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Posted on February 21, 2016February 20, 2016 by James — Leave a comment

Is Twitter Silencing Conservatives?

Posted by Jonathan Levin Saturday, February 20, 2016 at 11:05am

Twitter, an invaluable news aggregator when properly run and used, has seemingly taken aim at conservatives and those advocating conservative causes.

In early January, Twitter stripped Breitbart Tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos (@Nero on Twitter) of his “verification,” saying he violated the anti-harassment Terms of Service.

A verified account means the user has a little blue checkmark next to his or her user name. It is Twitter’s way of affirming to all other users that this is, in fact, the person he or she claims to be. It sounds like a small thing, but Twitter, like so much social media, is rife with accounts purporting to be or that just look like a real public figure.

That verification checkmark tells all the other users that a particular account is the real thing. Having a verified account can be a big draw and boost followers who are otherwise reluctant to be suckered or drawn in by fakes. Stripping verification takes that mark of legitimacy away. It is also a sort of peculiar way to punish violations of terms of service. Assuming @Nero actually violated the terms of service, is the account somehow no longer Yiannopoulos’s?

Of course not. More important, it is not at all obvious that @Nero violated the terms of service at all. Stipulate that he is a troll who relishes destroying the Left’s sacred cows and laughs at the resulting discomfiture. Stipulate even that it’s really not nice and consciously deprives people of their “safe spaces.” So what? Five minutes on twitter reveals death threats by and against every possible demographic. Terror accounts proliferate. Anti-Semitism is rampant.

Leaving these accounts untouched but de-verifying a public figure like @Nero for violating the Terms of Service in the course of his public persona is nonsensical. Other Twitter methods for stifling anti-PC thought have come to light.

https://legalinsurrection.com/2016/02/is-twitter-silencing-conservatives/

Posted on February 17, 2016February 17, 2016 by James — Leave a comment

Twitter Shadowbanning ‘Real and Happening Every Day’ Says Inside Source

by MILO YIANNOPOULOS16 Feb 2016888

Rumours that Twitter has begun ‘shadowbanning’ politically inconvenient users have been confirmed by a source inside the company, who spoke exclusively to Breitbart Tech. His claim was corroborated by a senior editor at a major publisher.

According to the source, Twitter maintains a ‘whitelist’ of favoured Twitter accounts and a ‘blacklist’ of unfavoured accounts. Accounts on the whitelist are prioritised in search results, even if they’re not the most popular among users. Meanwhile, accounts on the blacklist have their posts hidden from both search results and other users’ timelines.

Our source was backed up by a senior editor at a major digital publisher, who told Breitbart that Twitter told him it deliberately whitelists and blacklists users. He added that he was afraid of the site’s power, noting that his tweets could disappear from users’ timelines if he got on the wrong side of the company.

Shadowbanning, sometimes known as “Stealth Banning” or “Hell Banning,” is commonly used by online community managers to block content posted by spammers. Instead of banning a user directly (which would alert the spammer to their status, prompting them to create a new account), their content is merely hidden from public view.

For site owners, the ideal shadowban is when a user never realizes he’s been shadowbanned.

However, Twitter isn’t merely targeting spammers. For weeks, users have been reporting that tweets from populist conservatives, members of the alternative right, cultural libertarians, and other anti-PC dissidents have disappeared from their timelines.

https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/02/16/exclusive-twitter-shadowbanning-is-real-say-inside-sources/

Posted on February 14, 2016February 12, 2016 by James — Leave a comment

MILO: Twitter ‘Embarking on a War Against Conservative Points of View’

by BREITBART TECH12 Feb 2016412

Speaking with host and Breitbart News Executive Chairman Stephen K. Bannon on Breitbart News Daily, Breitbart Tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos discussed the suppression of conservative voices by Twitter on the social media platform.

“Why are you beating up Twitter, and why are you saying that Twitter trying to suppress conservative voices, and why is Twitter’s stock in a total free fall because Milo’s taking them on?” Bannon asked. “Are you a bigger, badder guy than Jack Dorsey?”

“Yeah, of course I am,” Yiannopoulos replied mischievously. “I’m absolute convinced that Twitter is embarking on a war against conservative points of view, a war against what we might call ‘Generation Trump,’ the dissident, mischievous voices of the new counter-cultural alternative right wing and libertarian youth.”

“Look at who Twitter employs,” he warned in reference to Twitter possibly influencing the 2016 presidential election. “You know, this guy used to work with Hillary, this guy used to work with Obama…”

“This is why Obama ran the tables with Google and with Facebook,” Bannon agreed. “Let’s talk about Facebook for a second. Why is Facebook suppressing voices in the continent of Europe about immigration. Why is Zuckerberg in bed with Merkel?”

Referring to the story of Facebook teaming up with the German government to censor debate over the influx of Middle Eastern migrants, Yiannopoulos said, “This is what the left does all over the world. They’ll take ridicule and criticism and they’ll rebrand it as abuse and harrassment or hate speech in some way.”

https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/02/12/milo-twitter-embarking-on-a-war-against-conservative-points-of-view/

Posted on December 11, 2015December 11, 2015 by James — 8 Comments

Ridgewood High School was not portrayed in the best light in the stands or in the parking lot at MetLife Stadium

Tradition_of_excellence_theridgewoodblog

High School Problems

Dear Parents/Guardians and Students:

We were excited that our football team made it to the final round of competition at Met Life Stadium on December 5. It was great to see so many people from our community support our team, band, and cheerleaders for this final event. The high school even ran student fan buses for close to 90 students. Although the final score did not go our way, we are extremely proud of our coaches and players.

Unfortunately, despite previous warnings and pleas for assistance, Ridgewood High School was not portrayed in the best light in the stands or in the parking lot. Administrators and faculty members spent much of the game dealing with students that were under the influence and/or involved in disruptive behavior. In addition, the parking lot in the Ridgewood section was left in a very poor state with trash and broken bottles.

As we move forward, we hope this event will be a learning experience for all. The incidents referenced above are not unique to this one weekend and come on the heels of the most recent issues at RHS regarding students and postings on social media sites, i.e., Yik Yak, Finstagram, Instagram, etc. Many of these negative behaviors we have been experiencing are illegal, disruptive, and/or dangerous. These incidents give us a chance to pause, reflect, and engage in meaningful discussions about character and decision-making. We do not want to have these conversations after a tragic or permanently harmful event occurs.

Students, parents, and educators are continually being challenged to set limits in children’s lives that effectively support growth and healthy behavior. Although initially frustrated, children thrive and are grateful in the long run when parents and educators set parameters and limits. These concerns are not unique to Ridgewood but must be shared as a community.

At RHS, we will continue to have educational discussions with our students about the effects of drugs and alcohol; assist in the emotional, psychological, and physical development of our teenagers; and teach about character and decision-making through class lessons, athletics, and the arts.

In the weeks and months to come, we will be engaging in conversations with students and parents throughout the community. We encourage you to do the same. If you have any suggestions or feedback you wish to share, please reach out to any teacher, coach, or administrator as we work on determining the best course of action to help our youth reach their fullest potential.

Sincerely,

Thomas A. Gorman, Ed.D.

Principal
A Tradition of Excellence

Posted on November 9, 2015November 8, 2015 by James — Leave a comment

Instagram confession: The ugly truth behind my perfect model shots

Rebecca Pearson is a jobbing model and for the last year has been creating the ‘perfect life’ on Instagram in order to get work. Here she reveals the truth behind some of her most popular snaps.

Before this week you may have never heard of Essena O’Neill; a bikini toting, beach leaping glossy teen who, with over 800,000 followers, was bit of a star on Instagram – one of the world’s most popular social media sites. But when she switched off her account, decrying her life as a vapid popularity contest in which she no longer wished to compete, her story made headlines across the world.

By re-captioning some of her most liked posts to reveal the creative licence that went into creating the ‘perfect’ photographs of her ‘perfect’ life , the 19 year old Australian model said she wanted to expose the artificial world of social media. After spending her teen years curating her life into a polished, barely-clothed sun-kissed world her followers, she said, would finally see the truth. One photo, she explained, had had to be taken over a hundred times to get absolutely right and in another she revealed she was paid hundreds of pounds to wear a certain dress. She told how she would starve herself for days to get the perfect flat stomach, and a new caption under a smiling selfie ends with a disclaimer all in upper case: ‘There is nothing real about this’. Often, she said, she felt utterly alone. While some users applauded her honesty, days later other commentators were calling the whole thing a hoax, a clever marketing ploy whereby Essena was simply making herself (and a her new website) even more famous.

It’s a sorry tale for a platform that started out as simply a means to share and discover experiences through photographs; where users can ‘like’ another person’s picture to show their appreciation for a beautiful photograph before scrolling onto the next shot. Today, Instagram has 400 million+ users which is probably why after it was launched five years ago, it has mutated into a behemoth of self-promotion where the more likes a person has, the more prestige and earning-power they can command.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/11980031/Instagram-confession-The-ugly-truth-behind-my-perfect-model-shots.html

Posted on July 5, 2015July 3, 2015 by James — Leave a comment

Government Trolls Are Using “Psychology-Based Influence Techniques” On YouTube, Facebook And Twitter

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/02/2015 21:15 -0400

Submitted by Michael Snyder via The End of The American Dream blog,

Have you ever come across someone on the Internet that you suspected was a paid government troll? Well, there is a very good chance that you were not imagining things. Thanks to Edward Snowden, we now have solid proof that paid government trolls are using “psychology-based influence techniques” on social media websites such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Documents leaked by Snowden also reveal that government agents have been conducting denial-of-service attacks, flooding social media websites with thinly veiled propaganda and have been purposely attempting to warp public discourse online. If we do not stand up and object to this kind of Orwellian behavior, it is only going to get worse and worse.

In the UK, the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) is a specialized unit within the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). If it wasn’t for Edward Snowden, we probably still would never have heard of them. This particular specialized unit is engaged in some very “questionable” online activities. The following is an excerpt from a recent piece by Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman…

Though its existence was secret until last year, JTRIG quickly developed a distinctive profile in the public understanding, after documents from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden revealedthat the unit had engaged in “dirty tricks” like deploying sexual “honey traps” designed to discredit targets, launching denial-of-service attacks to shut down Internet chat rooms, pushing veiled propaganda onto social networks and generally warping discourse online.

We are told that JTRIG only uses these techniques to go after the “bad guys”.

But precisely who are the “bad guys”?

It turns out that their definition of who the “bad guys” are is quite broad. Here is more from Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman…

JTRIG’s domestic and law enforcement operations are made clear. The report states that the controversial unit “currently collaborates with other agencies” including the Metropolitan police, Security Service (MI5), Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), Border Agency, Revenue and Customs (HMRC), and National Public Order and Intelligence Unit (NPOIU). The document highlights that key JTRIG objectives include “providing intelligence for judicial outcomes”; monitoring “domestic extremist groups such as the English Defence League by conducting online HUMINT”; “denying, deterring or dissuading” criminals and “hacktivists”; and “deterring, disrupting or degrading online consumerism of stolen data or child porn.”

Particularly disturbing to me is the phrase “domestic extremist groups”. What does someone have to say or do to be considered an “extremist”? For example, the English Defence League is a non-violent street protest movement in the UK that is strongly against the spread of radical Islam and sharia law in the UK. So if they are “extremists”, how many millions upon millions of ordinary citizens in the United States would fit that definition?

When conducting operations against “extremists”, psychology-based influence techniques are among the tools that JTRIG uses to combat them online. The following comes from one of the documents that was posted by Greenwald and Fishman…

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-07-02/government-trolls-are-using-psychology-based-influence-techniques-youtube-facebook-a

Posted on March 19, 2015March 19, 2015 by James — Leave a comment

Chicago High School Superintendent: Teen Sexting Is a Police Matter

Chicago High School Superintendent: Teen Sexting Is a Police Matter

Two teens send nude selfies. Police spend several weeks, interview 25 students to “investigate.”

Elizabeth Nolan Brown|Mar. 18, 2015 5:15 pm

From suburban Chicago, another tale of teens being treated like criminals for sharing sexually oriented photos with each other. Four students at Ridgewood High School, in the suburb of Norridge, now face possible charges for “dissemination of harmful material to a minor,” police said. Those charged include two girls, 15 and 17, who sent nude photos of themselves via Snapchat and two male teens who received the photos and forwarded them to others. Another student overheard classmates discussing it and ratted them out to school officials, who ratted them out to the police.

Why the sex lives of teens should be subject to school discipline is suspect enough, but it’s extra perplexing what interest the government has in such matters. We’re talking about teens using private phones and communications platforms to exchange photos. It may not be the most wise move to send nude selfies to your crush, but criminal? Surely police resources could be used in better ways?

https://reason.com/blog/2015/03/18/high-school-superintendent-teen-sexting

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