Category: Social
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Some thoughts on the new Voice.com project
This evening we finally learned what the #B1June hype was all about: among other things, a new social media system called Voice.com, built by Block.one, the company behind the outrageously well-performing EOS token. (Full disclosure: Everipedia, where I am CIO, is built on EOS and is the recipient of a major investment from Block.one.) The…
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Talk back: Why should we have more restrictions on “harmful” speech on social media?
Dear all, This is a different sort of blog post. Rather than me writing yet another essay to you, I want to open the floor to you. I want you to answer something for me. It’s like the subreddit “Change My View.” This is aimed specifically at my liberal and progressive friends who are very…
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If you want government censorship through the back door, advocate for social media regulation
Last week, Facebook permanently blocked the accounts of a motley assortment of conservatives, libertarians, and anti-Semites. This set the Internet, especially the free speech loving parts of the Internet, in an uproar. (That would include me.) Conservatives, who normally cheer for deregulation, demanded the government start regulating social media. This includes two that Facebook booted.…
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An opinionated FAQ about Facebook’s censorship of the alleged “far right”
A lot of people understand neither free speech nor what the far right is. Here’s a beginner’s guide. Yesterday, Facebook and Instagram, which are owned by the same company, announced a purge—a fair description—of accounts by a roster of famous right-wing figures as well as Louis Farrakhan. What are we to make of this? Who…
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There are no NPCs
International travel drives home that insight that, contrary to a put-down used by immature people, and consistent with Jordan Peterson’s frequent observation that our biographies are all fascinating, there are no NPCs in the world: the variety of human experience is stunning. Yesterday I was delayed (here in Tokyo) by a long, long queue of…
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Zuckerberg Is Wrong: Don’t Regulate Our Content
Last Sunday, Mark Zuckerberg made another Facebook strategy post. (This is his second major policy post in as many months. I responded to his March 6 missive as well.) Unsurprisingly, it was a disaster. I want to shake him by his lapels and say, “Mark! Mark! Wrong way! Stop going that way! We don’t want…
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A reply to Mark Zuckerberg’s “Privacy-Focused Vision for Social Networking”
Yesterday (March 6), Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg outlined Facebook’s new “vision and principles around building a privacy-focused messaging and social networking platform.” The essential problem isn’t that they need a new app; rather, they need to reform their existing one. Rather than acknowledging the elephant in the room—that users are deeply incensed that their privacy…
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How to decentralize social media—a brief sketch
The problem about social media is that it is centralized. Centralization empowers massive corporations and governments to steal our privacy and restrict our speech and autonomy. What should exist are neutral, technical standards and protocols, like the standards and protocols for blogs, email, and the Web. Indeed, many proposed standards already do exist, but none…
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My Facebook #DeletionDay goodbye message
Here’s what I posted as my last long message to Facebook. Folks, as previously announced, tomorrow will be my #DeletionDay for Facebook. It’ll be the last day I’ll post here, and I’ll begin the process for the permanent removal of my account. (Among other things, I’ll make a copy of my data and my friends list.)…
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Why I quit Quora and Medium for good
It’s not a temporary rage-quit; I’ve deleted both accounts. I have zero followers, no content, and no username. I’m outta there. This is going to be more interesting than it sounds, I promise. When I first joined Quora in 2011, I loved it, with a few small reservations. Then, after some run-ins with what I…
