Social Media & Big Tech news and discussions

[caltrek]

Spotify CEO Defends Joe Rogan Deal in Tense Company Town Hall
by Ashley Carman
February 3, 2022

https://www.theverge.com/2022/2/3/22915 ... rm-podcast

Introduction:

(The Verge) Spotify CEO Daniel Ek addressed employees about the Joe Rogan controversy in a 15-minute speech yesterday, of which The Verge obtained audio, defending the company’s choice to work with Rogan, explaining its reasoning, and defining why he believes Spotify is a combination of a platform and a publisher. Employees had been skeptically awaiting the discussion at the company’s regular town hall meeting for nearly a week: since things had escalated with Joe Rogan, the company’s star exclusive podcaster, employees had been venting inside the corporate messaging system and awaiting a response from leadership about why it chose The Joe Rogan Experience over Neil Young, setting off a domino effect of other musicians and podcasters pulling content off the service.

You can read a full transcript of CEO Daniel Ek’s at the end of the article linked above the quote box. Here are some excerpts from that transcript, along with my own comments:

That said I need to make something crystal clear, even in the face of the criticism over the last few weeks, our policies are still something we stand behind. And during this COVID-19 pandemic, these policies have resulted in the removal of over 20,000 episodes. We can’t write new or different policies based on news cycles or calls from individuals. If that was the case, what creator would ever trust us?

caltrek’s comment: So, Rogan can be allowed to spread all sorts of misinformation wherein trust is not an issue. Having made that initial mistake, the rules cannot be changed for the sake of consistency?
Right

...And that means biasing towards and standing by creators. And that means including enabling their ability to be alternative, or even controversial, because that’s usually what important creators are.

caltrek’s comment: So, spreading false information is now redefined as just being a matter of being controversial?

And we continue to gain market share in this important market and others around the world. So to be frank, had we not made some of the choices we did, I am confident that our business wouldn’t be where it is today.

caltrek’s comment: Because, of course, everything is justified by the overriding importance of profit.

We’ve long had content on our platform that gets into tough, tough [areas], like violence, misogyny, and even murder. So carefully allowing for greater expression isn’t new territory for us.

caltrek’s comment: Here, he makes a strong point. One which traces back to the question posed by critics of Plato over the centuries: Who guards the Guardians? Who should have the right and/or responsibility of deciding what is “true” and what is “false”?

Unfortunately, all too often the answer comes out sounding like “the mob” should be given preference over “the scientific community.” Partially because determining who should be considered a part of that scientific community is in fact problematic.

Donald Trump has posed one answer: Donald Trump should be the sole arbiter in these matters so long as he can continue to command the respect of the mob. Thus, we march forward toward what W. J. Fox has warned us about: the stupidity singularity.

[caltrek]

Researchers Find New Way to Amplify Trustworthy News Content on Social Media Without Shielding Bias
February 3, 2022

https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/942276

Introduction:

(Eureka Alert) TAMPA, Fla. (Feb. 3, 2022) – Social media sites continue to amplify misinformation and conspiracy theories. To address this concern, an interdisciplinary team of computer scientists, physicists and social scientists led by the University of South Florida (USF) has found a solution to ensure social media users are exposed to more reliable news sources.

In their study published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour, the researchers focused on the recommendation algorithm that is used by social media platforms to prioritize content displayed to users. Rather than measuring engagement based on the number of users and pageviews, the researchers looked at what content gets amplified on a newsfeed, focusing on a news source’s reliability score and the political diversity of their audience.

“Low-quality content is engaging because it conforms to what we already know and like, regardless of whether it is accurate or not,” said Giovanni Luca Ciampaglia, assistant professor of computer science and engineering at USF. “As a result, misinformation and conspiracy theories often go viral within like-minded audiences. The algorithm ends up picking the wrong signal and keeps promoting it further. To break this cycle, one should look for content that is engaging, but for a diverse audience, not for a like-minded one.”

In collaboration with researchers at Indiana University and Dartmouth College, the team created a new algorithm using data on the web traffic and self-reported partisanship of 6,890 individuals who reflect the diversity of the United States in sex, race and political affiliation. The data was provided by online polling company YouGov. They also reviewed the reliability scores of 3,765 news sources based on the NewGuard Reliability Index, which rates news sources on several journalistic criteria, such as editorial responsibility, accountability and financial transparency.

They found that incorporating the partisan diversity of a news audience can increase the reliability of recommended sources while still providing users with relevant recommendations. Since the algorithm isn’t exclusively based on engagement or popularity, it is still able to promote reliable sources, regardless of their partisanship.

[wjfox]

Facebook suffers $230bn wipeout in biggest one-day US stock plunge

Thu 3 Feb 2022 22.54 GMT

A historic plunge in the stock price of Facebook’s parent company has erased more than $230bn in its market value, easily the biggest one-day loss in history for a US company.

The 26.4% wipeout in Meta comes amid concerns about its future after the company reported its first ever drop in daily user numbers in its Wednesday earnings report. Facebook rebranded to Meta last year as part of its strategic pivot to becoming a virtual-reality based company. The company’s advertising model has also been hit hard by privacy changes at Apple, which Facebook has said it expects will cost them billions.

The slump in stock price has sent Mark Zuckerberg’s personal wealth tumbling by nearly $30bn.

Meta’s stock fall marked the biggest slide in market value for a US public company, according to a Reuters analysis of Refinitiv data.

It was a disappointment for a company that investors have become accustomed to delivering spectacular growth. Meta also reported a rare decline in profit due to a sharp increase in expenses as it invests in the “metaverse”.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... zuckerberg

[caltrek]

Spotify Pulls 70 Episodes of Joe Rogan’s Podcast
by Noah Kim
February 6, 2022

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... y-podcast/

Extract:

(Mother Jones) The controversy over podcast host Joe Rogan reached a new stage on Saturday when Spotify quietly removed 70-some episodes from his show’s archives.

Though the company hasn’t officially explained why the content was taken down, the move came as Rogan posted an Instagram video apologizing for repeatedly using the N-word in past episodes, as well as for once comparing a movie theatre’s all-Black audience to Planet of the Apes.
…
Joe Rogan is a politically heterodox figure whose anti-establishment views have sometimes led him to host figures from the fringes, including right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and Jordan Peterson, the libertarian, carnivore, mystic self-help expert. During the coronavirus pandemic, Rogan invited anti-vaxxers like Peter McCullough and Robert Malone, who used his massive platform to spread a series of false claims about the COVID-19 vaccines. Rogan has said that he’s just interested in having conversations, and has also hosted figures more on the left. While he does occasionally fact-check his guests, conversation is usually friendly, allowing guests to elevate harmful assertions that cut against the scientific consensus.
...
Spotify’s move comes after Friday, when singer India.Arie, in explaining why she had asked Spotify to remove her music, posted an Instagram video compilation capturing Rogan saying the N-word 22 times in past episodes of the show.

In his latest apology, Rogan deemed his use of the slur as “the most regretful and shameful thing I’ve ever had to talk about publicly.” The podcast host, while acknowledging that “it looks fucking horrible—even to me,” sought to minimize the clips, saying they were taken “out of context” from “12 years of conversations.”

[wjfox]

Facebook falls behind Nvidia in market cap and is now eighth most valuable U.S. company

Tue, Feb 8 2022 5:31 PM EST

Facebook parent Meta continued its slide on Tuesday and has now dropped so much in the past week that the company is worth less than chipmaker Nvidia.

Meta shares dropped 2.1% to close at $220.18. The stock is down 35% this year and is trading at its lowest since July 2020.

Not long ago Facebook was among the five most-valuable U.S. companies, alongside Big Tech peers Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet. However, Meta has since fallen to eighth, below Tesla, Berkshire Hathaway and now, for the first time, Nvidia.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/08/faceboo ... in-us.html

[caltrek]

The Spotify-Rogan Saga Highlights the Distinction Between Publishers and Platforms
by Amanda Silberling
February 9, 2022

https://techcrunch.com/2022/02/09/spoti ... -platform/

Introduction:

(TechCrunch) As our Equity podcast recently asked, “How many times must Spotify step on a rake?”

The streaming service is learning the hard way that it’s counterintuitive to act as both a platform and a publisher — now, in trying to reassert its status as a platform, it’s acting even more like a publisher.

Back in 2020, Spotify was celebrating its success when it signed one of the most popular podcasters, Joe Rogan, to an exclusive, multi-year podcasting deal worth $100 million for “The Joe Rogan Experience.” But the controversial host has repeatedly platformed misinformation about COVID-19, recently prompting 270 physicians and scientists to sign an open letter to Spotify demanding that it institute misinformation policies, which then led high-profile figures like Neil Young and Joni Mitchell to pull their content from Spotify.

Spotify belatedly published platform rules — something that the most dominant music and podcast streaming service probably should have made public already — which prohibit the spread of false or deceptive information about COVID-19 and other illnesses.

As a result, Rogan asked Spotify to remove over 100 episodes of “The Joe Rogan Experience” for various reasons, including the use of racial slurs. Many of the slurs were uttered in older shows, but still, as recently as January, Rogan has made controversial comments when sharing his opinions about the use of the word “Black.”

[caltrek]

How do you solve a problem like Joe Rogan?
by Aja Romano
February 23, 2022

https://www.vox.com/culture/22945864/jo ... ontroversy

Extract:

(Vox) Like the internet itself, Rogan and whatever dangerous misinformation, conspiracy theories, jerky bigotry, or offensive views he wants to serve up today are all unstoppable and essentially answerable to no one. He has all of the audience, money, attention, and prestige of a traditional gatekeeper, but with barely any real pressure to assume responsibility for repeatedly making high-profile mistakes on the job.

The public’s growing lack of trust in traditional journalism and legacy media outlets — a wariness evinced by media throne usurpers like Rogan himself — has made it even less likely for him to be effectively held accountable or face real consequences for repeated mistakes. After all, fans who are already prone to distrust the media are hardly going to support the journalism they dislike for trying to call out the podcaster they do like — especially not for what they see as foibles rather than serious flaws.

That, too, is a unique problem: If Rogan’s audience doesn’t agree that his guests or his rhetoric are problems to begin with, or that his pattern of platforming bigotry and misinformation is an issue, then who’s to say they’re wrong?

[caltrek]

Spotify's Business Model is Killing Music
by Sonali Kolhatkar
February 16, 2022

https://otherwords.org/spotifys-busines ... ing-music/

Extract:

(Other Words) (Spotify's) business model, to put it simply, is built on the severely underpaid labor of millions of creators.

Say an independent musician spends years putting their heart and soul into their craft. Finally, they score a hit that garners millions of plays on Spotify. You might imagine this translates into a generous payout.

But in reality, Spotify’s paychecks are peanuts. One analyst estimated that band members with families would need more than 24 million plays on Spotify per year to just barely clear the federal poverty line.

Even those minuscule royalties may need to be split with a record label, collaborators, songwriters, managers, and more. The money that most of Nestel-Patt’s musician friends earn from Spotify is “so negligible that they don’t even account for it.”

In short, Spotify sells products that creators get almost no money to produce. It’s akin to theft. “Imagine any other business working that way,” says Nestel-Patt.

[caltrek]

UK Wants to Squeeze Freedom of Reach to take on Internet Trolls
by Natasha Lomas
February 24, 2022

https://techcrunch.com/2022/02/24/uk-on ... -trolling/

Introduction:

(TechCrunch) The UK government has announced (yet) more additions to its expansive and controversial plan to regulate online content — aka the Online Safety Bill.

It says the latest package of measures to be added to the draft are intended to protect web users from anonymous trolling.

The Bill has far broader aims as a whole, comprising a sweeping content moderation regime targeted at explicitly illegal content but also ‘legal but harmful’ stuff — with a claimed focused of protecting children from a range of online harms, from cyberbullying and pro-suicide content to exposure to pornography.

Critics, meanwhile, say the legislation will kill free speech and isolate the UK, creating splinternet Britain, while also piling major legal risk and cost on doing digital business in the UK. (Unless you happen to be part of the club of ‘safety tech’ firms offering to sell services to help platforms with their compliance of course.)

In recent months, two parliamentary committees have scrutinized the draft legislation. One called for a sharper focus on illegal content, while another warned the government’s approach is both a risk to online expression and unlikely to be robust enough to address safety concerns — so it’s fair to say that ministers are under pressure to make revisions.

Hence the bill continues to the shape-shift or, well, grow in scope.

The rest of the article (see link above quote box) is fairly long by TechCrunch standards but may be of great enough interest to certain readers to justify the time.

[weatheriscool]

Russia says it's blocking Facebook in alarming new censorship push
Source: The Verge

Russia’s communications agency Roskomnadzor announced Friday that it is blocking access to Facebook in Russia. It cited 26 cases of “discrimination against Russian media and information resources by Facebook” since October 2020, in addition to the more-recent restrictions Facebook has placed on Russian state media outlets.

In response, Meta president of global affairs Nick Clegg tweeted in response to the move, saying “Soon millions of ordinary Russians will find themselves cut off from reliable information, deprived of their everyday ways of connecting with family and friends and silenced from speaking out. We will continue to do everything we can to restore our services so they remain available to people to safely and securely express themselves and organize for action.”

The block comes after increasing domestic protests over the country’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Russians have taken to the streets in massive numbers to protest the ongoing invasion, provoking thousands of arrests. The regime has denied any plans to institute martial law, but has issued ongoing threats to outlets that publish information critical of the ongoing war effort, including Wikipedia.

-snip-

Many tech platforms have already begun restricting services in Russia. Google-owned YouTube has blocked Russian news channels RT and Sputnik in Europe, for example, while Facebook has blocked RT and Sputnik in the EU and stopped recommending Russian state media globally. Apple has also halted product sales in the country.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.theverge.com/2022/3/4/22960 ... or-ukraine