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Musk and the federal government

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Via Next Draft: What’s in it for Musk (and a handful of other billionaires funding the entire Trump operation)? Well, let’s narrow the answer down to this: Everything. Franklin Foer in The Atlantic( Gift Article): What Elon Musk Really Wants. “Many other titans of Silicon Valley have tethered themselves to Trump. But Musk is the one poised to live out the ultimate techno-authoritarian fantasy. With his influence, he stands to capture the state, not just to enrich himself. His entanglement with Trump will be an Ayn Rand novel sprung to life, because Trump has explicitly invited Musk into the government to play the role of the master engineer, who redesigns the American state—and therefore American life—in his own image.” (On the positive side, if the turnout is good for Dems, they can beat Trump and Musk in one election.)

+ NYT (Gift Article): U.S. Agencies Fund, and Fight With, Elon Musk. A Trump Presidency Could Give Him Power Over Them. “Given Mr. Musk’s immense business footprint, he will be a major player no matter who wins the election. But he has thrown his fortune and power behind former President Donald J. Trump and, in return, Mr. Trump has vowed to make Mr. Musk head of a new ‘government efficiency commission’ with the power to recommend wide-ranging cuts at federal agencies and changes to federal rules. That would essentially give the world’s richest man and a major government contractor the power to regulate the regulators who hold sway over his companies.” And from WaPo(Gift Article): “In essence, Musk is running a real-time experiment on American democracy. “Can a billionaire change the results of a close election by buying a communications platform, stretching legal limits by throwing millions around in swing states, and funding organizations that run deceptive ads?”

Media Monitoring Guide Everything You Need to Know

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Muck Rack – Media monitoring is the practice of listening, watching, and tracking media coverage and conversation about your organization, your industry, your competition, and topics that relate to your industry. Table of contents What media monitoring means in PR Why is media monitoring so hard? What to monitor and where to start What functionality… Continue Reading

How to find helpful content in a sea of made-for-Google BS

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HouseFresh: “Uncovering the tactics used by big media content farms, SEO pattern makers, content thieves and AI slop creators to fool Google’s enshittified algorithm (so you don’t fall for them, too). At the beginning of 2024, we said Google was killing independent sites with its bias towards established media outlets, even in cases where these… Continue Reading

How the Malleus maleficarum fueled the witch trial craze

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Ars Technica: “Between 1400 and 1775, a significant upsurge of witch trials swept across early-modern Europe, resulting in the execution of an estimated 40,000–60,000 accused witches. Historians and social scientists have long studied this period in hopes of learning more about how large-scale social changes occur. Some have pointed to the invention of the printing… Continue Reading

How rational inference about authority debunking can curtail, sustain, or spread belief polarization

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Setayesh Radkani, Marika Landau-Wells, Rebecca Saxe. How rational inference about authority debunking can curtail, sustain, or spread belief polarization. PNAS Nexus, 2024; 3 (10) DOI: 10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae393 In polarized societies, divided subgroups of people have different perspectives on a range of topics. Aiming to reduce polarization, authorities may use debunking to lend support to one perspective… Continue Reading

How social media distorts perceptions of norms

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Claire E. Robertson, Kareena S. del Rosario, Jay J. Van Bavel, Inside the funhouse mirror factory: How social media distorts perceptions of norms, Current Opinion in Psychology, Volume 60, 2024, 101918, ISSN 2352-250X, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2024.101918.  “The current paper explains how modern technology interacts with human psychology to create a funhouse mirror version of social norms. We… Continue Reading

What If Google’s Biggest Problem Isn’t AI?

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New York – Intelligencer [unpaywalled]: “Let’s say you represent the most powerful government on Earth and would like to convey some information to the citizens of your country in a moment of crisis. We’re talking pretty basic stuff: How to apply for federal assistance after a series of massive natural disasters, the general state of… Continue Reading

What’s happening in America today is something darker than a misinformation crisis.

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The Atlantic [no paywall]: ” I’m Running Out of Ways to Explain How Bad This Is What’s happening in America today is something darker than a misinformation crisis. By Charlie Warzel. The truth is, it’s getting harder to describe the extent to which a meaningful percentage of Americans have dissociated from reality. As Hurricane Milton… Continue Reading

FTC Findings on Commercial Surveillance Can Lead to Better Alternatives

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EFF: “On September 19, the FTC published a staff report following a multi-year investigation of nine social media and video streaming companies. The report found a myriad of privacy violations to consumers stemming largely from the ad-revenue based business models of companies including Facebook, YouTube, and X (formerly Twitter) which prompted unbridled consumer surveillance practices.… Continue Reading

Who U.S. Adults Follow on TikTok

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“Adult TikTok users in the U.S. use the platform to follow pop culture and entertainment accounts much more than news and politics. A new Pew Research Center analysis of the accounts Americans follow on TikTok highlights the centrality of internet-native content creators, prominent influencers and traditional celebrities on the popular short-form video platform. It also… Continue Reading

The White House launches Reddit account

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The Biden-Harris Administration has launched a Reddit account to provide accurate info on Hurricanes Helene and Milton. The White House will combat misinformation and share updates on federal response, recovery, and preparedness efforts across key sub-Reddits. TechCrunch: “On Tuesday, a White House official announced that the Biden-Harris administration has launched a White House account on… Continue Reading