historical strike of slavery and segregation on the books).

   

There are disturbing situations going on known to me, where there is a lot of “guilt by association”.  I still believe that any ideology can be presented in public, even Marcuse’s, even if the latter could be dangerous to me personally.
  
 Black may not be quite right on the "very fine people on both sides" thing with Charlottesville;  PragerU explained that (cf blog, Aug. 11)

Marcuse, asymmetry, and the modern "regressive Left": they can remold the world in such a way I don't belong in it

Why is the “regressive Left” so intolerant of normal free speech of others, even of moderates? 

   

There are many papers around that trace the ideology to philosophy professor Herbert Marcuse and the Frankfurt School.  For example, consider Dinesh D’Souza in the Daily Signal.  Ulysses Alvarez Laviada (who apparently likes gender fluidity personally) has an even more detailed explanation on Medium.  This seems to describe a very dangerous ideology indeed. 

     

The basic idea seems to be existential.  The “oppressed” (whether a religious, racial, sexual, or simply exploited worker minority) must become combative in order to survive. Once there is a privileged, oppressing class exploiting visible minorities (which may be race-based, or may be just class, as with the original Russian revolutions), tolerance and free speech become tools for staying in power and retaining order.

You see this in arguments and tweets (some sent to me) which maintain that the lower-level left-wing violence (Antifa groups) is acceptable because the extreme right creates a much bigger threat for loss of life or further abuse of already oppressed groups. So the “both sides” depiction falls apart.  Moderate speakers and journalists are hounded to put down their pens and take action and join fights for the oppressed.  Journalism gets viewed as violating Burning Man’s “no spectators”, or “skin in the game” moral paradigms.

Another way to put it, is that (in the view of the authoritarian Left) being oppressed makes you morally superior and automatically gives you reparative privileges.  To counter oppressive speech, you are allowed some violence, and it isn’t nihilistic.

Once there is this kind of asymmetry in the way different groups in society function, free speech comes to be seen as destabilizing.  That’s why China is now a fairly successful and stable country now for most of its people, as it suppresses speech (Hong Kong extradition now) and urges citizens to mind their own local business in collectives.  I wouldn’t want to live there.  But it makes some sense.

  

On my first job as a young adult, at RCA in Princeton NJ (David Sarnoff Labs) in Princeton NJ in 1970, I had a co-worker who liked to talk about Marcuse.  He was straight and married, but noted that men can only “shake hands” to interact. In 1972, I ran into Marcuse-like ideas at the People's Party of New Jersey, that made no bones about revolution in private meetings and saw me as an oppressor for merely being employed as a "salaried professional".  In 1973, I came out again. 

New York Times LTE's suggest that journalism is public service and could be supported by philanthropy

The New York Times has useful LTE’s today to a weekend (Aug 4) column “A Future Without a Front Page” (Steve Waldman, Charkes Sennott) which describes local journalism as national service, with an effort called “Report for America”. This is certainly interesting, and it may be an opportunity I should look into given my current circumstances, described before.

One of the LTE’s says that philanthropy should support journalism.  It discusses the Charles F. Revson Foundation. 

Another, noting Youngstown, Ohio’s loss of a paper (I was recently there, or in Warren) suggests that laws need to change to make it easier for newspapers to become non-profits.

  

Again, I have worked, “for free”, almost, on my own in retirement and even I am “accused” of low-balling non-profits and professional journalists.  That is one of the reasons for what is going on in the EU with the Copyright Directive, same model.  On the other hand, consider the open access debate (Saturday).

FCC fines Jimmy Kimmel for fake "emergency broadcast" intended to make fun of Trump

The FCC has fined Jimmy Kimmel over $400000 for broadcasting an emergency broadcast tone as a jole when there was no emergency, as a way to make fun of Donald Trump. The same has happened with "The Walking Dead". 

This is illegal over broadcast or cable services.  Buzzfeed News reported the story, and the FCC has a specific warning.  It could cause confusion among consumers and emergency services.  I don't know if this applies to social media livestreams, but it probably does. 

    

But the incident does underscore the concern some people may have over giving the FCC more censorship powers in Trump’s proposed executive order.

Elsevier subscription costs for academic journals now a challenge to universities

In July, The University of California terminated discussions about subscription from Reed Elsevier, the Books in Print people, over high subscription rates.  The UC says this is very difficult for professors, students (both graduate and undergraduate) and possibly other community efforts like science fairs (as Jack Andraka – now at Stanford – has often argued with many tweets and public talks and in the film “Science Fair”).

The UC July link leads to a second article at UC August 2, which is quite detailed as to discussions and the use of copyright law.

  

The San Jose Mercury News had reported this matter in detail in March.
  
Tom Donoghue has an important tweet on his own research being affected. 

Legacy publishers, as well as independent creators, now complain about advertiser (keyword-based) blacklists on controversial or important news content

The Wall Street Journal notes in a story by Suzanne Vranica (front page) that “Advertiser blacklists hobble publishers”.  

Advertisers have long lists of keywords that they don’t want to appear in articles (online or possibly print) next to ads.

One of the most commonly banned words is “Trump”.

  

David Pakman and to some extent Tim Pool and Ford Fischer have repeatedly noted that YouTube has shunned monetizing issue- or politically oriented videos from independent creators in favor of legacy media (which is more likely to be leftist but does include Fox).  But the Wall Street Journal article maintains that newspapers and legacy larger media companies are now having a problem with getting ads placed near important news stories. 
    
Some publishers (like Vice Media) are starting to refuse blacklists of some words, especially those relating to LGBTQ content or to faith-based content. 

  

  

On Blogger, I have found more posts don't get ads in the past two or three years.  But some posts with very sensitive content still do.  I segregate some of the most sensitive content to twp separate blogs ("cf" and "fil") to reduce the effect. 
 
What seems so notable to me is that the corporate world (including the social media companies) are uncomfortable that so many “intellectuals” and “individualists” (who like to spout their theories on YouTube and blogs) have decreasing interest in consumerism, social solidarity, and often organized charity.  I noticed this in the job market as early as maybe 2002 and the following years, where I would be contacted to see if I wanted to sell life insurance (and other financial things) since I had spent 12 years in IT in the business, and were met with a degree of diffidence from me.  Wasn’t that my expertise?

  

This is also a good time to make a note about YouTube subscriptions.  David Pakman has noted that some of them “disappear”.  Subscriptions only through YouTube don’t result in charges.  If you “subscribe” through Patreon or Subscribestar, then you are charged, which on many channels allows you to see additional content.  Other channels don’t to this, and regard this as a form of crowdfunding.  A number of months ago, the banning of some persons from Patreon and the difficulties Subscribestar had getting allowed to use payment processors when persons kicked off Patreon tried to use it, created controversy last winter and now has resulted in some FTC investigation. But the difference between truly paying for content and offering patronage could itself become controversial in the future, and I expect to get into this again.  Having a single corporate sponsor for a video is a way to "pay" for it, perhaps more legitimate than "clickbait" advertising. 
  
Update: Aug. 18 

Here's a story from the Guardian on how the "Advertising Standards Authority" in the UK banned ads for Philadelphia Cream Cheese and Volkswagen for "gender stereotyping." 

Tumblr sold by Verizon to Wordpress owner for almost nothing

Verizon is selling the blogging platform Tumblr to Automattic, the owner of Wordpress, for a very nominal amount.  The Verge story by Julia Alexander is here.  

Tumblr was known for terse, photo-heavy personal blogs.  But in December it attracted attention when it decided to ban “adult” content, which was thought to hurt LGBTQ creators.

  

  

It’s a good question, whether the platform will be combined with Wordpress technically, with some sort of plugin manipulation.  Will Tumblr users be offered a conversion tool to convert to Wordpress? 

  

When AOL discontinued Hometown in 2007, Blogger offered a conversion tool.

But it is hard to see how free Blogging platforms make money in the age of social media.

YouTube seems to be inconsistent on demonetization, giving slack to biggest independent creators

The Washington Post, in an article by Elizabeth Dwoskin, reports on YouTube’s inconsistent moderation and monetization standards, and maintains big stars like Pewdiepie and Logan Paul get “wrist slaps” and are allowed to go back to their usual business because they generate so much revenue for YouTube.  

ArsTechnica has a similar article here. 

The article also describes the difficulties in content moderation, which is becoming unsustainable.
  

Another problem is inconsistent culture.  Probably a majority of mainstream adult viewers are not offended or very sensitive to videos that marginalized communities call out. Pewdiepie is a good example, as most viewers see his games and animation as satire or plain entertainment and don’t see it as prodding the right wing. It’s hard work to be a consistent entertainer who can bring in so much revenue with video that is of good technical quality. OK, Logan Paul wants do push hyper-masculinity.  Maybe some of us need that.  Prager U will approve. 

The article also notes that the FTC is already regulating some social media issues (despite the controversy over Trump’s intended executive order, yesterday’s post).

David Pakman, in particular, has noted that YouTube seems to be trying to drive viewers to “ad safe” content from larger companies and legacy creators.  But there also seems to be an underlying political motivation.  There is a belief that independent creators are diluting viewer hours and causing layoffs and job losses in more guilded legacy companies.  Non-profits and activists, especially on the left, complain that independent creators dilute activism and solidarity and tend to get in the way of getting political change to happen.  YouTube (and Facebook, recently, too, with its plan to have a legacy news page and to make its normal user interaction more ephemeral) seem to be taking the position that “do it yourself” activism may not be such a good thing and that people with strong egos need to reconsider their priorities.

Tim Pool (Timcast) also weighs in here. He mentions low-profile conservatives getting banned. That can happen to me, although I have an "unusual" business model which refuses to "play ball" with conventional activists (who really want me to join them). 

Trump considers Executive Order putting the FCC in charge of monitoring social media censorship

Trump is reportedly considering issuing an executive order that would place regulation of Internet monitoring by large social media sites under the FCC or FTC. 

The order reportedly claims to protect speakers from unreasonable censorship (especially of conservatives, in practice).

  

Brian Fung has a discussion of the order on CNN Business. 

Fight for the Future (known for its opposition to Trump’s rolling back net neutrality) is claiming that the XO would enable any censorship Trump wants, petition site. 

Gizmodo expresses similar concerns in an article by Melanie Ehrenkranz and suggests that social networks might actually shut down with greatly weakened Section 230.  But it is hard to see how the FCC could really do very much with this bureaucracy.

EFF notes a recent Second Circuit ruling (Sophia Cope and Aaron Mackey) that says Section 230 protects Facebook from downstream liability in a case involving Hamas.  Other circuit rulings cited were weaker and predicated on the credibility of specific claims of harms. 

Americans arrested abroad for social media or other online content; how big a problem?

The Washington Post, in a story by Sudarsan Raghavan, reports that a dual American citizen Egyptian national Reem Mohamed Desouky, who works as a teacher in Lancaster PA, was arrested and detained in Cairo when she arrived with her 13 year old son, for “administering social media accounts critical of the regime”.

Egypt, like many authoritarian countries, has strict laws against criticizing the regime, believing that “free speech” leads to uncontrollable civil unrest. It has arrested other travelers, as from Lebanon.  What is less clear is if it would arrest Americans or foreigners who are not Egyptian. 

The question needs to be asked before traveling to any authoritarian country.

There would also be a question as to whether this policy applies only to major social media platforms, but also to hosted websites.

  

  

For example, I might be arrested if I traveled to one of these countries (or tried to visit China) as it would be simple for authorities to check my “online reputation” in search engines.

  

Since I have announced a massive scale-back of my online presence to happen at the end of 2021 (in about 28 months) travel to these countries might be conceivable afterwards.  But the Internet archive could also be checked.

   

It’s worth looking at the video above to know whether you can be prosecuted for violations of US laws when traveling overseas (if you are from the US). Sometimes you can.

European limits on free speech and campus attitudes affecting social media companies big time

Melissa Eddy and Aurelien Breeden have a thoughtful article on p. A12 of the New York Times on Wednesday, Aug. 8, “Studying Europe’s Laws After Manifestos Revive the Free Speech Debate”, or, online, “The El Paso Shooting Revived the Free Speech Debate; Europe Has Limits”, link. 

“Free speech” is supposed to be a human right in Germany and France but the constitutions allow more explicit limitations on speech. European law tends to ban speech intended to provoke hatred for members of specific groups.  Marine Le Pen, who was a candidate for prime minister, is now being prosecuted for disseminating hateful messages available to a minor (like the former US COPA law) when she posted images of ISIS violence on Twitter.

But members of groups comprising people who feel they are marginalized and unable to compete as individuals because of group prejudice, want to shut down exposure to speech that they see as hurtful.  This is sometimes particularly true with gender and sexuality related issues.  We’ve gotten familiar with the problems of “speech codes” and “microaggressions” from woke universities, and these are affecting the perception of what should be acceptable speech in social media or even constitutionally protected in some countries.  These in turn affect what speech social media companies and advertisers see as acceptable in the US, because content is seen abroad.

  

Groups even see some legitimate topics, like population demographics or low birth rates in some countries, as motivated by racism, at least indirectly.   Such views could inhibit necessary discussion of what is behind anti-gay laws or beliefs in countries like Poland and Russia, where there a low birthrate issues and “replacement” fears in some right-wing groups.

Update: later Aug 8

Ben Collins of NBCNews reports that the White House will meet with tech executives on online extremism Friday Aug 9, link. 

NYTimes offers pessimistic view of how to deal with (especially right wing) domestic extremism

I discussed the NYTimes editorial on the Issues blog, but now I see the NYTimes print headline that produced outrage, “Trump urges unity vs. racism”, link.  (Umair Haque continued this story on Medium.)

  

The New York Times continues a discussion which, in my own setup, I placed first on my “Bill on Major Issues” blog Sunday, with an article by Nicole Perlroth et al 

The article is correct in that in practice it is harder for law enforcement and the criminal justice system to ferret out true terror dangers from white supremacy than it was for radical Islam, because the former is closer to our own political power center, and because of the “stochastic terrorism” risk inherent in memes, dog whistles (which change) and the difficulties in drawing lines as to what is acceptable behavior, where attitudes about personal association are less private in the Internet age and can have insidious public consequences.

It’s also true that gun control alone will not remove threats which could be carried out in other ways (in Japan there was an arson incident; in Sweden, as Tim Pool has pointed out, there have been grenades). But there is no excuse for Congress’s not implementing some reasonable gun control reforms.

The article mentions that the scale of tech platforms makes it impossible to draw lines effectively in policing inciteful speech, and that the supposed tech prejudice against conservatives may be deceptive because the extreme right generally has more capacity to create extreme damage than the extreme left (Antifa notwithstanding, or even Dayton).

Tim Pool, above, refutes Trump's placing emphasis on the "dangers" of video games.  Pewdiepie and Minecraft are not a problem. 

The problem does have to do with the problems with a hyperindividualistic society in which many people simply cannot function as expected, so they tend to rejoin tribes where they find more sense of purpose.  Our problems may not be so much with racism as with cognitive ableism.

Update:  Aug 9

The Wall Street Journal offers an op-ed by Clint Watts as a Saturday essay on how to fight specifically bottom-up domestic terrorism. It notes that extremists have been driven into corners by major social media. 

Update: Aug 12

From USA Today, here is an op-ed by R. Derek Black, "This is how white nationalists think about shootings", p 5A in the print edition (I bough it today), tricky URL.   However the deplatformings and payment processor cutoffs he supports have ensnared people who are not white nationalists by the usual meaning. 

Journalist exposes a small "entrepreneur" whose business model is plagiarizing academic papers

The journalist Bostwiki tells a story about the values of journalists. “F***ing Over People: The Truth About Journalism”.

The writer, who is quite handsome, slender and probably late 20s, talks (as he walks around Greenville SC) about an incident where he convinced someone who wrote fake academic papers for a living (called a "paper mill").  His story on Yahoo is here 

In the early days of my own websites, I learned of three or four instances where people (or teachers) claimed my online essays (in those days on flat sites) had been plagiarized.  These might have been found by Turnitin.

  

Imagine the consequences had this happened when I worked as a substitute teacher 2004-2007.

Reason magazine has a useful video on right of publicity and "unauthorized biographies"

Eugene Volokh, First Amendment law professor at UCLA, provides Reason TV useful practical advice forum on writing books or making movies about other people (even) without their permission.

The “right of publicity” of a public figure would not prevent the making of an “unauthorized biography” by, for example, a new author.  It would preclude claiming the person’s endorsement of the book.

Volokh gives some outlier cases involving comic books (which seem a bit more jealously guarded, maybe because of the political influence of big entertainment companies like Marvel) and fantasy sports leagues on the Internet.  The latter reminds me of a fantasy sports “league” I and neighborhood kids formed in the 1950s, in an era where there was a lot more outdoor play and physical creativity (like making cardboard stadiums and real whiffleball fields with appropriate outfield fences).

Laws may be different in Europe, where “the right to be forgotten” plays in. 

   

It's also important to ponder, in the Internet age of social media and search engines, who has the "right" to claim to be a public figure if he wants to be. (If you claim it, then it is harder for you to win a libel case.  And what it you are an "accidental" public figure like one of the Covington kids?) 

    

I’ve had maybe three times when people asked me not to name them on my websites, where search engines would find them.  In one case, I removed a name from a footnote file of the image of my first DADT book (1997, 2000) but it cannot be removed from the book itself. There is a practical issue that obscure authors could make otherwise less visible people “famous” because of search engines and this issue has been around since Web 1.0. 

Pakman's knockdown by CNN during livestream of debate raises questions that ought to be settled law

On Wednesday, July 31, I embedded David Pakman’s video of his having a livestream of the CNN Democratic debates stopped (on the TV blog).  Pakman reported getting a formal three month copyright strike from YouTube after a manual complaint from someone at CNN, and also being the target of a malicious tweet calling him a pirate.

Today Pakman reports that the copyright strike has been reversed. He did the second night livestream on Twitch without incident.  I’m a little confused if you need separate Twitch membership to his channel to join the chat.

But the big question still remains:  can one network monopolize rights to carry a political debate from candidates for national office?  How does copyright law apply?  Could the Copyright office change the policy if CASE eventually passes?

Did the Democratic Party of DNC give CNN exclusive right to carry the debates?  It sounds like it is very much against the public interest if it did so, and the DNC is giving in to Wall Street and big media if it did, and behaving hypocritically (big surprise). 

  

But it is common for persons who film pubic events (like outdoor protests and demonstrations) to own the exclusive rights for their own film, and to license the film to documentary film companies or to larger news outlets for broadcast.  It is possible to do this and still allow the YouTube video to be embedded for free in blog posts (although that goes against the idea of paywalls and this practice could change if industry gets around to setting up bundled paywalls for consumers, which I have been advocating for having healthier business models).  Ford Fischer’s videos of protests are licensed this way (by News2Share).
  
 But we should not have controversy over livestreaming political debates with commentary.  Whether this is Fair Use ought to be settled law already, 

Subverse (Tim Pool's) invites investors in a crowdfunding drive; could I fold myself into it?

Subverse, an independent media company founded (at least in large part) by Tim Pool is doing a crowdfunding campaign today, which you can participate at this link. 

  

It appeared to need a bank draft escrow, which will draw later.  The minimum share is $100 (making total purchase $108).  You can post a public message to other investors when you purchase at least one share.  I did the $100 today.

I wanted to take a moment to note that most of my online content (outside social media sites) is in three segments:  Blogger (16 blogs, since 2006), Wordpress (4 blogs, since 2016), and the legacy flat site doaskdotell.com, to which no new content is normally added, but which houses many older movie, book, and drama/music reviews as well as some older essays, and the text of my books.  (There is also Minds.)  I do get criticism for the lack of obvious “transparency” and the amateurishness of not being able to put everything in one format. I could say that is what fundraising for new sites is about.  I stay out there, and don’t “play ball” with others in the community.  But I keep on playing my own game.  Right now, there is no other game.

Instagram removes some more meme accounts, but this may be due to genuinely inauthentic commercial behavior by users

About thirty Instagram users running “meme” accounts had their work deactivated and removed this weekend, following a similar purge last December.  Fox5 in San Diego offers a typical story. 

  

Some critics say that the incident is related to a FB-driven crackdown on conservative or even libertarian ideology, and is motivated by the 2020 elections, and more observers are noting the enormous power social media companies have on American elections, possibly with Russian influence (as with Mueller’s testimony last week).

  

  

A narrower reading of the incident suggests that some users were violating terms of service, including offering verification services or restoration available only to members of the established media (although why that would be so is disturbing). Several users were making large incomes, one as a college fund.

Memes normally comprise graphics or brief video or audio that metaphorically illustrate a political concept, but sometimes even wordmarks (like my “do ask do tell”) are viewed as memes.  Pewdiepie, a entertainer and a grown man getting rich by acting out online the role of a little boy playing with Christmas toys (like Minecraft) brags about his memes in gest with no real political message.  Unfortunately, people read into memes what they want to see already. 

Federal judge dismisses Covingron kid's lawsuit against the Washington Post based on opinion rule of First Amendment

A federal judge has dismissed with prejudice the lawsuit by the Sandmann family against the Washington Post.

The Hill has a detailed story.  The opinion stressed the distinction between facts and opinions in the First Amendment.

  

The Post’s own version of the story is here. 

  

The Cincinnati Enquirer has an op-ed that is well worth reading.  On this one, the parents and school expected the kids to be the adults in the room while the grownups dropped the ball. 

Update:  Aug. 1, 2019

The Wall Street Journal, in an op-ed by David Rivkin and Donald Grossman, points out that the judge consider's Phillips's claim that Sandmann was blocking him a purported opinion, not a purported fact. (French as a language would come in handy with subjunctive mood conjugations -- I noticed this reading French signs in Canada, the language is inherently careful not to claim suppositions as facts.)  The article goes on to make an "orginalist libel defense" going back to the 1964 NYT Sullivan case, but it is hard to follow. 

Facebook's $5 billion fine seems like a non-event, as more talk about CDA230 stirs

Facebook is paying a record $5 billion fine for its sins, and somehow I’m underwhelmed.     Facebook still doesn’t have to tell people about new tricks up its sleeve.

Charlie Kirk of the WPost writes that “it is time to treat platforms like Facebook as publishers” and take away Section 230, but that means they just will be choosy about who gets to speak, like regular publishers.   Maybe they’ll put in a formal social creditworthiness test.  It would be a much bigger deal if this applied to hosting platforms, too.

Tim Pool reports on another “stop Internet censorship act” coming out of Congress that may target 230.

Ted Cruz introduces a resolution to label Antifa as a terrorist-organization, and this is a dangerous step; the asymmetry of activism on left v right

Truthout is running one of its panic campaigns to see donations, and they do this all the time, so it’s hard to believe.  (Well, that’s what activists do, isn’t it – beg and demand; am I an activist, or a journalist?)

I do support a few video channels (mostly “libertarian” and centrist – like Pakman’s, Pool’s, etc).  

  

I’ve also suggested before that industry needs to set up a way to bundle paywalls so you can conveniently pay for multiple newspapers or video channels at much lower costs (they used to sell magazines this way).

Some of their articles seem to urge socialism and the end of capitalism, which I won’t support, but some of their articles have a lot of substance and need an answer.  Here is one op-ed by Spencer Sunshine, “Ted Cruz’s ‘Antifa Are Terrorists’ Resolution Seeks to Stifle the Left”, with Senate Resolution S 279 link.

Okay, it is dangerous for the government to label organizations as “terrorist”, I agree, it is possible to jump to all kinds of conclusions.

But private tech companies want to “libel” organizations as “dangerous” (on the right) and even individuals, in a few cases without solid evidence. Facebook, for example.  And Truthout wants to start a “Make a racist cry” campaign.  What if someone is labeled a "racist" on flimsy claims merely by distant "association".  (It was that way for homosexuals before Stonewall a half century ago.)

No, I don’t believe in going around labeling people “racist” simply because they have sometimes associated socially with other people thought of that way, or because they seem indifferent to demands for group solidarity and activism from the left.

Yet, I sometimes wonder, when do citizens have an obligation to stop writing and filming (claiming “Swedish” neutrality) and join in protesting, even at risk to themselves. “Extinction Rebellion” has been making that claim at the Capitol this week.

(Oh, superglue can make an embarrassing sacrificial depilatory for men.)

I got an angry tweet that pretty much explains why the far Left has a right to make demands of people even like me, and that I should take my “both sides bullshit” elsewhere (Trump’s “fine people on both sides”). There’s a typo in the tweet;  the last “and” should be an “if”.  A lot of visitors liked her tweet.

I email my Senators on the CASE Act

I’ve sent brief messages today by email to Virginia Senators Mark Warner and Tim Kaine about the CASE Act, S1273 (see July 18).

I generally use the email forms supplied by members of Congress or other politicians first.  In the past I have sometimes called.  But repeated calls on so many issues would not be effective and would dilute "influence", from someone who is not on one specific activist "team". 

  

“I wanted to express my concern over the quick passage of S1273, the CASE Act, from the Senate Judiciary Committee on July 18.

  

“The legislation would need to make sure that it does not invite copyright trolls (like “Righthaven” a few years back) to file frivolous lawsuits against ordinary Internet users in the “small claims court”.  The Copyright Office would need to be instructed to have anti-spam policies, and lay down some rules about how it will apply Fair Use, as with respect to newsworthy images or music passages (you can’t copyright a chord or a rhythm, for example) or even work titles (you can’t copyright a book or film title, you can trademark a series).  It would be well to compare the proposed small claims court with how the patent office is stumbling now with patent trolls (especially in software).”

House has major anti-trust hearing regarding big Tech companies July 16; Subverse channel reports

Subverse has a major video explaining the Antitrust scrutiny hearings before the House of Representatives on Tuesday July 16.

  

CNBC Television has the full 3+ hour video here. 

A major idea is that even the subsidiaries of Facebook (like WhatsApp and Instagram) would be powerful on their own.

Another idea is that breaking up the companies would not solve all the privacy problems, which more related from the business models themselves.

Lior Leser (YouTuberLaw) has a complaint before the Federal Trade Commission regarding possible collusion among payment processors and platforms last winter in conjunction with Patreon.

The idea of network neutrality was mentioned in the meetings, along with the idea that telecom companies might soon start to feel emboldened to charge more for premium services affordable only to really big companies already.

  

There has not been another social media startup since 2011 with SnapChat, which I don’t use.

CASE Act passes Senate Judiciary Committee with little discussion, raising questions of a trolling risk (maybe as soon as 2021)

The Senate Judiciary Committee today passed the CASE (Copyright Enforcement in Small-Claims Enforcement) Act out of committee.  It would presumably create a small claims court within the Copyright Office, with statutory limits on damages.  The basic problem is that it is much cheaper for a plaintiff to file a claim, and a defendant would be stuck with the responsibility of asking for an expensive jury trial, so the system could invite copyright trolls, unless there were more safeguards.

Marc Schneider of Billboard has a summary story. 

 Generally, artists’ groups have favored the legislation, but there has been criticism of Judiciary Committee’s blindness to the risk of trolling.

Katherine Trendacosta reports on the passage of the bill out of committee today with the trolling warnings, on Electronic Frontier Foundation, here. 

The bill would remind me of the history of a particular copyright troll, Righthaven, about a dozen years ago, which sued bloggers for excerpting stories and sometimes images from small town newspapers. I last discussed Righthave here Feb. 28, 2013. 

  

The bill was introduced by Senator John Kennedy of Mississippi as S 1273 (govtrack) 

The identical bill was introduced in the House as HR 2426.    Thomas gives no indication on when the House will hear it.

The bill would apparently allow a 120 comment period after passage, and then the Copyright Office would have one calendar year to set up operations. It would sound likely that such a mechanism could go into effect by early 2021.

It seems purely speculative at this point as to how the Copyright Office would handle frivolous or minor claims (about blog images, etc) or whether it would have mechanisms to discourage intentional trolling.  But by way of comparison, the Patent office does not have a good handle on preventing patent trolls.

Here is the video for today’s hearing, at 33:11.  There was no mention of the trolling risk. 

It would be valuable to know if a copyright troll problem pops up in the EU given the passage of its Copyright Directive and controversial Article 17.  

I have also covered this issue on a Wordpress blog here.