I was planning on doing a Callin episode tonight anyway, to discuss yesterday’s column about the resignation of Jack Dorsey, but then I saw the news that Twitter has already made a major advance in its content moderation policies, announcing that it will henceforth be limiting the sharing of images:
“When we are notified by individuals depicted, or by an authorized representative, that they did not consent to having their private image or video shared, we will remove it.”
I spent a fair part of the morning polling people in both journalism and the tech business, trying to get a grasp on what this will mean practically, but this is exactly the problem with vaguely defined speech controls - nobody knows. As I wrote in yesterday’s piece, “Will Twitter Become an Ocean of Suck?” (readers overwhelmingly thought I used the wrong tense in the headline), the problem with making “harm” or “safety” a speech standard is that aggressive censors can make such standards mean almost anything.
In any case, I’ll be on Callin tonight at 5:00 p.m. to discuss. Just click here to join in:
Just over a year that I have been off Twitter. I am sane. Less anxious, more calm. More forgiving and happier. Get off Twitter. Slinging crap back at people who sling crap at you or who are pedaling lies, will not move the needle one millimeter. Get off now. Read a book. Take walks. Don't wait until tomorrow. Do. It. Now. The alternative sites, while uncensored, are also a time suck with little value. Pick a few folks like Matt, Glenn, Bari and check Instapundit at least once a day.
I purged myself from social media and the news at the beginning of the pandemic, and I never felt more clear-headed and less anxious. You begin to realize there isn't much of a payoff to being hyper-aware of problems you're not doing anything to solve. Being trapped in my apartment as our government was failing to address the pandemic really enforced that within me; I was trapped in my apartment drowning in outrages to be anxious about. I find reading books to be far more productive than trapping yourself in the news cycle.
As a retired reference librarian I can recommend books as more reliable sources of information, too. The picture of people like Tucker Carlson, Jonah Goldberg, Christopher Caldwell and Kevin Williamson that emerges from their well-researched, persuasively argued books differs dramatically from mainstream media caricatures of these individuals, and the fare offered is far more substantive.
I hear you. I am off all social media now, including Facebook. It has its downsides (particularly with family contacts, etc), but so much better for my mental health. As far as social media goes, Twitter is the most useless. If someone tried to cancel me on Twitter, I wouldn't even know about it. LOL.
While I won’t be able to make it on the callin, I will say that I think what you’re doing with Substack is probably one of the most important actions for creating a new anti-MSM free speech alternative.
You, Greenwald, and others are building increasingly huge audiences. The MSM is afraid of Substack. Greenwald’s Substack-Rumble combination is nice too. That has the ability to make the MSM YouTube matrix take a new body blow, in my opinion. Let them have all their stupid cat videos.
People should just get their news from a constellation of Substack and Rumble pages. There can be one great constellation of Substack pages that essentially functions as a new anti-MSM.
Let’s hope Substack keeps getting more honest and original thinkers and many many many more readers on board so we can watch the MSM/ Social media Tower of Babel crumble, forever.
I follow Taibbi, Greenwald, and also Alex Berenson on Substack for his excellent investigations and exposure of the CoV2 virus. Refreshing to find actual facts with sources sited instead of BS propaganda from those with a political agenda.
These VC types (like David Sacks, Sequoia, Goldcrest) have priorities and your free speech isn't one of them. You are important only in your relevance in their engagement metrics, which is how they will demonstrate their success in executing their business plan at the next round. But at this stage in the game (A round was two months ago) being easily available to everyone isn't critical to tracking the growth curve they seek.
We need to bring the hackers to the bright white light side - that’s what Ed Snowdon should be helping us do to preserve our freedom - along with helping journos in totalitarian states & I ain’t talking Russia or Amerika (yet) Ed paid an ultimate price, but really I wouldn’t mind living in St Petersburg
I know. The irony has a big red flashing light and is making that old-timey claxon sound.
I remember groaning out loud when GG was gushing with excitement about what these tech tycoons had told him about what their apps will do for free speech. There is a grain of truth in their story given that technolibertarianism is the default theology of that class. But that's just bafflegab to hide their true cyberselfish nature.
That old truism deserves elaboration. Some people get corrupted by power. Others refuse to be corrupted and therefore don't get to exercise any power. If life were as simple as that then we have literally no reason for hope. So it seems that modification of power is what we should seek.
The problem is - if you have none, you are not s player so no one cares (we obvs care or we wouldn’t be writing). If you, by luck or legacy or brains or hooking, get money or power you are doomed. Gandhi knew it. The historical Jesus knew it. Shakespeare knew it. If there was a god he/she/it would know it. Socialist utopias would make everything as equal as possible - and someday I hope that works.
One thing they are failing to realize with this rush to everything mobile is that there are many of us out here unable to use such technology due to the oft-denied electro-magnetic sensitivity. All around me, friends and family are complaining of muddled thoughts and a sense of electricity going through them ever since 5G was turned on. And these folks are only having the mild symptoms of something I have experienced even from normal electricity itself in the pre-digital age.
We electrosensitives were called kooks because corporate funded studies always "proved" that the telecom products were safe. Of course, independent studies from Europe, determined that it is a real phenomenon. Our censored news won't allow us to know this.
It is important now since so many people are going to become ill as the signals grow stronger and stronger. The technocrats really don't seem to care what it does to our health. Even now, their answer is a theraputic rather than a cure when it comes to Covid 19. The drug powers have managed to have the definition changed for what a vaccine is. Prior to the current vaccine, a vaccine meant that the NONVAXINATED were not going to make you sick.
Not against the shot for those who are high risk or willing to be guinea pigs for a drug that will take at least 5 years before we know whether it is really safe or not. Go ahead, but when this is becoming mandatory around the world to go along with a QR ID code - this is mandatory mobile tracking, mandatory drug injection and loss of all private and personal autonomy.
Recently Matt hosted Adolph Reed to speak about his alternative to the neoliberals. As left wing and progressive as he sounded, he was still spouting the very agenda of the WEF, who are behind the shift to global governance. Dr. Reed even used some of their talking points, especially when he came down rather militantly demanding the vax to participate in society, considering any who object to be right wing Trump supporters! Well, I've been pretty far to the left all my life, but what I am seeing in the "left" is fascism and Marxist tactics without any of the actual social justice of the left. Does Dr. Reed know that some people are allergic to PEG? Where is the room for the person who doesn't fit the cookie cutter mold in this technological world? This is why we still need human hearts and not digital algorithms. From Dr. Reed's words, it seems the US has 3 options that are all leading to the WEF in the end. No way. Some of us are busy articulating yet unconsidered options that have NOT been co-opted. I
This brings me back to the exclusive forum for the podcast. Please do not get caught up in this dazzling web of technology. The best thing we can do for freedom now is revert to old school technology - back to blogs like substack, even samizdat distribution of magazines, videos - you know, off line and in person! We have forgotten this over the past years and I say we take this power back for ourselves!
Then instead of writing on substack read Dennis Kucinich’s Light and Power and get those lines upgraded and buried. Your e/m confusion with 5G will feel like a minor headache compared to the nuclear explosion to come with a few hacks on our power grid my friend
I believe Kucinich is one of the good guys. Politics demands compromise so we should judge political actors by evaluating the compromises they make and those they refuse to make.
I think that's the point. Forcing you to have a mobile phone and a number is a form of firewalling, though burners are possible.
That said, can't discount the inability of some devs to work outside their preferred platform. It's a partial explanation for what happened to Parler, for instance.
A week after the Rittenhouse acquittal — the result of which must have been largely based upon footage uploaded to, yes, Twitter — the new CEO, chair and board have decided to ‘limit’ (read ‘selectively restrict’) images. Can't have potential evidence slipping through to the public sphere, it makes spinning so much harder.
"“When we are notified by individuals depicted, or by an authorized representative, that they did not consent to having their private image or video shared, we will remove it.”
I spent a fair part of the morning polling people in both journalism and the tech business, trying to get a grasp on what this will mean practically..."
It means no more unflattering pictures of Democrats on Twitter.
I got rid of Twitter long ago, back when they allowed so few characters that nobody could say anything of substance. It is better now, but the trouble with Twitter is that people blurt out stuff that they haven’t really thought about.
Here is another topic to discuss: When Trump stopped flights from China, there were constant accusations of racism and xenophobia. Now that Biden has cut off flights from Africa, where are the accusations? Nothing but silence. Why aren’t conservatives throwing this in their face? Why are conservatives so passive?
Conservatives are doing this but no one cares, including Twitter. Corporate media rules and Callin is corporate media. So, really, is Substack. There are places where a little dissent is allowed so they (the big THEY) can say we have free speech while at the same time destroying it. One of my dreams is the Internet just imploding and smartphones suddenly not working at all. I can dream.
Yep, guys like him and Greenwald are joined at the hip with Twitter and they don't realize that 99.9% of the people don't care. Twitter is simply irrelevant to most people's lives. I know zero people who look at Tweets unless they are in a news article (and Twitter has made journalists more lazy that before and they have always been lazy.
And there's another weirdo minority that don't twitter but love to get outraged about nonsense that goes on out there and feel superior. And that's the fertile land that Substack and presumably Callin are tilling.
For example, have you listened to the Blocked and Reported podcast? It's quite witty but in the end its a support group for recovering social media addicts. They have many hilarious anecdotes but still manage to take their stance with respect to media very seriously.
If ppl that are articulate in short form fought back on the form .., but blocking makes it futile. Matt and Glen are so adept they can fight back without causing a knee jerk block. You have to be subtle and signal the elite code
Nice point. Because if dems do it, it’s ok. Ever wonder why many countries destroyed their elite class? It seems like self harm to a country, but eventually so called elites become such autocrats that cultural revolutions start looking good. Russia, China, Iran, VN and on and on. Too bad and so sad for us that the replacements grew so paranoid they turned out just as bad if not worse in different ways. The answer is that there is no answer.
Great point. One thing that aggravates it is that our elites are all in one place, living in the DC Bubble. Their insular existence makes them blind to how the rest of the country lives. If we moved the Supreme Court to Omaha, the legislature to Houston, and the White House stayed put, maybe parts of the givernment would see some real life.
You're referring to one aspect, geography, of a specific elite, the American political elite, that helps us understand its bizarre homogeneity and ceaselessness. 50 years ago, I recently learned, Joan Didion described it so well that her account is mostly good enough for our purposes today.
There are other elites, and certain of which own this political elite.
The answer against social media censorship already exists. It rests in multiple people hosting their own social media software that can see each other and communicate interchangeably without a single point of failure.
It’s hard man - but Greenwald is acting as we speak... so twitter is doubling down on the HunterBiden new life on earth shit show. Wow, are betters are really showing us what’s what.
Also - I'm reminded as my renewal fee hit - that I'm paying for content that I structurally can't access because I don't use an iPhone... it gets worse the more you think about it.
Blame tech, not substack. Really don’t blame Matt or Gken. ‘Substack help’ does everything in their power to help this issue. It’s a young site. The big tech axis of evil keep firewalls between each other like sociopathic two year olds. There will be a solution.
Tech is neutral in this. How people use tech in pursuing their will to power is more interesting. But ultimately it's people's choices that are to blame, not any specific tech or tech in general.
That said, I won't stand in anyone's way when they invoke 𝖙𝖊𝖈𝖍 allegorically and blame it, like blaming the devil, or envy, or the daemon bottle.
Tom - tech may have been neutral during ‘the Well’ days in its infancy, but now it censors. That is not invoking the devil or evil or any pagan concept, that is against this country’s constitution and every person who fought for it. It is unlawful and wrong and needs to be peacefully rectified.
Tech does not censor. People use tech to censor. Censorship is a policy enforcement and the policy is really what matters. The exact same tech could be used to apply an egalitarian policy or a policy that actively reduces the influence of the most wealthy. But, ofc, since the tech is owned by the most wealthy that's not the policy it enforces.
Tech is one of the machines in the factory that manufactures consent. It can make a wide of things. But somebody owns the factory and decides what the machine will do. That's the key.
Ok - gun/shooter. I don’t want to get rid of tech and I hate guns...but but but. Tech engineers make the algorithms to censor so poke like crazy Dorsey can enforce it. Have it your way I’m cool with that. Just get a Supreme Court case going to make censorship on tech illegal and punishable - like confiscation of wealth as thug cops did for years to SUSPECTED drug traffickers driving thru the Midwest.
And anyway she was talking about substack using only an iPhone platform and I was talking about Apple not supporting my old phone so I could not update my browser — therefore not get comments; so it was tech being proprietary, which is why it should be a public fking utility. Egg/chicken.
I know this is been brought up before, but as you know Callin is only available for iPhones. I have a MacBook and still can't participate because I have an Android phone. Is there no other platform available for these calls? That is supported by Mac, iOS, Android, Windows, etc. I'm beginning to experience FOMO! :)
Best remedy for FOMO, and you can see that half the folk here have figured this out, is to start your own podcast or blog on Substack. I did both! Committing myself to having an audience of 1, i.e. myself, is really liberating. I don't envy Matt because he really has to seriously engage with technology to make a living. That must suck.
I love tech I hate tech kinda like my partner. Bless Matt he has this covered and is excellent at it. Stay well Matt you work too hard. We fking appreciate it & thank your family too. Hope you make a gazillion because you are the kind of guy who doesn’t need to get into pissing contests like Bezos & suckingzuck and that Virgin Blighty dude etc etc etc ad nauseum
The irony that Brand and Jimmy Dore and so many others are into New Age is seldom noted, or so it seems to me. New Age is the religion of liberal individualism. It seems to have been invented by the same team that invented Meritocracy. It's really just a special kind of Self Help. And like all Self Help, it serves to prevent solidarity and the impede the power of organization.
I'll gladly second your motion for Matt, and additionally his cadre of informed and brilliant subscribers, to read, comment on, and disseminate this extraordinary piece of writing on the timely death of the russiagate debacle.💥
Speaking of comments Diana, methinks Patrick deserves one of yours.🤔
I was permanently suspended from Twitter after 15 years of being on the platform because I indirectly referred to Ted Nugent as a “redneck freak.” Twitter censors indiscriminately.
I'm unlikely to listen, as consuming audio is not my fave way to get information. That said, this censorship thing is just an excuse to decide what content they can filter, it's not any guideline that would be useful for a content producer to create content that would not run afoul of their limitations.
I really have to recommend Richard Bartle and particularly his works "MMOs from the Inside Out" and same same "from the Outside In". While his study was gamers, his conclusions are accurate across the board for any large scale online social interaction. An example observation is that there really is only one multiplayer game and they all end up looking pretty much the same ultimately, policywise and rulewise.
What i'm saying here is that what is happening to social media - firm censorship - was predestined at the beginning and there would be no way to avoid it ultimately, short of shutting the platforms down. The idea of a "free speech platform" is a pipe dream, and my apologies to fellow administrators that I argued this point with 20 years ago; they were right and I was wrong.
I posted something yesterday on this topic, touching some of the points, but Bartle really deserves to be read on this.
"... the problem with making “harm” or “safety” a speech standard is that aggressive censors can make such standards mean almost anything."
Meanwhile, is there any danger on the other end of the spectrum - no restrictions, anywhere, for any reason? That's been my question all along, and so far I haven't received a substantive response.
I have mixed feelings about this. I help run the non profit Families Advocating for Campus Equality (FACE) and have seen many innocent students wrongly accused of sexual misconduct vilified on Twitter, and their photos and contact information published, whether or not the school found them not responsible. Twitter has responded inconsistently to requests to have this personal and reputation-damaginginformation deleted.
On the other hand, I am disgusted with Twitter's censorship of verified information that does not fit the preferred narrative.
I am thankful for and subscribe to various Substack writers including Matt and Glenn G.
One thing we can be thankful for vis a vis big tech and its 'censorship': it really put the lie to the whole right-wing 'just let the free market work and all will be well' nonsense, eh?
According to the free marketeer, this ability to 'censor' shouldn't exist because these are private companies. In the logic of the free market, if these big tech companies censor too much and people don't like it, people will naturally migrate to alternative platforms where they are freer to speak their minds, and those platforms' market share will grow until the monopoly power of the previous 'censorious' platforms dwindles away.
Now the usual right-wing suspects who were bleating about the free market a few years ago are ranting about the tyranny of tech monopolies that were chosen by said market. Not that they'll ever grasp how effectively they have refuted their own ideology.
I understand Matt, Glenn and many others @ Substack, Rumble, Callin' etc., etc., are trying to build alternatives ('platforms' as well as 'exciting new features'.) to the more established and traditional, er, 'dominant elite discourse and establishment narrative' and I applaud that. Good luck and God speed .. . lord only knows the total tonnage of utter bullshit that has been piled on so high and wide by traditional media since the great 2001 Space Odyssey and the never-ending global war on terror? e.g.
Nevertheless, it is still only through rational and authoritative argument that one can, at last, breach the walls of ignorance, malefaction and dominate mass-media organizational schizophrenia (moss).
Can you give the time zone on the time, pls? If I didn't know you live on the East Coast, I would have missed this. Any corporation espousing free speech will be limited by its revenue/advertising model. Any free speech platform that would be independent enough to avoid censorship would have to be either quasi-governmental or a non-profit. But, hell, Wikileaks got labelled as essentially an espionage organization. They were essentially private, but non-profit.
I like your articles (thank you!) but a callin show because Jack Dorsey stepped down? Who cares?
I also don’t care about (or watch) any legacy media. Nor do I care about - or use - fb, insta, or most other social media sites. An ocean of suck? It’s been that way for some time.
News? My life is good without it. Matt Taibbi, Tim Pool, Epoch Times & Breaking Points. And I’m not listening or reading much of them (sorry, Matt).
Things may get a little weirder North of the border in Canada, where the current government hates being criticized. I know that's off your usual beat, but this is what they have planned... https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/bill-c10-user-generated-content-1.6007192 BTW - 5:00 PM in which time zone?
The money doesn't go to artists, Gutterdandy. It goes to networks. Some of it may end up in the hands of artists, but the networks will decide who they are. Meanwhile, artists who have escaped that system to create their own successful Youtube Channels or Tik-Tok subscriptions will have to pay into the same fund and the CRTC will control what they can distribute.
Seems to me like a good step in the direction of organizing the voiceless and disenfranchised people in a geographically pretty-big-place like the u.s.
I was one of Matt's first supporters on Substack but need something for Android or Windows, and I've heard that Callin will expand to other platforms at some point, hope it's soon.
Yup exactly the problem. Thanks for keeping on top of this for us, Matt. So many other journalists choose or feel forced to stay silent. Of course I can sympathize with them but all the better that you’re covering this.
Matt while you are straining at some of the news botching stories about a Trump Russia nexus, the right is blaming all crime problems on Soros money influence. Why not focus a little on the Republican insistance that money is free speech, unless of course you don't like the effect of that speech?
I think the questions shouldn't be whether Twitter will suck more. It's already an awful platform perfect for propaganda, for spreading group-think, making cults and forming mobs, while clumsy for deep discussions and building meaningful human connections. It's making the world a worse place. I propose a different question altogether: "What can we do to accelerate its obsolescence as a dominant platform?".
I can’t download the app. It’s wants a version of ios beyond my device’s capacity. I tried to copy the address and paste it into a couple different browsers, but no success. Oh well. Rokfin app doesn’t work on here either. Fucking technology is a pain in the ass.
Just over a year that I have been off Twitter. I am sane. Less anxious, more calm. More forgiving and happier. Get off Twitter. Slinging crap back at people who sling crap at you or who are pedaling lies, will not move the needle one millimeter. Get off now. Read a book. Take walks. Don't wait until tomorrow. Do. It. Now. The alternative sites, while uncensored, are also a time suck with little value. Pick a few folks like Matt, Glenn, Bari and check Instapundit at least once a day.
I purged myself from social media and the news at the beginning of the pandemic, and I never felt more clear-headed and less anxious. You begin to realize there isn't much of a payoff to being hyper-aware of problems you're not doing anything to solve. Being trapped in my apartment as our government was failing to address the pandemic really enforced that within me; I was trapped in my apartment drowning in outrages to be anxious about. I find reading books to be far more productive than trapping yourself in the news cycle.
As a retired reference librarian I can recommend books as more reliable sources of information, too. The picture of people like Tucker Carlson, Jonah Goldberg, Christopher Caldwell and Kevin Williamson that emerges from their well-researched, persuasively argued books differs dramatically from mainstream media caricatures of these individuals, and the fare offered is far more substantive.
I hear you. I am off all social media now, including Facebook. It has its downsides (particularly with family contacts, etc), but so much better for my mental health. As far as social media goes, Twitter is the most useless. If someone tried to cancel me on Twitter, I wouldn't even know about it. LOL.
Yup you are right! I guess journalists have to use it but good choice by you!
Dear Matt,
While I won’t be able to make it on the callin, I will say that I think what you’re doing with Substack is probably one of the most important actions for creating a new anti-MSM free speech alternative.
You, Greenwald, and others are building increasingly huge audiences. The MSM is afraid of Substack. Greenwald’s Substack-Rumble combination is nice too. That has the ability to make the MSM YouTube matrix take a new body blow, in my opinion. Let them have all their stupid cat videos.
People should just get their news from a constellation of Substack and Rumble pages. There can be one great constellation of Substack pages that essentially functions as a new anti-MSM.
Let’s hope Substack keeps getting more honest and original thinkers and many many many more readers on board so we can watch the MSM/ Social media Tower of Babel crumble, forever.
Agreed, but cats are very cool. Humans are the problem.
Yes & the huskies on IG I can’t quit them
This so much
Taibbi and Glenn Greenwald might be the last 2 actual journalists we have left.
Aaron Mate, Max Blumenthal, Ben Norton, Anya Parampil, all from the Grey Zone, are also excellent journalists who have broke huge stories.
Especially for those of us who live in Latin America.
I hope glen never gets off twitter. He is a global treasure
David Fuller, too.
I follow Taibbi, Greenwald, and also Alex Berenson on Substack for his excellent investigations and exposure of the CoV2 virus. Refreshing to find actual facts with sources sited instead of BS propaganda from those with a political agenda.
Though he is controversial, Freddie deBoer writes some excellent cultural analysis on Substack.
Come on over to Facebook, the water is fine and there's no ambiguity whether it sucks or not. It totally sucks!
I think you meant to say it Zucks.
Nice nice nice
FB was always lame Feta Meta
Not a whole lot of ambiguity about Tweeter either........
Still Apple only... Still shitty.
Not even a web based option. It's 2021.
These VC types (like David Sacks, Sequoia, Goldcrest) have priorities and your free speech isn't one of them. You are important only in your relevance in their engagement metrics, which is how they will demonstrate their success in executing their business plan at the next round. But at this stage in the game (A round was two months ago) being easily available to everyone isn't critical to tracking the growth curve they seek.
We need to bring the hackers to the bright white light side - that’s what Ed Snowdon should be helping us do to preserve our freedom - along with helping journos in totalitarian states & I ain’t talking Russia or Amerika (yet) Ed paid an ultimate price, but really I wouldn’t mind living in St Petersburg
They are already there. Check out, for example, Hackers On Planet Earth or CCC's annual conferences. Great bunch of people.
for example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bB7tTknkDw
High comedy given the topic of discussion.
I know. The irony has a big red flashing light and is making that old-timey claxon sound.
I remember groaning out loud when GG was gushing with excitement about what these tech tycoons had told him about what their apps will do for free speech. There is a grain of truth in their story given that technolibertarianism is the default theology of that class. But that's just bafflegab to hide their true cyberselfish nature.
You know - it is really true - power corrupts absolutely- I may give these A Holes the benefit of the doubt in the beginning
That old truism deserves elaboration. Some people get corrupted by power. Others refuse to be corrupted and therefore don't get to exercise any power. If life were as simple as that then we have literally no reason for hope. So it seems that modification of power is what we should seek.
The problem is - if you have none, you are not s player so no one cares (we obvs care or we wouldn’t be writing). If you, by luck or legacy or brains or hooking, get money or power you are doomed. Gandhi knew it. The historical Jesus knew it. Shakespeare knew it. If there was a god he/she/it would know it. Socialist utopias would make everything as equal as possible - and someday I hope that works.
One thing they are failing to realize with this rush to everything mobile is that there are many of us out here unable to use such technology due to the oft-denied electro-magnetic sensitivity. All around me, friends and family are complaining of muddled thoughts and a sense of electricity going through them ever since 5G was turned on. And these folks are only having the mild symptoms of something I have experienced even from normal electricity itself in the pre-digital age.
We electrosensitives were called kooks because corporate funded studies always "proved" that the telecom products were safe. Of course, independent studies from Europe, determined that it is a real phenomenon. Our censored news won't allow us to know this.
It is important now since so many people are going to become ill as the signals grow stronger and stronger. The technocrats really don't seem to care what it does to our health. Even now, their answer is a theraputic rather than a cure when it comes to Covid 19. The drug powers have managed to have the definition changed for what a vaccine is. Prior to the current vaccine, a vaccine meant that the NONVAXINATED were not going to make you sick.
Not against the shot for those who are high risk or willing to be guinea pigs for a drug that will take at least 5 years before we know whether it is really safe or not. Go ahead, but when this is becoming mandatory around the world to go along with a QR ID code - this is mandatory mobile tracking, mandatory drug injection and loss of all private and personal autonomy.
Recently Matt hosted Adolph Reed to speak about his alternative to the neoliberals. As left wing and progressive as he sounded, he was still spouting the very agenda of the WEF, who are behind the shift to global governance. Dr. Reed even used some of their talking points, especially when he came down rather militantly demanding the vax to participate in society, considering any who object to be right wing Trump supporters! Well, I've been pretty far to the left all my life, but what I am seeing in the "left" is fascism and Marxist tactics without any of the actual social justice of the left. Does Dr. Reed know that some people are allergic to PEG? Where is the room for the person who doesn't fit the cookie cutter mold in this technological world? This is why we still need human hearts and not digital algorithms. From Dr. Reed's words, it seems the US has 3 options that are all leading to the WEF in the end. No way. Some of us are busy articulating yet unconsidered options that have NOT been co-opted. I
This brings me back to the exclusive forum for the podcast. Please do not get caught up in this dazzling web of technology. The best thing we can do for freedom now is revert to old school technology - back to blogs like substack, even samizdat distribution of magazines, videos - you know, off line and in person! We have forgotten this over the past years and I say we take this power back for ourselves!
Then instead of writing on substack read Dennis Kucinich’s Light and Power and get those lines upgraded and buried. Your e/m confusion with 5G will feel like a minor headache compared to the nuclear explosion to come with a few hacks on our power grid my friend
I believe Kucinich is one of the good guys. Politics demands compromise so we should judge political actors by evaluating the compromises they make and those they refuse to make.
I think that's the point. Forcing you to have a mobile phone and a number is a form of firewalling, though burners are possible.
That said, can't discount the inability of some devs to work outside their preferred platform. It's a partial explanation for what happened to Parler, for instance.
I always thot the one number thing was great - thanks for clarifying that it is as identifying as a yellow star
A week after the Rittenhouse acquittal — the result of which must have been largely based upon footage uploaded to, yes, Twitter — the new CEO, chair and board have decided to ‘limit’ (read ‘selectively restrict’) images. Can't have potential evidence slipping through to the public sphere, it makes spinning so much harder.
"“When we are notified by individuals depicted, or by an authorized representative, that they did not consent to having their private image or video shared, we will remove it.”
I spent a fair part of the morning polling people in both journalism and the tech business, trying to get a grasp on what this will mean practically..."
It means no more unflattering pictures of Democrats on Twitter.
...and an end to unflattering political cartooning.
I just deleted Twitter from all of my devices. Who the hell really needs all their grief?
I got rid of Twitter long ago, back when they allowed so few characters that nobody could say anything of substance. It is better now, but the trouble with Twitter is that people blurt out stuff that they haven’t really thought about.
Twitter trains people to yap before they think--not good at all.
The blurting out thing kinda seems to be a problem with Life
Here is another topic to discuss: When Trump stopped flights from China, there were constant accusations of racism and xenophobia. Now that Biden has cut off flights from Africa, where are the accusations? Nothing but silence. Why aren’t conservatives throwing this in their face? Why are conservatives so passive?
Conservatives are doing this but no one cares, including Twitter. Corporate media rules and Callin is corporate media. So, really, is Substack. There are places where a little dissent is allowed so they (the big THEY) can say we have free speech while at the same time destroying it. One of my dreams is the Internet just imploding and smartphones suddenly not working at all. I can dream.
Even guys like Tabbi and Tracey love Twitter -- when they admit it sucks, you can tell it's killing them. They would like to dump it but are hooked.
Yep, guys like him and Greenwald are joined at the hip with Twitter and they don't realize that 99.9% of the people don't care. Twitter is simply irrelevant to most people's lives. I know zero people who look at Tweets unless they are in a news article (and Twitter has made journalists more lazy that before and they have always been lazy.
And there's another weirdo minority that don't twitter but love to get outraged about nonsense that goes on out there and feel superior. And that's the fertile land that Substack and presumably Callin are tilling.
For example, have you listened to the Blocked and Reported podcast? It's quite witty but in the end its a support group for recovering social media addicts. They have many hilarious anecdotes but still manage to take their stance with respect to media very seriously.
If ppl that are articulate in short form fought back on the form .., but blocking makes it futile. Matt and Glen are so adept they can fight back without causing a knee jerk block. You have to be subtle and signal the elite code
Very well said.
To be effective on twitter is an art. Read Ed Snowden’s beginning. He made Jack D. look like an imbecile
Nice point. Because if dems do it, it’s ok. Ever wonder why many countries destroyed their elite class? It seems like self harm to a country, but eventually so called elites become such autocrats that cultural revolutions start looking good. Russia, China, Iran, VN and on and on. Too bad and so sad for us that the replacements grew so paranoid they turned out just as bad if not worse in different ways. The answer is that there is no answer.
Great point. One thing that aggravates it is that our elites are all in one place, living in the DC Bubble. Their insular existence makes them blind to how the rest of the country lives. If we moved the Supreme Court to Omaha, the legislature to Houston, and the White House stayed put, maybe parts of the givernment would see some real life.
You're referring to one aspect, geography, of a specific elite, the American political elite, that helps us understand its bizarre homogeneity and ceaselessness. 50 years ago, I recently learned, Joan Didion described it so well that her account is mostly good enough for our purposes today.
There are other elites, and certain of which own this political elite.
c̴e̴a̴s̴e̴l̴e̴s̴s̴n̴e̴s̴s̴ cluelessness
Like this so much
5 pm in what time zone?
The answer against social media censorship already exists. It rests in multiple people hosting their own social media software that can see each other and communicate interchangeably without a single point of failure.
It’s called federation, first came about in 2016 via https://joinmastodon.org. For example, https://mstdn.io is one of many open servers, others are like https://mstdn.social, or https://mastodon.online also
We need to just simply stop talking about this and start embracing the solutions to the problem that people already came up with and that work!
It’s hard man - but Greenwald is acting as we speak... so twitter is doubling down on the HunterBiden new life on earth shit show. Wow, are betters are really showing us what’s what.
Is this east coast time?
Also - I'm reminded as my renewal fee hit - that I'm paying for content that I structurally can't access because I don't use an iPhone... it gets worse the more you think about it.
Blame tech, not substack. Really don’t blame Matt or Gken. ‘Substack help’ does everything in their power to help this issue. It’s a young site. The big tech axis of evil keep firewalls between each other like sociopathic two year olds. There will be a solution.
Tech is neutral in this. How people use tech in pursuing their will to power is more interesting. But ultimately it's people's choices that are to blame, not any specific tech or tech in general.
That said, I won't stand in anyone's way when they invoke 𝖙𝖊𝖈𝖍 allegorically and blame it, like blaming the devil, or envy, or the daemon bottle.
Tom - tech may have been neutral during ‘the Well’ days in its infancy, but now it censors. That is not invoking the devil or evil or any pagan concept, that is against this country’s constitution and every person who fought for it. It is unlawful and wrong and needs to be peacefully rectified.
Tech does not censor. People use tech to censor. Censorship is a policy enforcement and the policy is really what matters. The exact same tech could be used to apply an egalitarian policy or a policy that actively reduces the influence of the most wealthy. But, ofc, since the tech is owned by the most wealthy that's not the policy it enforces.
Tech is one of the machines in the factory that manufactures consent. It can make a wide of things. But somebody owns the factory and decides what the machine will do. That's the key.
Ok - gun/shooter. I don’t want to get rid of tech and I hate guns...but but but. Tech engineers make the algorithms to censor so poke like crazy Dorsey can enforce it. Have it your way I’m cool with that. Just get a Supreme Court case going to make censorship on tech illegal and punishable - like confiscation of wealth as thug cops did for years to SUSPECTED drug traffickers driving thru the Midwest.
And anyway she was talking about substack using only an iPhone platform and I was talking about Apple not supporting my old phone so I could not update my browser — therefore not get comments; so it was tech being proprietary, which is why it should be a public fking utility. Egg/chicken.
I know this is been brought up before, but as you know Callin is only available for iPhones. I have a MacBook and still can't participate because I have an Android phone. Is there no other platform available for these calls? That is supported by Mac, iOS, Android, Windows, etc. I'm beginning to experience FOMO! :)
Best remedy for FOMO, and you can see that half the folk here have figured this out, is to start your own podcast or blog on Substack. I did both! Committing myself to having an audience of 1, i.e. myself, is really liberating. I don't envy Matt because he really has to seriously engage with technology to make a living. That must suck.
I love tech I hate tech kinda like my partner. Bless Matt he has this covered and is excellent at it. Stay well Matt you work too hard. We fking appreciate it & thank your family too. Hope you make a gazillion because you are the kind of guy who doesn’t need to get into pissing contests like Bezos & suckingzuck and that Virgin Blighty dude etc etc etc ad nauseum
Speaking of zuckerballs, 10 years ago I wrote, and you should feel special because I don't, as a rule link, my stuff in comments here, 'cos that's gross, but ... https://thefsb.wordpress.com/2012/07/11/three-people-i-really-really-want-to-punch/
This is so awesome it made my day. Thanks Tom for making the exception. Russell Brand LoL LoL
The irony that Brand and Jimmy Dore and so many others are into New Age is seldom noted, or so it seems to me. New Age is the religion of liberal individualism. It seems to have been invented by the same team that invented Meritocracy. It's really just a special kind of Self Help. And like all Self Help, it serves to prevent solidarity and the impede the power of organization.
True & astute re: Gwyneth
What time zone?
This one’s for you, Matt:
https://consortiumnews.com/2021/12/01/patrick-lawrence-obituary-for-russiagate/
@ Diana 👍✔💡🎯
I'll gladly second your motion for Matt, and additionally his cadre of informed and brilliant subscribers, to read, comment on, and disseminate this extraordinary piece of writing on the timely death of the russiagate debacle.💥
Speaking of comments Diana, methinks Patrick deserves one of yours.🤔
As Usual,
Thom Williams (aka Ethan Allen)😎
Methinks you’re right, EA. Found a few words tonight.
@ Diana ✔
And well chosen they are mon ami‼😊
As Usual,
Thom Williams (aka EA)😎
Oh😀, by the way, have you read this earlier, and very prescient piece of his❔
http://patricklawrence.us/the-biden-blackout/
This won't work if you don't state the time zone.
I just love the turn of phrase, “an ocean of suck”. Taibbi at his best!
Eastern Time or?
I was permanently suspended from Twitter after 15 years of being on the platform because I indirectly referred to Ted Nugent as a “redneck freak.” Twitter censors indiscriminately.
Ted would take that as a complement. 😂
Wow. That's really believable.
I'm unlikely to listen, as consuming audio is not my fave way to get information. That said, this censorship thing is just an excuse to decide what content they can filter, it's not any guideline that would be useful for a content producer to create content that would not run afoul of their limitations.
I really have to recommend Richard Bartle and particularly his works "MMOs from the Inside Out" and same same "from the Outside In". While his study was gamers, his conclusions are accurate across the board for any large scale online social interaction. An example observation is that there really is only one multiplayer game and they all end up looking pretty much the same ultimately, policywise and rulewise.
What i'm saying here is that what is happening to social media - firm censorship - was predestined at the beginning and there would be no way to avoid it ultimately, short of shutting the platforms down. The idea of a "free speech platform" is a pipe dream, and my apologies to fellow administrators that I argued this point with 20 years ago; they were right and I was wrong.
I posted something yesterday on this topic, touching some of the points, but Bartle really deserves to be read on this.
https://taibbi.substack.com/p/will-twitter-become-an-ocean-of-suck/comment/3808214
"... the problem with making “harm” or “safety” a speech standard is that aggressive censors can make such standards mean almost anything."
Meanwhile, is there any danger on the other end of the spectrum - no restrictions, anywhere, for any reason? That's been my question all along, and so far I haven't received a substantive response.
Is this restrictive to Apple users? What about subscribers without an iPhone?
I have mixed feelings about this. I help run the non profit Families Advocating for Campus Equality (FACE) and have seen many innocent students wrongly accused of sexual misconduct vilified on Twitter, and their photos and contact information published, whether or not the school found them not responsible. Twitter has responded inconsistently to requests to have this personal and reputation-damaginginformation deleted.
On the other hand, I am disgusted with Twitter's censorship of verified information that does not fit the preferred narrative.
I am thankful for and subscribe to various Substack writers including Matt and Glenn G.
Cynthia
One thing we can be thankful for vis a vis big tech and its 'censorship': it really put the lie to the whole right-wing 'just let the free market work and all will be well' nonsense, eh?
According to the free marketeer, this ability to 'censor' shouldn't exist because these are private companies. In the logic of the free market, if these big tech companies censor too much and people don't like it, people will naturally migrate to alternative platforms where they are freer to speak their minds, and those platforms' market share will grow until the monopoly power of the previous 'censorious' platforms dwindles away.
Now the usual right-wing suspects who were bleating about the free market a few years ago are ranting about the tyranny of tech monopolies that were chosen by said market. Not that they'll ever grasp how effectively they have refuted their own ideology.
Dang, missed it again. .. life got in the way.
But I'm here now .. . and fully prepared to plot a course toward the mythic great white whale sighted off the coast of Jamaica, at your command Ahab! https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/30/white-sperm-whale-rarest-animals-captured-on-film-jamaica
I understand Matt, Glenn and many others @ Substack, Rumble, Callin' etc., etc., are trying to build alternatives ('platforms' as well as 'exciting new features'.) to the more established and traditional, er, 'dominant elite discourse and establishment narrative' and I applaud that. Good luck and God speed .. . lord only knows the total tonnage of utter bullshit that has been piled on so high and wide by traditional media since the great 2001 Space Odyssey and the never-ending global war on terror? e.g.
Nevertheless, it is still only through rational and authoritative argument that one can, at last, breach the walls of ignorance, malefaction and dominate mass-media organizational schizophrenia (moss).
*once more into the breach dear friends.
You are my hero. And I must apologize I think for omitting the second n on Glenn’s name. I am mortified. But bravo/a/i
Is it ironic that most comments on this page concern social media and harmful comments? Struck me funny.
Can you give the time zone on the time, pls? If I didn't know you live on the East Coast, I would have missed this. Any corporation espousing free speech will be limited by its revenue/advertising model. Any free speech platform that would be independent enough to avoid censorship would have to be either quasi-governmental or a non-profit. But, hell, Wikileaks got labelled as essentially an espionage organization. They were essentially private, but non-profit.
I like your articles (thank you!) but a callin show because Jack Dorsey stepped down? Who cares?
I also don’t care about (or watch) any legacy media. Nor do I care about - or use - fb, insta, or most other social media sites. An ocean of suck? It’s been that way for some time.
News? My life is good without it. Matt Taibbi, Tim Pool, Epoch Times & Breaking Points. And I’m not listening or reading much of them (sorry, Matt).
Things may get a little weirder North of the border in Canada, where the current government hates being criticized. I know that's off your usual beat, but this is what they have planned... https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/bill-c10-user-generated-content-1.6007192 BTW - 5:00 PM in which time zone?
The bill will pass with NDP support. It ties in with Canadian content rules and can be used to support Canadian artists.
The money doesn't go to artists, Gutterdandy. It goes to networks. Some of it may end up in the hands of artists, but the networks will decide who they are. Meanwhile, artists who have escaped that system to create their own successful Youtube Channels or Tik-Tok subscriptions will have to pay into the same fund and the CRTC will control what they can distribute.
Time zone, time zone, time zone. Always scrambling trying to figure that out.
EST
Is anyone here experienced with what Matt's up to with this iPhone app? Is it any good?
Seems to me like a good step in the direction of organizing the voiceless and disenfranchised people in a geographically pretty-big-place like the u.s.
I was one of Matt's first supporters on Substack but need something for Android or Windows, and I've heard that Callin will expand to other platforms at some point, hope it's soon.
Are there any platforms you can use that aren't iPhone only?
Yup exactly the problem. Thanks for keeping on top of this for us, Matt. So many other journalists choose or feel forced to stay silent. Of course I can sympathize with them but all the better that you’re covering this.
Matt while you are straining at some of the news botching stories about a Trump Russia nexus, the right is blaming all crime problems on Soros money influence. Why not focus a little on the Republican insistance that money is free speech, unless of course you don't like the effect of that speech?
Is there a recording or transcript available anywhere?
So followed this link to Twitter. Really interesting compilation. https://twitter.com/i/status/1465712918868025355
"Harm" and "safety" as standards are as precise as using "emergency" to justify "laws" that bypass the legislature and democratic process.
I think the questions shouldn't be whether Twitter will suck more. It's already an awful platform perfect for propaganda, for spreading group-think, making cults and forming mobs, while clumsy for deep discussions and building meaningful human connections. It's making the world a worse place. I propose a different question altogether: "What can we do to accelerate its obsolescence as a dominant platform?".
Yeah!!!! Woo Hoo!!! Another thing I couldn't participate in. Way to be inclusive.
Callin didn't work this week - removed it from my iphone.
EST?
Is there a software option that would allow both apple and android users to participate?
Is this only available for iPhones? Not Samsung?
PS Panquake.com can’t get here soon enough.
FOMO here, too, since I don't have an iPhone. I do see that the Nov. 17 Callin is available to listen to via browser, though.
I can’t download the app. It’s wants a version of ios beyond my device’s capacity. I tried to copy the address and paste it into a couple different browsers, but no success. Oh well. Rokfin app doesn’t work on here either. Fucking technology is a pain in the ass.
Apparently call in is only available on iphone, not on those of us old fashioned enough to use a laptop
Any progress on making this browser based or otherwise accessible to the non-Apple, hoi polloi?