[governance] FW: [Dewayne-Net] Technology set journalism free, now new platforms are in control

[Deirdre Williams]

My perception is that the "right not to listen" has gone the same way as
the "right to say no" and the "right to hold an individual opinion".
I sincerely, but not too hopefully, would be glad to discover that my
perception is incorrect.
Deirdre

On 24 November 2014 at 09:56, Daniel Kalchev <daniel at digsys.bg> wrote:

> I only wonder when we will begin talking about the "right to not listen"
> to someone's speeches.
>
> Also, this seems to prove that new discoveries are the well forgotten
> old knowledge.
> When did those people forget, that "before the Internet", if they wanted
> to reach auditory outside of their own abilities to communicate (limited
> individually), they would depend on "privately-run platforms" such as a
> newspaper, book publisher or a broadcaster?
>
> Daniel
>
> On 24.11.14 07:06, michael gurstein wrote:
> > According to this article below our civil society free speech warriors
> who
> > are so concerned to keep governments at bay may just be missing the
> bigger
> > picture, but I'm sure they will have an excellent chance to be brought
> up to
> > speed in their multistakeholder NMI canoodling with the likes of Facebook
> > and Twitter.
> >
> > M
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: dewayne-net at warpspeed.com [mailto:dewayne-net at warpspeed.com] On
> Behalf
> > Of Dewayne Hendricks
> > Sent: Sunday, November 23, 2014 5:51 AM
> > To: Multiple recipients of Dewayne-Net
> > Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Technology set journalism free, now new platforms
> are
> > in control
> >
> > Technology set journalism free, now new platforms are in control By
> Mathew
> > Ingram Nov 22 2014
> > <
> https://gigaom.com/2014/11/22/technology-set-journalism-free-now-new-platfo
> > rms-are-in-control/>
> >
> > Emily Bell, the former Guardian digital editor who now runs the Tow
> Center
> > for Digital Journalism at Columbia University, gave a speech recently at
> the
> > Reuters Institute in the UK about the crossroads at which journalism
> finds
> > itself today. It's a place where media and journalism - and in fact
> speech
> > of all kinds - has never been more free, but also paradoxically one in
> which
> > speech is increasingly controlled by privately-run platforms like Twitter
> > and Facebook.
> >
> > I was glad to see Emily addressing this issue, because it's something
> I've
> > written about a number of times - both in the context of
> Twitter'scommitment
> > to being the "free speech wing of the free-speech party," and also in the
> > context of Facebook's dominance of the news and how its algorithm can
> > distort that news in ways we still don't really appreciate or understand,
> > because it is a black box.
> >
> > "Today. we have reached a point of transition where news spaces are no
> > longer owned by newsmakers. The press is no longer in charge of the free
> > press and has lost control of the main conduits through which stories
> reach
> > audiences. The public sphere is now operated by a small number of private
> > companies, based in Silicon Valley."
> >
> > Free speech vs. profit
> >
> > As Emily pointed out, it's a serious issue not just for journalists or
> the
> > media but for society as a whole to have "our free speech standards, our
> > reporting tools and publishing rules set by unaccountable software
> > companies." Although these platforms often say they are in favor of free
> > speech and other principles, as Twitter does, at the end of the day they
> are
> > profit-oriented public companies who must pursue certain ends in order to
> > generate revenue.
> >
> > There's also a certain tendency on the part of these platforms and their
> > executives to deny that they act in any kind of editorial role or perform
> > any kind of journalistic function, when they clearly do. In an interview
> > with the New York Times, the Facebook executive in charge of the main
> news
> > feed said he doesn't think of himself as an editor - and yet, algorithms
> > involve editorial choices of what to include and what to leave out, even
> if
> > Facebook and other companies don't want to admit it.
> >
> > "No other single branded platform in the history of journalism has had
> the
> > concentration of power and attention that Facebook enjoys. If one
> believes
> > the numbers attached to Facebook, then the world's most powerful news
> > executive is Greg Marra, the product manager for the Facebook News Feed.
> He
> > is 26."
> >
> > This power is often exercised in disturbing ways: Facebook repeatedly
> > removes content that doesn't meet its standards, but often doesn't say
> why -
> > and in some cases this can affect the historical record of important
> events,
> > such as the Syrian government's use of chemical weapons against its own
> > people, as the investigative blogger Brown Moses has described a number
> of
> > times.
> >
> > [snip]
> >
> > Dewayne-Net RSS Feed: <http://dewaynenet.wordpress.com/feed/>
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> ____________________________________________________________
> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>      governance at lists.igcaucus.org
> To be removed from the list, visit:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing
>
> For all other list information and functions, see:
>      http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
> To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/
>
> Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t
>
>


-- 
“The fundamental cure for poverty is not money but knowledge" Sir William
Arthur Lewis, Nobel Prize Economics, 1979
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/governance/attachments/20141124/3b701147/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.igcaucus.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t