Deplatforming Trump

Deplatforming Trump

In about a month, Trump will no longer be president. He’ll no longer have the “political leader” exception on social media — he’ll have to play by the same rules as everyone else. I’ll game out what’s likely to happen as social networks and others consider “deplatforming” the ex-president. How deplatforming works All technology companies…

How the Fairness Doctrine should apply to social networks

How the Fairness Doctrine should apply to social networks

Simply put: social networks like Facebook are contributing to the polarization of American politics. The solution is not to break them up. The solution is to require them to expose members to a diversity of viewpoints. Why is America so divided? Why, even now, are there partisans so desperately afraid of Biden’s election that they…

The filth factory: Why social network content moderation is doomed to fail

The filth factory: Why social network content moderation is doomed to fail

A battle is waging between humanity’s evil side and the cleverness of Silicon Valley social network engineers. The evil side is winning. And it will always win. The Verge published some insightful articles on this topic in the last few weeks. Casey Newton published the second in a series of exposés on the outsourced operations…

Google CEO says YouTube is too big to fix. So what’s reasonable to expect?

Google CEO says YouTube is too big to fix. So what’s reasonable to expect?

Google CEO Sundar Pichai said on CNN that YouTube will never be free of offensive content. Fine. But let’s get some appropriate principles for content in place. Here’s some of what Pichai said: We’ve gotten much better at using a combination of machines and humans. . . . So it’s one of those things, let’s…

tronc’s employee video is the opposite of inspiring
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tronc’s employee video is the opposite of inspiring

Tribune corporation produced a video to excite employees about its transformation to “tronc” (Tribune online content). The video vividly shows why it’s unlikely to succeed. Newspapers are in bad shape. And Tribune — which owns the Chicago Tribune and the LA Times, and has stumbled from owner to owner — is in particular trouble. Hence…

At LinkedIn and Carrier, videos, jobs, and trust in a crisis

At LinkedIn and Carrier, videos, jobs, and trust in a crisis

Recently, the CEO of LinkedIn, Jeff Weiner, explained the company’s future in the wake of a 45% drop in the company’s shares. At around the same time, an executive at Carrier air-conditioner factory explained that 1,400 people would lose their jobs. It’s clear from the videos that the LinkedIn leader was successful, while the Carrier executive was a failure….