#Reddit "…the platform that was once the darling of the internet's cool kids is now facing an existential crisis. It's a feeling that should be familiar to anyone who's watched their favorite punk band sell out and start playing elevator music. You want to look away, but you can't help but wonder: How did we get here?" https://joanwestenberg.com/how-the-internets-front-page-is-eating-itself
"#Musk's algorithms pushed pro-riot content so hard down users' throats it prompted a #UK government rebuke and talk of legal sanctions. Tommy Robinson, a leading British racist, got over 430 million views for his X posts, for instance. Andrew Tate, Britain's top misogynist, got 15 million views for one X post inciting rioters. And the biggest turd in the cesspit—Musk's own avatar—…ranted about "civil war" in the UK, peddled pro-Trump conspiracy theories,…"
EUobserver
Why EU leaders should get off Musk
Leaders should ask themselves - is X really what I want my brand to be associated with?
"From now on, we will refer to them as #corporatemedia.” The word “mainstream” is defined as the dominant ideas, attitudes, and values in our society. But nothing about the major news outlets is #MainstreamMedia anymore. They are all owned by a handful of rich people and run by boards that pander only to the wealthy and powerful. It’s clear that corporate media can’t be trusted as the standard bearers of #journalism." V. @npub1kxu2...9fca
Time to Stop Calling Them "Mainstream" Media
We've had enough
#introducao Para a turma que chega, me apresento como um cidadão do Fediverso. Trabalho com Internet desde 1995, inicialmente publicando websites de governo, depois mais diretamente com políticas públicas para o digital. Hoje estou no Ibram-Museus, e lá estamos trabalhando em um projeto experimental para museus no Fediverso. Saúdo a todes com a paciência necessária para enfrentar a entrada peculiar nesta região da infosfera, e que permaneçam o tempo suficiente para criar laços por aqui. Inté!
A turma que sai do Twitter agora aqui no Brasil vai direto para o Bluesky. Para chegar no Fediverso, a pessoa precisa passar por uma transformação em sua perspectiva sobre o que sustenta o ambiente digital. Leva algum tempo, e faz sentido que assim seja. Se houvessem instâncias preparadas para bem receber essa leva de refugiados locais, daríamos um salto. Mas vai rolar..
The Verge
Brazil’s X ban is sending lots of people to Bluesky
“We’ve never seen traffic like this.”
"#Telegram referred to as an #encryptedmessagingapp. This phrasing drives me nuts because in a very limited technical sense, it’s not wrong. Yet in every sense that matters, it fundamentally misrepresents what Telegram is and how it works in practice. And this misrepresentation is bad for both journalists and particularly for Telegram’s users, many of whom could be badly hurt as a result. Now to the details…"
A Few Thoughts on Cryptographic Engineering
Is Telegram really an encrypted messaging app?
This blog is reserved for more serious things, and ordinarily I wouldn’t spend time on questions like the above. But much as I’d like t...
"It’s time to stop playing defense. It's time to go on the offensive. To restore #competition, #regulation, #interop and tech worker power so that we can create the new, good internet we’ll need to fight fascism, the climate emergency, and genocide. To build a digital nervous system for a 21st century in which our children can thrive and prosper." @npub1fdrp...lvhs says it's time to "Hack the planet!"
Pluralistic: “Disenshittify or Die” (17 Aug 2024) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
"The #onlinenazis are, frankly, fucking lonely. We aren't talking about people who are winning at life. They're not happy family men or pillars of their community. #Socialmedia gave them something they crave: acceptance, a shared enemy, and a twisted sense of purpose. And when that shared enemy increasingly just leaves them alone, leaves them to the wasteland of their own playgrounds, they lose it." https://joanwestenberg.com/truth-social,-twitter-and-the-loneliest-reich
"Tapping into the #Fediverse presents a unique opportunity for discovery. The current offering most platforms have today are relatively sparse, but #Flipboard will be able to yield results across Threads, Mastodon, Podcast Index, and other ActivityPub-based platforms. In trying to make discovery more robust, Flipboard is bringing visibility of popular accounts to help solve that problem, making it easier for people to find their favorite creators." https://wedistribute.org/2024/08/flipboard-fediverse-following/
"Our main concern is the potential impact that AI tools could have on the human motivation to continue creating & sharing knowledge. When people visit Wikipedia directly, they are more likely to become volunteer contributors themselves. If there is a disconnect between where knowledge is generated (e.g #Wikipedia) and where it is consumed (e.g. ChatGPT or Google AI Overview), we run the risk of losing a generation of volunteers and all the knowledge they help contribute."
Sherwood News
AI is mining the sum of human knowledge from Wikipedia. What does that mean for its future?
We spoke with Wikipedia executives who told us AI could jeopardize the encyclopedia’s connection with the volunteers who create it....