To tweet and not to twit. Thursday news
Today is the 28th of April, 2022. Let’s talk about freedom of speech on social networks, and yesterday’s visuals.
The last news were mostly about the same war, Macron’s win in the French Presidential election, specificities of the nationalists movements in France. Refugees attract more and more attention because unequal treatment of different nationalities becomes ridiculously obvious. Ukrainian refugees started to protest against Russian refugees, immigrants, and anything that has connection to Russian culture - from art to restaurants, though people are barely paying attention to that. Though I can’t say there was anything as much discussed as Twitter deal with Elon Musk, maybe only the gas shortage in Europe. So let’s talk about those latter two.
Russian gas slowed down in delivery to Poland and Bulgaria, who announced earlier that they have no intentions to pay for it according to the changed contract’s conditions. Somehow that was seen as a demonstration of Russian manipulation tactic. On the other hand, what sort of economic measures are allowed to keep one country’s economy from shutting down after it was attacked as brutally as it happened with Russia in February and March? Where’s the logic in refusal to pay for something and yet expect it to be delivered anyway because it’s about gas, and people depend on it?
How about Russian people, who won’t have a lot of stuff, starting with medications, by the way, not just semiconductors, equipment, and so on, plus there’s a mechanical default scheduled for May?
I have a question: what are the EU sanctions then? What is the whole EU politics addressed to Russia for the last 10 years about? What do the very same politicians say to the other countries? “If you don’t behave, continue closing deals with Russia, we’ll sanction you as well”. After 60 days of the war they got a first shot back that could have been avoided if paid in time. At least it was dressed into a legal form, unlike the arrest of all Russian federal and private assets in the Europeans and American bank systems. Let’s see the words pronounced for what they are - a manipulation with public opinion.
It would be so nice to connect words used irresponsibly to politicians’ actions and their intentions. Are those about keeping their own countries safe and their own economies running? Russian people face the same dilemma, packed in the same “freedom and independence” message from their own government. Unfortunately that’s when propaganda plays its role and makes the choice crystal clear when the alternative voices are exiled from the wide public reach politically or by self-regulation censorship mechanics. People choose the bright right side. Broken mirror, isn’t it? Distortion of reality. We losing the orientation in the space of right and wrong, depending on which side of the border we live. But if with Russian propaganda everything is more or less clear, what’s going on in the so called “free world”?
Speaking of disinformation and censorship, let’s look at the big Twitter news. So Twitter was bought by Elon Musk. The battle over the meaning of it is still hot. It’s not the most popular social platform and not the first media platform that is under the control of one person, yet the platform users see it as a challenge or as a network’s fall. I want to remind that no one could solve the problem of the perfectly fair news feed algorithm, adequate content policies, fake accounts and trolling, and high legal risks for the platforms because of their users’ posts.
I don’t see how Musk’s ownership threats to freedom of speech on social media if he behaved as a bully online or not. I think there was a massive amount of misconducted bans, apart from Trump's account. Honestly, I don’t see why speaking bullshit on the TV should be allowed but doing the same should be blocked on the social platform that has minimum credibility on its own plus trust is defined by the speaker’s reputation. If that goes against the law it’s obviously should, but if it’s just an opinion or facts that were made up, then the purpose of such censorship is unclear to me.
Musk plans to work on identity verification and on weakening the policy against unpopular opinions in favour of wider access to all sorts of thoughts providers. Users should decide who is worth following and who deserves ban. It should be a personal choice, not one general preset for everyone.
The public is widely afraid of massive fake news uploads on Twitter. Don’t you think it’s a panic that exaggerates the problem. We post beautified photographs and videos on Instagram, Facebook or TikTok every day, let’s be honest, we share fake news. It may be considered as nothing special until a teenager decides that their body, face or life in general isn’t as perfect as the image we created, so there’s no sense and no hope for them in this world, it’s better to leave the Earth now. Should the platform ban us for posting fakes? I’m pretty sure the most users will say “no way”.
There are so many senseless and stupid tweets posted and shared every hour that a million more of them or a million less doesn’t matter. Most of those are about twitting someone for something. What matters is the algorithm that supplies the particular posts to concrete users, and is based on their immediate reaction predictions ruled out from their previous interests. If you once liked, shared, looked for and commented on cats, the algorithm will show you more cats, but if it was a nationalist’s text that you discussed online it will offer more of that kind of tweets or news.
The organically promoted content will be arranged according to its effectiveness - the more intense reaction it causes the better. So it’s either “WOW! how cute” or “WOW! That’s terrible! A scandal! I protest!” The viral effectiveness of the posts will be multiplied by the ranging algorithm and the chosen content logic for each user will be used for creation the personified feeds. Each user will receive the same message repeatedly or posts by the same content creator. For example, I was researching Elon Musk a week ago, every day since then I receive updates on his twitter activity.
But I don’t use Twitter for news, I follow only 27 accounts, mostly fashion editors and major media outlets, so I don’t feel the impact. But let’s see what I would read if suddenly I’ve changed my mind and decided to scroll the feed. On my first screen right now is: Kamala Harris’s health, Beto O’Rourke’s opinion on Texas schools funding, Biden’s prideful tweet on the unemployment rates that fell down to the historical minimum. I couldn’t care less about the first two. I really don’t like Biden, especially when he shows the statistical number outside its context in his tweet.
A problem with the American labour market at the moment is that companies’ owners can’t offer good payment rates for the opened vacancies so there’s a deficit of the labour. And Biden, either prefers to ignore that worrying sign, or just manipulate the data. I would be interested to know the rate dynamics for those who worked at 2 or even 3 jobs to cover their living expenses in 2021 and now. It’s obvious that inflation growth is very high, the salaries are not moving up though.
I’m not American, I’m not following the American economy on Twitter, but people I follow are interested in those subjects or persons, so the algorithm feeds me such “news”, including that 100% propaganda message. I’ve already written about the method that is used widely among political forces or by business. The real statistical numbers can be played around with false logical conclusions the are repeated multiple times with every occasion. If you are in contact with the same messages, you forget to question the logic behind them a week and in a month you can start sharing it as your own truth. That is how propaganda mechanisms work.
The thing is that social algorithms are not politically biassed, but economically. They should keep users active and sell them to advertisers and advertisers, in turn, they sell to users. So if someone resurrects Trump’s profile on Twitter, he will die trying to be seen, if he’s not promoted by his haters and by his followers. His tweets will go to everyone who reacted in a proactive manner.
Technically it doesn’t matter who owns the network - a pack of rich men or just one guy. The question is what should be done with the philosophy behind the code. Will the algorithm be better if it’s open source? And what is the owner of the network interested in - is it a new Agora for him or a super profit opportunity?
Without aggressive marketing strategy everything that is published can coexist and compete according to the chronology of publications and the activity of content creators that users chose to follow. It makes the Twitter business model way less attractive for the advertisers. So Musk offered to develop the paid services instead. Is it possible to do? He thinks yes. What do you think?
If you want to read more opinions on the subject, here are few links:
Where were you when Elon Musk agreed to buy Twitter? Probably on Twitter (Wall Street Journal)
How Elon Musk can liberate Twitter (Wall Street Journal)
Elon Musk can fix Twitter culture (Wall Street Journal)
Elon Musk’s Twitter deal stokes Democrat fears and Republican jubilation (Financial Times)
From punchline to deal in under 2 weeks: how Elon Musk won his Twitter prize (Financial Times)
What Elon Musk's Twitter takeover means for CEO Parag Agrawal (Time)
P.S.
All of the above are my thoughts. Let me know if the freedom of speech on social platforms bothers you, what you think about it. Leave your comments, but first login into your account on Substack. Or write to me directly.
Visuals from my feed for April 22-23rd, 2022
7 am April 22nd. zakharova_kaetano #morningcondition after the all night through writing… Good morning ☀️ How are you today? #haveagoodday I’m off to sleep. #morninginspiration is provided by @mignonettetakespictures #morningmood#goodmorningpost #dancingthrough #justsmile
4pm April 22nd zakharova_kaetano #finding thanks to @lostinjewels An Indian ring from 1850s from @vamuseum #artofjewellery#beautyofjewellery #antiquejewelry #jewelleryasinspiration#natureinspirejewelry #historyofjewellery
9pm April 22nd zakharova_kaetano #nightmood #fashioneditorial #fashionstory@patti_wilson style SMOKES UP @issalish by @solvesundsbostudio for @vogueitalia march 2015 Hair : Shon Makeup : @thevalgarland #artofphotography #beautyoffashion#fashionasinspiration #fashionportrait
11 pm April 22nd zakharova_kaetano #goodnightandsweetdreams #nightmood@sheidlina #digitalart I want hide in #surreal #surrealmood#contemporaryart #good
7.30 am April 23rd zakharova_kaetano Good morning 🌞 How are you today? #haveagoodday I really don’t understand what’s going on with Instagram right now. The reach is very low. Either someone reported on me again)) like a week ago on provoked sexual stimulation or whatever… i needed to appeal. That was a complete nonsense. Either algorithm changes. Let me know if you see my posts🙏 #morningmood #sigourneyweaver#helmutnewton in color #goodmorningpost #morninginspiration#artofphotography #artofportrait #beautyofwoman
4 pm April 23rd zakharova_kaetano #finding hands are super beautiful, jewelry suits them well @partsof4 Ylva—Max @ylvafalk #artofjewellery#contemporaryjewellery #beautyofjewellery#jewelleryasinspiration
9.40pm April 23rd zakharova_kaetano #nightmood #fashionportrait #fashioneditorial Photographer @stefanmilevtheencyclopedia #StefanMilev #fashionstory ‘Neo Romantik’, styled by #HanniPontani. Model @jessicapitti8 #JessicaPitti for Madame Germany November 2013. Hair and makeup by @heikopalach #artofphotography #fashionasinspiration #beautyoffashion #likeapainting
11.30 pm April 23rd zakharova_kaetano #goodnightandsweetdreams #nightmood#artasinspiration @buttonfruit Night’s Shade #beautyofart#contemporaryart #artofportrait #colour
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