Posted on 12/11/2018 6:41:24 AM PST by Louis Foxwell
What the Facebook Wars are Really About Soros and the media’s censorship plot. December 10, 2018 Daniel Greenfield
Facebook got its start as FaceMash: a site comparing the attractiveness of female Harvard students. It was then reborn as a social network for Harvard students, Ivy League schools and then everyone.
More recent surveys showed that the average Facebook user in the United States is 40 years old. That makes Facebook users less likely to start stupid viral trends, those tend to come from younger social media apps, some owned by Facebook, and more likely to be deeply engaged in politics.
Mark Zuckerberg had created a company to appeal to college students who wanted to rate the cutest girls on campus, but is instead stuck with a monster worth hundreds of billions (that number will continue fluctuating with media hit pieces) used by people with actual jobs to share family photos and talk politics. And it’s the politics part, not the baby photos, that’s turning the heat up on Zuckerberg.
Despite the hundreds of billions of dollars, the marriage, the language lessons, the awkward tour of America, Zuckerberg is still on some level the drunken college kid who got in trouble setting up a site to rate his classmates. He doesn’t understand the stakes of the game. As Facebook aged, it became an unwanted gatekeeper for global politics, instead of for teens doing viral challenges.
And though Zuckerberg has given the media some of what it wants, allowing its “fact checkers” to censor certain trending conservative stories, he hasn’t allowed Twitter’s wholesale censorship.
Zuckerberg was told he had to clean up Facebook after Trump’s victory. He failed to do it. Now the Left and its media apparatus is coming for the heads of Facebook leadership. The endgame is to inflict punishing harm on Facebook’s valuation, forcing the company to replace its leadership with media types who will lock down Facebook and make it a safe space for the media and for its political agenda.
Facebook’s problem, the media insisted after Trump’s victory, was ‘fake news’. And ‘fake news’ was anything that didn’t come from the media. Or whose content the media didn’t like.
Michelle Goldberg in a New York Times call for regulating Facebook was more direct, “Without Facebook, Donald Trump probably wouldn’t be president, which is reason enough to curse its existence.”
Facebook has been blamed for nearly every populist movement that the Left hates, from Brexit to the victories of Duterte in the Philippines and Bolsonaro in Brazil, Buddhist protests against Muslim violence in Myanmar and the Yellow Jacket riots in France. None of these media hit pieces address the fact that Facebook is just as responsible for successful populist movements that favor the Left, and that social media is an agnostic political tool anyone can use because that is the whole point of the Facebook wars.
The Left doesn’t want anyone to be able to harness the social media tools of populism.
Censoring Facebook is about suppressing political dissent while promoting lefty political speech. And the best way to do that is to turn the media into the gatekeepers of what can appear on the internet.
Many of these hit pieces targeting Facebook came out of BuzzFeed, a viral site that had gotten big by barraging Facebook with listicles and memes, but that had transitioned with Facebook’s aging demographics into the realm of serious politics.
BuzzFeed was uniquely vulnerable and obsessed with Facebook’s algorithms. Jonah Peretti, BuzzFeed's boss, has proposed battling Facebook by merging lefty viral trash sites like BuzzFeed, Vice and Vox together. BuzzFeed’s obsession with Facebook revenues captures the corrupt intersection between politics and profits that is at the heart of the media’s war against Facebook.
George Soros and his ilk want to regulate Facebook because they fear the power of populism. They see the media as a politically reliable entity pushing the public leftward while restraining blowback. The media wants to regulate Facebook because it offers too much scope for uncensored political dissent, but also because regulating its key distributor will lock in a business model that can assure its future.
Facebook became the dog and the media the tail. The media dog wants Facebook to be its tail.
The situation grew direr as digital lefty media’s revenues turned shaky. It’s why BuzzFeed is talking about a merger with Vice and Vox. Lefty media is already heavily subsidized by the huge companies that are making a fortune from the internet. The Washington Post is owned by Amazon’s boss. AT&T owns CNN and helps subsidize Vice. Verizon owns the Huffington Post. Netflix helps subsidize Vox. Facebook’s co-founder Chris Hughes took over New Republic and turned the former liberal magazine into a trashy leftist clickbait blog that runs stories like, “Facebook Betrayed America”.
The media wants to transform Facebook’s political and business models. Its campaign is backed by lefty billionaires like George Soros, who likely see both political and financial angles in taking over Facebook.
Mark Zuckerberg, Sheryl Sandberg and other Facebook leaders are on the Left. They haven’t been resisting the media’s censorship and George Soros’ coup because they believe in free speech, but because their business model depends on free speech. If Facebook is reduced to just recirculating Vox and BuzzFeed lefty clickbait, their failing business model will become Facebook’s failing business model.
Facebook has made concessions to the media mob, but it hasn’t given away everything. If its user base was still in college, it could censor more freely, but an older user demographic is also a more conservative one. As Facebook’s base aged, it also became more conservative. And the brand of comprehensive censorship that the media mob demands would destroy Facebook’s viability.
The new wave of media attacks is forcing Facebook to consider whether it would lose more value from the hit pieces or from defenestrating its user base. As tech stocks decline, the companies have become perfect targets for pressure campaigns. Facebook became the first company to lose over $100 billion in one day. That’s the atmosphere that explains why the pressure campaign was suddenly turned up.
If Facebook is ever going to be rolled, now’s the time.
History is rich and rotten with examples of radicals devouring their own clueless enablers. Silicon Valley is filled with companies that have enabled political radicals. The drivers of Porches, BMWs and Teslas with Bernie 2016 stickers on the back don’t really think that their money will be affected.
The digital darlings of the Left that specialized in social media clickbait bet everything on video and lost their shirts. They plan to survive by devouring Facebook. The dead tree media can’t wait for the cannibalistic orgy. And George Soros is happy to fund the astroturf protests to make it all happen.
The media began its war on Facebook by accusing it of hosting fake news. Now it’s fighting Facebook with false accusations of rigging elections, causing genocide and aiding right-wing populism.
The truth behind the fake news is that it’s about power and profits. The real enemy isn’t Facebook, it’s what it represents, a more open internet in which people aren’t passive consumers of CNN broadcasts and New York Times editorials, but get to choose what they watch, read and listen to. It’s a world of cable cord-cutters and social sharer activists who distrust the media and make up their own minds.
And it’s not an environment that can be controlled except by banning the political opposition.
The Great Facebook Wars are not just about one company; they’re about the structure and nature of the internet. They’re a bid by the media to reclaim a totalitarian top-down business model that has no place in the modern digital age and that cannot be maintained except through a totalitarian regime.
This isn’t about Facebook. It’s about freedom.
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Greenfield always delivers. Good work.
Trump used the same Social Media to do the same in 2016, and the Silicon Barons are butt-hurt that their own platforms were used against them so successfully.
They were determined that it wouldn't happen again in 2018, and they were partially successful in getting conservative commentators silenced, banned, or shadow-banned.
They will pull out all the stops for the 202 cycle. I am surprised that they haven't tried to ban Trump's Twitter feed yet, due to his 'violation' if their community 'standards.'
I disabled the app a few months ago on my phone. I can still access it on my phone, my pad and my computers, but without active notifications, I rarely go there. By “rarely”, I mean once every few weeks. And each time it turns out to be a waste of time.
Wow
And the feminazis say nothing at all.
==============================
President Trump Should Strip Social Media Companies Of Section 230 Immunity.
FR Posted on 8/20/2018 by Enlightened1
President Trump should introduce legislation stripping all social media companies of their section 230 immunity.
Since the tech companies are trying to have it both ways where on one hand they are censoring conservatives, promoting Democrats in their social media algorithms, but at the very same time they have public square immunity under federal law from what people post to their web sites. The Tech Left are saying they can do whatever they want when it comes to censorship. However, if you have public square immunity from federal law, then you cannot at the very same time censor conservatives and promote Democrats.
President Trump simply needs to make it so that Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc.. can no longer have immunity to third party posts. Thus, social media will no longer be treated as public platforms or the modern public square where people can say what they want, but treated as Publishers. Again this is since social media giants want to censor what is being said on their web sites. The Tech Left are trying to have it both ways, and you cannot. You fall under one category or the next.
This above is an easy way to make everyone play by the same rules. If you make a billion dollar as these tech companies do, then say they are liable for all content posted on their web sites like a Publisher. The funny part is the Tech Left for years have been arguing they are just a public platform and they cannot be held accountable. However, since they are now openly and actively censoring people it is time to strip away their section 230 immunity. Section 230 is part of the Digital Millennium Copyright act, and it holds that platforms are not liable for content posted by third parties to their websites.
It would be great if social media were neutral forums. However, since they are not neutral forums then we have a problem. Since the algorithms are rigged to favor Democrats and Leftists the Justice Department must open an investigation into the social media companies to determine if the algorithms are an “in kind” election contribution.
For instance, if you own Billboard, then you cannot give that Billboard to a political candidate. That is known as “in kind” contribution, and there are contribution limits. Thus, if you like a candidate and you donate the maximum money. You then cannot go put out a bunch of commercials for that candidate. This is because you already maxed out giving money to the candidate. What these tech companies are doing by rigging the algorithms is the functional equivalent of giving a candidate free billboards and TV ads.
The above is the key for President Trump to stop the tech left election engineering and rigging. President Trump should have the DOJ send subpoenas to all these social media companies a notice to preserve all evidence, and a notice to preserve all documents. If they fail to do this, hide information, etc… then they can go to prison under federal laws for tampering with evidence and documents. Furthermore,
President Trump can send them notices of anti-trust, election meddling and election fraud, Federal Elections Commission and to the Anti-Trust commission. The tech companies have made a bet. They believe the Democrats are going to win the House of Representatives in November of 2018. If this happens, then they are off the hook. This is because they will not have Mark Meadows, Jim Jordan, Matt Gaetz and others to hold them accountable since the Democrats would be in control. They believe as long as they help the Democrats they are free and clear.
This is why President Trump needs to send out the notices to preserve evidence, subpoena them and open a criminal investigation for election meddling, election engineering and illegal “in kind” campaign contributions made by social media giants. This is all in clear violation of campaign finance laws.
This is the Tech Left Coup. Remember Dinesh D'souza was investigated, charged and sent to prison over giving 20k to a friend through alleged shell donors, then why is there no investigation into the “in kind” contributions? Remember too the new Black Panthers got investigated for standing outside of voting centers with clubs to intimidate voters. Although Holder let them go. Anyhow, these are the Democrats blocking everyone and intimidating everyone.
So when Twitter and Facebook rig their platforms so that Democrat content goes to the top of the pile, that is the functional equivalent of giving someone a free commercial. That’s a clear campaign contribution of billions of dollars.
==========================
NOTE: TRUMPS'S HUD COMPLAINT NOW IN MOTION SAYS: Facebook mines extensive user data and classifies its users based on protected characteristics. Facebook’s ad targeting tools then invite advertisers to express unlawful preferences by suggesting discriminatory options. Among those options are physical disabilities, parents with children and even religious practices — advertisers are allowed to show their ads only to people Facebook deems interested in “Jesus” or the “Christian Church,” for example. Those practices could violate the Civil Rights Act, HUD said in the complaint, dated August 13.
My wife and I don’t use Facebooks and are not fans of it and many of its users.
Having said that, Greenfield appears to be on target again with this oped. He wrote this excellent insight to the Facebook wars with liberals against Facebook:
The media began its war on Facebook by accusing it of hosting fake news. Now it’s fighting Facebook with false accusations of rigging elections, causing genocide and aiding right-wing populism.
The truth behind the fake news is that it’s about power and profits. The real enemy isn’t Facebook, it’s what it represents, a more open internet in which people aren’t passive consumers of CNN broadcasts and New York Times editorials, but get to choose what they watch, read and listen to. It’s a world of cable cord-cutters and social sharer activists who distrust the media and make up their own minds.
And it’s not an environment that can be controlled except by banning the political opposition.
The Great Facebook Wars are not just about one company; they’re about the structure and nature of the internet. They’re a bid by the media to reclaim a totalitarian top-down business model that has no place in the modern digital age and that cannot be maintained except through a totalitarian regime.
This isn’t about Facebook. It’s about freedom.
Fakebook is for mommies to spy compete compare and share feelings
Not much more
Will it make women more likely to vote Democrat?
Meh ! Who cares
As always, he’s spot on.
Bottom line goal: Conform to the Globalists view or you will be unacceptable and perceived as a threat to the New World Order. You will not be acceptable and not welcome or allowed to function as one of the acceptable.
The Main Stream Media (MSM) are merely the spokesmen for multi-national (Globalist) corporations.
This is the way we must always refer to them - the corporate media.
Their only loyalty is to profit and the attendant power it confers.
Truth is not purchased - it is "unalienable".
This is a great article and explains a lot of the dynamics around the social media economy. Thanks for posting Daniel so faithfully, Louis Foxwell!
I've heard of porch pirates, porch gliders and porch monkeys, but this is a new one! LOL
Oh, I gather that a bunch of Harvard women were pretty incensed at the time. Being informed that, objectively, you are below average in attractiveness will do that.
If you own a business, you must have a page on facebook with your picture and your business description and contact information.
Good one! Hahahaha!
Even when I was a big user of Facebook, I never, EVER used it to contact businesses. I looked for their web page.
That being said, I was in a few bands that tried to use it and it was marginally successful. But only marginally. For all of them, if it got serious, we created a web page.
Facebook is really just a toy to me. Always has been.
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