“If you know me, you know I’m committed to truth and fairness,” [X CEO Linda] Yaccarino posted. “Here’s the truth. Not a single authentic user on X saw IBM’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to the content in Media Matters’ article.”
Following the lawsuit’s filing, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton piled on, announcing he would be investigating Media Matters to determine whether its study of content on X might constitute “potential fraudulent activity” under Texas law. He also called the group a “radical left-wing organization” that “would like nothing more than to limit freedom by reducing participation in the public square.”
Here's the Media Matters analysis, with the images it generated. If Yaccarino is wrong — "Not a single authentic user on X saw IBM’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to the content in Media Matters’ article" — then there should be a counterclaim of defamation.
CNN writes that "Musk appeared not to dispute the results of Media Matters’ analysis, instead targeting the group for having created a test account and allegedly refreshing the account until X’s advertising systems ran an ad for a major brand beside extremist content." And "The result generated by the test would almost never happen in the real world, Musk’s complaint alleged."
Here's the X Corp. complaint, which purports to rely on X's internal user data to describe how Media Matters "intentionally evad[ed] X's multiple safeguards by curating the content on its feed and then repeatedly attempting to create pairings of advertisements for major brands with controversial content."
Posts
98 comments:
It's not a watchdog, it's an attack dog.
“Early in life I have noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired hailed as heroes of imaginary victories; and I saw newspapers in London retailing these lies and eager intellectuals building emotional superstructures over events that never happened. I saw, in fact, history being written not in terms of what happened but of what ought to have happened according to various ‘party lines."
-George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia
Yes. Knowingly. Maliciously. Manipulatively. The media have been actively engaged in controlling the conversation since before Hearst.
Musk fights the liberal media like Trump. Kick ass.
Media Matters lied, just like the rest of the media does. They manipulated the data and images. Musk is no dummy. Texas Attorney General is looking at criminal charges.
Those that pulled advertising based on Media Matters lies are going to look like idiots. But, then again, it's pro-censorship Apple and the rest. Wouldn't be surprised if the advertisers are fully aware the images are bullshit, and probably we're in on the scam.
Whether it's Trump or Musk, it's refreshing seeing someone with the funds to fight back, when most people just have to endure the myriad forms of humiliation these morons can dish out.
i do NOT understand the complaint..
Media Matters is Owned and Operated by the Democrat Party..
By DEFINITION, the Democrat Party can NOT be convicted of Any crime.. EVER
The Law EXISTS, to Support and Defend the Democrat Party..
Bringing charges Against one of its subsidiaries Makes No SENSE
LONG LIVE BIG BROTHER! LONG LIVE JOE BIDEN!!
only through continued War in the Ukraine, can we have Peace!!!
We see this juxtaposition all the time on fringe sites like NYT, Wikipedia, PBS, Fox, whitehouse.gov, etc.
CNN Business reports, in "Pro-Nazi posts next to Apple ads: Elon Musk’s X sues watchdog for its damning report."
The words "watchdog" and "report" were consciously chosen to sway opinion in a non-opinion piece. "Progressive group" and "claims" would be more accurate.
Gadfly and LLR-democratical Rich/C**** hardest hit.
Nuke Media Matters. Nuke em. Corrupt leftwing Neo-marxist toxic poison. Lying liars who lie.
Media Matters's first kill was Imus, 2006 I think. Imus had Obama on the show for interviews, but refused to let Hillary on for her general loathesomeness. Imus friend Trump called Imus and begged him to let his friend Hillary on the show. No way, said Imus. Trump reported back to Hillary, and Hillary to Media Matters, which the very next day, 15 minutes into the show, seized on "nappy headed ho'" as beyond the pale (for Rutgers women's basketball players trash-talking their opponents into defeat), and the rest was history. Everybody dropped Imus, to the amazement of everybody. And the danger having been exposed, everybody started deploring Imus.
One of the weirdest moments in American culture.
We are living in an era of billionaires and oligarchs using technology to manipulate governments worldwide. This involves right-wing targets such as George Soros, Klaus Schwab, Bill Gates, and Michael Bloomberg, as well as left-wing targets such as Donald Trump, Peter Theil, and (recently) Elon Musk.
Elon Musk is a curious case, as much/most of his fortune follows from government payments and subsidies (i.e., lefty-favorite Tesla; SpaceX). His purchase of Twitter-cum-X (ewwww) might therefore be seen as government planned activity. Did he buy Twitter or merely shift government resources to adjust Twitter to the middle as a de facto federal mouthpiece?
Cancel culture ends when trench warfare begins. Musk is setting up strong, deep right-wing trenches. The left's lighting war against the right (post 2016 with Trump; post 2020 with systematic censorship) is now over and likely cannot progress further.
So, with Musk possibly bankrupting Media Matters...activist lefties will either shut up or move back into the pre-Obama-era government agency shadows. I see the USA becoming ever more like the thick, ineffective European Union and United Nations bureaucracies. Trench warfare with a lot of happy-talk but where nothing happens. It's surely better than people losing their jobs and being imprisoned for telling the truth...
One world government. One world mafia. Welcome! Enjoy your cement shoes. The river is nearby.
Smart to have Yaccarino out front on this. Musk is hated by the Left and Linda is distrusted by the Right. So it is good for X to have them united in the lawsuit against the notorious liars at Media Matters.
the connection between media matters and the companies that pulled the ads is not so innocent. there was collusion and conspiracy to participate in fraud.
If Yaccarino is wrong — "Not a single authentic user on X saw IBM’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to the content in Media Matters’ article" — then there should be a counterclaim of defamation.
Note the Clintonesque term authentic user. Imma take the under but go ahead in invest your own time and effort in that defamation suit counselor…
CNN Business reports, in "Pro-Nazi posts next to Apple ads: Elon Musk’s X sues watchdog for its damning report."
I was struggling on whether what Media Matters truly did was fraud, until I read this headline. Are they a watchdog if they create a bad guy, have the bad guy do something nefarious, and then claim they caught the real bad guy in X that allowed the created bad guy to do the nefarious act? No CNN, the watchdog is the criminal, and their damning report is as honest as the Steele Dossier, the Biden laptop as Russian disinformation, or calling Jan. 6th a violent insurrection. It is the same pattern.
The Crack Emcee said..."Whether it's Trump or Musk, it's refreshing seeing someone with the funds to fight back, when most people just have to endure the myriad forms of humiliation these morons can dish out."
Refreshing, indeed. Musk is a hero for fighting these scum bags, at no little cost to himself. You can't get any lower than Media Matters.
"Gadfly and LLR-democratical Rich/C**** hardest hit."
'What about me!', Mark cries out.
So that happened. What BS is being shoveled on us now that is of similar odiousness? Everything, I would posit. Prove me wrong.
Make them the next Gawker
I hope Media Matters rides this all the way to trial. No way Musk wants to go to discovery on this. Also — Texas has an anti-SLAP law on the books. MediaMatters should sue Musk and Paxton.
gilbar sarcastically said...
"LONG LIVE BIG BROTHER! LONG LIVE JOE BIDEN!!"
At 81, it's more like Big Great-Grandpa.
So what if so-called extremist content is next to an IBM advertisement? X users should be able to figure out that IBM doesn't support Nazis.
Big lies mean big payouts -- consider the Sandy Hook verdicts and the Fox News settlement.
Musk admits that it is theoretically possible. Yaccarino says it's never actually happened.
So the argument is, Media Matters manipulated the platform to create a situation could happen and then wrote an article about it happening, making it sound like it was a normal thing.
Seems like a pretty good case for Musk IF he can get the court to recognize that Media Matters is not a journalistic outfit AND that advertisers pulled their ads in response to the MMA article.
Where do they find that stuff? I'm on Twitter a lot, and I never see really offensive stuff. I assume they are searching specifically for Nazi images. It's a real distortion of the average user experience.
Also, from what I've seen, judges invoke a range of doctrines to excuse leftwing defamation (while applying a very different standard to right-wing speakers).
Enigma writes, "...with Musk possibly bankrupting Media Matters..."
Bankrupting Media Matters isn't the goal. Media Matters owns virtually nothing and has little in the way of cash assets. By any reckoning Media Matters is already bankrupt, the organization having lived hand-to-mouth since its foundation. The goal is the utter humiliation of David Brock and his assistance slime balls. Unfortunately, pond scum can't experience humiliation.
Q - What makes this "pro-Nazi content"?
"I shall never believe that what is founded on lies can endure forever.
I believe in truth.
I'm sure that, in the long run, truth must be victorious."
A - According to Media Matters, Adolf Hitler said it.
Imagine a user who follows only racist twitter user but keeps also typing IBM IBM IBM IBM IBM so twitter decides he really is a good ad target, and then the user keeps clicking the ads to reinforce this.
IBM KKK IBM KKK IBM KKK IBM KKK
1) It's totally manipulated.
2) If such a person existed, they might buy IBM products even while being a racist, or maybe someone who monitors racism?
NFL, SOMEONE IS DRESSED UP WITH A HITLER OUTFIT WATCHING MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL, BETTER STOP YOUR BROADCASTING APPLE ADS!
"David Brock is one of the biggest scumbags in America. Let's hope Musk can shove this right up his ass."
Eeehhh .... he might like that.
Assuming this suit survives a motion to dismiss, we're going to learn a lot about how X operates under Musk. Ditto Media Matters (if one cares about it.)
Not a single authentic user on X saw IBM’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to the content in Media Matters’ article
So if one authentic user on X saw this, does that really defame MM?
So they admit that the MMFA's reporting was accurate, just claim it was misleading? I expect, like most of the billionaire LOLsuits, this gets dismissed pretty early.
Say good-bye to Media Matters. So sad, Gadfly. So sad.
How is Charley Partanna gonna make a living when his professional services are no longer found necessary? What kind of world is this we got here?
Who's running the show? These people have no sense of honor...
Michael Shellenberger : “The media say X is placing Apple, IBM, and other ads near pro-Nazi content, but it's not. We tried various ways to replicate Media Matters' research and couldn't. The real goal of Media Matters isn't to fight antisemitism. It's to destroy X as a free speech platform.”
Via Substack
Apparently Media Matters set up the phony account and then just repeatedly clicked to follow on the few (pathetic) extremist sites as well as the corporate sites they were targeting for outrage, and kept clicking until Twitter registered the phony user's preferences and dutifully fed in the ads for their screenshot.
Twitter has every keystroke on record to support their case. 'Damning report'? How can it be called such, which it's an artifice of Media Matter's gaming the algorithms for its own engineered result?
David Brock is the poisonous toad behind Media Matters, and he's a nasty piece of work, indeed. I would relish the destruction of his toxic brand, and root for the kind of results that Hulk Hogan got for Gawker.
The first challenge will being accepted by a Texas Federal Court. The next will be how the pack of defendants manage when one decides it's less expensive to arrange an out-of-court settlement. In the end, it will be seen as a spectacular battle of attorneys fighting over the money.
Is it "damning" if it's false? Isn't it just defamatory?
Discovery will be interesting. Media matters is going to see an awful lot.
Defamation potential? Meh. Media Matters is a public figure. They would have to show actual malice. I mean, maybe they'd countersue, but on the merits? Gimme a break.
“If you know me, you know I’m committed to truth and fairness,” [X CEO Linda] Yaccarino posted. “Here’s the truth. Not a single authentic user on X saw IBM’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to the content in Media Matters’ article.”
But Yaccarino's boss, Elon Musk, has publicly endorsed -on X - an antisemitic conspiracy theory popular among White supremacists: that Jewish communities push “hatred against Whites.”
That my friends is not "truth and fairness" since the lady CEO has zero control of the situation. Nor can she justify shopping for an extreme right-wing judge in Texas.
"[X's] complaint seemingly admitted that no statements that Media Matters published were false."
I was trying to find out what watchdog group was being referred to...then realized it was 'Media Matters'. Eh?
After Media Matters did this, CNBC spent the day talking about how to ethically stop investing in Tesla so as not to support Elon Musk and his anti semitism.
"Pro-Nazi posts next to Apple ads: Elon Musk’s X sues watchdog for its damning report."
I hate how repugnantly dishonest the writers of this article are. The subject of the article is the lawsuit brought by X. The headline should be the thrust of the allegations of the lawsuit. Instead of writing a neutral and honest summation of the lede like, "Musk's X Sues Media Matters Claiming Misleading Report on Anti-Semitism," they pull this trash, writing a headline trying to get the reader to assume the Media Matters report is correct. I hope these incestuous pig-shits get everything coming to them. Legacy Media delenda est.
Blogger Gusty Winds said...
"Texas Attorney General is looking at criminal charges."
Would that Attorney General be Ken Paxton who is scheduled to go to trial after being indicted on fraud charges? The same Ken Paxton, who was impeached with bipartisan approval by the republican controlled Texas House of Representatives? The same Paxton, who is separately being investigated by federal prosecutors for similar legal issues on coinciding federal statutes- that Ken Paxton?
"If Yaccarino is wrong — "Not a single authentic user on X saw IBM’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to the content in Media Matters’ article" — then there should be a counterclaim of defamation."
I'm not seeing it. If, in fact, MM was just posting Nazi content because they're Nazis, and they like to post Nazi content, then Yaccarino's claim that they were posting it for purposes of malicious tortious interference might, indeed, be defamatory. Good luck with that argument.
It's interesting to recall that David Brock got his start, such as it was, by poking holes right through the lies that Anita Hill told about Clarence Thomas. Then he later changed sides, and apologized to Hill, although the evidence he had developed that she was lying was still entirely persuasive. Did I say that Michelle Goldberg is one twisted sister? I did. But she's nothing to David Brock. Or maybe he just decided the money was easier on the Democrat side.
First, NYT, CNN et al. Then, Fox. Now, Media Matters. Yahoo!
CNBC is full of libs.
Carl Q, Jim Cramer, Andrew Sorkin.
LLR-democratical Rich/C****: "I hope Media Matters rides this all the way to trial. No way Musk wants to go to discovery on this."
LOL!
This is an aggressive level of stupid.
Wouldn’t the Media Matters manipulation establish fraud, tortious interference and actual malice?
Conversely, not sure you could prove knowledge of falsity on the defamation counterclaim, based on the “authentic user” qualifier.
Would a Nazi doing searches be considered an “authentic user”? Sounds like a matter of opinion.
Wouldn’t the Media Matters manipulation establish fraud, tortious interference and actual malice?
Conversely, not sure you could prove knowledge of falsity on the defamation counterclaim, based on the “authentic user” qualifier.
Would a Nazi doing searches be considered an “authentic user”? Sounds like a matter of opinion.
'If Yaccarino is wrong...'
Well, X has the data so I'm assuming it's a fairly standard search for them to do...
Some people seem to think that discovery is a process where you can ask any question about anything, but that isn't so. It has been a while since I've been in the FRCP, but discovery has to be tailored in such a way as to reasonably lead to admissible evidence. It isn't a blanket fishing license into someone's life or business.
I'm hoping we find out that Media Matters coordinated their smear though DMs on X. It would increase the entertainment value of watching them get sued.
And there it is: 27 Democratic lawmakers are accusing X of profiting from accounts glorifying violence against Israel. The letter claims the profits are coming from Premium subscriptions as well as ads shown in replies. They are using Media Matters as their reference.
The projection, gaslighting and outright lying by the democraticals, in order to deflect from their 7th century islamic-supremacist death cult alliance, is going to be off the chrts for the next year.
Meh. Instead of wasting time back-and-forthing with charges of He's an anti-semite and He's an anti-semite who's massively pro-Israel etc, we should just adopt the same programmed responses that Media Matters does towards we on the Right and push forward to destroy them.
Don't worry about winning or losing the defamation case: just do what they do, wage lawfare and smear the living shit out of them. Hurt them so fucking badly that they will, at worst, think twice about doing this to certain targets, and at best, be sued by others and bankrupted into oblivion.
To paraphrase Patton: cause them to lose money, blacken their reputation, dox their people and fuck up their lives.
I have not read the pleadings, but I'd bet on claims for interference with contractual relations, interference with future contractual relations, business defamation, and business disparagement. I could see creative arguments for one or two more, but they'd be more of a stretch. I'd have to research first.
Jake said...
Defamation potential? Meh. Media Matters is a public figure. They would have to show actual malice. I mean, maybe they'd countersue, but on the merits? Gimme a break.
**********
Musk will likely sue for "tortious interference with his business" rather than defamation.
"Tortious interference, also known as intentional interference with contractual relations, in the common law of torts, occurs when one person intentionally damages someone else's contractual or business relationships with a third party, causing economic harm."
So a different legal burden of proof would apply.
“So the argument is, Media Matters manipulated the platform to create a situation could happen and then wrote an article about it happening, making it sound like it was a normal thing.”
“Seems like a pretty good case for Musk IF he can get the court to recognize that Media Matters is not a journalistic outfit AND that advertisers pulled their ads in response to the MMA article.”
What seems to have happened is that MM set this up, by setting up a fake account, and using it to generate Nazi results, waiting for some big advertisers to be displayed with it. They apparently did this thousands of times. They then essentially did screen shots of it, and took them to these big advertisers, and some of them pulled their advertising. Sure sounds a bit fraudulent, as well as intentional interference in contractual relations.
No doubt MM figured that fishing for this sort of display ads displaying with Nazi content would go unnoticed with the billions of searches that X does every day. But they likely had liberal arts degrees. But Musk and the techies still working at X (after most of the liberal arts grads had been purged), knew better. Musk knew, after dealing with all of the inferference he got buying the company, and digging out the government interence, etc, Musk knew better. Behind all of the search results is a very extensive audit trail (supporting the “metrics” used to sell advertising), and you just have to know how to query it. And the techies at X are the experts at it. So, they were very quickly able to identify the queries, as well as the advertising displayed with it. And, lo and behold, it turns out that MM did thousands of queries for every hit - essentially turning what was a very rare confluence into what appeared to be intentional. But it wasn’t intentional - it was random, and very likely these companies had failed to specify that their ads not be displayed near Nazi content.
“Defamation potential? Meh. Media Matters is a public figure. They would have to show actual malice. I mean, maybe they'd countersue, but on the merits? Gimme a break.”
See my previous post. Thousands of queries for each incriminating hit very strongly suggests that they knew, very well that their piece was fraudulent.
But Yaccarino's boss, Elon Musk, has publicly endorsed -on X - an antisemitic conspiracy theory popular among White supremacists: that Jewish communities push “hatred against Whites.”
Yaaccarino is Jewish, Gadfly is Jewish, but they take opposite reviews of the situation. So looks like its a tie.
One of the reasons I like delayed comments on this blog is that you will notice that some of the regular commentators here will post a response to Althouse's blog within 2 or 3 minutes after her original post. Obviously they have never read her whole post, let alone the original source of her post, but by g-d they have an opinion about it, whether they understand it or not, and they are going to post it right away to be first in the comments section.
I just read that Media Matters is part if David Brock's empire of deceit, holy cow. I had no idea. If you want to view the phaggotty face of fetid fucking evil, stare at that pederast catamite's face for 5 seconds.
Brock is pure evil. In a just world he'd get robbed by an underage john and tortured al la Elegabulus style before being executed. Actually strike that...that would probably turn Brock on.
Kill that sadist with fire.
Whether it's Trump or Musk, it's refreshing seeing someone with the funds to fight back, when most people just have to endure the myriad forms of humiliation these morons can dish out.
Like when Peter Thiel took down Gawker. These guys may be portrayed as villains but they are the heroes we need at this moment.
@lonejustice: "Obviously they have never read her whole post, let alone the original source of her post"
B*llshit. Many Althouse posts lag hours or days behind external sources. When you've already read it, you don't need to read it again.
Blogger Rich said..."I hope Media Matters rides this all the way to trial. No way Musk wants to go to discovery on this. Also — Texas has an anti-SLAP law on the books. MediaMatters should sue Musk and Paxton."
I occasionally think Rich may be sincere, but deluded.. Then he goes and gets in bed with Media Matters. All anyone needs to know.
Blogger Dave Begley said..."So what if so-called extremist content is next to an IBM advertisement? X users should be able to figure out that IBM doesn't support Nazis."
Yeah, this is so lame. I think PB is onto something:
Blogger PB said..."the connection between media matters and the companies that pulled the ads is not so innocent. there was collusion and conspiracy to participate in fraud."
Blogger MayBee said..."After Media Matters did this, CNBC spent the day talking about how to ethically stop investing in Tesla so as not to support Elon Musk and his anti semitism."
And that's what this is all about.
Yaccarino’s statement, "Not a single authentic user on X saw IBM’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to the content in Media Matters’ article" is followed by the curious follow-up, “Only 2 users saw Apple’s ad next to the content, at least one of which was Media Matters.”
She is talking only about the 6 specific posts with pro-Nazi content in the Media Matters article. She’s not making a denial about ads next to pro-Nazi comment more generally. And her denial is only with regard to 3 of the 4 advertisers shown in in the Media Matters article not advertisers on X generally. By admitting X has the data to perform such an analysis, they’ve opened the door to Media Matters getting the data in discovery and doing its own analysis.
"Brock, a veteran Clinton operative, is “arguably the single most craven, deceitful and amoral scumbag DC politics has ever seen,” according to Greenwald.
Megan Kelly goes off on the vile liars at Media Matters.
The projection, gaslighting and outright lying by the democraticals, in order to deflect from their 7th century islamic-supremacist death cult alliance, is going to be off the chrts for the next year.
I suspect that you have vastly understated what will happen in 2024.
“Seems like a pretty good case for Musk IF he can get the court to recognize that Media Matters is not a journalistic outfit AND that advertisers pulled their ads in response to the MMA article.”
If the case were tried in NYC by Latela James no examples of damages to advertisers pulling ads would be needed for application of the statutes.
With selective targeted advertising, if you search for Nazi, you get Nazi related adds. Everyone knows this. If I search for Scientology I will get some Scientology ads, except I have an ad blocker.
"then there should be a counterclaim of defamation"
Maybe it would be appropriate to read "there should be" as
"I would expect to see".
Seems like a case of "and you, a law professor" in reverse.
It hinges here, ala GE Moore and not Bill Clinton, on the definition of should. What does Althouse mean here by "should"? I don't think it is axiological but rather epistemic.
Also to reply to lonejustice, Althouse links to paysites so often that click throughs to read the entire article are often unrewarding and fruitless. I am disabled; I can't afford these many paysites. So while your observation about not reading articles is correct in my case for sure, I am less sure that a negative judgement is warranted.
LLR lonejustice: "Obviously they have never read her whole post, let alone the original source of her post"
Enigma: "B*llshit. Many Althouse posts lag hours or days behind external sources. When you've already read it, you don't need to read it again."
So true.
LLR lonejustice demonstrating once again why the bat signal went up for more competent LLR trolling at Althouseblog by the Usual Suspects.
tim maguire,
You were doing great, right up to this point:
"...IF he can get the court to recognize that Media Matters is not a journalistic outfit..."
The First Amendment applies to everyone. A "journalistic outfit" has no more rights and does a lone individual sitting in his pajamas blogging from his mother's basement.
The dis-information is real - from the misinformationist frauds.
Give 'em the Gawker treatment, Elon.
We have now entered the "oh, so now it's antisemitic to say that Hitler was right about Jews" phase of Elon discourse.
Harun said: "NFL, SOMEONE IS DRESSED UP WITH A HITLER OUTFIT WATCHING MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL, BETTER STOP YOUR BROADCASTING APPLE ADS!"
Well, the NFL did take a knee in support of BLM, and BLM doesn't just support Hamas, it supports the acts committed by Hamas on Oct. 7th. Meanwhile, the NFL still paints BLM messages across the end zones and allows BLM messages on jerseys and helmets. Does the NFL really have to Hitler show up to figure out the messaging?
“She is talking only about the 6 specific posts with pro-Nazi content in the Media Matters article. She’s not making a denial about ads next to pro-Nazi comment more generally. And her denial is only with regard to 3 of the 4 advertisers shown in in the Media Matters article not advertisers on X generally. By admitting X has the data to perform such an analysis, they’ve opened the door to Media Matters getting the data in discovery and doing its own analysis.”
I don’t see how that is going to help MM. Sure, they will get in discovery the several thousand records that are the basis of the lawsuit. BFD. The context, after the fact, is obvious - the search history of the fake ID over a short period of time. But I don’t see them getting much else useful. They are unlikely to be able to structure queries that produce enough incriminating evidence to be a useful use of their money, without being overly burdensome. A thousand additional records would likely not be useful, but a billion would be excessively burdensome. Probably a million would. 10k maybe not. 100k? If I remember correctly, the standard for discovery in federal court is that it is reasonably calculated to lead to admissible evidence, and isn’t excessively burdensome. The knowledge gap here is highly asymmetric.
But so is the money differential. X is very likely going to bankrupt MM through this suit. The broader the discovery, the more it’s going to cost, and one side has billions to throw at the suit, with the richest man on the planet throwing in his pocket change, while several million dollars is going to bankrupt MM. And remember, X has one relevant stockholder to please. If he sees long term advantage in squashing MM (which seems very likely here), it’s going to be done. The more data that MM asks for, the quicker their demise. The reason that the suit transcends the personal, is that its effect is likely to be the in terrorem effect of being squashed as a bug, and driven out of business if you try this sort of thing against X and Musk. This isn’t just something that X/Musk does here, but common practice in the tech field with IBM, MSFT, Google, etc all playing the deep pocket game.
Kinda real story here. Many through the years have considered Scientology a cult. I know that I do. Just personal opinion, of course. So, up through the mid 1990s, an organization, the Cult Awareness Network (CAN), monitored a bunch of what they considered cults. One was Scientology, and they ultimately got sued by someone they apparently identified as a Scientologist, or some such. There was a money gap, CAN got deep pocketed, lost, and the winner ended up with their trade name, 800 numbers, and web site. Which was pretty slick on their side, because someone calling up one of those 800 numbers, trying to get help getting out of a cult, would get answered by someone selling Scientology, and the leads were already prequalified by being overly susceptible to cults in the first place. What happens when X/Musk takes over MM as their major creditor? Imagine the skin of that organization over an organization trying to ferret out misinformation on by the MSM supporting the left? Could this be part of what is behind this suit? I wouldn’t be surprised if Musk was fully aware of what happened with CAN. He has long run in the right tech crowds to have known about it. I did through my association with Mike Godwin (yes, “Godwin’s Law” on Nazis) and the nascent Electronic Freedom Foundation in the early 1990s.
“One of the reasons I like delayed comments on this blog is that you will notice that some of the regular commentators here will post a response to Althouse's blog within 2 or 3 minutes after her original post. Obviously they have never read her whole post, let alone the original source of her post, but by g-d they have an opinion about it, whether they understand it or not, and they are going to post it right away to be first in the comments section”
Many, if not most, of us comment based on what Ann says, and not what the NYT (etc) says. She reads it so that we don’t have to. I am not about to support such a hard left mouthpiece by paying to get through their pay wall. Ann does, and that is great for all of us. Many, if not most, here don’t really care what the underlying article actually says. It’s most often nonsense, spin, and misinformation. That you take those articles seriously is more a comment on you and your gullibility, and leftist viewpoint, than anything.
Why are supporters of Israel so dishonest"
Leftist Jews advocate Replacement Theory just like Leftist Christians do. How is that anti-semitic?
Leftist Jews advocate Replacement Theory just like Leftist Christians do. How is that anti-semitic?
Bankrupting Media Matters is likely to be a quick but relatively meaningless exercise. I would imagine someone as clever and twisted as David Brock and his minions have figured out the best way to protect their media cesspit from libel suits as a matter of priority, would be to make it a creature of cash flow, not assets. The question is, can their cash flow be starved to extinction? The only way I see to really manage that is through discovery and such a thorough dose of their own medicine so that any donor of Dark Money will be scared of exposure. Lay it on nice and thick, Elon.
I don't get it.
How is "created a test account and allegedly refreshing the account until X’s advertising systems ran an ad for a major brand beside extremist content" manufacturing the claim? It seems like a way of demonstrating the claim.
What safeguards were bypassed?
Obviously if I'm a normal business advertiser I don't want my ad associated with this (or lots of other) dreck. Somebody just tried to do Musk a favor, but I suspect he will not like any of the possible solutions.
"Blogger PB said..."the connection between media matters and the companies that pulled the ads is not so innocent. there was collusion and conspiracy to participate in fraud."
I suspect there is truth to this point, and my suspicion is along the lines of the activism that we have seen from the leaders of Vanguard and Black Rock for example, voting for the ESG scam here a few years back (which they have largely quietly stopped doing): A case of voting against the direct investment goals of their investors - which was to make money - and instead wielding the power of their institutional shares as leverage to advance a leftist agenda. The corrupted use of corporate power for private, personal interests.
So if Media Matters had insiders in the targeting corporations, even at lower levels of discretionary authority, those insiders could decide or advocate for dropping X as an advertising venue - and even claim that they had access to exceptional information that X and Elon are somehow antisemitic, re-broadcasting the Media Matters lies as a matter of industrial intelligence, and so forth. Wouldn't surprise me, not one little bit. The Gramscian March, only for corporations.
Last night on CNBC, Texas AG Ken Paxton looked like a very happy pig knee deep in slop as he described the criminal case he intends to bring against Media Matters. Lawfare is an ugly, ugly thing, even when non-leftists use it. And he intends to make this very ugly indeed.
The Crack Emcee: "Why are supporters of Israel so dishonest"
LOL
Team Taqiyya/7th Century Death Cult speaks!
Many, if not most, here don’t really care what the underlying article actually says. It’s most often nonsense, spin, and misinformation. That you take those articles seriously is more a comment on you and your gullibility, and leftist viewpoint, than anything.
Exactly. It might be interesting to see what the spin is but not enough to waste my time.
Mark said...
"Discovery will be interesting. Media matters is going to see an awful lot."
You understand that discovery works both ways.
Anything that makes life for Media Matters more complicated is fine with me.
Isn’t that what this whole lawfare thing is about? If you can dish it out, you better get ready to get some in return.
Somebody just tried to do Musk a favor, but I suspect he will not like any of the possible solutions.
Yep. Media Matters was simply trying to do Musk a favor. I'm sure that's it.
“How is "created a test account and allegedly refreshing the account until X’s advertising systems ran an ad for a major brand beside extremist content" manufacturing the claim? It seems like a way of demonstrating the claim.”
“What safeguards were bypassed?”
“Obviously if I'm a normal business advertiser I don't want my ad associated with this (or lots of other) dreck. Somebody just tried to do Musk a favor, but I suspect he will not like any of the possible solutions.”
Read the Complaint. It explains it somewhat. They started with an older account, so the safeguards put in for bot accounts would be turned off. Then they were very selective about their queries - one the one side, only the companies they were targeting (Apple, IBM, etc). On the other hand, only the desired extremest rhetoric. Thousands of queries, and they would get a hit. One of the combinations was made twice over billions of searches, and one of them was contrived by MM. The issue was never whether or not the combination could occur, because on X almost any combination can. It’s the frequency that is relevant. One in a hundred would be bad. One in a thousand maybe worrisome. But two in a billion is insignificant. And that is why the Complaint points to context as being at the heart of the complaint. It’s the portrayal of the two in billions (one contrived) situation being commonplace that is at the heart of the fraud alleged in the Complaint.
A brief note. Mention before was made about Discovery, and I pointed out, in this realm, the advantage is immensely in favor of X. It was a simple matter, with the metrics and analytics in place to sell advertising, for X to quickly and easily figure out how frequently a specific pair of an ad and offensive material were served together. The tools have long been in place, are very efficient, and are used routinely. Indeed, they were probably used, at least indirectly, by the Trump campaign in 2016, and because they were so successful, were limited, by X, Google, etc in 2020, at least for Republicans.
"X users should be able to figure out that IBM doesn't support Nazis."
Not since 1945, anyway.
X is going to have to prove advertisers are not leaving based on other actions of theirs, like this which also happened this week:
"Marketers will have to keep (blindly) trusting X, formerly Twitter, when it says it’s a safe place for advertising. Unfortunately, they can’t verify those claims independently.
The platform recently opted out of independent auditing by Ernst & Young for its Media Rating Council (MRC) brand safety credentials. X cited existing resource constraints and ongoing technological challenges as the reasons it could not continue with the formal audit right now, though the company is open to revisiting it down the line, an MRC spokesperson told Digiday."
Media Matters can point to a long list of Twitters corporate decisions like this on why large advertisers are leaving, along with the poop emoji responses from Twitter PR when they tried to reach out to their (fired) contact.
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