
Updating our advertising policies on state media - toephu2
https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2019/advertising_policies_on_state_media.html
======
akersten
Great steps. Propaganda machines are alive and well, and moves to limit their
influence are a powerful sign for democracy. It's meaningful that a company
would decline business in defense of a principle, so I'm proud of Twitter for
taking a stand today.

~~~
farisjarrah
Will this make a meaningful difference? Wont this just push all the propaganda
off onto Super-PAC type organizations?

~~~
jonnycomputer
I am generally suspicious of claims that policy enforcement is useless because
it will just be circumvented. We hear it all the time, e.g. don't tax the rich
because the rich will just find ways to avoid paying them. don't enforce fuel
efficiency standards, because car companies will just cheat their way out of
them. it goes on and on. don't bother with security because they'll find a way
to get you if they really want you.

But in the end, the effectiveness of regulation is proportional to the degree
of effort avoidance or circumvention requires. I say, "Twitter: good call."
Let states speak for themselves.

~~~
rhizome
It's the Nirvana fallacy, like the pro-gun argument requiring every gun
control initiative to eliminate all gun crimes.

~~~
vorpalhex
In the US, the bar to repress a right requires more than a theory. You can't
put restrictions on the right to vote because it might cut down on voter
fraud.

Nation states however have no such right. Thus the ability to bar their
propaganda is much lower, as it should be.

edit: limit to bar in p2

~~~
rhizome
As few restrictions on the _right_ to vote as there are, the comparison is
inapt. What you may be missing is that there are plenty of constraints on the
_act_ of voting, as well as the process.

You can't pay for votes, you can't have someone sign their vote-by-mail ballot
and fill it in for them, you can't vote in-person in someone else's stead
(even though it doesn't create an extra vote), and so on. There are also
plenty of restrictions (at least in the text of the law) on how to handle the
ballots themselves.

None of these are restrictions on the right to vote.

------
mmanfrin
Studies have shown that in liberal democracies, state supported* [e: I forget
the exact term used] media tends to be the least editorially biased
(individual reporters and journalists still have biases) and most educational
(e.g. BBC, NPR). I wonder what the word "state-controlled" means in this
context.

I also wonder if they consider owned by the head of state to be state-
controlled (e.g. RT, Al-Jazeera)

~~~
tedunangst
NPR is state run?

~~~
0xffff2
No, it's not. Most of NPR's funding comes from member stations paying dues.
Most of the money funding member stations comes from individual donations. A
relatively small proportion of funding does come from government grants, but
it's misleading to say that NPR is "state funded" (implying complete or
majority funding form the state), much less state run.

------
Leary
"Sources include Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom Index, Freedom House,
the Economist Intelligence Unit Democracy Index, the European Journalism
Centre’s Media Landscapes Report, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and
UNESCO's framework to assess media development and independence."

But Freedom House is US government funded, a lot of studies have shown it's
biased toward countries that are aligned with us foreign policy.

~~~
threeseed
Might want to read the article more carefully.

"This policy will not apply to taxpayer-funded entities, including independent
public broadcasters"

~~~
asdf21
"independent"

Seems like a pretty big loophole for a bad actor to jump through.

~~~
samat
this is the BBC clause, nobody's jumping through!

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_bxg1
That's great, but this:

> They will have 30 days to offboard from our advertising products, after
> which we will stringently enforce these policies.

Means it probably won't apply to the Hong Kong propaganda, which is what
brought it to people's attention in the first place.

~~~
walkingolof
You expect that to be resolved in 30 days ?

~~~
_bxg1
One way or another, pretty much. We've reached a boiling point in only a
couple of weeks. I don't see the standoff lasting another month.

~~~
duskwuff
A couple of weeks since what? The Hong Kong protests started on March 31st.

~~~
_bxg1
It seems you're right... not sure what I was thinking. Still, it feels like
we're on the precipice of something happening. I think 30 days from now the
damage from the propaganda will have been done.

~~~
i_cant_speel
Agreed. I understand giving most organizations a 30 day grace period, but it
would be great if they made an exception and cut off such a clear-cut offender
immediately.

------
rgovostes
Recently I was shown a promoted tweet from Purdue Pharma (makers of OxyContin)
about how they generously support drug abuse education. I'm not sure I
immediately see the moral difference between state-sponsored propaganda and
corporate propaganda.

~~~
whatshisface
Required reading from our own PG:
[http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html)

Now that China is using historically corporate channels of propaganda, I hope
that we can all realize that we need to close them, not just to foreign states
but also to the corporations who were abusing them originally.

------
RcouF1uZ4gsC
Does this mean that the BBC is prohibited from advertising on Twitter?

~~~
kchamplewski
The post states:

> This policy will not apply to taxpayer-funded entities, including
> independent public broadcasters.

So quite probably no, since the BBC is an independent public broadcaster (much
like NPR in the US) - it is state funded but not directly controlled by the
state; it maintains editorial independence.

Of course conclusively defining editorial independence seems like quite a non-
trivial task. It's made even more confusing by the fact that it goes on to
state:

> This policy will apply to news media entities that are either financially or
> editorially controlled by the state.

While the BBC and other taxpayer funded independent public broadcasters are
not editorially controlled by the state, isn't being taxpayer funded
synonymous with being controlled financially by the state?

~~~
scottishfiction
The BBC isn’t ‘tax-payer funded’, it’s funded by the license fee.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licensing_in_the_Un...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licensing_in_the_United_Kingdom)

~~~
makomk
The license fee is a mandatory tax on all television ownership, regardless of
whether you watch the BBC or not, whose amount and rules are set entirely by
the government. When thinking about how much financial independence the BBC
has, you can more or less just think of it as government funding. Also, the
BBC World Service (which broadcasts news to the rest of the world) is
partially funded by direct government payments as a form of "soft power"
influence and used to be even more dependent on direct government funding.

~~~
scottishfiction
It’s not a tax, as it isn’t collected by government. It’s also not ‘on all
television ownership’ - you only need to pay the license fee if you watch
public broadcast television as it airs, or you use the BBC iPlayer.

------
olliej
I really don't understand why twitter, facebook, etc don't just state that
commercially operated/controlled accounts are a direct violation of T&Cs which
is a violation of CFAA, or breach of contract with monetary terms.

E.g. couldn't their t&cs start including "accounts controlled or instruction
by a government, political, or commercial entity, or otherwise compensated for
posted content, require explicit pre-authorization, and price negotiation.
Non-negotiated fees are $ABC per tweet, and $XYZ per account, payable within
30 days". Or some similar terms.

Whether you could make such t&cs work, and whether you can make $GOVERNMENT
actually pay is obviously another question: Governments love passing laws that
make them immune to law suits domestically, while also providing other
countries with immunity.

At least it might be able to resolve those "business intelligence" companies
by immediately opening them up to huge costs.

------
huac
here's the context: [https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/19/twitter-is-blocked-in-
chin...](https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/19/twitter-is-blocked-in-china-but-
its-state-news-agency-is-buying-promoted-tweets-to-portray-hong-kong-
protestors-as-violent/) (h/t idlewords)

~~~
commandlinefan
That might be the context, but this is very clearly an attempt to prohibit any
foreign influence in the upcoming US 2020 presidential election. I'm also not
sure I trust Twitter to apply this fairly when the election kicks into high
gear next year.

~~~
floatingatoll
Their post about Hong Kong earlier today contradicts a US-centric
interpretation of this new policy:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20740179](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20740179)

It may end up being relevant to the US elections, but that's unlikely the sole
reason.

------
olivierduval
"This policy will not apply to taxpayer-funded entities, including independent
public broadcasters" and "This policy will apply to news media entities that
are either financially or editorially controlled by the state" seem a bit
contradictory to me: state media and taxpayer-funded entity are exactly the
same! They can be independant as much as the politics allowed them to be. Most
of the time, the people working there for some times know when to shut up and
look elsewhere to save their own career or get a promotion... but are
considered independant !!!!

On the other side: how independant are journalists in a news group when the
top boss is a friend of the president and helped him to get elected (true in
every democracy)? No need for a direct (and obvious) control to control the
press: money is enough

Lastly: it only shows that Twitter is just making rules to target some
specific actors (China) without naming it. But, using these rules, Twitter is
"weaponizing" informations as much as China.

------
JMTQp8lwXL
It is inevitable that social media platforms will get into the business of
shaping discourse. The fact that various platforms are controlled by private
parties is a little nerve-racking. We can only hope for judicious use of their
power to best serve the public interest.

~~~
caseysoftware
Social media's entire business model is peddling influence at massive scale.
They've always been in the "shaping discourse" business but most refused to
realize it.

"Twitter Revolution: How the Arab Spring Was Helped By Social Media" is over 7
years old now: [https://www.mic.com/articles/10642/twitter-revolution-how-
th...](https://www.mic.com/articles/10642/twitter-revolution-how-the-arab-
spring-was-helped-by-social-media)

~~~
JMTQp8lwXL
I think the business model is mostly based on ad revenue. They only care to
influence to the extent that it increases the amount of time spent on the
platform, maximizing the amount of ads shown, raising ARPU.

~~~
icebraining
What are ads if not influencing people?

------
revicon
In the US, the problem is most of our large media is owned and operated by
large corporations with a few (usually right-wing leaning) owning individuals.
These corporations are also the defacto power behind our government (see $
spent on lobbyists, campaign donations, Citizens United, etc). Unfortunately
these media sources aren’t going to be effected by this new policy.

But they could be! The same organizations that Twitter is using to define
“state run media organizations” also keep track of US media corporation
ownerships and could be tracked against ones that are attempting to slant
public discourse via story selection, etc.

------
sarcasmatwork
Does anyone actually trust twitter? There platform, their rules. I will not be
involved. I do not trust them, nor should anyone else.

------
fibers
does this mean we won't see state sponsored propaganda from Voice of America?

------
nlh
Actual question (not trying to be snarky):

Is Fox News considered state media, and if not, will it be?

~~~
_bxg1
I'm a huge critic of Fox News, but this is a totally empty accusation. Fox
News is the exact opposite of state media: it's a capitalistic organization
designed to be as inflammatory as possible, towards one particular segment of
the population, in hopes of making lots of money. Like Trump himself, its
motivations are nothing so elaborate as trying to push a sinister ideology: it
just wants attention.

~~~
jrockway
Yeah. Fox News has been consistent to their own ideals throughout political
changes. They hated Obama because he was a Democrat and love Trump because
he's a Republican. If a Democrat is elected in 2020, I don't foresee them
being a mouthpiece for her. They like their Republicans. The majority of
electoral college members switch it up from time to time, but Fox News doesn't
change at all.

~~~
mschuster91
> If a Democrat is elected in 2020, I don't foresee them being a mouthpiece
> for her.

I wouldn't be so certain about the Democrats putting up a woman against Trump.

1) A woman would be a prime target for utterly vile sexist campaigning - Trump
himself has resorted to that in the past ("blood coming out of her wherever"),
and his fan base is orders of magnitude worse. I believe that women will
(unfortunately) be voted out in the primaries as voters will want to spare a
candidate from this sort of treatment.

2) Centrist Democrats are going for people who voted Trump in '16 but maybe
willing to switch (especially frustrated white older men in rural/"flyover"
areas) - for that demographic, a "strong man" has it easier to gather support
than a woman (or, for that matter, also male candidates with a harsher view on
gun regulations, or supporting the right to abortion and LGBT equality).

If I were the Democrat leader, I'd put up a moderate middle-aged white male
for the '20 election who (w/c)ould fix the most urgent mess resulting from the
current Presidency, and building up a promising left-leaning, progressive
woman candidate for 2024.

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redthrowaway
So no sponsored content from the BBC or NPR then?

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buboard
Does this include the BBC? This is probably overly broad and easy to
circumvent .. maybe better just ban russian accounts ... but that can be
circumvented too ...well its a global connected world

