Flooding the zone with Trump trumps Godwin’s law
When intensely watching the orange orangutan in the White House we miss the invisible gorilla in the oval room.
Media
internet
NZ consumed 30% more Russian disinformation than the USA during Covid
Russian troll farms successfully penetrated Kiwi country and culture. The consumption remained high and the fervour hasn’t stopped
News and New Zealand Democracy
How do we prevent the decline of broadcast tv news being a deep wound to our democracy?
My Way or the Huawei
I like my Huawei phone. I’m looking forward to the new Mate 60Pro. It’s launch means the US-led sanctions aiming to crush Huawei, with New Zealand as a fast follower, have completely failed to set back Chinese technology.
Twitter and commenting on The Standard
“Something went wrong”
Surviving the apocalypse of the Great Twit
The Great Twit at Twitter has been cauterising off staff in excess. I suspect that the platform is going to go down the toilet for that (amongst other reasons). My concern here has been to preserve the embedded tweets in posts and comments on this site if the idiot engineer manages to destroy the platform through simple stupidity.
Twitter as slow motion trainwreck
It is really quite something to be watching in real time, the implosion of twitter at the hands of Elon Musk.
The Striking Similarities Between Elon Musk and Wayne Brown
Elon Musk and Wayne Brown both deliberately promote chaos.
What happens if Twitter dies?
It seems strange to type this but Twitter may be terminal. The social media site that has become the go to for many years for journalists, politicians and any one interested in news especially breaking news may be on its death bed.
The problem with keyboard warriors and media commentators
Internationally Jacinda Ardern’s speech to the Harvard graduating class has been very well received. But locally not so much.
Who Will Protect Us From Media Power Now?
With RNZ and TVNZ now in full merger mode, we have yet another untested state megalith upon us. But where is the power that will hold it to account?
Weird stuff Jacinda Ardern has been accused of
It appears that social media allegations against Jacinda Ardern are becoming more and more extreme.
Judith Collins is not John Key
I honestly am not sure what Judith’s game plan. Supporting someone who on twitter called for the lynching of a person with a contrary view is not a way to reach to the middle of New Zealand politics.
The daily critics whinge
I was just reading a post by Bryan Gould on his current perspective on news media in “The Government v. the people”. It resonated because some news and opinion media are getting tedious. It made me reflect on my current habits because much of what he is discussing is that I remember as something in my rear view mirror. Not what I do today.
Parliament’s tie issue
Not wearing a tie in Parliament is a weird issue for the Maori Party to get ready to die in a ditch about. But the rules should be changed.
The fascinating story about when some redditors took on Wall Street
The world has been watching, mostly with amusement, as some redditors have brought a Wall Street merchant bank to its knees, by buying stocks in a company, GameStop who has seen better days and whose business model is antiquated.
Regulate big tech now
If we had seen our Prime Minister fall from power because three companies decided that their dominance in society should be used to bring her down, we would be outraged. Yet that pretty much just happened in the United States.
The twitter purge
Over the past few days Twitter has suspended not only Donald Trump’s twitter account but 70,000 accounts world wide many associated with the propagation of Qanon conspiracies.
Words of Outrage or Outrageous Action?
Do you reward rage with rage or do you ignore it and walk away quietly?
The background traffic is loud.
Along with the grey weather, the weather around our local net is downright annoying at present. There are a massive increase in attempts to break into this site via backend systems and brute force front-end logins, a surge in scans from the search engine spider bots, and a lot of requests for putting up paid content. All of which have been ignored or dealt with. Good thing that we aren’t a target like the NZX, banks, mainstream media and the MetService are.
Left wing twitter is the worst *
* but you should see what Judith Collins’ husband has been posting.
The top seven things Covid has changed
Covid has fundamentally changed society for the better in surprising ways.
The strange tale of the Auckland Central selection and Merv from Manurewa
News has emerged that a senior National Party figure rang talkback radio and made derogatory comments about National’s only Sri Lankan candidate in an apparent attempt to reduce her chance of being selected as National’s Auckland Central candidate.
Tick Tock Tik-Tok
Trump has announced he will ban Tik-Tok from the United States. It’s Chinese-owned so there. Or maybe he will force it to be sold to Americans.Don’t think security is the issue; kids used it to stuff up his Tulsa rally. And it is good for mockery, as clips about Trump and Pompeo show. Don’t think that will stop if Americans own it.
Protesters, Anarchists, Agitators and Lowlifes
Donald Trump has planned to hold a political rally on the day used to celebrate the abolition of slavery at a place where one of the worst examples of white brutality on black people using advertising material containing nazi symbols. All in the middle of a global pandemic.
Advising the country about Covid19 is unfair to National
National is complaining that a Government Covid19 media account liked Jacinda Ardern’s instagram page. And a National cheerleader wants all Covid 19 response advertising to stop.
Protesters Say Statue Tripped, Fell Into Water
The toppling of a statute of former slave trader Edward Coulson has led to conjecture that the statute may have tripped and fallen rather than forcibly removed and deposited in Bristol Harbour.
Dear Hamish please keep it up
Hamish Price’s twitter game is proving to be a boon to Labour.
Twitter takes on Trump
Donald Trump is engaged in an escallating war with Twitter after the Social Platform hid one of his tweets calling for Minneapolis rioters to be shot.
dear sysop: on covid-19 debt
We put in guest posts occasionally. These days I’m the person who runs the email account and sees the general ones. Mostly I don’t give any feedback as much as anything else because a lack of time. But I should. This is the first to get that editorial attention. The topic itself is worth discussing. What is the process of raising debt for the cobid-19 economic response.
Matthew’s Magic Numbers
Matthew Hooton has tweeted a series of numbers. They add up to good news for the Government.
UPDATE: Curia Polling reckons it’s even better for Labour!
National’s new conservation policy was previously announced in 2014
National has announced a “new” policy that it previously announced in 2014. And that has already been implemented.
Back in the U.S.S.A.
The onslaught launched against Trump from sections of corporate media and liberal institutions will look as nothing next to the unified onslaught that will be unleashed against a President Sanders.
The Fourth Estate struggling in the social media world
Originally posted on Nick Kelly’s blog
Ahead of the 2020 General Election in New Zealand, Labour Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced that her party is committed to run a factual election and has signed up to a social media tool to help prove it. The 2020 NZ election will be an interesting case study of whether in the social media age there can be honest political debate free of misinformation and manipulation of facts.
The power of positive campaigning
With the 2020 election just round the corner and recent complaints about the left’s treatment of the #TurnArdern campaign it is a perfect time to think about the importance of language and positive uplifting campaign themes.
T’was the day of Christmas
National’s social media team spent Christmas day deleting tweets suggesting there was any link between its MPs and members of the #turnardern campaign.