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Category: Social media

Threads blocks searches related to covid and vaccines as cases rise

Threads blocks searches related to covid and vaccines as cases rise

The Washington Post reports: Instagram’s text-based social platform Threads last week rolled out its new search function, a crucial step toward the platform’s expansion and one that would give it more parity with X, formerly known as Twitter. Tech is not your friend. We are. Sign up for The Tech Friend newsletter. Not even 24 hours later, the company was embroiled in controversy. When users went to Threads to search for content related to “covid” and “long covid,” they were…

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The truth about Elon Musk and anti-Semitism

The truth about Elon Musk and anti-Semitism

Judd Legum and Tesnim Zekeria write: Elon Musk, a self-proclaimed “free speech absolutist,” is threatening to sue the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) for billions of dollars because the group has publicly criticized his management of X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. In a public meltdown over X’s declining financial condition, Musk accused the ADL, an organization founded in 1913 “to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all,” of being “the biggest…

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Elon Musk amplifies call by antisemites to ban the ADL from X

Elon Musk amplifies call by antisemites to ban the ADL from X

JTA reports: Elon Musk is engaging with white nationalists and antisemites who want to ban the Anti-Defamation League from Twitter, the influential social media platform he now calls “X.” Musk on Saturday asked his followers whether he should poll the platform about a hashtag, #BanTheADL, embraced in recent days by white nationalists and others on the far right. Musk had earlier “liked” the tweet launching the hashtag by Keith Woods, an Irish white nationalist and self-described “raging antisemite.” “The ADL’s…

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Twitter accused of helping Saudi Arabia commit human rights abuses

Twitter accused of helping Saudi Arabia commit human rights abuses

The Guardian reports: The social media company formerly known as Twitter has been accused in a revised civil US lawsuit of helping Saudi Arabia commit grave human rights abuses against its users, including by disclosing confidential user data at the request of Saudi authorities at a much higher rate than it has for the US, UK or Canada. The lawsuit was brought last May against X, as Twitter is now known, by Areej al-Sadhan, the sister of a Saudi aid…

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Musk’s new Twitter policies helped spread Russian propaganda, EU says

Musk’s new Twitter policies helped spread Russian propaganda, EU says

The Washington Post reports: Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter) has played a major role in allowing Russian propaganda about Ukraine to reach more people than before the war began, according to a study released this week by the European Commission, the governing body of the European Union. The research found that, despite voluntary commitments to take action against Russian propaganda by the largest social media companies, including Meta, Russian disinformation against Ukraine, thrived. Allowing the disinformation and hate speech to…

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Following Elon Musk’s lead, Big Tech is surrendering to disinformation

Following Elon Musk’s lead, Big Tech is surrendering to disinformation

The Washington Post reports: Social media companies are receding from their role as watchdogs against political misinformation, abandoning their most aggressive efforts to police online falsehoods in a trend expected to profoundly affect the 2024 presidential election. An array of circumstances is fueling the retreat: Mass layoffs at Meta and other major tech companies have gutted teams dedicated to promoting accurate information online. An aggressive legal battle over claims that the Biden administration pressured social media platforms to silence certain…

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Environmental activists are fleeing Elon Musk’s Twitter

Environmental activists are fleeing Elon Musk’s Twitter

Quartz reports: Scientists and environmental activists have been fleeing Twitter—now called X—after Elon Musk bought the social platform and took a wrecking ball to its innards. A study (pdf) published in a journal called Trends in Evolution and Ecology on Aug.15 showed, that out of a sample of 380,000 environmentally oriented X users, “nearly 50% became inactive” after Musk’s acquisition. This rate, the researchers found, was “much higher than a control sample.” By April 2023, only 52.5% of sampled environmental activists on X were still active. The study was conducted between Dec. 2022 and May 2023. Days after…

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What if you knew what you were missing on social media?

What if you knew what you were missing on social media?

Julia Angwin writes: Social media can feel like a giant newsstand, with more choices than any newsstand ever. It contains news not only from journalism outlets, but also from your grandma, your friends, celebrities and people in countries you have never visited. It is a bountiful feast. But so often you don’t get to pick from the buffet. On most social media platforms, algorithms use your behavior to narrow in on the posts you are shown. If you send a…

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Special counsel obtained Trump DMs despite ‘momentous’ bid by Twitter to delay, unsealed filings show

Special counsel obtained Trump DMs despite ‘momentous’ bid by Twitter to delay, unsealed filings show

Politico reports: Special counsel Jack Smith obtained an extraordinary array of data from Twitter about Donald Trump’s account — from direct messages to draft tweets to location data — newly unsealed court filings reveal. But it took a bruising battle with Twitter’s attorneys in January and February — punctuated by a blistering analysis by a federal judge, who wondered whether Elon Musk was attempting to “cozy up” to the former president by resisting the special counsel’s demands — before prosecutors…

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Elon Musk’s X is throttling traffic to websites he dislikes

Elon Musk’s X is throttling traffic to websites he dislikes

The Washington Post reports: The company formerly known as Twitter has been slowing the speed with which users could access links to the New York Times, Facebook and other news organizations and online competitors, a move that appeared targeted at companies that have drawn the ire of owner Elon Musk. Users who clicked a link on Musk’s website, now called X, for one of the targeted websites were made to wait about five seconds before seeing the page, according to…

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Special counsel obtained search warrant for Donald Trump’s Twitter account

Special counsel obtained search warrant for Donald Trump’s Twitter account

Politico reports: Special Counsel Jack Smith obtained a search warrant for Donald Trump’s Twitter account, @realDonaldTrump, earlier this year, according to newly revealed court documents. Twitter’s initial resistance to complying with the Jan. 17 warrant resulted in a federal judge holding the company, now called X, in contempt and levying a $350,000 fine. A federal court of appeals upheld that fine last month in a sealed opinion. On Wednesday, the court unsealed a redacted version of that opinion, revealing details…

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Twitter threatens legal action against nonprofit that tracks hate speech

Twitter threatens legal action against nonprofit that tracks hate speech

The New York Times reports: Elon Musk has over the last year threatened legal action against tech competitors, employees and people who use Twitter, which he owns. Now he is also taking aim at an organization that studies hate speech and misinformation on social media. X Corp., the parent company of the social media company, sent a letter on July 20 to the Center for Countering Digital Hate, a nonprofit that conducts research on social media, accusing the organization of…

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Twitter’s rebranding is a meaningless publicity stunt

Twitter’s rebranding is a meaningless publicity stunt

Scott Nover writes: Elon Musk, the mercurial owner of Twitter, announced overnight that he is changing the platform’s name and logo to “X.” In doing so, he’s throwing away the brand name, the bird logo, and maybe even the verb “tweet,” all of which breathe financial value into the company he has bought, stripped, and suffocated. The New York Times reports that Musk spent Monday projecting the letter x in the cafeteria and rechristening conference rooms with names like “s3xy”…

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RFK Jr. and his group are fans of a fringe streamer who claimed that ‘Hitler was a Rothschild’ who was ‘utterly set up’

RFK Jr. and his group are fans of a fringe streamer who claimed that ‘Hitler was a Rothschild’ who was ‘utterly set up’

Media Matters reports: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his organization Children’s Health Defense are fans and promoters of James Corbett, a Sandy Hook and 9/11 conspiracy theorist who has claimed that “Hitler was a Rothschild” and “Hitler and the Nazis were one hundred percent completely and utterly set up … by the international banking community and the international crony capitalists.” Kennedy has thanked Corbett for his supposedly “extraordinary work for keeping the public informed,” and Kennedy’s anti-vaccine group has featured…

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Far-right Twitter influencers first on Elon Musk’s monetization scheme

Far-right Twitter influencers first on Elon Musk’s monetization scheme

The Washington Post reports: On Thursday, Twitter announced that it would begin sharing ad revenue with content creators on its platform for the first time. But the offer won’t apply to all creators. The first beneficiaries appear to be high-profile far-right influencers who tweeted before the announcement how much they’ve earned as part of the program. Ian Miles Cheong, Benny Johnson and Ashley St. Clair all touted their earnings. “Wow. Elon Musk wasn’t kidding. Content monetization is real,” tweeted an…

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The two faces of TikTokers promoting Syrian tourism

The two faces of TikTokers promoting Syrian tourism

Jessica Roy writes: “Get ready with me to go clubbing with this bitch!” commands a recent TikTok posted by an Arab International University student named Patricia. In the clip, two college-aged girls in one’s childhood bedroom apply bronzer, chat and listen to music as they prepare to go out to a party. Both wear the uniform of a 20-something in 2023 — denim and a going-out top — and one sports a tattoo along the blade of her collarbone. The…

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