Free Republic

More and more, the big tech oligarchs are behaving more like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping when it comes to the media than George Washington nearly every U.S. president since before Barack Obama started spying on journalists. What began as gentle throttling of content and reach (mostly against conservatives) has since expanded into outright information suppression that simultaneously pushes disinformation as ‘fact’ while burying facts as disinformation. .. Social media giant Twitter announced this week that it will begin labeling tweets that share “misleading information” about the coronavirus vaccine and will implement a strike system for repeat offenders of the...

The growing willingness by U.S. Big Tech to censor political debate highlights a hypocrisy that belies any notion that expelling conservative voices is an act of principle rather than something more cynical and sinister. President Donald Trump may have been intemperate, but violence linked to his Twitter account is more debatable. Certainly, he exacerbated America’s political polarization, but no more so than former Office of Management and Budget nominee Neera Tandren and Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.). Political polarization is a problem and the tone of American political leaders and cable news pundits neither elucidate nor help, but censorship is not...

Censorship by Big Tech companies is becoming a growing reality for conservatives in the United States. Following the January 6 riot at the United States Capitol, Twitter permanently banned President Donald Trump, with Twitter CFO Ned Segal later confirming that he would continue to be barred from the platform even if he decides to run for a second term in the White House. More recently, the social media giant suspended conservative commentator Steven Crowder from his account after he detailed instances of potential voter fraud. The tweet received a warning label explaining that users could not like or retweet the...

SEATTLE—As state and federal lawmakers consider drafting new legislation to counter big tech censorship of dissenting political voices, few seem to realize that an anti-discrimination law already on the books could spell big trouble for big tech companies that engage in political censorship. Ironically, the law was enacted by one of the most politically progressive cities in the country: Seattle. Unlike most political jurisdictions in the United States, Seattle expressly forbids discrimination on the basis of “political ideology.” Seattle defines political ideology expansively as any idea or belief, or coordinated body of ideas or beliefs, relating to the purpose, conduct,...

At least three times during CPAC, the excellent coverage from Right Side Broadcasting Network was interrupted by disclaimers, breaking away from speeches, and even muting of interviewees. This wasn’t due to them not believing in the message. They self-censored because two topics that are taboo on Big Tech, YouTube in particular, were being discussed.Before we detail what all went down, let’s be clear about something. I do not blame RSBN for doing what they did. This is a growing business that many people depend on. It’s not just the excellent livestreaming coverage of events pertinent to conservatives, but also families...

The man who originally created online encyclopedia Wikipedia is pledging to create a new platform to replace it, citing Wikipedia’s left-wing bias. Larry Sanger, who co-founded Wikipedia in 2001 before leaving the project, is describing his Encyclosphere as a networked aggregation of existing and new encyclopedia content, which will be distinguished from the colorful and unverified content slung onto Wikipedia by the site’s user base. Sanger envisions millions of people writing and submitting encyclopedia entries, which can be rated and judged for accuracy by their readers themselves, rather than the “arrogant and controlling oligarchy” Sanger maintains is running Wikipedia. Sanger...

CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) — Nevada's governor on Friday unveiled a proposal that would allow technology companies to establish jurisdictions with powers similar to those of county governments, arguing the state needed to be bold to diversify its economy and pushing back against those who have likened the idea to company towns. “This proposal is an exciting, unprecedented concept that has a potential to position Nevada as a global center of advanced technology and innovation, while helping to create immediate positive economic impact and shape the economy of the future,” Gov. Steve Sisolak said of his Innovation Zones idea. “As...

Microsoft has teamed up with a number of tech and media companies to create a system of tracing content around the internet that could destroy online privacy and anonymity, radically transforming the nature of the web. Against stiff competition, the alliance of tech and media giants has devised a plan that may constitute Big Tech’s most brazen power-grab yet. According to Microsoft’s press release, it has partnered with several other organizations to form the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA). Put simply, the purpose of this organization is to devise a system whereby all content on the internet can...

Whistleblower Worked As Facebook Fact Checker Reveals Sinister Social media Accelerate Great Reset

The extension is called Big Tech Detective, and after using the internet with it for a day (or, more accurately, trying and failing to use), I’d say it drives home the point that it’s almost impossible to avoid these companies on the modern web, even if you try.

Apple continues to carry Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube on its App Store, all of which have been the platform for Antifa to broadcast violence.During Apple’s virtual annual shareholder meeting on Tuesday, a shareholder pushed Apple CEO Tim Cook on the company’s ban of Parler from its App Store after the free-speech platform was re-launched last week. Yet Cook did not indicate that Apple will reinstate Parler. “Now that Parler is back online with increased safeguards, when will it be allowed back on the App Store? It was one of the most downloaded apps in 2020 and reached No. 1 in...

Some House Democrats have urged cable companies to cancel Fox News, Newsmax TV, and One America News Network ahead of a Wednesday hearing on extremism in the press.In 1801, Thomas Jefferson became the third president of the United States. In his Inaugural Address, he urged our fledgling nation to stand strong against those who would restrict the right to free speech. He even described those “who would wish to dissolve this Union” as “monuments of safety with which the error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.” As president, Jefferson was an ardent defender...

In China’s bid to acquire advanced technology from the United States, officials from the north-central city of Baoding tried to meet with Silicon Valley executives and discuss deals for companies to set up offices there, according to internal government documents that The Epoch Times obtained recently. Citing the Chinese regime’s key strategy of “bringing technologies in, exporting our products out,” the Baoding government detailed a successful example: it attracted AXT Inc., a U.S.-based designer and manufacturer of semiconductor substrates, to set up a factory in Dingxing county, Baoding. The semiconductor substrates are components for making electronic chips, which power nearly...

Together with a few other tech and media corporations, Microsoft has formed a coalition focused on fighting “disinformation” and fake news. The other founding members of the coalition are Truepic, Intel, BBC, Adobe, and Arm. Disinformation and fake news have become prevalent buzzwords to create a justification to censor in this digital age. It’s now very easy for people to formulate and spread falsehoods, according to the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity. “There’s a critical need to address widespread deception in online content — now supercharged by advances in AI and graphics and diffused rapidly via the internet. Our...

If any single platform can be fingered as the favorite of the rioters, it appears to be Facebook. Yet Facebook remains unmolested by app stores and untargeted by opportunistic politicians.It’s been more than a month since the app stores of Google and Apple joined forces with Amazon Web Services to knee-cap an upstart competitor, Parler. The stated reasoning was Parler’s lack of content moderation policies, which Apple, in particular, claimed led to Parler’s use as a forum to “plan, coordinate, and facilitate the illegal activities in Washington DC on January 6, 2021.”This reasoning was confidently repeated across the corporate press....

The Biden administration is working with Facebook, Google, and Twitter to target “COVID misinformation” and overcome “vaccine hesitancy,” according to senior officials in the administration who spoke to Reuters. Via Reuters: The White House’s direct engagement with the companies to mitigate the challenge has not been previously reported. Biden’s chief of staff Ron Klain has previously said the administration will try to work with Silicon Valley on the issue.

Poland is taking a stand against the Big Tech conglomerate, proposing whopping fines for platforms that censor or remove posts for ideological reasons, according to the country’s Deputy Minister of Justice Sebastian Kaleta. In a Fox News interview, Kaleta said social media companies have been targeting Christianity, conservatives and traditional values through their blacklisting and removal of posts. “We see that when Big Tech decides to remove content for political purposes, it’s mostly content which praises traditional values or praises conservatism,” Kaleta said. “It is deleted under their ‘hate speech policy’ when it has no legal right to do so.”...

For the third time in less than five months, the U.S. Congress has summoned the CEOs of social media companies to appear before them, with the explicit intent to pressure and coerce them to censor more content from their platforms. On March 25, the House Energy and Commerce Committee will interrogate Twitter’s Jack Dorsey, Facebooks’s Mark Zuckerberg and Google’s Sundar Pichai at a hearing which the Committee announced will focus “on misinformation and disinformation plaguing online platforms.”

Former President Donald Trump said he was not interested in returning to Twitter after he was permanently banned from the platform last month. “It’s become very boring. We don’t want to go back to Twitter,” Trump told Newsmax’s Greg Kelly on Wednesday. “I’ll tell you, it’s not the same. If you look at what’s going on with Twitter, I understand that it’s become very boring and millions of people are leaving.” Trump, who has been one of the most active presidents on social media, was permanently suspended from Twitter following the Jan. 6 breach of the U.S. Capitol. The targeted...