The EU's warning to Elon Musk today over Twitter....'you best go back to the old ways of moderation and controlling content, or we will forbid you access to the EU'.
What'll happen? Well....I think that Elon will make some witty comment that the EU's version of moderation and the general definition of censorship....might lead down the same path. Then he'll mention....did you know before I bought Twitter....that they were manipulating data, commentary, etc....to bend elections this way or that way? Then he'll gaze at the French....the Germans and various other EU members, and ask them....did you appreciate the way that Twitter's old management handled your elections?
He might even bring up confidential meetings where this party met with Twitter engineers.....to get the right brand for the elections out.
Yeah, there's going to be tension, and denial.
Then, the EU will go and say you need to do this by such-and-such day (probably mid-December).
Around five days prior to this....Elon is going to forbid entry to Twitter and close down the shops throughout the EU....mostly saying they will discover a Pandora's Box now infesting their reality.
The 7.5-million Twitter users in Germany? VPN.....all the way baby.
As much as the Germans and the EU think they can control things....VPN puts them into the same category as the Chinese government.
So, settle back and prepare for one of the finest soap operas in recent history. Everyone (even 10-year old kids) will have VPN services and accusations of Chinese-like management will become a daily thing.
8 comments:
Good riddance to Twitter.
Head over to mastodon instead.
The sooner they make sites accountable the better. There's far too much bleating that its all beyond their control, but frantic shrieking any anytime someone threatens to regulate or establish controls.
Or even better, ditch all social media.
It begs the question in the end....how did we survive before FB, Instagram, or Twitter...arrived?
How did we shop before Amazon?
How did we survive before WhatsApp came to be?
How did we make it so many years without streaming video?
How did we waste two hours a month on banking, before ATMs, Apple-pay, and swipe-capability occurred?
On Mastodon, it's slowly becoming a one-side chat zone, and it lessens the overall value.
I think we survived reasonably well. We've outsourced a lot of thinking, and the reality is, look at the way Musk bows and caves to other authoritarian regimes. It's not like he's cultivating a free and open exchange of ideas like he claims. Just go on to twitter and congratulate him for his commitment to support freedom of expression within Taiwan. See how quickly your account gets banned.
There are 3 realities in today's world....which don't fit together:
1. Virtually everything (even World Cup soccer, or e-charging stations) is now politicized. There is viewpoint A, or viewpoint B. Prior to social media, you could have either viewpoint, and it was NOT a big deal.
2. A lot of our innovations and technology for the past hundred years....came from non-scientists and non-engineers. In today's world...no one wants to hear from this crowd (the credentials aren't there). Yet, that Gates-kid in his garage built the path to Word and early processors. The only reason we have music DVDs today...because of some German guys fumbling around in a lab.
3. Finally, as much misinformation/propaganda that exists....there's probably just as much dished out with 'good' intent (at least originally), and later...we can't forgive the 'good' intent people ever again.
I see the Musk issue brewing with moderation. I'd like to draw a line and just say no more than two hours a week on German public TV with politicized chatter. I'd like for soccer games to have zero commentary...just video of the game and the audio of the fans. I'd like for people to have the ability to protest...but just not on autobahns or using glue as 'tool'. Moderation ought to be like a good beer...no fancy tastes or weird additives, and drunk in limited amounts.
Sorry but I can't really groove to point 2. Gates wasn't exactly a garage tinkerer, he had access to terminal time and was ahead of the curve. I can't think of any major breakthrough's made that were made by people without formal education. The best I can come up with is Sister Kenny - the bush nurse in Australia who developed a better treatment for polio that was rejected by the medical establishment for 20+ years. She still studied the equivalent of what was nursing in the day though, and acted like a clinician...so it wasn't as if she had no head start of expertise. But then under the criteria of the last 100 years it's not really that clear. Her work was mostly done in 1910-20.
What major innovations came from non-scientists and non-engineers? In the last hundred years? Top three?
http://www.polioplace.org/people/sister-elizabeth-kenny
Just in case you're interested in the story. I find it really fascinating.
Top inventions by regular people? I'd have a different listing than most people.
1. Windshield wipers (dreamed up by a some Hollywood actress).
2. Frequency hopping, which we used for wi-fi and blue-tooth today...Hedy Lamar (Hollywood gal) dreamed it up.
3. Fireworks. The story goes that a Chinese cook was looking at ways of heating up food in a hurry and just accidentally discovered a way of exploding things.
I'll contest Hedy Lamar, she had a lot of un-credited help from friends when you delve deeper in to the story. Makes a great story though, and she was smart enough (like Edison) to put her name on the patent.
She definitely co-conceptualised it, but who implemented it? I'd split that amongst Lamarr, Antheil, and Prof. Samuel Stuart Mackeown. Note the professor part. It's not from a side field, but directly to do with it. From wiki:
"During World War II, Lamarr read that radio-controlled torpedoes[42] had been proposed. However, an enemy might be able to jam such a torpedo's guidance system and set it off course.[43] When discussing this with her friend the composer and pianist George Antheil, the idea was raised that a frequency-hopping signal might prevent the torpedo's radio guidance system from being tracked or jammed. Antheil succeeded by synchronizing a miniaturized player piano mechanism with radio signals.[34] Antheil sketched-out the idea for the frequency-hopping system, which was to use a perforated paper tape which actuated pneumatic controls (as was already used in player pianos).
Antheil was introduced to Samuel Stuart Mackeown, a professor of radio-electrical engineering at Caltech, whom Lamarr then employed for a year to actually develop the functionality of the idea.[44] Lamarr also hired the Los Angeles legal firm of Lyon & Lyon to search for prior knowledge, and to craft the application[45] for the patent[46][47] which was granted under US Patent 2,292,387 on August 11, 1942 (filed using her married name Hedy Kiesler Markey).[48] In 1997, Lamarr and Antheil received the Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Award and the Bulbie Gnass Spirit of Achievement Bronze Award,[49] given to individuals whose creative lifetime achievements in the arts, sciences, business, or invention fields have significantly contributed to society.[50] In 2014, Lamarr and Antheil were posthumously inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.[51] "
So, having a professor implement your idea sort of violates the 'everyman' principle of the premise.
The other two fall outside of your past hundred years limit. Wipers were 1903, and fireworks were much earlier.
But it was a valiant effort.
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