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On Tuesday, The Guardian posted an article about the US military pouring millions into researching how to become a Twitter-user-influencing, propaganda-spewing machine.
The program in question is known as Social Media in Strategic Communication (SMISC).
SMISC, which was announced in 2011, has been regarded as the means by which the US military can both detect and conduct propaganda campaigns via social media.
While DARPA's social media experiments well might have avoided breaking any law by using only publicly available data, some of its studies are sure to make people uncomfortable.
For example, some of the SMISC research has focused on the Occupy Wall Street protests and those in the Middle East, while other projects have analysed online memes and tweets from celebrities including Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga (described as "the most popular elite user on Twitter", according to The Guardian.
The manager of SMISC, Dr. Rand Waltzman, said in a post that understanding social media is just part of DARPA's "mission of preventing strategic surprise."
(Score: 1) by TheB on Friday July 11 2014, @04:37PM
I don't like the moderation system here at all.
Logged in daily. A month went by without receiving any mod points. Now I don't bother logging on at all.
If Soylent gains enough attention it will be just like all the other sites.
Those with something to gain, will know how to game the system, and legitimate users won't have a voice.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 11 2014, @05:11PM
On the article submitters post since they can't validly dispute him and used illogical off topic attacks on him instead here (laminator X did) http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=2836&cid=67656 [soylentnews.org] (see Laminator X's post prior to that, it's chock full of illogical off topic ad hominem attacks). Little tin god dictators on forums boards can ALWAYS BE COUNTED ON TO DO THE WRONG THING, and they have (downmodding the article submitter himself's points on ALLOWING what you yourself do not mind - the ability to see who upmodded or downmodded you). WHY? They abuse it as apk alluded to and you youself seem quite aware of yourself.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 11 2014, @05:13PM
At work (it doesn't, per their own rules) http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=2836&cid=67676 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by tibman on Friday July 11 2014, @05:17PM
The mod points here are really random. I have noticed though that when they do rarely appear it is right after i made a comment. Lurkers probably don't get any.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 11 2014, @08:21PM
hi tim