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Current Affairs published an in-depth editorial on recent revelations about a $1 million astroturfng campaign by Correct the Record:
Astroturfing makes me angry. It should make you angry. It should make you fucking well see red. It's marketing evolved into something incredibly scary, sophisticated, and evil. It's essentially thought warfare, or psychological warfare, which takes away much of what was supposed to make the internet a new and beautiful frontier of communication. Worse yet, if you actually identify and approach these operatives, they'll gaslight you and deny that they are such an operative. These are people who are paid to psychologically abuse you. Do you get this? It's an ugly and evil thing, and not only does it take away our ability to take information and fact at face value, but it takes away our ability to take opinions, feelings, and personal stances at face value as sincere and legitimate.
takyon: For some additional context, "Hillary-supporting super PAC invests $1 million to hit back at online Clinton critics":
Correct the Record, a super PAC supporting Hillary Clinton's bid to become US president, has promised to invest more than $1 million to respond to users criticizing its candidate on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, Instagram, and other social media services. The super PAC says its new "Barrier Breakers digital task force" will to respond "quickly and forcefully to negative attacks and false narratives found online," in addition to thanking major supporters and "committed superdelegates" directly.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @01:43AM
> if you've got a weak mind, you don't deserve much respect.
Irony alert.
Gynormous irony alert.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 26 2016, @01:52AM
That's it, Punkinhead, attack the messanger. How cute, how predictable!
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @02:11AM
You can't be a messenger if you don't have a message.
Only someone with a weak mind would confuse that rant for a "message."
It's just a mess of poorly conceived anger.
Oh, I get it you meant attack the messanger.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @02:41AM
ah, the witty woman with the trigger on the flamebait and troll mods :DDD
see, even idiots survive evolution, mainly because others fight for them or because nobody sees them as a threat.
at the end of the day, though, not all, or even many, of the fighters are happy with the dead comrades and idiot survivors.
the only happy fighters are the ones with idiot, but really good looking, wives...
to put an argument into your idiot woman mouth, with fighters i mean marines with guns, since men with guns are the créme of civilization.
btw, idiot woman, did i mention muscle? thats is the shit... without muscle u are nothing.
i hope i have provided some things for u to mod.
/zug
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @03:34AM
did you forget your password or something zugnub?
or did your muscles just get so big that your fingers can't type it anymore?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 26 2016, @05:38PM
I just bet you charm the socks off the ladies, you manly man, you! Haven't you got a Nazi rally you need to be getting to by now, zug?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 26 2016, @02:36AM
FTFY.
And please stop massaging the message (aka astroturfing); also stop being dismissive to those having punk in their head: its not illegal and if you want respect, treat others the same.
(grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Tuesday April 26 2016, @03:47AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FOUqQt3Kg0 [youtube.com]
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 26 2016, @04:01AM
Nope... but rather [youtube.com]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Tuesday April 26 2016, @04:15AM
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xSHYlSxQyJM [youtube.com]
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 26 2016, @04:30AM
... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPn0KFlbqX8 [youtube.com]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 3, Informative) by mcgrew on Tuesday April 26 2016, @02:30PM
I liked the internet a lot better before youtube brought all you aliterates to it. And no, that's not a misspelling despite the idiotic spell checker, in both Webster's and the OED. I doubt you'll find it in the Urban Dictionary.
Just so you guys know, if you want me to hit a youtube link, let me know how funny it is unless it's something really cool that absolutely requires video that can't be done in print.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday April 26 2016, @11:42PM
Well, I liked it better before the alphabet agencies started to look into all the traffic and digging into it.
Take the above as an example of (an innocent) conversation which will resist automatic "pattern detection" and yet would be able to transmit a meaning.
(incidentally, this is one technique that was used in life under communist regimes - of course, not based on youtube).
See? It works.
Not foolproof, but it will work even if Eve knows the technique (by increasing at least one order of magnitude the effort to detect/decipher a conversation automatically)
---
It's somehow a shame that one which aspire to be a writer didn't recognize in it the same technique used in creating literature (when was ever "telling straight what you mean" considered literature? This is what manifests and slogans are for), even if this case relied on means other than printed words.
As a penance (for being dismissive and expecting "funny"), I'd suggest you to write a story about a sophisticated society in which failure to use this technique in every aspect of one's everyday life is punishable with degrading one into a lower caste; the somehow meritocratic elite maintains itself by the ability of its members to "speak" multiple languages of various society groups. Shared ethos and lore, thus supposedly able to resonate - if not empathize - with their needs; the more ethoses one can share, the more groups can trust that one to be their voice.
* "Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra" - is the language commoners speak - shared experience of the global society, but unrefined for specific areas of life
* "The Moon Moth" will show you the elite will use not only verbal symbols, but also visual clues and music. Add other means as necessary.
* Shunning someone by not seeing him even when present - one is dead when even his parents don't see him anymore - I can't remember the book/author (nor even the plot) in which this was used (some help will be gratefully appreciated)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Wednesday April 27 2016, @03:31PM
I'm not dismissive of art or humor or anything that's best presented as a video; both True Grit movies were good, the book sucked. But it took a lot less time to read the book than to watch either movie, and that's the trouble with 90% of youtube links I've hit - someone reading to me when I can read it myself twenty times as fast with better comprehension.
Someone made a video of They're Made Out of Meat. Lousy movie, two guys sitting in a diner parroting the aliens' words. Pathetic.
If, otoh, 90% of the links were moving illustrations rather than talking heads I wouldn't have a problem. But I have no use for a video of someone talking.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday April 27 2016, @04:10PM
Just to male sure... you did get that part of my explanation were I said the dialogue had nothing to do with the quality of the videoclips, right?
(should I decode the dialogue for you?)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Tuesday April 26 2016, @02:26PM
Just so you know, I'll never be at a TED talk, let alone watch one on youtube. Videos are for illustration, the written word is the best method of communication. I only mention it because I've seen several links to youtube here today, and I don't WANT to listen to a talking head, I'm listening to music and READING on a photo and video-free site. Do you have a link to that content that doesn't involve using my ears?
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by Vanderhoth on Tuesday April 26 2016, @05:23PM
Videos can have they're place, they can be really informative. Written arguments can be hard to follow because you lack the non-verbal cues that go into an argument. That's not to say they're bad, but it's just not always the best way to get a point across, especially if someone, that's hell bent on misrepresenting you, shows up and starts taking everything you say out of context, conflating issues and/or derailing a topic.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
(Score: 3, Touché) by MostCynical on Tuesday April 26 2016, @09:01PM
And some times a video is just a video, or, as here, people being silly.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Wednesday April 27 2016, @03:40PM
Videos can have they're place
I see by that sentence that you're not a reader.
they can be really informative
Yes, if it's something like this [hubblesite.org] but nearly always it's a talking head.
Written arguments can be hard to follow because you lack the non-verbal cues that go into an argument.
The written word is FAR more understandable than the spoken word, as poets have pointed out for centuries. "Lets all get up and dance to a song. That was a hippie four. Your mother was born, though she was born a long, long time ago".
Or Robert Service's "Dangerous Dan McGrew" which comes out as "dangerous damned McGrew" when read out loud. But if you don't know the difference between there, they're and their then yes, the written word might seem unwieldy.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by Vanderhoth on Wednesday April 27 2016, @04:17PM
You know I follow you right, for quite a long time actually, and read your Mars, Ho series when you were posting it in your journal.
Some times people just make spelling mistakes. I often am just doing too many things at one time and screw things up without thinking about it. But your response actually makes my point. Sometimes, during a conversation, how people are posturing toward each other can convey a lot of a conversation that would be over looked or misinterpreted when written.
None of that is to say that written words aren't also important or that you can't make a point without body language.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Thursday April 28 2016, @06:11PM
Body language is good at conveying emotion, but that's all. Body language won't explain microbiology or cosmology, only words and maths will do that.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by Vanderhoth on Monday May 02 2016, @10:22AM
Pictures help, graphs, cell diagrams, charts.
And sometimes having someone point to what they're talking about as they run through demonstrations and examples.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe