Slashdot Mirror
CNN Warns It May Expose An Anonymous Critic If He Ever Again Publishes Bad Content (theintercept.com)
New submitter evolutionary writes: CNN appears to be giving veiled threats at a Reddit user who posted critical comments about the media giant. After an apology was given by the Reddit user (possibly under fear upon discovering CNN had his identity), CNN stated: "CNN reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change." The story stems around Trump's July 2nd tweet, which includes a video showing him wrestle and takedown someone with a photoshopped CNN logo on their head. The video was accompanied by the hashtags #FraudNewsCNN and #FNN. CNN reportedly tracked down the Reddit user who claimed credit for the tweet and announced they would not publicize the user's identity since they issued a lengthy public apology, promised not to repeat the behavior, and claimed status as a private citizen. However, as The Intercept reports, "the network explicitly threatened that it could change its mind about withholding the user's real name if this behavior changes in the future: 'CNN is not publishing HanA**holeSolo's name because he is a private citizen who has issued an extensive statement of apology, showed his remorse by saying he has taken down all his offending posts, and because he said he is not going to repeat this ugly behavior on social media again. In addition, he said his statement could serve as an example to others not to do the same. CNN reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change.'"
The guy admitted to them he's a troll, and asked them not to publish his real name because of the potential negative impact his trolling would have on his real life. They said ok, but if you start trolling again we may not be willing to withhold your name.
What's the better option? What they did, or publish and be damned (with probably at least a bunch of harassment for the guy), or withhold the name but not tell him they might publish in future if he keeps it up? I think they chose a reasonable course.
When I read this article I was surprised at the tone and how they treated the troll. The attitude of the writer was, "Hey everyone! We finally caught a troll! He acts all big and bad online but once we got his name he was all scared and apologetic. Don't be a scared little troll, be good online or we will find you like we found this troll." I think the writer thought he was doing a public service, but in reality he was being a corporate despot. There are people in power who want to get rid of anonymity on the internet, and the fact is, if The Man really wants to know what you do online, The Man will find out. The thing is, this problem with Russian hacking and talk of fake news is giving The Man more reasons to get rid of anonymity online.
Shameless self promotion, I wrote a cyberpunk novel about this sort of thing called Girl in a Fishbowl
The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
It's pretty straightforward. Trump tweets the third-party content. CNN sees the content and starts to investigate the source of that content -- just as any news outlet would. They find out that the source of the content was from a Reddit user. They see a ton of other disgusting content that the Reddit user also created. BOOM --
this is a real story... the president is tweeting content from a disgusting internet troll. CNN digs deeper and finds out the identity of the source of that content. The person's identity is very relevant to the story. The reporter contacts the person, tells them that they know who he is and what he did. The troll rightly freaks out, sends a letter of apology, and makes an impassioned plea that he won't do anything like this again if CNN won't publish his name. CNN agrees to conditionally respect that request.
I don't see the issue here, folks. News outlets do this every single day of the week and twice on Sundays. A big part of journalism is digging, finding the story, finding the hidden underbelly... and then deciding what to do with that information. Every news outlet has serious dirt on a lot of people that they don't release. Many times, those people ask the news outlets not reveal their identities. Sometimes the news outlet says yes. Sometimes the news outlet says no.
CNN is not going to release this guy's name -- although they certainly could have as it is pertinent to the story. But the bigger story here is that (yet again), the President does some completely moronic and non-presidential on Twitter.
If the idiotic photograph of the Trump beheading had blurred out Kathy Griffin's face... the news outlets would have (rightly) dug deep to expose who was in the photograph and who took the photograph. I'm sure they would have called her up saying, "We know who you are, we know what you did." I'm sure Kathy Griffin would also made an impassioned plea to that news outlet.
There are consequences in everything you do. If you act like a complete idiot... and it becomes newsworthy... then you'd better watch out. Because a world of hurt is coming down on you.
When you reward behavior like this, it will continue.
I would suspect CNN will use this tactic going forward to silence critics and other opinions CNN doesn't agree with.
Thus, f*ck CNN and their extorsionist ultimatum bullshit.
I don't do ultimatums. I would make another video just out of spite. Their threats be damned.
Okay let's boil this down. Small guy versus giant news agency. What small guy did was publish some pieces and made the Internet equal of a political cartoon. That's free speech and bully for the small guy. Big news company comes in an begins their "CNN SMASH" all over the place and small guy breaks. I'm pretty sure this has been going on since printing press to some degree, and each era gets its own version of disgusted by it. So digs on CNN for being the bad guy, but at the same time, this guy got called and he just couldn't own up to what he published. Heck at least in days of yore the truly brave who eventually got called on their pieces owned it at the end of the day. Those that actually do political cartoons sign their name on it, so you know who owns it.
And that's my thing about trolls. It's one thing to have an opinion that runs counter to the popular option. You like Trump? Fine, so be it. You're a racist? Cool, glad to know you can at least admit it, even though I think you're scum. You like to pretend to be homophobic because you just like to get the LULZ by bucking the trend? Put a sock in it amateur.
F- CNN for what boils down to blackmail, but F- this "victim" for publishing BS he can't even stand beside. Do I think doxxing is okay? Nope, and CNN doxxing is bull, but even CNN being in the clear wrong about this doesn't make Mr. Reddit BS any more right. Until we get more legal clarification (LOOKING AT YOU CONGRESS AND YOUR INABILITY TO MODERNIZE LAWS) it's basically wild west rules when it comes online blackmailing. It's a gamble, maybe you'll make a point, maybe the point will get lost on you being a bully. CNN made a call and it was clearly the wrong one, but this dude, he gets no clean hands in the matter either.
As far as the other stuff. That's just people trying to make more of this story to fit a narrative that MSM is evil. I think they're mostly BS but I think the same about most of the people in the capital in DC. So while it's cool to think MSM is this soul sucking menace, I think the folks who can actually be soul sucking menaces are ranked a little higher on my list. CNN being anti-Trump is one soul sucking beast and that's just how it is, at least everyone I hope has the intelligence to mostly ignore them. GOP wanting to "reform" healthcare is a different kind of soul sucking beast that's a bit more real than the man in the TV and is less able to be ignored.
You want to do a GIF of the President punching a news network, cool, at least own up to your art. Oops, you got some baggage under your account you're not exactly proud of? Might want to reexamine your motives for putting that baggage there in the first place.
Also, I don't disagree with anything you said (except the CNN knowing that the Russia story is fake, I don't give them that much credit), especially your sig, voted third party myself, and I'm proud to own up to that.
That thinking is part of the problem. They're a media outlet. They used to be respectable journalists. And taking offense at a harmless joke is beyond lunacy. The "picked sides" long before 'HanAssholeSolo' created that hilarious 'political cartoon' aka political gif
Think about what you're saying here though. You're saying that what the President of the United States says to the public is not only not worth reporting on, but that it lessens a news organization for doing so.
I think if you read my post again, you'll see that I said precisely the opposite.
What I said is that what the President of the United States says to the public is very much reporting on. What some Reddit troll who never had direct contact with the President does is not. And that by going after the Reddit troll, CNN managed to take the spotlight away from the Trump's behavior, distracting us from what really does matter with their own bad behavior.
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.
Correct the video was what drew their attention however dude was a vile piece of shit advocating for violence against all kinds of groups and calling for shooting members of the media so i'm sure that's what pissed them off. Either way. His information was already public so it's not like they dug up private information anyway like Drudge and the like would have you believe. When you have your info public and go pushing for violence against people because of their color or group or whatever then fuck it.. you deserve what the fuck you get. The dude was an asshole.