So If We're Going To Control Information (Like Everybody on Twitter Wants To Now!)...

I agree. As a member of CISA’s advisory committee, we met over the last year & provided recommendations to start conversations about what those guidelines and methods should be. We shared those recommendations in public meetings in June and Sept. They are not secret. https://t.co/vJxO8AIoUh

— Kate Starbird (@katestarbird) October 31, 2022

Let's start here (on Twitter!!!).

The background is an Intercept article:

The inherently subjective nature of what constitutes disinformation provides a broad opening for DHS officials to make politically motivated determinations about what constitutes dangerous speech, write @kenklippenstein and @lhfang. https://t.co/tvYCbqfFjh

— The Intercept (@theintercept) November 1, 2022

Read it at your leisure, if you wish. We like kinda full disclosure around here.

Starbird has knowledge of the subject, and criticizes very carefully the Intercept article, especially the insinuations that all this information is "secret".  My guess is that journalismese for "SCOOP!"  When, of course, it isn't (the "public meetings" is the first clue).  But to cut to the chase:

Articles like this that make dark insinuations about meetings w/in a publicly announced advisory committee (yes, amazingly, committee members like Gadde attended committee meetings!) make it increasingly hard to even TALK ABOUT what the U.S. government should (& should not) do.

— Kate Starbird (@katestarbird) October 31, 2022

And that is a serious problem, as well as a club wielded quite intentionally by people with an adversary to do journalism to.  But this is not a problem of Twitter or algorithms or technology.  This is a very old, very human problem of how the facts are turned into a narrative turned into a story.  And I mean, on the one hand, The Intercept is not the New York Times.  Nobody is screaming this Intercept article from the rooftops (and yes, I'm thinking of the NYT shenanigans over Whitewater and again over Iraq and WMD.  Takes more to remove a President from office than to ruin the reputation of the Grey Lady.  A lot more. Are these things right, or wrong?)  It's something of a noise on Twitter.  But that just means means nobody is really paying attention, except some people on Twitter:

This response to/rebuttal of the Intercept article from an insider is worth reading.https://t.co/P2saIoHebo

— RiggedAndStollenHat (@Popehat) November 1, 2022

It's worth reading on Twitter if you've read about the Intercept article on Twitter.  Which, again, is not the fault of Twitter; it's the fault of how people use Twitter.

Or use "journalism," for that matter.  The Intercept describes itself as "Fearless, adversarial journalism."  Which I guess leaves a lot of room for "accuracy" to be overlooked in pursuit of "adversarial."  Again, not that the Grey Lady is a shining beacon of rectitude.  But this ain't all down to the limit of 240 characters.  I've seen the same thing with accounts of court trials.  Back before I was a lawyer in my own right, I was a legal assistant at a law firm that handled a case requiring the testimony of Kirk Douglas.  I actually saw him striding down the halls of the firm, preparatory to going to court to testify (don't ask what about, it was a business thing, boring as a pitcher of spit).  He looked just like Kirk Douglas except:  short.  He was remarkably short.

Anyway, I mention that because the presence of so august a personality in Austin prompted news coverage of the trial.  And the article in the local newspaper no more resembled the trial or the issues than a statement by Donald Trump on Truth Social (or anywhere, for that matter) represents reality.  That's all I remember about it now:  that journalists who prate about being "objective" and "reporting only the facts" are just another blind man describing a section of the elephant.  And usually getting even that wrong.

And then, apparently, there's "adversarial journalism."  Whatever the hell that means (depends on who the "adversary" is, huh?).  I'll have to study on how this is all the fault of modern communications technology. It probably involves an algorithm.....

Also, how we prevent this misinformation from spreading (except almost no one reads The Intercept, I mean) is the real issue.  Isn't it?

If the people opposing the fascists could be less stupid that would be great.

— RiggedAndStollenHat (@Popehat) November 2, 2022

I blame the algorithm. MATH is not protected by the First Amendment!

There! I’ve run rings ‘round you logically!