
The Google-Facebook Duopoly Threatens Diversity of Thought - yostrovs
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-google-facebook-duopoly-threatens-diversity-of-thought-1513642519
======
frgtpsswrdlame
The solution really is a revitalization of antitrust policy. The reason
markets work is because participants in them are bound to a 'race to the
bottom' with many other participants doing the same thing. When companies
aren't forced to race to the bottom against each other, the conditions of
authoritarianism rise. Authoritarian structures don't have to necessarily come
from government - monopolies, oligopolies and implicit cartels are some of the
authoritarians of today. The question is have we reached a point where
technology and globalization provide such enormous returns to the economies of
scale that we can't go back or is all this corporate concentration just due to
a lack of government enforcement?

~~~
humanrebar
> The question is have we reached a point where technology and globalization
> provide such enormous returns to the economies of scale that we can't go
> back or is all this corporate concentration just due to a lack of government
> enforcement?

At some point, America decided that only horizontal monopolies counted, not
vertical ones.

Many of our concerns about antitrust would be assuaged if regulators started
keeping separate markets separate. Like banning content distributors from
buying content creators. Or requiring platforms to provide third-party-
friendly APIs. Microsoft got in trouble for trying to vertically integrate its
browser into its operating system. But Facebook isn't likewise called to task
for treating Facebook live streams differently than others.

~~~
platz
RE: Antitrust - on the right track. Consumer's can't solve this from the
ground up. What's needed is to prevent certain kinds of key acquisitions. The
law around acquisitions is too permissive in an age of network effects;
acquisition laws were fine pre-internet but don't solve their intended purpose
anymore. Normally, the market corrects against the biggest players because the
biggest players are slow to change culture and their business. But,
acquisitions are the mechanism by which the big players are preventing
themselves from being disrupted by smaller, more nimble players. If the big
players can simply buy up any new comers (who will want a deserved pay-out for
their efforts) on the scene, they maintain complete control regardless of what
consumers want. Otherwise, any "alternative practices" you try to foster will
simply be crushed, if they ever become a large enough threat.

Facebook acquiring Instagram is a perfect example.

~~~
acover
What about a consumer group to assert pressure?

Edit: a consumer group could have monopsony powers and be capable of
negotiating concessions. Such as an open api.

~~~
briandear
Consumers already can do that — they can refuse to use FB products — but they
don’t. So a consumer group is pretty useless without enough consumers to
actually exert their power.

~~~
acover
Boycotts aren't the only option.

Consumers have boycotted products in the past. Consumer pressure has worked
against Facebook in the past.

I agree that it is an unlikely and difficult solution. I don't see an easy
one.

~~~
rwnspace
I am boycotting Facebook, but I only interact with 5% of my 'friends list' on
a regular basis, so it's hard to get the message out, y'know?

------
narrator
Which makes me ask the question: do you, gentle Hacker News reader, really
want diversity of opinion and why? Do you have unpopular opinions and if so,
would you get fired or ostracized for sharing them? Are you practicing
crimethink?

After all, the only people actually working on alternatives to Google and
Facebook are the alt-right who have been de-platformed. Gab.ai is so de-
platformed that google doesn't even let them put their app in the play store!
Unlike the Pirate Bay and scihub, gab.ai is actually not violating the law.
You aren't one of those filthy alt-righters who voted for Trump are you? Are
you a person who raises uncomfortable questions that cause mental pain by
triggering or creating cognitive dissonance in ideologically defenseless
individuals you wish to torture with your arguments?

Anyway.... I don't think most of you want the Internet Facebook and Google
insulate you all from. Why the heck are you complaining?

~~~
ThrowawayR2
> _Are you practicing crimethink?_

-A few hundred years ago, being an atheist was "crimethink", as was religious tolerance towards Jews, Muslims, and so forth.

-A few hundred years ago, questioning the divine right of kings to rule was "crimethink".

-In the early 1600s, Galileo stood trial and was condemned for the "crimethink" of saying the Earth moved around the Sun, in contradiction to the teachings of the Church.

-As little as 200 years ago, advocating racial equality was "crimethink", as was equal rights for women.

-As little as 60 years ago, in the McCarthy era, being a leftist or socialist was "crimethink" and people lost their jobs and/or were jailed because of it.

I do want diversity of opinion because I believe in the values of the
Enlightenment, which include the ability to openly voice dissent without fear
of reprisal and I have the strength of character to listen to the beliefs of
others without feeling threatened; in short, _I want diversity of opinion
because I am a liberal_.

~~~
ithilglin909
You say you want diversity of opinion because you are a "liberal" but
mainstream liberalism has next to nothing to do with classical liberalism.
Your average urban, coastal "liberal" adheres to their orthodoxies with about
the level openness to other opinions as a stereotypical religious zealot.

~~~
supernovae
Without context what you are saying is meaningless. Sure, "liberals" seem
closed minded in not accepting racism, bigotry or hate speech but in accepting
people for who they are, it's hard to say their opinions are stereotypical at
all... I mean the democrats/liberals/progressives agree to disagree more often
than not.

~~~
chmln
> racism, bigotry or hate speech

The problem is that these words have become nearly meaningless from vast
overuse.

~~~
supernovae
how so? another comment without context.

~~~
CasteTraitor
A perfect example would be the immigration debate. I believe if you are in
this country ilegally you should be deported. Apparantly, according to many
many liberals, that makes me a "racist."

Of course race has nothing to do with it, I couldn't care less what color you
are , if you're here illegally you need to be deported. And it's not just me,
but I constantly see others who have the same beliefs getting accused of being
racist.

And that's just one example. I've seen people be accused of being sexist just
because they didn't like Hilary Clinton. It was actually really common for
liberals to accuse opponents of Clinton of being sexist regardless of the
total absence of any evidence of actual sexism.

~~~
TheCoelacanth
> I constantly see others who have the same beliefs getting accused of being
> racist

Probably because of the massive amount of racist rhetoric used in support of
that position. It's not an inherently racist position, but when such a large
portion of arguments in favor of the position use racist rhetoric it's hard to
avoid being lumped in with those arguments.

~~~
ithilglin909
Lumping totally dis-similar arguments together is just intellectually lazy,
which is most of my problem with the use of words like "racist, sexist, etc."
They have valid applications, but are often used to circumvent rational
debate.

~~~
TheCoelacanth
Most people are intellectually lazy. Better get used to it. If you want your
arguments to be consistently distinguished from the racist ones you will have
to put in more effort to make them seem more distinct.

~~~
ithilglin909
You don't even know what my arguments would be!

------
humanrebar
This is the first I heard of the Prager U parental filtering and
demonetization.

The videos are certainly conservative, both culturally and economically, but
the ones I've seen aren't objectionable in any way. In many ways, they are
_less_ objectionable than a lot that goes out over the AM radio bands in the
U.S.

Ars Technica on the story:

[https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/10/prageru-sues-
you...](https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/10/prageru-sues-youtube-says-
it-censors-conservative-videos/)

Best I can find of a response from Google:

[https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/heres-googles-
resp...](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/heres-googles-response-
lawsuit-accusing-youtube-censoring-conservatives-1052745)

~~~
lr4444lr
What do you think about the fact that this WSJ article though is "the first
you've heard of it"? Could the story itself perhaps have been suppressed in
some deliberate manner by Google?

~~~
nickik
That literally the line they use every time they are talking about the 'evil
internet'. They really don't like that people don't just follow them anymore,
now they need to grab attention like all those internet blogs they so hate.

------
kelukelugames
It's funny how competing groups rally around terms that sound the same. Terms
that carry positive connotations and share common words. "Pro choice" vs "pro
life". And now we have "diversity and inclusion" vs "diversity of thought."

update: haha, there's a wikipedia section on this called political framing.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_pro-
choice_movem...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_pro-
choice_movement#Terminology_controversy)

~~~
backpropaganda
Another one: Feminism and Postfeminism. I think it's basically because you can
respond to a question about A with B with some melodic alliteration, the kind
which draws cheers from the crowd. This idea seems to have been ported from
the "yes, and ..." idea of improvisational comedy. That is, for maximum
offense in a debate, agree with all the accusations of your opponent, and then
hit them back with a small "but".

Are you pro-choice? I'm pro-life! Do you care about diversity? Yes, of
thoughts. Are you a feminist? I'm postfeminist!

~~~
abiox
i guess i'm missing some context, because this seems kinda nonsequitur.

------
trendia
The Justice Dept has a very strict definition of monopoly [0] -- it requires
both 1) the ability to raise prices profitably above that in a competitive
market, and 2) anticompetitive conduct.

That means that Google receiving 90% of all searches wouldn't automatically
imply market power or anti-competitive conduct, and I can't see how Google or
Facebook can raise their prices higher than a "competitive market" if they
don't charge anything for their product.

How would a competitive market in search and social networking even look?

[0] [https://www.justice.gov/atr/competition-and-monopoly-
single-...](https://www.justice.gov/atr/competition-and-monopoly-single-firm-
conduct-under-section-2-sherman-act-chapter-1#cia)

~~~
dominotw
How is comcast not a monopoly? That was my only choice when I lived chicago.

~~~
brixon
That would be a different kind of "monopoly". The government (usually local)
granted rights to a single provider in an agreement that they install
connections to a minimum user base or geographical area. What would happen
otherwise is the providers would only install access in areas that are
profitable and not extend further out into the more rural area.

What needs to happen is these granted rights should be re-evaluated from time
to time.

~~~
nickik
> providers would only install access in areas that are profitable and not
> extend further out into the more rural area

That is a argument often made by those ISPs but I don't believe it for a
second.

In Sweden remote rual villages get together, fund a fiber connection to their
village (and quite often actually help dig) where some companies is allowed to
lay fiber but is required to allow any ISP to compete.

The market (and admittedly good general regulation in Sweden) leads to an
effect where free people in voluntary association get together with private
business).

As long as you have single monopoly access these ISP will never update their
infrastructure and voluntary offer higher speed and better service.

~~~
pitaj
Exactly. These franchise agreements are the real culprit behind the issues
consumers have with ISPs. I'd much rather have a federal can on franchise
agreements than Title II.

------
padseeker
It's very concerning that there is so much influence concentrated within such
few hands. However I have to ask - would the WSJ would be so concerned if
Google or Facebook were conservative leaning outlets? Normally the WSJ defends
this kind of duopoly kind of thing - if either Google or Facebook had some
sort of right side leaning the WSJ would be preaching to us about the genius
of capitalism and the wisdom of the markets.

~~~
haberman
This is exactly why "viewpoint diversity" is something people are increasingly
concerned about. The basic premise is: we _all_ engage in motivated reasoning.
We all accept weak arguments sometimes if they reinforce or flatter our
existing world view. If we shut out all dissenting views, we'll let lots of
bullshit go unchallenged because we were never forced to actually defend our
beliefs.

So I think it's totally fair to call out perceived inconsistency in the WSJ
position. Maybe the WSJ has a blind spot where they are more willing to accept
consolidated power when it favors them. But I think that illustrates exactly
why viewpoint diversity is important. WSJ will have blind spots sometimes, but
other times they may be able to call other media on their blind spots.

Put another way, you can think of society as a whole as a mind. Just like our
individual minds, the societal "mind" can have conflicting or competing ideas.
The mind functions best when these different thoughts can "have it out" and
try to convince each other that they are correct.

~~~
padseeker
I appreciate your thoughtful, reasonable and balanced response. It also treats
the opposing viewpoint, the WSJ's opinion, with a degree of intellectual
integrity.

Your point about 'blind spots' though is a very gentle jab to my larger point.
I don't believe this is a 'blind spot'. My point is more basic - I don't think
the WSJ has any real intellectual integrity.

In all honesty I think its bad from a viewpoint diversity to have such a small
number of outlets control this much of the flow of information. And so if this
was a real concern of the WSJ then maybe they would take that approach to very
similar and present concern - the purchase of Tribune Media by Sinclar.
Tribune Media owns 40+ TV stations. Sinclair owns at least 100 stations. In
some cities Sinclair owns 3 stations. Certainly if the WSJ cares about
'viewpoint diversity' they would be concerned about a single company owning
that much of the media landscape.

Except they don't take issue with Sinclair the same way they have concerns of
Google/Facebook. As a matter of fact the WSJ probably loves the Sinclair
merger. I disagree with your point, I do not believe this is a blind spot. I
think its much simpler.

WSJ doesn't like the Facebook/Google duopoly because they represent a
viewpoint they don't like, a more left or liberal viewpoint. And they do at
least tacitly approve of the Sinclair merger because Sinclair does have a
viewpoint they agree with, a more conservative one.

There is no intellectual heft to "we don't like it when they do to us what we
do to them". So the WSJ has to manufacture some phony principled argument that
under normal circumstances would contradict their typical position.

I'm not here to argue the for or against the government intervention trying to
prevent a narrowing of the diversity of opinion. I'm saying the WSJ does not
give a crap about diversity. They have no real ideals. They only care when
their side has a disadvantage.

I can't read more than the first paragraph due to the paywall. But I do think
that the WSJ is being intellectually dishonest when they try to advocate
against Google/Facebook narrowing the diversity of opinions when its more like
"we don't like it when the other side can crowd us out'. The WSJ hates opinion
diversity, unless it is their own.

~~~
haberman
I get the distaste for what can easily be seen as political opportunism. I
think it's entirely possible that you are right that WSJ would not care about
viewpoint diversity unless that position was benefiting them at the moment.

But after years of following endless cultural trench warfare carried out on
social media, I strongly believe that focusing the debate on the perceived
evil of certain people/organizations (like WSJ) doesn't help. I think it's
actively toxic and prevents us from finding common ground.

I have no particular love for WSJ, but viewpoint diversity is something I feel
very passionate about. This cause is being spearheaded by Heterodox Academy,
who focus specifically on academia:
[https://heterodoxacademy.org/problems/](https://heterodoxacademy.org/problems/)

So even though I might disagree with WSJ on all sorts of other things, I'm
still happy to see them popularize an argument that I care about. I can feel
"in coalition" with them on this issue, even if I might disagree strongly with
them on other things. Pointing out contradictions in their argument (as you
have done above) is totally fair game and could force them to reconcile these
inconsistencies if enough people call them on it.

> I'm not here to argue the for or against the government intervention trying
> to prevent a narrowing of the diversity of opinion. I'm saying the WSJ does
> not give a crap about diversity. They have no real ideals. They only care
> when their side has a disadvantage.

I feel exactly the opposite: I'm not here to argue whether WSJ is a sinner or
a saint. To me it's a fruitless question because even if you could prove they
have bad motives, that doesn't tell us what we should think about this
argument. People can make good arguments for the wrong reasons. That doesn't
mean we should throw the argument out based on who is making it.

By the way, I say this as someone who has broken this rule countless times
over the years. I don't say all this because I think I am better at productive
argumentation than other people. I say this because I've spent too much time
over the years on toxic discourse that goes nowhere.

------
guelo
Right wing propaganda is so strong and coordinated these days that they can
develop a new goal and drive a single message repeatedly across multiple
platforms for months or years. This attack on Google is a new right wing
message developed this year but they just keep hammering at it across all
their channels tailoring their argument to the different audiences and
continuously building mind share and momentum.

~~~
colordrops
Both right and left wing propaganda is strong and coordinated these days. I
can't say anything that doesn't toe the line with either side and not have
them look at me like I'm an asshole. I've been called both a socialist welfare
state supporter and a reactionary corporate feudalist. Which is it folks. The
division is worse than it ever was in my lifetime.

~~~
at-fates-hands
Welcome to identity politics and the over saturation of a politically correct
ruling class run amok.

If people weren't so fucking reactionary to everything they read, see, hear
and experience, we wouldn't be in this mess and rational discourse might have
a chance. As it stands, people are so easily offended, there isn't any space
for an actual discussion.

As someone who considers myself an Independent, I spend hours every day
reading articles on both sides and then attempt to form a cohesive thought
process on where I stand. Do you have any idea how exhausting that can be with
the amount of misleading and straight up false reporting there is these days?
Nobody cares about the facts anymore, "journalists" just want to frame their
stories in a political meaningful way for people to reinforce their "filter
bubbles" they live.

We're not encouraging dialect on topics by simply providing the facts, we're
actively and purposefully dividing people.

~~~
matt4077
This sort of false neutrality, tinged with the cynicism of putting scare
quotes around "journalists", and the indecency of somehow mistaking their
rather pedestrian fare of contrarianism with exceptional smartitude is exactly
what I think of when faced with peoples' incredulity at the continuing
existence of "independents".

~~~
TheAdamAndChe
Well given the fact that pretty much all major news organizations blatantly
pick a political side, putting "journalists" in quotes and being skeptical of
any single source isn't too crazy to me.

If news sites prioritize view counts over maintaining an unbiased viewpoint,
Roy Moore is what results. Republicans did not trust liberal news
organizations to tell the truth.

------
TYPE_FASTER
> In a November speech, Ajit Pai, chairman of the Federal Communications
> Commission, argued that “edge providers” like social-media websites and
> search engines “routinely block or discriminate against content they don’t
> like.” ... > He also pointed to Twitter’s suspension of a pro-life campaign
> ad from Rep. Marsha Blackburn, an action that would have been illegal if
> done by a TV or radio station.

Which is interesting, considering this FCC decision in 2014:

[https://www.huffingtonpost.com/sue-wilson/fcc-no-more-
equal-...](https://www.huffingtonpost.com/sue-wilson/fcc-no-more-equal-time-
re_b_5332812.html)

It's also worth noting that FCC statute 315
([https://www.fcc.gov/media/policy/statutes-and-rules-
candidat...](https://www.fcc.gov/media/policy/statutes-and-rules-candidate-
appearances-advertising)) applies to licensees.

Is the FCC going to begin licensing social media sites?

Does the FCC consider internet traffic to be a broadcast mechanism? When
newspaper publishers are not required to follow the same laws/statutes as
radio and TV when it comes to political advertising?

~~~
TYPE_FASTER
In addition, in 2009 Mike Pence sponsored the "Broadcaster Freedom Act of
2009" ([https://www.congress.gov/bill/111th-congress/house-
bill/226](https://www.congress.gov/bill/111th-congress/house-bill/226)). This
bill "amends the Communications Act of 1934 to prohibit the Federal
Communications Commission (FCC), notwithstanding any other provision of any
Act, from having the authority to require broadcasters to present opposing
viewpoints on controversial issues of public importance."

------
Spivak
Apparently having a large market share in advertising also means that you
somehow own communication.

Yes, a lot of people use Facebook and Google but that doesn't mean that there
aren't 50 bajillion means of communication. Network effects are strong but
ultimately they don't prevent you from communicating with anybody. The person
on the other end of the line who has a strong preference for their chosen form
of communication does. There's also basically no barrier to switch, I mean
I've got 12 different messaging apps on my phone right now and it's not even
close to a burden. And that doesn't even include email and IRC. And when it
comes to broadcast communication which this article seems to be focusing on
Facebook and Google are by far not the only sources of broadcast. Hell you
should be looking at the consolidation of print and broadcast television if
you want to see a true cartel on information distribution.

~~~
kelukelugames
> I've got 12 different messaging apps on my phone right now and it's not even
> close to a burden.

This might be a generational issue. I have older relatives who can't use more
than one app. If at that. Maybe the people who complain about these things are
just bad at discovering other apps and platforms.

~~~
freeflight
> Maybe the people who complain about these things are just bad at discovering
> other apps and platforms.

Or maybe some people just want to keep their life as simple as possible,
attention economy and all?

With my mid-30's I don't consider myself "that old", but just the idea of
having to manage through a dozen different messenger apps is driving me super
anxious just in the same way I like to have all my email accounts in one
client/app and not spread across a dozen different clients/apps.

There's also something to be said about efficiency; Keeping up with a dozen
apps (not just in content but also software version) is a whole lot more
effort than doing it with just one app.

Maybe I'm actually that old? I just think simpler is usually better and to me,
there's nothing "simple" about doing the same thing trough 12 different apps,
to me that feels counter-intuitive and in the context of Internet
communication, very archaic.

~~~
nickik
Nobody is requiring you to use 12 apps. The point is that there are 12 (and
actually many more) apps that people could choice if they were in any way
unhappy with their current choice.

Even search, where google has the clearest leads other offers exists.

You can not expect your definition of monopoly to be 'any costumer must be
able to immediately switch service without any transaction cost on any of the
many, many application any company provides'. That would be pretty insane.

~~~
freeflight
> Nobody is requiring you to use 12 apps. The point is that there are 12 (and
> actually many more) apps that people could choice if they were in any way
> unhappy with their current choice.

I can only make that choice for myself, if my family and peers are on none of
these apps, then what gain will I get from switching to them?

> You can not expect your definition of monopoly to be 'any costumer must be
> able to immediately switch service without any transaction cost on any of
> the many, many application any company provides'.

I didn't define any monopoly at all, I'm merely pointing out that there's
something to be said about keeping it simple and "centralized" with certain
things. This is also the same reason why Facebook is one hand good (one
centralized place to handle all your online social interactions) but also bad
(with that comes a lot of influence).

Why not look for solutions where we still have the advantage of aggregation,
without the disadvantage of being dependent on a single party?

~~~
nickik
You can't just expect your own decision to change the market. There are of
course network effects and eventually you have to make a choice if you want to
support all clients and thus all people or if you don't want to do that then
you have to make choices.

The point is that there are many networks and there is lots of competition on
every level and as a costumer you have the choice how to organise your live.

> I didn't define any monopoly at all, I'm merely pointing out that there's
> something to be said about keeping it simple and "centralized" with certain
> things.

I agree, if the market is relativly free and a dominant player emerges, it is
usually an efficent result, even if many people are not very happy.

That is why many free-market economist don't agree with the idea that anti-
trust law is needed to prevent the centralisation that marx proclaimed and
many modern progressive economists defend in new ways.

So I'm quite ok with one player, like Whatsapp, dominating for a time. For
myself however, I dislike centralisation in fundamental infrastructure, so I
make the personal choice to also have Signal, Matrix and many other chats.
Depending on what group of friends I use a different app.

So we need to be carful with what are your personal choices and interest, and
what are our acceptable market outcomes. Many people have a much to narrow
view about how the market outcome 'should' look based on their assumtion of
cost (typical example is transportation threw centralised nodes that many
people think 'make no sense').

------
fjabre
I don't think this is necessarily true. If proper regulations are in place
Google and Facebook can certainly be out competed in some of their core
services.

Verizon and ATT threaten diversity much more than does Google or Facebook.
That should be painfully obvious to anyone who's done their research.

Also WSJ is owned by Rupert Murdoch which should also raise some flags on this
article.

------
jacksmith21006
Not sure ther issue with Google. I use Google Alerts and get a mixture of
content and definitely not slanted one way or another.

I am pretty liberal but I am someone that can deal with reading the otherside
and do not have to put my head in the sand. I will even watch Fox from time to
time just to see how they are talking about things.

Google would know my slant so putting Breitbart articles in my alerts and on
the Google Assistant suggests they are not filtering.

Heck I get negative Google stories and clearly if Google was going to filter
be the first thing to filter out.

I really do not use FB so can not comment about it.

~~~
atomi
Here's something: ask your Google Assistant how old the Earth is. Now ask how
old the Moon is. Do you think it's just an innocent oversight that Google
Assistant doesn't reply with the age of the Earth? Perhaps it is.

~~~
dragonwriter
Given that it gives the _wrong_ answer for the moon (even though it's source
has the right answer!) and given its spotty coverage of other similar
information pairs where there is no credible ideological motive (e.g., sunrise
times vs. moonrise times), yes, I think “Knowledge Graph is spotty,
incomplete, often inaccurate, and has insufficient human attention” is the
Occam’s Razor-compatible answer, despite how fun conspiracy theories can be.

~~~
atomi
Or it could also be that the source knowledge graph has inconsistent
information because of religious mis-information - there's that Occam’s Razor-
compatible answer for you.

------
debt
Journalism is dead. We can't, in near real time, detangle the complexities of
the plans of large entities such as governments/corporations and the effects
of their policies. That's typically what journalists were really good at.

That's the real problem.

Colorful thought and artful diversity is the spice of life, but priority
number one is consumer safety.

We just need to know what's going on!

It's been on the downward trend towards the grave for a very, very long time.
Facebook/Google are simply nails on the coffin.

------
camdenlock
This has been troubling me for a while. We mainstream liberals seem to be
calling for more diversity, but the most vocal amongst us seem to want only
superficial diversity (i.e. a variety of physical appearances) instead of
diversity of thought/ideas.

Take, for instance, the firing of Denise Young Smith from Apple. She correctly
argued in favor of ideological diversity being a worthwhile goal for an
organization, saying: “There can be 12 white, blue-eyed, blonde men in a room,
and they’re going to be diverse too because they’re going to bring a different
life experience.”

She was crucified by (ostensibly?) mainstream liberals, who apparently felt
that such a comment didn’t reflect the true goal of diversity: having a
variety of phenotypes in a room.

This is only one concrete example, but it’s representative of what I’ve
noticed is a growing trend. Not sure if anyone else here has seen it as well,
but I suspect some of you have. I hope we all wise up and recognize that what
we truly want is a mixture of experience and viewpoints, not just mere
phenotypic variety.

------
reefoctopus
Rupert Murdoch’s propaganda threatens the foundation of American democracy.

~~~
mizzack
Am I correctly reading from your tone that you are of the opinion that the
remainder of the consolidated media powerhouses somehow don't?

------
fzeroracer
It's really amazing how quickly the topic shifts after the repeal of Net
Neutrality. Places were pushing this topic constantly in attempt to shift
debate on why insuring ISPs don't do any silly things with user traffic. It
very quickly became 'Google and Facebook are monopolies and are controlling
all of your content / censoring everything'.

This isn't to say that I don't agree that Google and Facebook are exceedingly
large companies with far-reaching tendrils controlling a lot of what we see
and do. But rather it's blatantly obvious that it's setting up a new target to
avoid backlash against giving ISPs effectively more power, especially over
said companies. I mean it would be less obvious if he literally didn't come
out and say that thing, plus various far-right websites repeating the topic
but that's the world we live in right now. I have a feeling the topic won't
stick at all beyond being a convenient whataboutism.

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ggggtez
Meh, I'm not convinced "diversity of thought" is worth anything. If I say 2+2,
and you say 6, well, maybe your thoughts deserve no platform.

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gimmeminusnow3
Both very bad for humanity and privacy of people. I wonder when people would
understand to avoid these services.

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jaaron
Ok, I can't read the WSJ article because it's behind a paywall, but I did read
an ArsTechnica story about the issue [1]. With _only_ that information (which
isn't admittedly much) it appears to be a run-of-the-mill story of YouTube's
content policies running amok. Some see nefarious purposes in YouTube's
incompetence, but that cynical view doesn't hold up when one considers how
consistently YouTube disappoints everyone.

Seriously, just search for "YouTube demonetization" and you'll find dozens of
similar stories that have _nothing_ to do with politics.

YouTube's content filtering and management is a mess and it's always been a
mess. Whether it's take down notices, tagging copyrighted content
inappropriately, issues with demonetization and advertising, YouTube has
consistently struggled with striking a balance between creators, consumers and
advertisers.

To take that mess and turn it into some sort of commentary about politics,
censorship or a general threat to diversity of thought is cynicism and
pandering that's worse than YouTube's alleged sins.

I expect better out (or used to) out of my Hacker News commentary, but alas,
few bothered to even look up the basics of this particular story.

[1] [https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/10/prageru-sues-
you...](https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/10/prageru-sues-youtube-says-
it-censors-conservative-videos/)

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losteverything
Am i the only guy who thinks been there, done that. With networks' news &
major papers.

Of course it will influence and change things. But we created it therefore it
is ok. Just scary now

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gumby
I love that this article begins by quoting an absurdist parody novel,
confirming the aphorism "many a true word is spoken in jest"

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cafard
Remind me who owns The Wall Street Journal...

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enitihas
Food for thought: What if Google+(or any othe google social initiative) had
succeeded and this duopoly were to become a monopoly. How worse the world
would be?

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davebryand
Stop using Facebook. Stop using Google. Problem solved.

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paulie_a
I cant dispute the conclusion of the article on diversity of thought because
the article is blocked by a paywall.

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killjoywashere
is there a non-paywall link?

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frgtpsswrdlame
[https://outline.com/gCJe5t](https://outline.com/gCJe5t)

