‘Twitter Files’

[GURPS]

‘Twitter Files’ part 3 details ‘internal debate’ over Trump’s ban after Jan. 6 riot​

Twitter executives decided to ban then-President Donald Trump from their social media platform after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, while maintaining regular check-ins with the FBI and other federal authorities as they decided what postings should be targeted for censorship, the latest report from new company CEO Elon Musk reveals.

In one of a series of tweets Friday evening, independent journalist Matt Taibbi said internal company messages showed how Twitter’s internal standards eroded during the months leading up to Jan. 6, with high-ranking executives violating their own policies while interacting with various federal agencies.

Taibbi posted messages that he said “show Twitter executives getting a kick out of intensified relationships with federal agencies.”

In one, Yoel Roth, then Twitter’s head of trust and safety, appears to describe how he struggled to disguise the purpose of weekly meetings with FBI and other government officials that helped guide the company’s decisions on policing posts on its platform.

 

[GURPS]

Twitter Files: Staff Favored Biden’s Tweets While Suppressing Trump’s​

But one of the revelations that was particularly intriguing was how the company handled tweets coming from Joe Biden in contrast to its treatment of Trump. According to journalist Matt Taibbi, the difference was pretty stark. He noted that “there are multiple instances of involving pro-Biden tweets warning Trump ‘may try to steal the election’ that got surfaced, only to be approved by senior executives.”

 

[GURPS]

New Twitter files dump reveal frenzied conversations before Trump was banned after the Capitol riot, how head of safety Yoel Roth met WEEKLY with FBI - and agency flagged election-related content for moderation​

• Matt Taibbi on Friday posted new internal communications from Twitter staffers
• They primarily focus on the months leading up to Trump's 2021 ban from Twitter
• Show former head of safety Yoel Roth mentioning 'weekly sync' with FBI
• One mentions 'a report from the FBI concerning 2 tweets' about elections
• Taibbi promised more internal document releases over the weekend

 

[GURPS]

Twitter secretly erased conservative voices - and let terrorists and vile vermin tweet freely. It's savage proof the left fears ideas more than actual killers​

'A new [Twitter Files] investigation reveals that teams of Twitter employees build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics — all in secret, without informing users,' Weiss wrote.

What else did a few liberals in Silicon Valley deem off-limits for the rest of us?

We know they put their thumb on the scale of the 2020 election and censored reporting about Hunter Biden that could have swayed the vote. But did they meddle in any other races?

Apparently, so.

On Friday, Musk was asked on Twitter: 'Were any political candidates – either in the US or elsewhere – subject to shadowbanning, while they were running for office or seeking re-election?'

He replied, 'yes'.

 

[GURPS]

'They better be retaining lawyers': Ex-Twitter execs face GOP gauntlet as Musk exposes old regime​

Senate Democrats can continue to block hearings even with the surprise defection Friday of Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), who said she won't caucus with Republicans. Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock's runoff reelection victory gives Democrats 50 seats even if Sinema doesn't caucus with them either.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said former Twitter Trust and Safety Head Yoel Roth, who quit two weeks after Musk's completed purchase, "flat-out lied" in an affidavit to the Federal Election Commission about not communicating with Democrats or the Biden campaign to censor reporting on Hunter Biden's laptop.

The FEC accepted Twitter's explanation that it blocked "potentially hacked content" from the laptop "for bona fide commercial reasons" and to enforce its policies. The Twitter Files show the company had no concrete basis to believe the materials were hacked.

 

[vraiblonde]

First of all, they didn't "secretly" do anything - it was right there in the open for everyone to see. They clearly and obviously censored/banned speech that didn't fit their political agenda, while allowing their ideology mates to run amok and not only say the most horrible things, but make violent threats. Not ONLY high-profile users, but normal boring people like me.

Sharing child porn was not against their TOS, but calling Chelsea Handler a skank got me banned.

Threatening to kidnap and gang rape a 12 year old boy is perfectly fine, but sharing videos that crazy pedo-leftist teachers put right on TikTok got LoTT banned.

And if you complained they were all like, **** you, if you don't like it go somewhere else.

So to the whining Democrats crying that Twitter now allows people to say things they don't like: **** you, if you don't like it go somewhere else.

It's stunning to see Democrats have such a lack of self-awareness that they'd dare to call anyone else "authoritarian". We have a couple of them on here - little bitchers and whiners who spin themselves into a frenzy because I "allow" someone to disagree with them.

 

[GURPS]

Twitter executives and the FBI met so frequently during Trump’s presidency that Twitter’s executives sometimes cracked jokes about it, and about concealing or obscuring those meetings, as did Yoel Roth, Twitter’s Director of Trust and Safety, in this embarrassing series of posts on Twitter’s internal chat software:



In the law, evidence of an attempt to conceal something is evidence of a consciousness of guilt. (That’s a useful rule of thumb in all situations.)

In this next example showing how banal and mundane these intelligence meetings had become, Yoel Roth gets another employee to cover so that he can ditch two separate meetings on the same day, one with the FBI and one with DHS, so he can go to Aspen instead.



Taibbi didn’t report any details from those meetings. I suspect it’s because he doesn’t have them. We’ll never see them, because they either don’t exist or were scrubbed before Musk took over. But Taibbi did give us some examples of FBI agents reporting “misleading” tweets.

Here’s a Constitutional principle for you: the government of the United States isn’t allowed to censor citizens’ speech. Not for politics, not for religion, and not for misinformation. Every time an FBI, DHS or CIA agent in their official capacity “reported” a citizen’s tweet for misinformation, that was an actionable civil rights violation, regardless of whether Twitter did anything with the report, or not.

But the routine meetings between Twitter and the agencies were much more ominous than the individual “misinformation” complaints, in terms of civil rights violations. For one thing, the meetings strongly suggest that the government actors were helping Twitter define its content moderation rules, standards, and policies. In the second example above, for instance, Roth mentioned that “Site Policy” was included in the meeting.

The Constitution forbids the government from helping private companies define their speech policies. That’s an actionable civil rights violation. But it gets worse. Much worse.

☕️ C&C NEWS ☙ Saturday, December 10, 2022 ☙ IMPLICATED 🦠

The biggest scandal in human history is emerging from the Twitter files, and nobody’s connected the dots yet; great news from a Florida Grand Jury; masks back in NYC; excess deaths; and more.

www.coffeeandcovid.com

 

[SamSpade]

The shadow banning things strikes me as particularly egregious - where they allowed you to post, but made sure no one could actually SEE it, so from your point of view - no one was interested or responding. It is in every other respect a ban because it blocks ALL of your content - you just don't know it.

At every turn, Twitter denied they did this and it has come out since that they did this extremely often.

Don't you think it strange that in 2016, the left was enraged and made the ridiculous case that a handful of Russians were able to post stuff on Facebook and somehow turn the tide of an election by influencing voters, and now we have several media platforms doing MUCH MORE than this, effectively silencing posts on the right - and since they cover a limited number of political issues, doing it SPECIFICALLY to influence an election -

And it draws a yawn, from the left?

 

[GURPS]

Don't you think it strange that in 2016, the left was enraged and made the ridiculous case that a handful of Russians were able to post stuff on Facebook and somehow turn the tide of an election by influencing voters, and now we have several media platforms doing MUCH MORE than this, effectively silencing posts on the right - and since they cover a limited number of political issues, doing it SPECIFICALLY to influence an election -

The NYT of all new outlets ... PROVED by looking at the impressions [ views / shares ] there was a MINIMAL Impact towards the election

with most posts barely garnering ANY Traction

1 Billion Dollars spent by Both Campaigns, PACS, Super PACS and Candidate Advocacy Ads

vs

A $ 2 million dollar GRU Budget - 12 Trolls From St Petersburg at the Internet Research Company Out

These Are the Ads Russia Bought on Facebook in 2016 (Published 2017)

A look at some of the ads designed by Russia to exploit divisions in American society and to tip the 2016 election in favor of Donald J. Trump.

www.nytimes.com

See Which Facebook Ads Russians Targeted to People Like You (Published 2018)

Congress last week released more than 3,000 Facebook ads linked to Russia around the 2016 presidential election, the most comprehensive look at the misinformation campaign mounted on the social network.

www.nytimes.com

Well hell ... now behind the NYT Paywall

 

[SamSpade]

The NYT of all new outlets ... PROVED by looking at the impressions [ views / shares ] there was a MINIMAL Impact towards the election

with most posts barely garnering ANY Traction

1 Billion Dollars spent by Both Campaigns, PACS, Super PACS and Candidate Advocacy Ads

vs

A $ 2 million dollar GRU Budget - 12 Trolls From St Petersburg at the Internet Research Company Out

These Are the Ads Russia Bought on Facebook in 2016 (Published 2017)

A look at some of the ads designed by Russia to exploit divisions in American society and to tip the 2016 election in favor of Donald J. Trump.

www.nytimes.com

See Which Facebook Ads Russians Targeted to People Like You (Published 2018)

Congress last week released more than 3,000 Facebook ads linked to Russia around the 2016 presidential election, the most comprehensive look at the misinformation campaign mounted on the social network.

www.nytimes.com

Well hell ... now behind the NYT Paywall

What was the most ridiculous was - THIS was the part and parcel, the entire scandal that "Russian collusion" was supposed to have managed.
ASSUMING IT WAS TRUE - *this* was all of it - Russian nitwits who managed to put up a few posts, and for this the entire Mueller probe was launched and the entire left lost its mind because a Presidential candidate illegally seized the White House by means of this incredible Russian effort.

The entire story is so utterly laughable, it really would work as a screenplay for a comedy spoof on elections on the level of "The Mouse That Roared". How a bunch of nobodies turned an election and gave the White House to Trump with what amounts to POCKET CHANGE for any Russian oligarch.

This of course, in contrast to the huge resources at the disposal of our major media outlets 'colluding' with the FBI and the DOJ to influence an election.

And I can't grasp the idiocy of the argument of "well, TRUMP was President when this was happening, and well - Trump!" as though entire government agencies and members in them weren't ALREADY AT THE TIME seeking to undermine his administration. Again - it doesn't matter that Trump was President - that doesn't translate into "they all obey him and follow his orders".

Trump wasn't President in 2016 and that didn't stop the ridiculous stories of collusion with Russians. The FBI, Twitter, DOJ and the Democratic Party don't need to hold the White House to do these treasonous crimes.

 

[GURPS]

Twitter Files #4 Released, Rules Changed to Target Trump – While Elon Musk Hints COVID Censorship Files Are Forthcoming​

Twitter File #4 walks through the internal conversation at Twitter in early January 2021, but again heavily redacts the specifics of who was participating in many of the conversations. Also missing is any contact by government officials or representatives of the Biden team as the transition period was ongoing. Given the nature of the previous contacts from the Biden campaign, the absence of communication from the transition period in Twitter File #4 release is stark.


♦ Additional scrutiny is finally beginning to surface toward the DHS/FBI network that is running in the background of Twitter. It is critical to remind ourselves that DHS Twitter is still the current Twitter as it is being witnessed and these files released.

Twitter user “NameRedacted,” a familiar account that has gone through many modifications since it was originally created and then banned from the platform, went through the public profiles of the Twitter officers currently on staff and started identifying all of the FBI officials that remain employed. The list is rather extensive [SEE HERE].

People are starting to ask questions about why so many officials from the U.S. intelligence community were hired by Twitter. Perhaps the Potemkin Village, the face of Twitter, may soon drop as people realize what Jack’s Magic Coffee Shop was really all about. As the smart question is asked, “Why, after Trump was elected, did Twitter hire over a dozen ex FBI/CIA agents and place them in Senior Management roles?”



♦ Twitter Head of Information and Safety, Yoel Roth, essentially the fulcrum of what content would be permitted on the platform or not, is now getting additional scrutiny not for his moderation decisions but for his personal sexual outlooks and the previous refusal of Twitter to remove explicitly sexual content around children.

After reviewing his dissertation at the University of Pennsylvania on gay sex, pornography and the social media app Grindr [SEE HERE] people are looking at the sexualized content of the Twitter platform differently. Did Yoel Roth allow child porn and other content as an outcome of his own deviancy? Many objective researchers are coming to the conclusion the answer was yes. Even Elon Musk seems to think the lack of urgency toward removing sexual content that targets minors was related to Yoel Roth.

 

[GURPS]

 

[GURPS]

 

[GURPS]

Michelle Obama Demanded Trump's Removal From Twitter As Musk Reveals Policies Were Ignored to Ban Him​

Additionally, Shellenberger revealed that Twitter had a policy called “Public-interest exceptions,” in which elected officials were not banned because there is a public interest in their comments, even if they seemed to violate other policies.

However, this policy was blatantly ignored in Trump’s case.

 

[SamSpade]

What I am still not seeing - is across the board outrage. There should be.

There's a basic premise in our society that has political parties at such bitter odds - the reason why we have rights enshrined in the Constitution is, the party that screws you TODAY is the party that will get screwed tomorrow. If you cheer on when the rights you hold most sacred are taken from people whom you don't like - be prepared for the pendulum to swing the other way and for it to happen to you.

Nobody "wins" for long - the wheel just keeps turning. Again, we have a Bill of Rights to make sure they are protected for everyone, not just people you like.

I can't believe in this free society, that message even needs to be said.

 

[GURPS]

Again, we have a Bill of Rights to make sure they are protected for everyone, not just people you like.

Nope Progressives Think Republicans [ Trump Supporters ] are EVIL, therefore the means justify the ends ...

You have to Punch A Nazi, Burn Down Pregnancy Crisis Centers [ people get confused looking for Abortions ] the compete with the Abortion Industry ... silence is violence ... etc

 

[stgislander]

What I am still not seeing - is across the board outrage. There should be.

There's a basic premise in our society that has political parties at such bitter odds - the reason why we have rights enshrined in the Constitution is, the party that screws you TODAY is the party that will get screwed tomorrow. If you cheer on when the rights you hold most sacred are taken from people whom you don't like - be prepared for the pendulum to swing the other way and for it to happen to you.

Nobody "wins" for long - the wheel just keeps turning. Again, we have a Bill of Rights to make sure they are protected for everyone, not just people you like.

I can't believe in this free society, that message even needs to be said.

It just goes to show the extent of the political division in this country. It's like the Grand Canyon is separating the left and the right. There is no middle ground to meet at anymore.

 

[SamSpade]

Does hate speech directed at the right or any person who supports a conservative issue count, as hate speech?

Did it count before Elon Musk?

I am wondering how they can possibly measure metrics about how many or how much, when all they can possibly do is measure those contained in groups or persons they know.

That, and is it incidence of hate they measure - or total? You double the amount of persons, you're gonna double the amount of hate.
At least, it should, logically.

 

[Hijinx]

John Brennan. The intelligence guy who signed onto a statement that the Russian hoax was real, and Michelle Obama. Two people who aren't worth the effort to listen to.

 

[Kyle]

It just goes to show the extent of the political division in this country. It's like the Grand Canyon is separating the left and the right. There is no middle ground to meet at anymore.

Only thing is, the right has been moving slightly left in the last two decades where the left has taken off to the restaurant at the end of the universe.