"They’re watching makeup tutorials and recipes and lip sync videos and funny dances. But that would make it all the more powerful a propaganda outlet, if deployed. And because each TikTok feed is different, we have no real way of knowing what people are seeing. It would be trivially easy to use it to shape or distort public opinion, and to do so quietly, perhaps untraceably. In all of this, I’m suggesting a simple principle, albeit one that will not be simple to apply: Our collective attention is important. Whoever (or whatever) controls our attention controls, to a large degree, our future. The social media platforms that hold and shape our attention need to be governed in the public interest. That means knowing who’s truly running them and how they’re running them. I’m not sure which of the social network owners currently clear that bar...."
From "There Is a TikTok Challenge We All Need to Face Up To" by Ezra Klein (NYT).
I can't help seeing this argument: Speech is "powerful... if deployed," therefore it must "be governed in the public interest."
Klein isn't just talking about TikTok, which is owned by a Chinese company and therefore subject to the Chinese government's idea of "govern[ing] in the public interest." He's talking about all of social media, because he's "not sure" whether they are "governed in the public interest." Who gets to decide what's "in the public interest" and how to "govern" the way to "the public interest"? I look around at the Americans who talk about governing social media in the public interest, and I don't trust them with freedom of speech any more than I trust the Chinese government. That is, I don't trust them at all.
Of course, propaganda is bad, but censorship makes propaganda worse. And I'd say Klein's article is propaganda in favor of censorship. Step #1: The Chinese!!!
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36 comments:
Tiktok isn't a propaganda tool...yet. That's correct. Tiktok is a biometric and network intelligence gathering tool. It has been one since its inception. That is also correct. Embrace the power of 'and'.
He's talking about all of social media, because he's "not sure" whether they are "governed in the public interest." Who gets to decide what's "in the public interest" and how to "govern" the way to "the public interest"?
As you All KNOW; there is Only one answer.
Any governance Is GOVERNANCE
Any one who gets to decide.. DECIDES
The ONLY answer is NO GOVERNANCE
we must say, that they (everyone) 'shall make no law' abridging the freedom of speech
Will this mean 'disinformation'?? Yes, yes it will
Will this mean MORE 'disinformation' than there is now? No, no it won't
Anything you read now, is suspect. This won't change. What WOULD change, is what you can read
How long have you been a Chinese asset, Ann?
I stopped looking at your TikToks when I realized you were using them to collect information. "What's your favorite? Tell me in the comments!" Yeah, right. And where does all that info go? You tell Mao's progeny that we're on to them, Ms. O'Brien.
Step #2: Elon Musk. And that's the only reason Ezra Klein wrote this. TikTok, Facebook/Instagram, Google, Apple, and company, have been doing what they've been doing for years now. It's clear that every one of them had a major hand in getting Joe Biden uncovered long enough to get elected. Even right there in Wisconsin.
Nice of Klein to notice that there's a problem here. As for the Chinese, they have already infiltrated every aspect of our lives from the universities to the media, to the ads we see, or don't see. To the news we see, or don't see. There's a lot of money that flows to get things suggested, or not mentioned, or talked about in a specific way.
But you know who else does that? Yes you do. Our own government. So, yes, Ann. I tend to agree with you that I don't trust any of them at all with deciding what's good speech or bad speech. We have to decide that for ourselves. But I am sure that Klein would not have even considered writing this to sound like it's TikTok he's concerned with, if Elon Musk had not purchased Twitter.
Saw this today. From our own government. Be all you can be. Or...be a Ghost in the Machine.
Ezra Klein started as a blogger.
This is purely a set up for Phase Two: Musk.
"governed in the public interest"
(I selected and copied that phrase in anticipation of a comment before scrolling further and seeing the rest of the post.)
Here's a C. S. Lewis quote that is always sitting at the ready, on the digital shelf.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
The left is embracing censorship (under whatever term they choose) because they believe:
1 Their viewpoint is right and moral, and
2 they will always hold the levers of power
Harry Reid eliminating the filibuster for Federal judges should have been, but was not, instructive.
There’s a turn in progress. The question Klein raises sounds like the noises center-right people have made about social media and privacy concerns. Apple changed the privacy ground rules, I think to conform to new EU regulations, and that in turn is forcing FB and Google to obtain user permission for tracking data. This has caused a drop in data availability because much fewer users opt-in now that their consent is required. Google Alphabet has been trying to avoid complying. Don’t know if Euros will impose the same changes on CCP tech as they are on Silicon Valley.
Don’t television programs and newspaper articles “shape or distort public opinion”? Shouldn’t they be controlled as well?
How do we know our intelligence agencies are NOT running FB, Twitter, Instagram and Google? What accommodations are “our” social media companies making for CCP without telling their American investors and “customers?”
I don't care what adults do.
If a 30-something wants to view Chinese spyware that's fine with me, assuming that person knows that it is Chinese spyware.
But kids? No fucking way.
Trump should have banned TikTok and put the onus on Biden to turn it back on...
It's a self-serving proposal by Ezra and I find it very dishonest especially coming from him. When he helped start Vox, they made a big point of describing why the market needed a Vox and what Vox would be. They tried to paint it as something other than a far left mouthpiece for indoctrinating left wing ideology and hiding contrary facts. Surprise!
Also keep in mind that Klein started the journolist message forum which seems to have had an extremely anti-transparency M.O.
Therefore, I wouldn't take what he says seriously, except to understand what people like him, with manipulative tendencies and complete lack of self-awareness (being charitable), are trying to do.
More fundamentally, I'm sympathetic to all of Ann's arguments. And I would add that freedom of speech, including the right to say extremely unpopular ideas, including (especially?) ideas that would discredit the speaker, is one of, if not the, paramount public interest to be served by social media.
Didn't Trump make China sell off TikTok USA? What happened?
What is wrong with you people? Don't you trust the extremely ethical Ezra Klein to police the world of social media?
Seems like this article largely misses the point, instead it's just a rant about censorship triggered by the word "governance." Klein isn't saying "hey, someone should govern social media." He is saying that someone already governs social media. Moreover, Klein says that what he means by "governance in the public interest" is "knowing who’s truly running them and how they’re running them." His article is a lot more interesting and thought provoking than Ms. Althouse's response.
Seems like this article largely misses the point. Klein isn't saying "hey, someone should govern social media." He is saying that someone already governs social media. Moreover, Klein says that what he means by "governance in the public interest" is "knowing who’s truly running them and how they’re running them." His article is a lot more interesting and thought provoking than Ms. Althouse's response.
"Our collective attention is important."
Nonsense. Collectives don't have attention- individuals do. And this:
"...governed in the public interest."
would be more honestly written:
"governed in the manner of which I approve."
But it's not about honesty, is it? It's about control.
Rather than governing, it's important to be aware of what is being posted on Tik Tok (and other social media). This means Libs of Tik Tok is performing an important service, right? She shows us what we normally wouldn't see in our own feeds. Or does he think she's one of the ones that needs to be shut down "in the public interest".
For me, TikTok is a giant time sink that adds no value to my day. If my time on TikTok would provide someone information about me I would rather not share, then avoiding it is "doublegood". When someone says to me she found things on TikTok, inside my head, my little voice says. "Has she nothing better to do?"
'Who gets to decide what's "in the public interest" and how to "govern" the way to "the public interest"?'
Experts, natch.
Somehow I think the people most interested in getting jobs as censors will turn out to be the people I would least want to have jobs as censors.
Well said.
"Our collective attention is important. Whoever (or whatever) controls our attention controls, to a large degree, our future. "
Says a writer at the declining NY Times, heralded as the "paper of record" meaning if the NY Times doesn't think it is important than none of the "smart" people should either.
All he says about social media, Chinese or otherwise, is true for the NY Times, Washington Post, et al.
I'm old enough to remember when Walter Cronkite used his control of the "collective attention" to betray American troops in the field, turning the win against the Tet Offensive to a loss in the American mind.
"Intellectuals" are given their sinecures at universities, think tanks, etc. as reward for them "molding the minds of the mass of men" for the state or their faction of the state. Newspapers, publishers, etc., seized control of how far those "intellectuals" could reach by controlling the media. Some "journalists" got the idea they were the "intellectuals". Social media upended all that. The "intellectuals" could go around the media, but then so could people who were actually knowledgeable, or not, on a topic. The war of the chattering class has been going on for a couple decades now.
Donald Trump's tweeting was really less about his rudeness and more about the President not going through the media to speak to the people, except in well contained, pre-discussed speeches.
They scream about "misinformation" because they don't control it or at least have an influence on it.
"How do we know our intelligence agencies are NOT running FB, Twitter, Instagram and Google?"
How do we know our intelligence agencies are NOT running the NY Times, Washington Post, MSNBC, CNN...? Sure the first two may be run more by a wink and nod, but run still the same.
You are the product.
Althouse writes, "Of course, propaganda is bad, but censorship makes propaganda worse."
Censorship is propaganda. Nobody reads the Völkischer Beobachter when the Berliner Tageblatt is available.
Virtually everything purveyed by all media is propaganda, even it is only commercial propaganda--that is, advertising--but one must be aware that even supposedly "objective" non-advertising reporting is overtly or subtly, (even possibly sub-consciously), shaped by the conscious and unconscious political, cultural, and philosophical beliefs and assumptions of the creators of the media content and by the overt business goals of the owners of the various media organizations.
One can probably can a pretty fair to good idea of "an" objective-ish rendering of the facts if one reads and views reporting on the same events and issues presented by multiple and diverse sources, comparing and contrasting how each source reports the known facts and discusses the larger significance of those facts.
""How do we know our intelligence agencies are NOT running FB, Twitter, Instagram and Google?"
Many news reporters and opinion writers over the decades have have been CIA assets.
From the post:
"Of course, propaganda is bad, but censorship makes propaganda worse. And I'd say Klein's article is propaganda in favor of censorship. Step #1: The Chinese!!!"
Sounds right to me.
"Governance in the public interest"
From the Battleswarm Blog:
"A secretive group backed by millions of dollars from liberal billionaire George Soros is working behind the scenes with President Biden’s administration to shape policy, documents reviewed by Fox News show.
Governing for Impact (GFI), the veiled group, boasts in internal memos of implementing more than 20 of its regulatory agenda items as it works to reverse Trump-era deregulations by zeroing in on education, environmental, health care, housing and labor issues.
“Open Society is proud to support Governing for Impact’s efforts to protect American workers, consumers, patients, students and the environment through policy reform,” Tom Perriello, executive director of Soros’ Open Society Foundations, told Fox News Digital.
Snip.
GFI, however, works to remain secretive. It is invisible to internet search engines like Google (an unrelated “Govern for Impact” is the only group that appears in a search). No news reports or press releases appear on its existence outside of a mention of its related action fund in a previous Fox News article on the $1.6 billion Arabella Advisors-managed dark money network, to which it is attached."
Klein has Ben as reliably a puts as they come for years l. I used to run into this douche all the time at my local dive bar, always sitting with Hillary & Obama staffers and other hard-left agitators like that assclown Karl Frisch (the childless homosexual on the Fairfax County School Board) and Kal Pen (jerkoff from the Go To White Castle series of movies who later was working for OFA). All of them living in an alternate reality. If you wanted to see what ‘smug douche’ looked like, you could put a picture of Klein next it and it would be perfect.
I agree with everything you said. At the same time, I won't download TikTok to my phone. This one device records and stores a huge amount of information about my life and everyday activities, and I'd rather not have that saved in other people's servers for any reason. (And I realize other apps are probably looking in too, but this one seems especially egregious.)
I won't use Facebook on my phone, either, although I need it to keep up with my friends and family. I use a safe browser on my computer and clear cookies in between, which (I hope) helps protect my privacy to some small degree.
Tik Tok, like any company based in China, has as one of its owners, the Chinese government. This allows the Chinese government easy access to any data pulled from the users of the product world-wide. A Chinese company may have an entrepreneur owner who founded the company but that owner must take on as a not-so-silent partner the Chinese government. If the primary owner fails to toe the CCP / government line, the government takes over the company and the owner may be lucky avoiding jail time and/or a slave labor camp as well as having their wealth confiscated. Foreign companies who establish factories in China have to create a subsidiary co-owned by them and the Chinese government. A great scam for the Chinese that allows them to skim from the profits to fund their government and military along with having easy access to the foreign company’s intellectual property without the need to do industrial espionage. The Regressives(TM) in this country such as Bernie Sanders and Lizzie Warren are no doubt taking notes.
Authoritarianism with a passive voice. "Social media need to be governed" does not cut it. Tell us WHO you want to govern social media.
Naive me, I actually expected Klein to plump for transparency at the end, instead of “governance in the public interest.”
Forced transparency would be far less objectionable.
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