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White House official corroborates account that Trump appeared to seek quid pro quo - The Age
'Our democracy is at stake': House formalises Trump impeachment inquiry
Stop us if you've heard this one: Aussies probeGoogle over misleading location stalking claims
The case certainly rings a
bell back in Europe
WSJ.com – White House plans to direct government staffers to not renew orders with the newspapers, whose coverage he has disparaged as ‘fake’ – “The White House is planning to instruct federal agencies to not renew their subscriptions to the New York Times and the Washington Post, administration officials said, escalating President Trump’s attacks on the media outlets.
NICOLA McGARRITY, JESSIE BLACKBOURN. Australia has enacted 82 anti-terror laws since 2001. But tough laws alone can’t eliminate terrorism (The Conversation 30-9-19)
This is part of a new series looking at the national security challenges facing Australia, how our leaders are responding to them through legislation and how this is impacting society. Read other stories in the series here. Continue reading
- If you’re a media junkie, this is a must-read: New York Magazine’s Reeves Wiedeman on what’s left of Conde Nast.
- The Ringer’s Jordan Ritter Conn with a story about the NBA/China/Hong Kong controversy, but this story comes from inside Hong Kong. It includes what those in Hong Kong now think about the NBA and in particular, LeBron James.
- One late-night host is going to have a blast now that Newsweek’s James LaPorta has discovered the name of the dog injured in the raid on ISIS.
In nature there is the circle of life. In the underworld there is the circle of death.
The arrest of Little Tommy Ivanovic in relation to the May 2000 murder of standover man Richard “Lionheart” Mladenich is just another link in a deadly chain that has so far cost three lives and destroyed Victoria Police’s most important investigation.
Ivanovic’s involvement, if any, may well be a matter for the courts but what we do know is the Mladenich murder is a trapdoor into a dark pit filled with money, corruption and betrayal.
Facebook and Twitter step up their game
For
nearly three years, Facebook has
been working with fact-checking organizations to limit the spread of false
content on the platform. That partnership, which the IFCN brokers and
(Poynter-owned) PolitiFact participates in, has changed a lot.
And
now, it’s changing again.
This
week during a press call, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced
a slew of updates to the company’s anti-misinformation efforts going into
the 2020 U.S. election. Among them: displaying fact checks more clearly on both
Facebook and Instagram.
Before,
posts rated as false by Facebook’s fact-checking partners, of which there
are more than 55 around the world, would be appended with the fact check
below the post. Now, a warning label will be superimposed on debunked photos
and videos to make clearer that they’re false. Facebook will continue to notify
pages that spread falsehoods, as well as users who share them.
Also
of note: Fact checks will now also be applied to posts on Instagram, which
fact-checkers
started partnering with in May. When users try to share a debunked post in
private messages, they’ll receive a warning message with the relevant fact
checks.
Finally,
Facebook announced
last week that it’s hosting its first-ever summit with fact-checking partners
at the company’s headquarters in Menlo Park, California. During that meeting,
which runs Nov. 5-6, more than 100 fact-checkers and journalists will gather to
discuss the program.
Those
are promising changes to what has become one of Facebook’s most visible
attempts to counter misinformation. And it’s not just Facebook that has changed
its approach to false content recently.
Twitter,
a platform that has
done little to limit the spread of misinformation since 2016, took
a baby step this week in announcing that it’s working on a new policy to
combat misinformation. The company said it is using a feedback period to gather
ideas from users on how best to combat “synthetic and manipulated media,” which
Twitter defined as “media that’s been significantly altered or created in a way
that changes the original meaning/purpose, or makes it seem like certain events
took place that didn’t actually happen.”
The
end result of that policy is not yet clear. In the past, Twitter has
been pretty successful in removing lots of bots and fake accounts, but
that’s very different from limiting the spread of false information.
Many
questions remain about the efficacy of Facebook’s partnership with
fact-checkers. But for now, it’s clear that both platforms are being more
deliberate about their approach to misinformation in 2020 than in 2016.
. . . technology
·
Speaking
of Facebook, artificial intelligence is getting “shockingly better very
quickly” at finding misinformation, the company’s CTO Mike Schroepfer said at
The Wall Street Journal’s Tech Live conference this week. Watch
here.
·
China
is beginning to “flex its muscles in the information space,” according to
experts at the Atlantic Council’s 2019 Global Forum on Strategic Communications
Wednesday. Here’s
the council’s report.
·
Federal
Computer Week explored the question of whether requiring social media companies
to verify anonymous users could help reduce misinformation. Rep. Joe Neguse
(D-Colo.) brought up the idea at a hearing this week on election
security.
. . . politics
·
ISIS
militants have been posting short propaganda videos to TikTok. An article in The
Wall Street Journal Monday said that the Chinese company has hired
thousands of content moderators.
·
During
the Canadian national elections, Reddit played “an outsized role” in spreading
unsubstantiated allegations that Prime Minister Justin Truedau was involved in
a non-existent sex scandal, the
National Observer reported ths week. (Trudeau was re-elected but will have
a minority
government.)
·
Politico
media writer Jack Shafer wrote that President Donald Trump is such a prolific
liar that the media should start
handling it differently. “As a petulant but devoted reader of the press,
Trump would notice a headline reading ‘President Trump Said Something True
Yesterday,’ and maybe tamp down on the lying,” Shafer wrote.
. . . the future of news
·
Dozens
of new “news” websites have appeared in Michigan, but are basically publishers
of conservative content. The
Lansing State Journal reported that the company behind the websites,
Metrics Media, says on its “about” age that it has plans to eventually launch
thousands of such sites nationwide. Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum noted
on Twitter that this was a tactic used by the far-right in Europe.
·
The
Duke
Reporters’ Lab added 21 fact-checkers to its database of reporting projects
that regularly debunk political misinformation and viral hoaxes. The database
now lists 210 active fact-checkers in 68 countries. Facebook's Third Party
Fact-Checking Program and collaborative election projects are driving the rise.
·
In
Bangladesh, four people died in riots when 20,000 people took the streets for a
protest after hackers posing as a young Hindu posted a Facebook message
insulting the Prophet Muhammad, according to RFI
(in French). Reuters
reported that all the hackers had been detained.
President
Donald Trump’s monologue at his cabinet meeting this week ran 71 minutes and
covered a wide range of topics, which meant plenty of room for false claims.
The Washington Post called
it “part news conference, part stream-of-consciousness bragging and all
about Trump.”
Fact-checkers
were quick to vet the speech – some in real time. Among the most prolific were CNN,
The
Washington Post, PolitiFact
and Factcheck.org.
CNN
found at least 21 claims to check (it has been updating its story), the Post
did 15, and PolitiFact dissected nine. Factcheck.org had five reporters
contributing to its comprehensive report. Some of the claims checked
overlapped, some did not. Some could be checked quickly because they’ve been
made before, like The Post’s check of Trump’s claim that a whistleblower gave a
false account about Trump’s call with Ukrainian President Volodmyr
Zelensky.
What we liked: Covering Trump as a beat reporter isn’t easy because of the frequency of his falsehoods. Reporters want to hold him accountable for what he says, but that would take time away from their ability to produce news and analysis. So in cases like this, fact-checkers carry a large load, taking the pressure off their White House colleagues so that readers see that falsehoods are debunked as they occur.
What we liked: Covering Trump as a beat reporter isn’t easy because of the frequency of his falsehoods. Reporters want to hold him accountable for what he says, but that would take time away from their ability to produce news and analysis. So in cases like this, fact-checkers carry a large load, taking the pressure off their White House colleagues so that readers see that falsehoods are debunked as they occur.
1.
First
Draft has updated
its guide to understanding information disorder.
2.
A
new study found that people are more likely to fall for false headlines if
they spend less time thinking about them.
3.
Agence
France-Presse wrote
about how the communications blackout in Kashmir is fueling a
misinformation battle between India and Pakistan.
4.
Until
Nov. 10, Maldita.es is offering a mini
daily-podcast related to the Spanish election process. This new format was
planned to reach those who have no more than 5 minutes to learn what is false
online.
5.
A
state senator from North Dakota apologized for posting
a long-debunked photo that purports to show U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.)
holding a weapon at an al Qaeda training camp. But he won’t apologize to Omar, the
Associated Press reported.
6.
People
in the fact-checking universe will want to keep an eye on MediaWell.
Launched by the non-profit Social Science Research Council, it promises
"to track and distill the latest research on disinformation, online
politics, election interference, and emerging collisions between media and
democracy."
7.
There’s
a new student-run fact-checking operation at the University of Hong Kong. It’s
called Annie Lab.
8.
In
Nigeria, WhatsApp is
the medium of choice for older people sharing misinformation.
9.
In
the United States, the Federal Trade Commission is
cracking down on companies using deceptive marketing tactics, such as
selling likes and posting fake customer reviews.
10.
The
Florida Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists is
attempting to trademark the term “fake news” to take some of its power away
from those who use it as a pejorative for the press.