Category Archives: cheap speech

WSJ Profile of Facebook’s Zuckerberg Talks About His Political Education, “Open Line” With President’s Son-in-Law and Others

October 16, 2020, 4:54 pmcheap speechRick Hasen

WSJ: Mr. Zuckerberg maintains an open line with Mr. Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser. The two sometimes discuss Facebook policies over WhatsApp. The CEO spoke this year with Mr. Kushner and separately with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin about… Continue reading

“Twitter Changes Course After Republicans Claim ‘Election Interference’”

October 16, 2020, 10:36 amcampaigns, cheap speechRick Hasen

NYT: President Trump called Facebook and Twitter “terrible” and “a monster” and said he would go after them. Senators Ted Cruz and Marsha Blackburn said they would subpoena the chief executives of the companies for their… Continue reading

Must-read: “For Trump’s ‘rigged’ election claims, an online megaphone awaits; sizable online network built around the president is poised to amplify claims about a rigged election, adding reach and enthusiasm to otherwise evidence-free allegations.”

October 15, 2020, 9:17 amcheap speech, fraudulent fraud squadRick Hasen

NBC News: The idea of a rigged election has already taken hold in Trump’s fervent online base, a horde of digital activists who dutifully share links from right-wing blogs and junk news sites and turn the president’s message into memes.Trump’s… Continue reading

“The First Amendment in the Age of Disinformation”

October 13, 2020, 9:39 pmcheap speechRick Hasen

Looking forward to reading this new Emily Bazelon in the NYT Magazine.

“Fake Twitter accounts posing as Black Trump supporters appear, reach thousands, then vanish”

October 13, 2020, 1:07 pmcheap speechRick Hasen

Washington Post: An account featuring the image of a Black police officer, President Trump and the words “VOTE REPUBLICAN” had a brief but spectacular run on Twitter. In six days after it became active last week, it tweeted just eight… Continue reading

“Engagement with untrustworthy Facebook content doubles since 2016”

October 12, 2020, 6:21 pmcheap speechRick Hasen

Axios: Facebook users engage with content from untrustworthy outlets twice as often today as they did at the time of the 2016 U.S. election, researchers at the German Marshall Fund found, despite the many measures the platform and its competitors… Continue reading

“Facebook bans marketing firm running ‘troll farm’ for pro-Trump youth group”

October 8, 2020, 10:19 amcheap speech, chicaneryRick Hasen

WaPo: Facebook said Thursday it will permanently ban from its platform an Arizona-based marketing firm running what experts described as a domestic “troll farm” — in a probe of the deceptive behavior prompted by a Washington Post article last month.The… Continue reading

“Facebook Widens Ban on Political Ads as Alarm Rises Over Election”

October 8, 2020, 7:33 amcheap speech, Election MeltdownRick Hasen

NYT: Over the past few weeks, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, and his lieutenants have watched the presidential race with an increasing sense of alarm.Executives have held meetings to discuss President Trump’s evasive comments about whether he would accept a … Continue reading

“How Russia Today Skirts High-Tech Blockade to Reach U.S. Readers; The Kremlin-backed outlet has been boosted by a news aggregator dominated by conservative media sites”

October 7, 2020, 1:14 pmcheap speechRick Hasen

WSJ: On any given day over the past two years, visitors to the home page of RealClearPolitics were likely to see its famous average of political polls, a roundup of news and center-right commentary—and, near the bottom, a link… Continue reading

“Facebook tightens political ad bans as US election nears”

October 1, 2020, 10:23 amcheap speech, fraudulent fraud squadRick Hasen

AP: With just over a month to go before Americans head en masse to the polls in an extraordinarily contentious election, Facebook is expanding restrictions on political advertising, including new bans on messages claiming widespread voter fraud.New prohibitions laid out… Continue reading

“How Facebook could help plunge our democracy into chaos on Nov. 4”

September 29, 2020, 1:54 pmcheap speech, Election MeltdownRick Hasen

Greg Sargent: The threat this time resides in a combustible combination of two factors. The first is what’s known as Facebook’s “Group recommendation engine,” which drives people to private Facebook groups. Experts have long warned that these private groups are… Continue reading

“‘Russia Doesn’t Have To Make Fake News’: Biggest Election Threat Is Closer To Home”

September 29, 2020, 12:58 pmcheap speech, chicaneryRick Hasen

NPR reports.

Knight Foundation: What’s Next for Tech and Democracy?

September 24, 2020, 9:20 amcheap speechRick Hasen

Happy to participate in this roundtable (Disclosure: Knight is generously supporting my book leave): Midway through a year rocked by a pandemic, protests and politics, we asked leading researchers and policy thinkers: What new questions relating to technology’s impact on… Continue reading

“Facebook allowed hundreds of misleading super PAC ads, activist group finds”

September 24, 2020, 7:39 amcampaign finance, campaigns, cheap speechRick Hasen

CNN: Facebook (FB) has allowed political advertisers to target hundreds of misleading ads about Joe Biden and the US Postal Service to swing-state voters ranging from Florida to Wisconsin in recent weeks, in an apparent failure to… Continue reading