Facebook guidelines allow users to call for death of public figures

Posted on March 23, 2021 by Admin

Exclusive: public figures considered to be permissible targets for otherwise-banned abuse, leaked moderator guidelines show

Facebook’s bullying and harassment policy explicitly allows for “public figures” to be targeted in ways otherwise banned on the site, including “calls for [their] death”, according to a tranche of internal moderator guidelines leaked to the Guardian.

Public figures are defined by Facebook to include people whose claim to fame may be simply a large social media following or infrequent coverage in local newspapers.

‘A letter tells someone they still matter’: the sudden, surprising return of the pen pal

Posted on March 23, 2021 by Admin

In the pandemic, many have rediscovered the sheer pleasure of writing to strangers, with new schemes spreading hope and connection around the world

A few months ago, when the rules had been sufficiently relaxed to allow friends to sit together outside, Liz Maguire had coffee with a woman she had never met. The pair had already been communicating for months, and quickly fell into easy conversation. Later on, this woman tweeted about their meeting, to which another woman replied: “You met Liz Maguire? As in the Liz Maguire?”.

The Liz Maguire is a 27-year-old American expat living in Dublin. Though undoubtedly a celebrity in her chosen field, she is not a professional, but that is simply because she is not paid to do what she loves, which is to write letters to strangers.

Unmasked: man behind cult set to replace QAnon

Posted on March 20, 2021 by Admin

The creator of the rapidly growing ‘Sabmyk Network’ is said to be a Berlin art dealer with a record of media manipulation

The mysterious individual behind a new and rapidly growing online disinformation network targeting followers of QAnon, the far-right cult, can be revealed as a Berlin-based artist with a history of social media manipulation, a prominent anti-racism group claims.

Since Donald Trump left the White House, QAnon’s vast online community has been in a state of flux as it comes to terms with the reality that its conspiracy theories – such as the former US president being destined to defeat a cabal of Satan-worshipping paedophiles – amount to nothing.

Why bands are disappearing: ‘Young people aren’t excited by them’

Posted on March 18, 2021 by Admin

Maroon 5’s Adam Levine was scoffed at for suggesting there ‘aren’t any bands any more’ – but if you look at the numbers, he’s right. Wolf Alice, Maximo Park and industry insiders ask why

“The moment that we started a band was the best thing that ever happened,” sings Matty Healy on the 1975’s recent single Guys. The song is an ardent love letter to the band, and to the romance of bands in general: the camaraderie, the solidarity, the joyous fusion of creativity and friendship. It’s an old sentiment but an increasingly rare one.

“It’s funny, when the first Maroon 5 album came out [in 2002] there were still other bands,” the band’s frontman Adam Levine told Apple Music’s Zane Lowe this month. “I feel like there aren’t any bands any more … I feel like they’re a dying breed.” Levine was quick to clarify that he meant bands “in the pop limelight” but the internet doesn’t really do clarification, so his remarks sparked bemusement and outrage among the literal-minded, from aggrieved veterans such as Garbage (“What are we Adam Levine? CATS?!?!?”) to fans of newcomers such as Fontaines DC and Big Thief.

‘Like a bad joke’: Al Jazeera staff bemused at rightwing US venture

Posted on February 24, 2021 by Admin

Rightly, a digital platform for conservatives, goes down awkwardly in Qatari-funded news organisation

Al Jazeera’s surprise decision to launch a digital platform for conservatives in the US has left many within the Qatar-based news organisation dumbfounded and confused, staff have told the Guardian.

The network has announced the launch of Rightly, a platform that will host programmes and produce online content aimed at “audiences currently underrepresented in today’s media environment”, in this case right-of-centre Americans.

Facebook over-enforced Australia news ban, admits Nick Clegg

Posted on February 24, 2021 by Admin

Communications chief defends reversed ban, saying it is unfair to force tech firms to pay for news content

Facebook “erred on the side of over-enforcement” in removing links to hundreds of non-media organisations in Australia, Nick Clegg has admitted, in a blogpost defending the social media company’s short-lived news ban there.

The former UK deputy prime minister, now Facebook’s vice-president of global affairs and communications, said the tech firm had been “forced into [the] position” of blocking content designated as news after the Australian government refused to back down over plans to require it to negotiate with news publishers for payment for content.

No 10 ‘concerned’ about Facebook news shutdown in Australia

Posted on February 22, 2021 by Admin

Oliver Dowden expected to meet US company, as No 10 says UK will ‘defend free speech and journalism’

The UK government is “obviously concerned” at the repercussions of Facebook’s shutdown of large numbers of news and public information resources in Australia, Downing Street has said, confirming that the culture secretary will meet the US company this week.

Oliver Dowden is “expecting to meet Facebook this week”, Boris Johnson’s spokesperson said, adding that the date had yet to be confirmed.

Eliot Higgins: ‘People accuse me of working for the CIA’

Posted on February 20, 2021 by Admin

The founder of the online investigative collective Bellingcat talks about working with Alexei Navalny, open source reporting and the trouble with ‘cyber-miserablism’

Eliot Higgins launched Bellingcat in summer 2014, days after the Russian military shot down Malaysian Airlines MH17 over eastern Ukraine. The online outfit has broken a series of international scoops. In 2018 it discovered the identities of the two undercover assassins who poisoned Sergei Skripal in Salisbury. Last year Bellingcat revealed extraordinary details of the plot by Russia’s FSB spy agency to poison the opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

Higgins’s first book tells the story of how open source investigation has redefined reporting in the 21st century. He argues that the internet can still be a force for good, despite bad actors, complacent technology firms and an explosion in alternative “facts”. Higgins lives in Leicester with his wife, daughter and son.

Tobacco giant bets £1bn on social-media influencers to boost ‘lung-friendlier’ sales

Posted on February 20, 2021 by Admin

As smoking falls out of fashion, BAT is pinning its hopes on younger users of e-cigarettes and nicotine pouches

Flashing an ice-white smile for her 50,000 followers on TikTok, a fresh-faced young woman pops a flavoured nicotine pouch into her mouth, as one of Pakistan’s most popular love songs plays in the background.

More than 3,000 miles away, in Sweden, another social media starlet lip-syncs for the camera, to a different pop tune. The same little pouches, made by British American Tobacco, appear in shot.

Facebook is ‘schoolyard bully’ in Australia news row, says UK media boss

Posted on February 18, 2021 by Admin

Trade group chairman says robust regulation is needed to rein in monopolistic tech firms

Facebook’s move to block all media content in Australia shows why countries need robust regulation to stop tech firms behaving like a “schoolyard bully”, the head of the UK’s news media trade group has said.

Henry Faure Walker, the chair of the News Media Association, said Facebook’s ban during a pandemic was “a classic example of a monopoly power being the schoolyard bully, trying to protect its dominant position with scant regard for the citizens and customers it supposedly serves”.

UK’s first football hate crime officer turns focus on social media

Posted on February 15, 2021 by Admin

Stuart Ward of West Midlands police aims to stamp out racist abuse in grounds and online to bring back community spirit

Since starting his role as the UK’s first football hate crime officer earlier this month, PC Stuart Ward has been busier than expected, considering football fans are banned from stadiums as part of the coronavirus lockdown.

Instead of jibes from the stands, players are now fielding more abuse on social media – just the other week, in Ward’s biggest case to date, West Midlands police arrested a man suspected of racially abusing West Bromwich Albion footballer Romaine Sawyers online.

Microsoft urges US and EU to follow Australian digital news code

Posted on February 12, 2021 by Admin

Firm stood against Facebook and Google over plan to make tech giants pay news organisations

Microsoft is calling for the US and the EU to follow Australia in introducing rules that require technology companies to share revenue with news organisations and support journalism.

The company, which stood against Facebook and Google in supporting the proposal, argues that it is necessary to impose such a levy to create a level playing field between large tech firms and independent media organisations.

Perfect storm: have the influencers selling a dream lost their allure?

Posted on February 6, 2021 by Admin

Social media stars, already under fire for trips to Dubai in lockdown, are now involved in a row over Instagram posts

Makeup artist Sasha Louise Pallari started her hashtag #filterdrop in summer 2020. A social media campaign to discourage influencers promoting beauty products by using filters to exaggerate their effect, it paid off last week when the Advertising Standards Authority banned two tanning brands from using misleading filters on Instagram Stories. The ruling means that in future all use of filters will be more tightly controlled – and, so the theory goes, more “natural” content likely to be seen on social media.

Google threatens to leave Australia – but its poker face is slipping

Posted on January 22, 2021 by Admin

Analysis: tech firm’s refusal to pay news publishers comes as it agrees to do exactly that in France

The biggest companies in technology love an ultimatum but rarely do they spell out their threats. This week, however, Google has done exactly that, telling an Australian parliamentary hearing that a proposed law forcing the company to pay news publishers for the right to link to their content “would give us no real choice but to stop making Google Search available in Australia”.

The threat, from the company’s Australian managing director, Mel Silva, is the latest escalation in a war of words over the proposal, which seeks to undo some of the damage online business models have dealt to the country’s publishing industry.

Roundup Newswires

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Category Archives: Digital media

‘Like a bad joke’: Al Jazeera staff bemused at rightwing US venture

Microsoft urges US and EU to follow Australian digital news code