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Notices by Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)

Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 10-Jan-2025 10:13:25 JST Casey Newton

NEW: Platformer has obtained the dehumanizing new guidelines moderating what people can now say about trans people on Facebook and Instagram. Employees tell me these changes are likely to inspire more violence against LGBT people: https://www.platformer.news/meta-new-trans-guidelines-hate-speech/
In conversation about 9 days ago from mastodon.social permalink
Attachments
1. And in a follow-up questions about whether denying that a protected class violates the hateful content policy, Meta also answers no. It gave these as examples of posts that are now allowed on Facebook and Instagram: "There's no such thing as trans children." "God created two genders, 'transgender' people are not a real thing." "This whole nonbinary thing is made up. Those people don't exist, they're just in need of some therapy." "A trans woman isn't a woman, it's a pathetic confused man." "A trans person isn't a he or she, it's an it." These seem like strange allowances for a policy that begins: “We believe that people use their voice and connect more freely when they don’t feel attacked on the basis of who they are,” and later states flatly, “we remove dehumanizing speech.” It is hard to imagine speech more dehumanizing than to tell someone that they have no gender and are an “it.”
  https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/113/801/373/482/054/790/original/59889fa77e0627b4.png
2. Inside Meta’s dehumanizing new speech policies for trans people
  
  from @CaseyNewton
  
  "A trans person isn't a he or she, it's an it," reads a new guideline telling moderators what is now allowed on Facebook and Instagram
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 15-Jun-2024 04:15:24 JST Casey Newton
in reply to
@Gargron @bart @pxl definitely built on top of it! not sure what they might have changed

In conversation about 7 months ago from mastodon.social permalink
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 05-Jun-2024 09:41:51 JST Casey Newton
in reply to
- Eugen Rochko
@Gargron great point! would love to see them engage with that more directly

In conversation about 8 months ago from mastodon.social permalink
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 05-Jun-2024 09:41:16 JST Casey Newton

There's yet another open letter from the AI safety crowd. If they want more people to take them seriously, they need to get more specific
https://www.platformer.news/tuesday-newsletter/
In conversation about 8 months ago from mastodon.social permalink
Attachments
1. At the same time, there’s no doubt that the AI safety argument has begun to feel a bit tedious over the past year, when the harms caused by large language models have been funnier than they have been terrifying. Last week, when OpenAI put out the first account of how its products are being used in covert influence operations, there simply wasn’t much there to report. We’ve seen plenty of problematic misuse of AI, particularly deepfakes in elections and in schools. (And of women in general.) And yet people who sign letters like the one released today fail to connect high-level hand-wringing about their companies to the products and policy decisions that their companies make. Instead, they speak through opaque open letters that have surprisingly little to say about what safe development might actually look like in practice.
  https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/112/561/175/352/843/994/original/3be006867caf5df5.png
2. What aren’t the OpenAI whistleblowers saying?
  
  from @CaseyNewton
  
  A group of current and former employees say the company has been reckless — but aren’t offering many details
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 13-Feb-2024 10:42:14 JST Casey Newton
- Eugen Rochko
- Zoë Schiffer
Here's @zoeschiffer interviewing Mastodon founder @Gargron on the state of the platform and its relationship with Meta. He says he thinks two-way federation between Threads and Mastodon is coming this summer https://www.platformer.news/mastodon-interview-eugen-rochko-meta-bluesky-threads-federation/
In conversation about a year ago from mastodon.social permalink
Attachments
1. I know that they're working on this, and I believe that it's going to be available in the summer: two-way federation between Threads and Mastodon, and I'm looking forward to it. Obviously you have to keep an eye out on what's happening and whatnot, and I think it's a valid question to ask, will Mastodon still be in charge of its destiny? But at the same time, the status quo is that we're here and we're doing what we're doing, and if Meta decides to pivot on that, we're still exactly where we were, and there's nothing we can do about any of this. So I see no point in really freaking out about it.
  https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/111/921/481/902/842/949/original/0d8a880d02aa7be1.png
2. How Mastodon made friends with Meta
  
  Founder Eugen Rochko on helping Threads federate, dodging venture capital, and why he hopes Bluesky abandons its protocol
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 11-Oct-2023 11:39:58 JST Casey Newton
in reply to
- Mastodon Migration
- Flipboard Tech Desk
@mastodonmigration @TechDesk My preference is for a site with a vibrant and growing ecosystem, and an innovative product. Mastodon is designed to be a niche, and that's fine if that's what it wants to be. I'd note that I still actually post here and read my replies, unlike 99 percent of my peers in the US tech press

In conversation about a year ago from mastodon.social permalink
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Friday, 10-Mar-2023 16:00:14 JST Casey Newton

NEW: Meta is building a decentralized, text-based social network that will support ActivityPub. The company confirmed that it is in the early stages of the project to Platformer exclusively
https://www.platformer.news/p/meta-is-building-a-decentralized

In conversation Friday, 10-Mar-2023 16:00:14 JST from mastodon.social permalink
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 18-Feb-2023 03:04:00 JST Casey Newton

This is completely false. We stand by our reporting
In conversation Saturday, 18-Feb-2023 03:04:00 JST from mastodon.social permalink
Attachments
1. Untitled attachment
  https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/109/880/980/194/522/428/original/4bfd4494d0e75070.png
Casey Newton (caseynewton@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 15-Feb-2023 15:46:44 JST Casey Newton
- Zoë Schiffer
Elon Musk ordered major changes to the Twitter ranking algorithm this weekend after ... President Biden's tweet about the Eagles got higher engagement than his did.
Inside the secret system that's showing you all his tweets first, from @zoeschiffer and me. https://www.platformer.news/p/yes-elon-musk-created-a-special-system
In conversation Wednesday, 15-Feb-2023 15:46:44 JST from mastodon.social permalink
Attachments
1. At 2:36 on Monday morning, James Musk sent an urgent message to Twitter engineers. “We are debugging an issue with engagement across the platform,” wrote Musk, a cousin of the Twitter CEO, tagging “@here” in Slack to ensure that anyone online would see it. “Any people who can make dashboards and write software please can you help solve this problem. This is high urgency. If you are willing to help out please thumbs up this post.” When bleary-eyed engineers began to log on to their laptops, the nature of the emergency became clear: Elon Musk’s tweet about the Super Bowl got less engagement than President Joe Biden’s.
  https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/109/866/118/078/935/602/original/d6b8fec5a7f40a6e.png
2. Yes, Elon Musk created a special system for showing you all his tweets first
  
  from Zoë Schiffer
  
  After his Super Bowl tweet did worse numbers than President Biden’s, Twitter’s CEO ordered major changes to the algorithm

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Email salesman at Platformer and podcast co-host at Hard Fork.

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