Facebook, Apple, YouTube and Spotify ban Infowars' Alex Jones

[Aratus]

Alex Jones sighting..

 

[Swordsmyth]

In a corporatist system of government, wherein there is no meaningful separation between corporate power and state power, corporate censorship is state censorship. Because legalized bribery in the form of corporate lobbying and campaign donations has given wealthy Americans the ability to control the US government’s policy and behavior while ordinary Americans have no effective influence whatsoever, the US unquestionably has a corporatist system of government. Large, influential corporations are inseparable from the state, so their use of censorship is inseparable from state censorship.
This is especially true of the vast megacorporations of Silicon Valley, whose extensive ties to US intelligence agencies are well-documented. Once you’re assisting with the construction of the US military’s drone program, receiving grants from the CIA and NSA for mass surveillance, or having your site’s content regulated by NATO’s propaganda arm, you don’t get to pretend you’re a private, independent corporation that is separate from government power. It is possible in the current system to have a normal business worth a few million dollars, but if you want to get to billions of dollars in wealth control in a system where money translates directly to political power, you need to work with existing power structures like the CIA and the Pentagon, or else they’ll work with your competitors instead of you.
– From the Caitlin Johnstone post: In A Corporatist System Of Government, Corporate Censorship Is State Censorship
​

Let’s be clear about something up front because it’s extremely important. This narrative that three tech giants, Apple, Google and Facebook all decided independently and simultaneously to de-platform Alex Jones without any threats or pressure from U.S. politicians and other powerful forces behind the scenes is pure fantasy. This isn’t private companies doing that private company thing, this is Silicon Valley oligarchs making a decision to appease politicians and the status quo system which made them billionaires in order to avoid regulation.
I’ve been warning about this for a long time, but let’s revisit something the late Robert Parry noted in September of last year.
From the post, Was Facebook Pressured Into Finding ‘Something’ to Implicate Russia?

The article purports to give the inside story of how Facebook belatedly came to grips with how the “company’s social network played a key role in the U.S. election,” but actually it is a story about how powerful politicians bullied Facebook into coming up with something – anything – to support the narrative of “Russian meddling,” including direct interventions by President Obama and Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee and a key legislator regarding regulation of high-tech industries.
In other words, Facebook was sent back again and again to find what Obama and Warner wanted the social media company to find. Eventually, Facebook turned up $100,000 in ads from 2015 into 2017 that supposedly were traced somehow to Russia. These ads apparently addressed political issues in America although Facebook has said most did not pertain directly to the presidential election and some ads were purchased after the election.
​

This seemed important at the time, but it’s become even more significant in light of recent events. For instance, Mark Warner appears to be the point man for Democratic politicians who intend to use Russiagate and “fake news” hysteria to intimidate tech giants into submission. It appears to be working.
There’s a big piece to this story that people seem to be missing, which I explained in a brief Twitter thread earlier today.

About a week later, Alex Jones and Infowars is de-platformed by virtually all the tech giants at once.
Politicians are threatening the tech giants with regulation unless they censor as politicians want.
The tech giants do as told, just like they did with surveillance.
— Michael Krieger (@LibertyBlitz) August 7, 2018​

It’s no coincidence Warner’s paw prints appear to be all over the latest pressure exerted upon tech giants. He and other Democratic politicians are methodically using fear around Russiagate and fake news to get Silicon Valley oligarchs do as they please.
Moreover, they know for a fact this sort of thing is effective, because the U.S. government’s done it before. Specifically and spectacularly with regard to domestic surveillance.

Major American tech companies have cooperated with the US government before, and they will again. If they don't cooperate, they will be compelled to cooperate.

Did you all forget the lessons of Snowden this quickly? pic.twitter.com/KP4ldaH7By
— Matt Odell (@matt_odell) August 7, 2018​

Again, politicians have no interest in actually reining in the power of the tech giants, they merely want to further weaponize them for their own ends.
The big game here is politicians bullying tech companies so that they censor their platforms in a way they see fit. See the following tweets by Democratic Senator Chris Murphy:

Politician calls Infowars ban "tip of iceberg."
If you don't know where this is headed, you're naive, a moron, or both. https://t.co/kijaQAFi7p
— Michael Krieger (@LibertyBlitz) August 7, 2018​

I know Facebook and Apple and YouTube have gotten so big they sometimes seem like the government.

But they aren’t.

They are private companies that shouldn’t knowingly spread lies and hate. They took a good first step today by removing Infowars.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) August 6, 2018​

Don’t worry though, that’s not a veiled threat just a friendly suggestion from the politburo.
Meanwhile, it appears Sen. Murphy got an earful following those tweets and responded by pointing out that Trump demonizes the press daily. That’s true, but so is the following:

Scorecard thus far:

Trump's stupid threats against the press. Zero actual impact on CNN or MSNBC's ability to publish nonsense.

Democratic politicians threatening tech giants: People with large audiences actually being de-platformed in real life.
— Michael Krieger (@LibertyBlitz) August 7, 2018​

There’s a big power play afoot — you can ignore it at you own risk.
Oh, and DELETE Facebook.
* * *

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018...-mastermind-behind-weaponizing-us-tech-giants

 

[Swordsmyth]

I know Facebook and Apple and YouTube have gotten so big they sometimes seem like the government.

But they aren’t.

They are private companies that shouldn’t knowingly spread lies and hate. They took a good first step today by removing Infowars.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) August 6, 2018

That's governments job?

 

[Brian4Liberty]

https://www.theguardian.com/technol...s-alex-jones?utm_source=digg&utm_medium=email

Full article at link.

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Is Alex Jones protected by the First Amendment, or will the idea that Facebook and YouTube are "Private Property" and they can do what they want? Where is the Line drawn?

On the Technical Side. Hosting his content on their servers I can see as Private Property. What about DNS Records? DNS is Domain Name Service. The internet does not directly use names like ronpaulforums.com to transfer data back and forth. ALL that data needs to be changed into IP addresses. For example, the IP of ronpaulforums.com is 67.225.158.173 and ALL websites have this. What DNS does is changes the Name to an IP so your computer can talk to it. So, lets say Alex Jones hosts ALL of his content on his own servers. Since they are his servers, would he have a technical Right to say what he wants on his website? What he can not do all by himself is register his own DNS records. Not a legal thing, its just the way the internet works. Now, with that, would his DNS Host also have a "Right" to shut him down? I could see that would be reasonable if the bills were not paid, and that is fine. But would his DNS Host (a.k.a. Domain Name Registrar) have a "Right" to deny him service based on the content he provides on his own servers?

So two possible Debates here, first is Free Speech in general, and the second is the Technical side of web and how stuff works, as well as who has "authority". Debate.

Interesting question. A question that can not be easily answered with platitudes.

My opinion is best summed-up in my sig:

“Beware the Military-Industrial-Financial-Corporate-Internet-Media-Government Complex."

Big brother is a complex. It can not be defined by simple terms like “government” or “private business”.

There are several natural reasons for the complex to develop in this way. The first is graft and corruption. It is much more profitable to engage in graft via outsourcing government activities to corporations and businesses. It is relatively difficult for elected politicians and government bureaucrats to engage in money skimming while in office. But as a government contractor, the profits are almost endless.

Number two is the fact that outsourced government corporatism is a loophole to bypass constitutional restrictions on government. This would be the main point of the current controversy about various forms of internet censorship.

And finally, size and scope would be a limiting factor without a distributed structure. Government as a single, centrally controlled, hierarchical entity could not possibly effectively do what is being done now. It has to be decentralized, with some incentives to innovate and invent. New companies and technology can be absorbed when they reach a critical mass and join the complex via contracts and regulation.

 

[specsaregood]

F.A.G.S.

 

[timosman]

F.A.G.S.

Using this word would get you fired in each one of those.

 

[Swordsmyth]

Big Tech has declared total war on Alex Jones and free speech just four months before the midterms.
Disqus banned Infowars, Prison Planet, Infowars Europe, Newswars and Alex Jones’s entire network of websites from using their comment system on Tuesday night.
Disqus sent Alex Jones a vague message saying they banned him for being “in violation” of their terms of service.


More at: https://www.infowars.com/censored-disqus-bans-infowars-entire-alex-jones-network-of-websites/

 

[ThePaleoLibertarian]

The "their company, their rules" analysis has officially expired as a remotely salient argument when it comes to digital markets. San Francisco progressives should not be able to privately own the modern public forum.

 

[Swordsmyth]

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan’s official Facebook page is rife with anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and other hateful speech, which have not been censored by Facebook content monitors, a Daily Caller News Foundation review of the page reveals.
Videos posted to Farrakhan’s Facebook page show the Nation of Islam leader claiming that Jews are secretly controlling government agencies to suppress black Americans and blaming Jews for “weaponizing” marijuana with “chemicals” to “feminize” black men.
Neither of those videos violate Facebook’s rules prohibiting hate speech, a Facebook spokeswoman told The Daily Caller News Foundation in a phone interview Tuesday.
Another video that showed Farrakhan warning against interracial marriage — which he blames on “the enemy” in Hollywood — to keep the black race “from being any further mongrelized,” was originally ruled not to violate hate speech rules, according to the Facebook spokeswoman.

More at: http://dailycaller.com/2018/08/07/louis-farrakhan-anti-semitism-facebook-hate-speech/

 

[Swordsmyth]

[h=2]Alex Jones claims 5.6 million people have subscribed to his free Infowars newsletter and podcast over the last 48 hours.[/h] These 48 hours have been crucial for Jones, as the Big Tech monopolies and left-wing news outlets like CNN and BuzzFeed have joined forces to blacklist/erase Infowars from the public square.
Jones and Infowars have had their accounts canceled – have been effectively purged and erased – from YouTube, Facebook, Apple, LinkedIn, Spotify, Stitcher, and Pinterest. Even the emailing service MailChimp blacklisted Jones, in what has been a highly effective and coordinated media/Big Tech campaign to silence a vocal Trump supporter.
Speaking to the Daily Mail, Jones said Wednesday, “The good news is Infowars has had the highest traffic it’s ever had – 5.6 million new subscribers in the past 48 hours – and so has my radio show.”
Jones added, “De-platforming doesn’t do anything, we already have the subscribers, it doesn’t do very much.”
On YouTube, Jones reportedly had 2.2 million subscribers. Jones claims these new subscribers more than make up for the loss of that platform.
“The loss we’ve had … on various platforms, has been way compensated by millions of new subscribers and visitors to our website, the mobile app, to our free podcast,” Jones said. “We’ve never had this much people signing up for our news letter, podcast, video feeds, they’re all hitting subscribe, subscribe, subscribe.”
Jones believes the onslaught of media/online censorship against him has backfired in his favor.

More at: https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2018...wars-subscribers-since-big-tech-blacklisting/

 

[r3volution 3.0]

But but, who will now rile up the illiterates into supporting the establishment in the name of opposing them?!

 

[timosman]

But but, who will now rile up the illiterates into supporting the establishment in the name of opposing them?!

Not that I am not happy to see you, but what brings you here now? Do you think we don't have enough trolls?

 

[r3volution 3.0]

Not that I am not happy to see you, but what brings you here now? Do you think we don't have enough trolls?

It's too bad they ruined the emojis.

 

[TheCount]

Ya, the most popular platforms on the web don't need anybody promoting peace, what they need is non-stop war mongering and leftist horse tripe.

 

[dannno]

“When I think about all the children Hillary Clinton has personally murdered and chopped up and raped, I have zero fear standing up against her,” Jones said in one YouTube video.

Last month, Facebook and YouTube both removed a few of Jones' videos, including that one quoted above, citing rules against harassment, bullying, child endangerment, or hate speech.

Well, they kind of have a point here. I mean, I don't think there is any evidence Hillary actually rapes children who she has murdered and chopped up. By adding the part about raping the children she's killed, that does kinda make it fake news potentially. So I'm going to distract you with that thought so you forget that Hillary murders children.

 

[dannno]

Trump did receive some tremendous political benefits to bombing an empty air base, as opposed to any of the other deadly plans he was presented with. Fortunately he was given a plan that was not intended to have any casualties. It would have been literally tens of thousands of times worse if Hillary was President.

 

[r3volution 3.0]

Someone's gotta pay for the hairplugs

 

[ThePaleoLibertarian]

Well, they kind of have a point here. I mean, I don't think there is any evidence Hillary actually rapes children who she has murdered and chopped up. By adding the part about raping the children she's killed, that does kinda make it fake news potentially. So I'm going to distract you with that thought so you forget that Hillary murders children.

Are you alleging that Hillary Clinton and/or Bill killed the two boys found on the tracks?

 

[timosman]

Someone's gotta pay for the hairplugs

Your insights tonite are very deep. I am glad you are no longer spamming the forum like a troll.

 

[timosman]

Are you alleging that Hillary Clinton and/or Bill killed the two boys found on the tracks?

Yeah, it was actually both of them. I have it all on tape.