Amazon, Apple, Google, and Facebook should be broken up

[China]

5 minutes ago, Bang said:

I go to facebook for one reason anymore, and it's because I am an admin of a page devoted to the F-18 program office. Every morning I post one time, "today's cool photo", and a picture of an F/A-18 Hornet, Super Hornet, or an EA-18G Growler. 
They have been flagging my posts as spam.

the admin of a page posting one picture each day of the very thing the page is about.. is spam.

 

 

~Bang

 

There must have been a typo or something.   You post a scram jet, they think you're posting a spam jet.

[TheGreatBuzz]

16 hours ago, Bang said:

I go to facebook for one reason anymore, and it's because I am an admin of a page devoted to the F-18 program office. Every morning I post one time, "today's cool photo", and a picture of an F/A-18 Hornet, Super Hornet, or an EA-18G Growler. 
They have been flagging my posts as spam.

the admin of a page posting one picture each day of the very thing the page is about.. is spam.

 

 

~Bang

Up until recently, I ran one of the big Navy Facebook pages.  I would take like 30 minutes and set up auto-posts for the next two weeks.  Made life so easy.  And if comments got stupid, I would just go turn them off.

Edited February 14, 2022 by The Almighty Buzz

[China]

The metaverse has a groping problem already

 

A woman was sexually harassed on Meta’s VR social media platform. She’s not the first—and won’t be the last.

 

Last week, Meta (the umbrella company formerly known as Facebook) opened up access to its virtual-reality social media platform, Horizon Worlds. Early descriptions of the platform make it seem fun and wholesome, drawing comparisons to Minecraft. In Horizon Worlds, up to 20 avatars can get together at a time to explore, hang out, and build within the virtual space.

 

But not everything has been warm and fuzzy. According to Meta, on November 26, a beta tester reported something deeply troubling: she had been groped by a stranger on Horizon Worlds. On December 1, Meta revealed that she’d posted her experience in the Horizon Worlds beta testing group on Facebook.

 

Meta’s internal review of the incident found that the beta tester should have used a tool called “Safe Zone” that’s part of a suite of safety features built into Horizon Worlds. Safe Zone is a protective bubble users can activate when feeling threatened. Within it, no one can touch them, talk to them, or interact in any way until they signal that they would like the Safe Zone lifted.

 

Vivek Sharma, the vice president of Horizon, called the groping incident “absolutely unfortunate,” telling The Verge, “That’s good feedback still for us because I want to make [the blocking feature] trivially easy and findable.”

 

It’s not the first time a user has been groped in VR—nor, unfortunately, will it be the last. But the incident shows that until companies work out how to protect participants, the metaverse can never be a safe place.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

-----------------------------------------------

 

Sexual harassment in the metaverse? Woman alleges rape in virtual world

 

A woman in the U.K. wrote in a blog post on Medium that she experienced a real horror play out in the virtual game Horizon Worlds developed by Meta, formerly known as Facebook.

 

"Within 60 seconds of joining," she wrote in the post from December, "I was verbally and sexually harassed – 3-4 male avatars, with male voices, essentially, but virtually gang raped my avatar.'”

 

She details watching her avatar get  sexually assaulted by a handful of male avatars, who took photos and sent her comments like "don’t pretend you didn’t love it.”

 

The woman is vice president of Metaverse Research for Kabuni Ventures, an immersive technology company. Meta released Horizon Worlds to everyone 18 years and older in the United States and Canada on Dec. 9 after an invite-only beta test a year ago.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Justice Department accuses Google of hiding business communications

 

The Justice Department has asked the judge overseeing its antitrust case against Google to sanction the company for allegedly training employees to "camouflage" business documents from being revealed by legal disputes, per a brief filed Monday.

 

Driving the news: The DOJ writes in its brief that Google teaches employees to request advice from counsel around sensitive business communications, thereby shielding documents from discovery in legal situations.

 

Once counsel is involved, the company can treat the documents as protected under attorney-client privilege.

What they're saying: "Google has explicitly and repeatedly instructed its employees to shield important business communications from discovery by using false requests for legal advice," DOJ attorneys wrote in the brief, asking U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta to sanction Google and compel the disclosure of more documents.

 

After DOJ prodding, "Google’s outside counsel eventually deprivileged tens of thousands of documents initially withheld or redacted on the basis of privilege. These efforts, however, do not — and cannot — cure the misconduct inherent in Google’s efforts to hide relevant communications. Indeed, many more challenged documents remain outstanding."

The other side: “Our teams have conscientiously worked for years to respond to inquiries and litigation, and suggestions to the contrary are flatly wrong," Google spokesperson Julie Tarallo McAlister said.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Renegade7]

What a doozy of a quote regarding digital gang rape...

 

Quote

At Meta's Wednesday shareholder meeting, a proposal was introduced to complete a third-party assessment of "potential psychological and civil and human rights harms to users that may be caused by the use and abuse of the platform" and "whether harms can be mitigated or avoided, or are unavoidable risks inherent in the technology."

 

https://www.businessinsider.com/researcher-claims-her-avatar-was-raped-on-metas-metaverse-platform-2022-5?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sf-insider-inventions&fbclid=IwAR3xLQPCuN93f7cVkuXWhRP0I6fYM7qQWEwDLNTMh0Iff4VT1VbuGKB2Nik&utm_source=reddit.com

 

I hope they lose so much money trying make Metaverse a thing they just give up and shut it down, digital gang rape should never be an unavoidable risk, FOH.

[China]

 

 

 

 

[Renegade7]

Facebook and Instagram removed posts about abortion pills immediately after the Roe v. Wade decision, reports say

 

https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-instagram-remove-abortion-pill-posts-roe-overturned-reports-2022-6?utm_source=reddit.com

 

Quote

 

The unnamed person told Vice: "I posted it at 11 a.m. and was notified within a minute that it was removed. I was not notified until I tried to post later that I was banned for it."

 

The AP and Vice said they shared their own posts on abortion pills to see what would happen.

 

Vice tried to post "abortion pills can be mailed" on Facebook, and was told seconds later that it violated Facebook policies on buying, selling, or exchanging medical or non-medical drugs.

 

The AP also wrote on Facebook, "If you send me your address, I will mail you abortion pills," and the post was removed within one minute, the outlet reported.

 

And you'll never guess what happened when AP and Vice tested this or Meta's response 😒

 

Quote

The AP reporter then made the exact same post two more times, replacing the words "abortion pills" with the words "a gun" and then "weed." Those posts were not removed, the AP said.

...

Meta told the AP that it had policies that meant guns, alcohol, and pharmaceuticals cannot be sold though its platforms, but did not explain why the posts offering to sell a gun and weed were not removed.

 

[China]

Jeff Bezos’ $500m superyacht stuck after firm decides against dismantling historic Dutch bridge, says report

 

Jeff Bezos’ $500m superyacht is stuck after the Dutch firm building it decided against dismantling a historic Rotterdam bridge following a public backlash and threats of an egg-throwing protest, says a report.

 

The billionaire Amazon founder had offered to pay for the middle section of the decommissioned Koningshavenbrug to be removed so that his monster 412ft sailing yacht, which is named Y721, could reach the ocean from its shipyard.

 

The yacht, currently the second-largest in the world, cannot get under the “De Hef” bridge without the modification taking place. But the plan has now been cancelled by manufacturer Oceanco after the criticism it faced, according to Dutch news outlet Trouw.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Larry]

We've decided to alter the expected delivery date of your package, after you agreed to the sale. Without notifying you of the change, or offering you a reduction in the shipping cost. 

[PokerPacker]

4 hours ago, Larry said:

We've decided to alter the expected delivery date of your package, after you agreed to the sale. Without notifying you of the change, or offering you a reduction in the shipping cost. 

I am altering the deal.  Pray I don't alter it any further.

[China]

FACEBOOK LABELS ABORTION RIGHTS VANDALS AS TERRORISTS FOLLOWING ROE REVERSAL

 

THE DAY AFTER the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Facebook’s parent company, Meta, internally designated the abortion rights group Jane’s Revenge as a terrorist organization, according to company materials reviewed by The Intercept, subjecting discussion of the group and its actions to the company’s most stringent censorship policies. Experts say the decision, Meta’s first known policy response for the post-Roe era, threatens free expression around abortion rights at a critical moment.

 

The brief internal bulletin from Meta Platforms Inc., which owns Instagram and Facebook, was titled “[EMERGENCY Micro Policy Update] [Terrorism] Jane’s Revenge” and filed to the company’s internal Dangerous Individuals and Organizations rulebook, meaning that the abortion rights group, which has so far committed only acts of vandalism, will be treated with the same speech restrictions against “praise, support, and representation” applied to the Islamic State and Hitler. The memo, circulated to Meta moderators on June 25, describes Jane’s Revenge as “a far-left extremist group that has claimed responsibility on its website for an attack against an anti-abortion group’s office in Madison, Wisconsin in May 2022. The group is responsible for multiple arson and vandalism attacks on pro-life institutions.” Terrorist groups receive Meta’s strictest “Tier 1” speech limits, treatment the company says is reserved for the world’s most dangerous and violent entities, along with hate groups, drug cartels, and mass murderers.

 

Although The Intercept published a snapshot of the entire secret Dangerous Individuals and Organizations list last year, Meta does not disclose or explain additions to the public, despite the urging of scholars, activists, and its own Oversight Board. Speech advocates and civil society groups have criticized the policy for its secrecy, bias toward U.S. governmental priorities, and tendency to inaccurately delete nonviolent political speech. According to Meta’s most recent quarterly transparency report, the company restored nearly half a million posts between January and March in the terrorism category alone after determining that they had been censored erroneously.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

This ad company subsidiary is teaming up with US carriers to take over your lock screen

 

Apple has introduced a brand-new take on the iPhone lock screen for the next release of iOS. The operating system now allows you to customize the lock screen with preferred fonts, colors, and there is even a parallax effect where the clock can be partially hidden behind a subject in the image. We’ve been hoping that Google would take some inspiration for Android from its competitor, and while it’s still a possibility for Android 14, it looks like Android users in the US might be in for a whole different lock screen experience. A Google-backed company called Glance is looking to launch in the US, and it brings media content, news, and casual games to Android lock screens.

 

If you’re not familiar with Glance, you can count yourself lucky. The lock screen platform is part of the pre-installed software on many, if not most, Android phones sold in India and other Asian markets. Glance says that since it was launched in 2019, it has become part of over 400 million sold smartphones. The service has taken it upon itself to monetize the lock screen, pushing news and ad feeds right into people’s faces before they even unlock their phones. It's a subsidiary of Indian advertising behemoth InMobi Group, which focuses on mobile-first ads.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[tshile]

Not that I love everything about the iPhone or any apple products for that matter, as everything has its problems and shortcomings, articles like that make me feel good about fleeing from the Google sphere years ago

[PleaseBlitz]

Someone should start a service that allows people (not companies) to sell the the ad space on their own phone.  Like, pay me $500 per month and I will allow you to show me an ad every time I go to unlock my phone. 

[tshile]

12 minutes ago, PleaseBlitz said:

Someone should start a service that allows people (not companies) to sell the the ad space on their own phone.  Like, pay me $500 per month and I will allow you to show me an ad every time I go to unlock my phone. 

or just in general

turn over all the advertising

i can’t imagine you’d make enough money to be worth it as the company, since you’d have to run the infrastructure to make it “work”

 

but one way I could see Google repair its image and maybe even grow it’s customer base, is if the users received a cut of the ad revenue generated off their data by having control of it (share more - earn more)

by the way this is what Microsoft does with the Bing search engine. If such a thing interests you, you should look into it

 

(I hate bing search results so I still don’t use it even though I basically make my living off knowing how to use search engines, use them constantly, and my coworkers make solid money off it… I hate it that much. I can’t even stand the interface)

 

[PleaseBlitz]

WTF is Bing?

[China]

2 minutes ago, PleaseBlitz said:

WTF is Bing?

 

A kind of cherry that frat boys like to stick up their asses.

[Renegade7]

24 minutes ago, PleaseBlitz said:

WTF is Bing?

 

 

My Dad likes the moving backgrounds they have on the home page so much he's the only human alive I know that set Bing as their home page in their Chrome browser 🙂

[Renegade7]

 

[China]

State representative wants to ban minors from social media

 

State Rep. Jared Patterson (R-Frisco) took to Twitter Friday to announce he would be introducing legislation to ban minors from using social media in Texas. 

 

"It's long past time to recognize the incredible harm social media is doing to the mental health of young Texans," Patterson wrote in a tweet Tuesday. "Next session, we put an end to it."

 

The tweet was in response to an article shared by the Texas Public Policy Foundation arguing for the ban of minors from social media.

 

Patterson said the idea for the new bill came from before Tuesday, initially spurring from talking with school officials following the mass shooting in Uvalde. 

 

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Renegade7]

I'm not against it.

[Cooked Crack]

Good luck with that. That's going to be as useful as stopping a teenage boy from going to an 18+ site.

[Renegade7]

9 hours ago, Cooked Crack said:

Good luck with that. That's going to be as useful as stopping a teenage boy from going to an 18+ site.

 

Depends on how it's implemented. 

 

Like how do people get actual verified accounts on twitter?  I don't know, but if a social media platform has over a certain number of registered members (say a million), should require drivers license number as part of verifying they are real (for starters).

 

Could cut down on the bots, which it seems more effort is put into the larger platforms to put bots, such as Twitter and Facebook.

[tshile]

On 7/6/2022 at 3:55 PM, PleaseBlitz said:

WTF is Bing?

https://www.bing.com/

 

 

[ixcuincle]

Government has no right to infringe on people's personal rights, including their right to watch ****ty TikTok dances on social media.