[grc] Media Alliance referenced

Ann Garrison anniegarrison at gmail.com
Sun May 2 23:18:31 PDT 2021 

Many interesting points, Tracy, which I consider worthy of discussion on
this list.

I'll quarrel with only one for the moment. Practice puts constant pressure
on the language, and "internet censorship" is now common parlance for
search engines and social media platforms erasure of content, whether with
algorithms, low wage labor, or decisions made at a higher organizational
level.

On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 10:30 PM Tracy Rosenberg via grc <
grc at maillist.peak.org> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> I'm sorry this landed on this list, and it appears to have been an error by
> the OP, which I'll mention below. But since my name was dragged here w/o my
> permission, let me clarify a few things.
>
> 1)  What is commonly known as "terfing" or gender pronoun disrespect isn't
> okay and it isn't about that righwing canard "political correctness". It is
> about letting people tell their own stories about themselves and respecting
> others
> as being as fully human as oneself and not refracting their ideas about
> themselves through a self-centered perspective about how it makes "you"
> feel. It is new for many of us. I have mis-gendered people. And in so
> doing, I have
> learned a lot about why I was doing that and why I needed to stop. Progress
> is hard. But it is when we stop trying that we commit sins against fellow
> human beings. There is no excuse for not recognizing anyone's chosen gender
> identity and no excuse for whining about it or dismissing it.
>
> 2) Media Alliance does not send our organizational bulletins to the GRC
> list, just like no one else does. Riva is mistaken in her claim that Media
> Alliance sent the circuit breaker petition to GRC. We did not. Riva
> receives our email bulletins because she is subscribed to our mailing list
> and if she does not want to be, there is a little button called unsubscribe
> at the bottom of each one. It is possible a member of GRC forwarded the
> petition here. I dunno. If so, that was their choice. But I expect that the
> original poster just got confused by their email inbox.
>
> 3) The ensuing conversation is confused on several counts. To start with,
> social media is not the same thing as email. "The Internet" is not the same
> thing as social media, nor is it the same thing as email. No one is
> censored on "the Internet". For the price of a domain name, anyone can set
> up a free website and say whatever they want. When people talk about
> "censorship", what they mean is traffic to their site or their content,
> which is a different matter. Free speech is not the same thing as a
> guaranteed audience size.
>
> 4) With regard to Spencer's post. Demand Progress are friends of mine, as
> are some others that have been using this talking point in their
> fundraising emails, like Common Dreams. It stems from a righwing talking
> point used at a Congressional hearing when a Republican started yelling
> about how his brother's campaign emails ended up in his spam folder and
> used it as proof that Google is biased against Republicans. Most of us made
> fun of it for a long time
> afterwards and I can't tell you how distressed I am to see progressives
> picking up a dumb rightwing talking point. As Pichai explained, and I will
> repeat, spam filters on email accounts like Gmail are a) popular with users
> and b) based on a long list of technical factors related to bulk emailing
> that include how fast unsubscribes and bounces are tended to, the number of
> bad email addresses, the frequency of emails sent, the open rates, the SPC
> setting on the sender email address, the number of spam complaints received
> and so on. While of course, these formulas could be more transparent, they
> aren't unknown and that is why digital directors are a job category. With
> political emails, because I got all of them (Sanders, Warren, Trump, Biden,
> Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Yang, Gabbard et al), I can personally testify that
> for all of them, some made it to my inbox and some ended up in spam. My
> recollection is that Trump was fairly adept at avoiding the spam box and so
> was Sanders later in his campaign, but not earlier. Warren did not have top
> knotch digital staff. The answer to what emails end up in spam is a tech
> question, not a political question and it isn't helpful to pretend
> otherwise. For those groups sending fundraising letters, well the accuracy
> of fundraising letters leaves a lot to be desired. It is a good idea not to
> pretend a donate email is a meaningful political analysis. It's a hook to
> encourage you to donate money.
>
> 5) A circuit breaker policy on social media has been recommended by a
> number of blue ribbon experts. The idea seems to have originated with
> Rutgers law professor Ellen Goodman (
> https://law.rutgers.edu/directory/view/1020). It is not censorship, which
> is the prevention of content being posted.  The problem of virality in
> social media is pretty much just the web 2.0 version of the old mainstream
> media problem of "if it bleeds, it leads". Being machines, the AI that
> powers social media algorithims pretty much interprets engagement as
> popularity. So a post of blatant lies that gets 600 people correcting it
> (i.e. the sun is closer to the earth than the moon) is perceived as
> desirable content, because so many people said "fuck no, that's wrong",
> while valuable posts that don't motivate so many people to correct them are
> seen as less popular and less desirable. It's the same thing that happened
> when daily newspapers plastered a bloody victim of a crime picture on the
> front page and sold three times as many copies as usual because people
> reacted and they drew from that exactly all the wrong conclusions.
> Everything old is new again.
>
> So left to their own devices, repulsive social media posts are served by
> the algorithim. This is exacerbated by the fact that the right wing has
> invested in a bot ecosphere to rapidly engage and kick up the AI and
> neither progressives nor centrist democrats have anything even remotely
> equal. That is why when you get lists of the 20 most viral posts any week
> of the year from Facebook, it is all or almost all rabid right wing
> frothing at the mouth. Similarly, that is why Donald Trump had so many
> followers on Twitter. It was a bot collection for the purpose of
> supercharging his content. When people play the system, it  is more than
> reasonable to play back. A circuit breaker censors nothing, but it slows
> down super-spreader content that is being manipulated for virality by
> coordinated networks for a short period of time, allowing for human review
> before it appears in hundreds of thousands or even millions of feeds. None
> of this impacts the original post, It remains. And none of this impacts
> progressive media because I hate to break it to you, progressive media
> content is not the superspreader content.
>
> This is apart from issues of community standards and terms of service,
> which on social media platforms are frequently applied by low wage workers,
> often in India, who make frequent mistakes. The answer for that is more
> resources for the function, which is a hard sell for the move fast and
> break things crowd.
>
> But all a circuit breaker is, is an artificial intelligence brake, and it
> is foolish to equate that with censorship. Way too broad a brush and
> essentially a meaningless argument imho.
>
> - Tracy
>
> On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 4:34 PM Ann Garrison via grc <grc at maillist.peak.org
> >
> wrote:
>
> > I agree that internet censorship is now such a critical media issue that
> it
> > merits discussion on this list, so long as it remains rational rather
> than
> > vituperative.  Discussion within Pacifica Radio often becomes
> vituperative
> > fast, and I wish that weren't so, but over the years I've learned it's
> best
> > to walk away once that happens.
> >
> > We produced two shows on censorship and surveillance, with particular
> > emphasis on internet censorship, for "COVID, Race, and Democracy."  Nick
> > Huntley, cybersecurity specialist and producer of "Nick’s Nerd News," a
> > show syndicated on Audioport, contributed a piece on Amazon surveillance
> to
> > the last one.
> >
> >
> https://covidtaskforce.pacifica.org/2021/01/25/covid-surveillance-and-big-tech-censorship-january-25-2021/
> >
> >
> https://covidtaskforce.pacifica.org/2021/03/02/covid-big-tech-censorship-surveillance-part-2-march-1-2021/
> >
> > On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 3:22 PM riva enteen via grc <
> grc at maillist.peak.org>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > MA put out an email to this list supporting Silicon Valley censorship.
> > So
> > > this is not a forum to respond to that?
> > > Frankly, I find it shocking that GRC doesn't grapple with this new,
> very
> > > controversial and potentially dangerous trend.  The debate was shut
> down.
> > > I guess Adrienne agrees that we are not to talk about Silicon Valley
> > > censorship.  No wonder the left is dead.
> > >
> > > On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 3:18 PM David Devereaux-Weber <
> > president at wortfm.org
> > > >
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > Hi riva,
> > > >
> > > > The GRC is an email list created for the Grassroots Radio Conference.
> > The
> > > > purpose of the list is to discuss things about starting and operating
> > > > community radio stations. We don't run Facebook. We don't determine
> > > > policies for Facebook. Radio stations who subscribe to this list may
> > wish
> > > > to broadcast programs about this topic, but that is not the purpose
> of
> > > this
> > > > list.
> > > >
> > > > You seem to be passionate about the topics of interest to you. That
> is
> > > > great. But this is not the forum for that discussion.
> > > >
> > > > Dave
> > > >
> > > > David Devereaux-Weber
> > > > President, WORT Board of Directors
> > > > president at wortfm.org <President at wortfm.org>
> > > > (608)576-2599
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 5:08 PM riva enteen via grc <
> > > grc at maillist.peak.org>
> > > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > >> It was too much trouble for you to allow debate about your "circuit
> > > >> breaker
> > > >> technology."  So you think FB can censor Robert Kennedy, Jr. because
> > he
> > > >> violates their terms of service?
> > > >>
> > > >> I think pressure and judgement about remembering a person's pronouns
> > > >> (plural yet) when a large group is introducing themselves is a
> > > distraction
> > > >> from what we face, such as the real threat of nuclear war.  And
> yes, I
> > > >> know
> > > >> I will be called transphobic, but I am proud to use the word
> feminist,
> > > >> although that apparently makes me a TERF.
> > > >>
> > > >> On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 10:04 AM Tracy Rosenberg <
> > > tracy at media-alliance.org
> > > >> >
> > > >> wrote:
> > > >>
> > > >> > You were not considerate, Riva. You said that it was too much
> > trouble
> > > >> for
> > > >> > you to observe the gender identities that people wish to be
> > recognized
> > > >> by.
> > > >> > By definition, that is rude and not considerate. You clearly need
> to
> > > >> > rethink your position on not eradicating others.
> > > >> >
> > > >> > You also do not understand what circuit breaker technology is.
> > > Platforms
> > > >> > do not determine truth, but they do define their terms of service,
> > > like
> > > >> any
> > > >> > other website, list serv, company, radio station or organization.
> > > >> >
> > > >> > -Tracy
> > > >> >
> > > >> >
> > > >> >
> > > >> >
> > > >> >
> > > >> >
> > > >> > On Sun, May 2, 2021, 09:55 riva enteen via grc <
> > grc at maillist.peak.org
> > > >
> > > >> > wrote:
> > > >> >
> > > >> >> I am glad to be considerate, butI think controversial issues must
> > be
> > > >> >> addressed in a principled manner.  MA seemed to shut down any
> > debate
> > > >> about
> > > >> >> Silicon Valley determining truth and I think Tracy's response
> with
> > > >> circuit
> > > >> >> breaker begs the question.
> > > >> >>
> > > >> >> On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 9:47 AM kenya lewis <kenyalewis at gmail.com
> >
> > > >> wrote:
> > > >> >>
> > > >> >> > Riva,
> > > >> >> >
> > > >> >> > What “stablished” this poorly edited set of personal
> observations
> > > and
> > > >> >> > grudges is broadly relevant to this GRC list (or as part of
> a/the
> > > >> black
> > > >> >> > agenda)?
> > > >> >> >
> > > >> >> > Is it possible to be considerate of each other and use this
> > > listserv
> > > >> to
> > > >> >> > cooperate?
> > > >> >> >
> > > >> >> > Kenya
> > > >> >> _______________________________________________
> > > >> >> grc mailing list
> > > >> >> grc at maillist.peak.org
> > > >> >> http://maillist.peak.org/mailman/listinfo/grc
> > > >> >>
> > > >> >
> > > >> _______________________________________________
> > > >> grc mailing list
> > > >> grc at maillist.peak.org
> > > >> http://maillist.peak.org/mailman/listinfo/grc
> > > >>
> > > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > grc mailing list
> > > grc at maillist.peak.org
> > > http://maillist.peak.org/mailman/listinfo/grc
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Sincerely,
> > @AnnGarrison <https://twitter.com/AnnGarrison?lang=en>
> > Independent Journalist,
> > SKYPE: Ann Garrison, Oakland
> > 415-503-7487
> > _______________________________________________
> > grc mailing list
> > grc at maillist.peak.org
> > http://maillist.peak.org/mailman/listinfo/grc
> >
>
>
> --
> Tracy Rosenberg
> Executive Director
> Media Alliance
> 2830 20th Street Suite 201
> San Francisco, CA 94110
> www.media-alliance.org
> 415-746-9475
> 510-684-6853 Cell
> Encrypted email at tracy.rosenberg at protonmail.com
> Text via Signal
>
> -
> _______________________________________________
> grc mailing list
> grc at maillist.peak.org
> http://maillist.peak.org/mailman/listinfo/grc
>


-- 
Sincerely,
@AnnGarrison <https://twitter.com/AnnGarrison?lang=en>
Independent Journalist,
SKYPE: Ann Garrison, Oakland
415-503-7487

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