Imagine if Trump, after his election, had allowed giant corporate mega supporters of his campaign to basically declare war on a foreign ally. Do you think we'd be hearing about it from the Dems?
And yet that's pretty much what has happened. Facebook has declared war on our Five Eye ally Australia. That actually happened after days of digital saber rattling from Google, as well. Big Tech is outraged because the government of Oz want to require them to pay local Aussie publishers for using their content. Via Zerohedge:
Furious Aussies React To "Zero Warning" Facebook Ban On News Content
The pushback and reaction to Facebook's drastic 'retaliation' on the Australian government has been fierce from both officials and the broader public in the hours following the Wednesday decision of the US-based social media platform to block all news sharing on the continent. Australian officials are warning that Facebook's actions are severely damaging the ability to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Facebook announcement came a day after on Tuesday the current session of parliament vowed to implement the so-called "News Media Bargaining Code" by end of next week. The controversial legislation will force major US-based internet companies to begin paying local Australian publishers for use of their content. Aussies are now barred from posting, sharing or even viewing news content on Facebook whatsoever in a move that Google had previously threatened with its search engine.
Where is the Zhou Baiden regime on this? Is this the Face(book) of America to the world--the face of a bully nation that's run by rapacious Deep State connected corporate giants? For better or worse--very much worse, in my view--that's the reality. Not a good look, for the supposedly most powerful democracy in the world--it's not as if other countries aren't watching and taking note of it all. Of course, they're all probably wondering who to talk to, since Zhou himself is, apparently, snoozing in front of the OO fireplace with his dogs.
Who's running this clown show in the Imperial City on the Potomac?
ADDENDUM: Via TGP here's the statement from the Australian government:
Facebook’s actions to unfriend Australia today, cutting off essential information services on health and emergency services, were as arrogant as they were disappointing. I am in regular contact with the leaders of other nations on these issues.
These actions will only confirm the concerns that an increasing number of countries are expressing about the behaviour of BigTech companies who think they are bigger than governments and that the rules should not apply to them. They may be changing the world, but that doesn’t mean they run it.
We will not be intimidated by BigTech seeking to pressure our Parliament as it votes on our important News Media Bargaining Code. Just as we weren’t intimidated when Amazon threatened to leave the country and when Australia drew other nations together to combat the publishing of terrorist content on social media platforms.
I encourage Facebook to constructively work with the Australian Government, as Google recently demonstrated in good faith.
That bit in red is somewhat diplomatic. By referring to "BigTech companies who think they are bigger than governments," Australia seems to be tacitly asking, Who's in charge? Should we be looking to talk to Zhou or to Zuck? Is Uncle Zuck in charge, or Uncle Zhou?
Is the face of America to the world the face of a nation in increasing disarray? Recall that France's Macron, of all people, has spoken out criticizing our "woke" PC culture:
Top French politicians, journalists, and intellectuals are warning that “woke” social science theories “entirely imported from the United States” regarding race, gender, and post-colonialism are a serious threat to France.
“Emboldened by these comments, prominent intellectuals have banded together against what they regard as contamination by the out-of-control woke leftism of American campuses and its attendant cancel culture,” The New York Times reported this week.
There is little going on in the US these days that can be reassuring to the rest of the world. They undoubtedly see us slipping into a form of the Corporate State, i.e., Fascism. Or worse.
Maybe it's time for the Aussies to pull a CCP-like trick: ban Google and Facebook (and enforce it) until they comply with Australia's requirements. If the Red Chinese can do it, why not the Aussies? In my opinion, the Aussies ought to be lining up other countries. If they get enough, Google and Facebook will have to comply.
ReplyDeleteOur arrogant elites.
@DFinley
DeleteAnd if the 'state' of Australia can do it, why not the States of Florida...or Texas...or South Dakota...or any State.
The Constitution reserves the powers not enumerated and granted to the federal government to the States and the people.
This reservation includes the so-called 'police powers' reserved to the States. The police powers are the capacity of the States to regulate behavior and enforce rights and order within their territory for the protection of the health, safety, morals, and general welfare of their inhabitants.
It seems to me that protecting the rights of its residents to privacy of their data and personal information, to access and participate in online platforms, and, in addition, for example, protecting their residents' ability to participate in elections free from interference would all seem to me to be appropriate exercises of police power.
Agree DFinley.
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't look like it on the surface, but Google and Facebook are* vulnerable - especially so Facebook, and they know it; that's why they've utterly overplayed their hand here. Disclaimer*: I don't like Mark Zuckerberg's face. ;0)
I work in digital marketing/advertising with focus on search marketing and I can tell you the Aussie 'model' has some legs. It's an idea that I believe will catch on in multiple countries; the freebies are over. If you want to publish our content (news) and the nauseating levels of ad-revenue you enjoy, you'll start paying us for it, or...go away. It will take one player (like MicroSoft as a competitor, and in-flight now) to change that game. Simple.
With an organized effort, it would take a few solid weeks of 10's of millions deleting their Facebook accounts, and consciously working to NOT click Google Ads...choke out their ad revenues.
E.G.: Google generates +/- $170 million USD a day*...in pay per click ad revenue...think it would get their attention if that number was cut by 10-30%, MoM? I do - they're the greediest of bastards.
Maybe the Aussies should send a message to Zhou on his Mario Cart game. The mad careening seems to be a perfect metaphor of his tech lords foreign policy.
ReplyDeleteThe totalitarians know they have a limited window before the reaction starts. Hence their hasty actions to try and jam as much as they think can stick before they are stymied.
From Immigration, Stimulus, Education, Energy and the Military they have developed a plan and are executing while the fawning court jesters of the media are scribbling and prancing about.
Spartacus
These companies have already proven that they will fold when their opportunity to conduct business is threatened.
ReplyDeleteBut on a side note, what Australia is proposing is quite terrible, actually. They are proposing a government commission to dictate the price any publisher wants to charge social media companies to have a link run through their platforms regardless of whether those links are posted by third parties (i.e. users).
That's pretty obnoxious. If Facebook/Google/Twitter at al were not fascistic censors, there might actually be a successful PR campaign that is grassroots driven to pull back what the Aussies are proposing. This is the cost these companies must bear now that they have decided to become political censors.
I urge you to correct the first sentemce, to say the following:
ReplyDelete"... supporters of his campaign TO basically declare WAR on a foreign..."
At your urging I've done so. Tx. :-)
DeleteHaving dealt with the rehabilitation of a stroke survivor whose severe left side hemorrhage damaged the parts of the brain that allow us to speak and/or understand speech (including writing and reading), executive function (a big one that includes focus, analysis, planning, judgment, decision-making) and impulse control (speaks for itself), I see similarities in what is going on with Joebama. He has no business running his own affairs let alone running a business. The notion that he’d be running or even trying to speak for what is still the #1 country in the world is beyond scary.
ReplyDeleteJoe Biden had two aneurysms when he was in his 40s. One on the right side, said to have been “under his brain” (a term I’ve never heard before) which did hemorrhage according to his physician; and another smaller one on the left side in an unnamed part of his brain.
The likelihood of brain damage is something that cannot be ignored, especially when a person shows the identifiable signs of functional deterioration that he is displaying.
"He has no business running his own affairs"
DeleteFortunately for him he's not. Not anything else either.
Unfortunately he is saying things and putting his OK on things that he may or may not fully understand. In a sense, he appears to be running things. That is still pretty dangerous, IMO.
ReplyDeleteWell, I'm sure our allies are trying to figure out who's in charge, too. Maybe when they figure it out they'll let the rest of us know.
DeleteThis situation reminds of of the Humiliation of Canossa, albeit I'm puzzled as to whom is Gregory VII, and to whom is Henry IV. Either way, I do not relish either "master" deciding my status or fate whilst considered by them a prole.
ReplyDeleteWe haven’t talked about Covid19 in a while. Here is a report that is a sickmaker:
ReplyDeleteWuhan Lab Eligible To Receive US Taxpayer Funding Through 2024, NIH Confirms
http://dailycallernewsfoundation.org/2021/02/16/wuhan-lab-eligible-to-receive-us-taxpayer-funding-through-2024-nih-confirms/
Paszak, the lone American on the WHO team that went to Wuhan to do the inspection last month is far from trustworthy. Read his remarks...
How about this: Bill Gates says maybe we need 3 shots (presumably to match the 3 masks?) but some doctors are saying maybe we only need one shot. I say: Maybe there's no point at all.
DeleteI read that neither Pfizer’s nor Moderna’s vaccines seem to prevent the South African strain, so both companies are at work on boosters. An additional shot after one has had the first two. I$n’t thi$ fun? Gate$ think$ $o.
ReplyDeleteI read that neither Pfizer’s nor Moderna’s vaccines seem to prevent the South African strain, so both companies are at work on boosters. An additional shot after one has had the first two. I$n’t thi$ fun? Gate$ think$ $o.
ReplyDeleteHere is an excellent article from Lee Merritt, MD. From the September 2020 issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons:
The Treatment of Viral Diseases: Has the Truth Been Suppressed for Decades?
https://jpands.org/vol25no3/merritt.pdf
It begins:
Since I started medical school in 1976, until 2020, I have heard the dogma that viral diseases are not treatable (with some exceptions such as antivirals for HIV/AIDS), certainly not with antimicrobials. My older son, a newly minted general surgeon, was educated much more recently, but with the same misunderstanding. Since viral diseases are not treatable, our only weapon is vaccination. A friend who spent his life as an academic university physician retiring in 2016 had never heard this fact either.
As the “pandemic” broke out, I constantly watched and read online publications. After reading about the Chinese, Indian, and Korean use of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), an antimalarial agent, against coronavirus, within an hour I found more than 20 scientific papers, written in the last 40 years on the use of lysosomotropic agents—specifically chloroquine—to treat viruses. Like Rip Van Winkle, I suddenly awoke, after decades, to a completely new medical reality.
For example, “numerous investigations have reported in vitro antiviral activity of AZ [azithromycin] against viral pathogens with 50% inhibitory concentrations ranging from ~ 1–6 μM, with the exception of H1N1 influenza,”write Damle et al.1 They state that in vitro evidence suggests that AZ has antiviral properties at concentrations that are physiologically achievable with doses used to treat bacterial infections in the lung. Intracellular sequestration of AZ may prevent viral replication. AZ is being used against COVID-19, with the generally stated rationale being its antibacterial or antiinflammatory activity.
There’s much more. Dr. Merritt does not mince words, so she is very clear that the successful use of these antibacterials against Covid and other viruses would give a big hit to the vaccine business...
Right. That's just about verbatim from the video of her that I linked.
DeleteAnd yet we keep running for more and more SaaS and Cloud services like it's a good thing.
ReplyDeleteWe've given a past time (social media) the ability to destroy countries and reap absolute havoc on economies. But then we keep doing it!?!?! Like the NSA says, it "JUST metadata".
It's like watching Fox news and complaining about what they are broadcasting! 🙄
Looks like Australia is going to have to learn to code...web sites.
ReplyDeleteAs Instapundit has said many times, the move to centralized content distribution via monopolized social media was a mistake. The rest of the World is watching too. Heck, UGANDA, had the wherewithall to unplug Twitter.