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China Is Perfecting a New Method For Suppressing Dissent On the Internet (vox.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Vox: The art of suppressing dissent has been perfected over the years by authoritarian governments. For most of human history, the solution was simple: force. Punish people severely enough when they step out of line and you deter potential protesters. But in the age of the internet and "fake news," there are easier ways to tame dissent. A new study by Gary King of Harvard University, Jennifer Pan of Stanford University, and Margaret Roberts of the University of California San Diego suggests that China is the leading innovator on this front. Their paper, titled "How the Chinese Government Fabricates Social Media Posts for Strategic Distraction, Not Engaged Argument," shows how Beijing, with the help of a massive army of government-backed internet commentators, floods the web in China with pro-regime propaganda. What's different about China's approach is the content of the propaganda. The government doesn't refute critics or defend policies; instead, it overwhelms the population with positive news (what the researchers call "cheerleading" content) in order to eclipse bad news and divert attention away from actual problems. This has allowed the Chinese government to manipulate citizens without appearing to do so. It permits just enough criticism to maintain the illusion of dissent and only acts overtly when fears of mass protest or collective action arise.
George Orwell would have been proud.
Social Media in China must be hell on a slow news day
Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.
China is the only thing stopping the US from becoming a fully-fledged dictatorship so this news is probably good overall.
-creimer
Living in US, my concern is the fact-checking effort from Facebook, Google, Twitter.... https://www.usatoday.com/story... It sounds good on the surface. In the end, it won't be rosy. In a democratic society, the ultimate way to prevent fabricated facts is education. However, our public education system is ...?!
^(oo)^pig~
Orwell would've been amazed at the ingenuity of people and technology and the new ways of manipulating society he never thought of. He would admit that Huxley was closer to reality than him.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
About bad news and about good news. More news at 11
In the age where commercial journalism is driven by profit into an ever deepening cycle of selling fear, positive news is a pretty darn good thing. I am not sure how to counterbalance that with the negative news properly, but I am sure that when left fully to "market forces", news cycle is not at all balanced or fair.
As a humorous aside, in a recent meetup in Shanghai I met a guy whose job is "social media censor". Pleasant fella, speaks good English, and assured everyone that "he's a bad censor and never actually suppresses any posts" :)
I kinda wish we had some of these guys here, though (but may be suppress posts based on authors's apparent IQ rather than content bias)
... errrm, wait, they are already. Ok, scratch that.
Basically we're all living in a bubble already, it's only getting bigger and thicker, and China only is ahead a little bit because they have huge amounts of expendable labour to do this sort of thing manually and are a little more on the "single party" side of things that, for instance, the US. But to think that the society of the US is any free'er than that of China (it may be for a privileged group but that's about it) is almost absurd. Same goes for the bubbling void or reality that is the intarweb and it's surroundings here in Europe. Someone at Google just has to turn a few knobs and 2 weeks in a new belief will spread throughout society. This isn't really news.
The interesting thing is that this just emphasiszes what we all know already: The internet isn't the real world and reality in society happens where people meet in RL and interact with one another. No amount of internent communication (manipulated or otherwise) will change that.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
...the Democrats and the institutional media in the US have been playing this game for years and frankly N. Korea has essentially made the Kim family gods using this strategy. It's not really novel to blow smoke up people's asses for the gain of political power, just the methodology has gone digital for the internet age.
Who are you? The new #2 Who is #1? You are #617565. I am not a number, I am a free man! Muhahaha.
I wonder if the study replaced US with China to get it through? Because I think US has been doing this for a long time. Maybe not intentionally but just by developing the Web2.0 where users themselves generate the content. Then it is simply a matter of keeping multiple viewpoints balanced and tied to create a good distraction.
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Trump is not happy being president. He apparently wants to be a dictator.
Watch The Singing Trump, with 4 men dressed as Secret Service Agents, on America's Got Talent. The Singing Trump says who he loves.
In the 2nd song of that performance, see the laughing when he says, "Am I original?"
Watch the 1st audition. The judges and audience were shocked.
Whether people like it or not, it definitely is political commentary.
Best internet dissent suppression possible: no internet at all. And btw, NK already perfected that cheerleading strat; the Chinese are just applying it to the internet in larger numbers.
And insidious, too.
Just make sure you have enough crackpots to spread bullshit about. The more insane the conspiracy theory, the better. From Chemtrails to Flat Earth, from Reptiloids to Hitler's base on the dark side of the moon, just make sure you flood everything that people could possibly use to get non-approved news with enough bullshit that nobody would want to wade through the pits of steaming shit in the vain search for tangible information.
It is way more efficient than trying to suppress non-approved information. Because if you try to suppress it, every little bit of leaked info can be scrutinized by the people wanting to see for themselves what the world has in store for them and what really happens. But when you make sure that anything that could threaten your narrative is drowned in the noise of utter bullshit, people will not even bother trying.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
If there's anything the internet has shown us, is that Fake News has been occurring ever since there was a media, and especially since the media became operating arms of weapons manufacturers.
I think they did all their experimenting with Marxism on Reddit to make sure it would actually work.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
all chinks are the same
"Dude, please! The preferred nomenclature is, 'Chinese American.'"
+5 insightful (and fearless)
> overwhelms the population with positive news
The problem emerges is when there is no substance behind positive news. If you say the mini-plenty chocolate allowance (or whatever it's called in Orwell's english original) has been augmented to 25 grams per week, instead of the previous 30, few people will cheer.
On the other hand, in a country where the guvmint can sincerely announce that 5 new hospitals have been built last quarter, 10 panda families saved, three more counties are getting linked by autobahn and HST until end of the year, materinity leave option is extended by further 4 months, inflation and unemplyoment are both at 3% and GDP has been steadily growing 5-6% per annum during the last decade - well, in such a place there is no need to quell dissent, because any dissent will be just mild creative criticism, rather than opposition or resistance.
Look at Yelp or Glassdoor or any place that allows for "open reviewing and commenting"
Both my apartment complex AND my company regularly spam review sites with "good newz everyone!" reviews. Like multiple 5 star ratings in a day after weeks of bad reviews.
Even on Amazon the review system is notoriously gamed - so it shouldn't be surprising that nations have adopted the same strategies.
You can probably even point to early newspapers that were funded by political cronies as an aspect of the same thing
On the bright side at least the dissenting voices are being heard in China instead of the usual state-run monolithic media.
This is Why NASA 'cuts live feed from International Space Station
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
UFO Sightings NASA Shuts Live Video Feed As Massive UFO Appears
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
UFO caught on ISS live feed before NASA cuts off 'again'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
I am sure they're not hiding anything, it's just coincident that they cut the live feed every time something show up.
I suspect that not only do the "Flood the web in China", but the people in China also "Flood the Web in the USA".
We are focused on Russia for interfering with our elections. Of course ______ * _____ is interfering with our elections also using increasingly sophisticated propaganda campaigns. *(international banks/corporations/nations/media conglomerates/foundations)
Meanwhile, people in middle america are unemployed, under educated, impoverished, depressed and addicted. But their health doesn't matter because they are stupid and deplorable.
Democracy for the people (particularly the bottom 50% of the IQ bell curve) is almost dead (and it is happening on our watch). Citizens of the world, CCP is a model of our future, unless we act.
https://yro.slashdot.org/story/17/06/23/1442206/chinese-government-fabricates-social-media-posts-for-strategic-distraction-not-engaged-argument
In contrast to prior claims, we show that the Chinese regime's strategy is to avoid arguing with skeptics of the party and the government, and to not even discuss controversial issues.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Heck, it goes back to ancient times.
It's not just governments, but religions, corporations, and other institutions have all done this for millennia.
All China did was put it on the Intertubes on a massive scale.
This is exactly the approach that the present Indian government is also using. Their intent is to use propaganda, lies and an army of trolls to control dissent, distract people from what is really happening and also to suppress any hint of an opposition.
One of the former members of this huge paid army even released a book on it:
http://www.amazon.in/Am-Troll-...
The Prime Minister Modi himself follows some of the worst members of this troll army who use rape threats, murder threats and whatever else against anyone engaging in any form of dissent.
The BJP party which is in power is the primary backers and the ones who run this troll army:
http://mashable.com/2016/12/27...
The question is if they are actively avoiding the fixing of the actual problems instead of just avoiding to talk about them. Maximizing instability isn't a sound strategy for a party that wants to minimize instability. And reason for the latter is of course their inherent realization of the increasing illegitimacy of their own power.
There are already people doing the exact same thing. And they have been under the radar for about a decade.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VANK
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China did this long ago - anyone recall the "Chinese Water Army" https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&biw=&bih=&q=%22Chinese+Water+Army%22&btnG=Google+Search&gbv=1/ ?
* Straight outta the "George Soros playbook" (lol!).
APK
P.S.=> So, in other words, they're up to their SAME OLD TRICKS... apk
that was all to hide embarassing fact, US authorities had the opportunity to try prevent 9/11 but did nothing you guess what, Bush was in office, and needed some "good reason", to end up the work of his father, END saddam's regime.
Since day 1, Bush 43 was already about saddam ( see clinton's book my life ).
While the real thing may have likely be, US secret services likely been ordered to look elsewhere at time of 9/11, when it was about radical islamism, for president Bush to take the opportunity of any future blast to promote HIS was in iraq.
Hence US secret services said they never "received" the following report, warning them, of any future attack.
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSL1612543820070416
When some investigations may have taken place, to prove they were ordered to look elsewhere. They ran this flooded mentra "comploting theory", Every day a new one, to make people and press busy, while days after days thinking it was all BS.
The same thing is happening in Hungary (or dare I say, Hungaristan) right now.
Those YouTube executive SJWs are likely behind this. Committing human rights violations in the name of social injustice and corporate oligarchy which reigns supreme over government, communist or democratic.
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I'm going to continue using the Host File Engine. Your software is well written, functional. The Host File Engine performs exactly as promised by mmell
his hosts program is actually pretty good by xenotransplant
his hosts tool is actually useful for those cases in which one does indeed want to locally block stuff outright while consuming minimum system resources by alexgieg
(APK's) work, I've flat out said it's good by BronsCon
I've tried his hosts file generating software. It works by bmo
APK your posts on this & the hosts file posts, and more, have never been in error &/or bad advice by BlueStrat
Your premise that hostfiles are a good way to deal with advertising & malvertising is quite valid by JazzLad
I like your host file system by Karmashock
* It's recommended/hosted by Malwarebytes' hpHosts!
APK
P.S.=> China imitated me http://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/04/26/boffins_supercharge_the_hosts_file_to_save_users_plagued_by_dns_outages/ - more coming in part #2... apk
Not only are they using the internet to do this, but they also consistently raise the quality of life of their citizens. It's evil genius!
the article summary could have had 80% fewer words and still have gotten all the important facts across. All the rest was just self-indulgent logorrhea.
What country doesn't produce pro-government propaganda? I understand it is different in China than the US but seriously we shouldn't act like it is some foreign thing that we have never heard of when our government does the same stuff.
I am reminded of this passage from Neal Stephenson's novel Anathem:
Source
-kgj
It changed the U.S. presidential election. Where the rubber meets the road is the voting booth. If people are voting based on bad information, then bad candidates are elected to bad things with the public weal.
So that is a level-N game. Bots, humans, news... still a game.
Knowing it is a game, you have to see if you can be a level N+1 player.
Does knowing this make you able to beat a level N player? Even as an individual, and not a nation, now that you know slightly more about what and how they are doing, can you "win" more or "lose" less?
I can. Reproducibly. And that means it isn't fake news after all. And that means that the wall of the bubble isn't as thick for me as it might be for someone else. Relatively speaking, the bubble wall is growing thinner for me.
What information and understanding, what ideas in your head, would practically and not delusionally, reduce bubble thickness/improve winningness/reduce losingness?
This is a great example showing that these so called researchers at the so called top universities are doing -- useless research, politically driven, and not contributing to the welfare of the social world. No, I am not saying whether they are drawing right conclusions or not, but the real question is, given the terrible state of so many problems that exist today, who cares about the research topic these researchers are carrying out? It is a gigantic waste of tax payers' dollars.
However, our public education system is ...?!
"His name was James Damore."
ah... so they do study the new york times after all... needle in the haystack, we've been doing that for years.
Nope you are just a tool.
No one brought up your worthless software so why did your idiot self feel the need to bring it up?
That is right, you don't have anything else so piss off.
You are right that China does imitate you, just not how you think.
They spam and overwhelm with propaganda, just like you do all the time, you big fat gay baby.
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See subject: Registered /.ers say I provide a program they like & use (what "your kind" can't ever do, lol) https://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=10944219&cid=54933297/ - all YOU ever do is troll & harass others by UNIDENTIFIABLE anonymous posts (some 'feat', lmao (not)).
APK
P.S.=> My using that fact in that link above easily shuts "your kind" (do-nothing "ne'er-do-wells", useless drags on society) every single time - have fun "raging out" KNOWING that others know what you are & yes, so do YOU (lol)... apk
"Fair and balanced" is a euphemism for state-propaganda machine!
...run by Homer Simpson?!?
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
The internet isn't the real world and reality in society happens where people meet in RL and interact with one another. No amount of internent communication (manipulated or otherwise) will change that.
Fortunately they invented safe spaces to prevent that. You can't let all those years of carefully manipulated student thought get destroyed too easily.
Shut up retard. You add nothing of value to any discussion you participate in. Whenever you attempt to communicate it is so random that the entropy in the rest of the universe decreases by an order of magnitude to compensate.
But to think that the society of the US is any free'er than that of China (it may be for a privileged group but that's about it) is almost absurd.
This is absolutely not correct. In the US, there is indeed constant propaganda that overwhelms our senses, but there are multiple, conflicting streams from a diverse range of sources covering the entire spectrum, and many of those streams directly attack and criticize the government and specific leaders with impunity. This situation does not exist in China. The actual set of ideas that flow through the US system may not be any more true or desirable than the in the Chinese system, but the US is absolutely much more free than the Chinese system solely due to the practical ability of anyone to inject their two-cent's worth of opinions and have those opinions reach the masses.
I am starting to think the founding father did not have the best interest of the folk in their heart with the first amendment. You give the impression to the plebe they are free.... But in reality you bury dissenting speech in a flood of crap done by the plebe. This is probably the best genius idea to make sure counter speech is never hear of.
Or alternatively it does not work like that, and your contention that news is flooded by a wave of crap is invalid.
and they do it much more subtly. Chinese propaganda machine acts in a very stupid way. They keep yelling in your ears day and night to the point nobody believes them. The US media however will carefully piece together selected evidences to lead you to a preset conclusion, but they never tell you the conclusion directly, so that you'll believe you draw the conclusions on your own thinking, based on "facts".
Living in eastern Europe, this is nothing new. You do not argue, you change the topic. This is happening in several countries, just on smaller scale. Government backed media is full of news like police returning stolen goods and great sports achievements and great turnout of crops and new playground opened. That are of no interest to the open public, but make you feel you live at a great place.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
Pick up a school textbook anywhere in the country. I'm sure once you've read it you'll want to send a gift certificate for a handy J to the extraordinarily red Texas commission that picked it.
It's exactly what the MNM did during the Obama administration to cover up its dozen scandals, and the exact opposite of what they are doing now to the Trump administration with fake news.
Running with Linux for over 20 years!
In other news, Trump decides what is neus (sp is correct) using the China Model
Tyrants of a feather and all that
See subject: ... & look @ YOU trying to use "big words" too like the 'pseudo-intellectual' that "your kind" always is - hahahahaha - what a WANNABE!
* I love it - Especially making you "lose it" & "rage out"! It's what you "Soros LOSERS" always do... hehehehe!
(QUESTION - Is your employer George Soros upset you can't keep your cool or what?? LMAO!)
APK
P.S.=> It's a FACT China did this before via their "water army" (or very much like this current 'tactic') - so won't you Puh-LEESE take your own advice, chump - ok??? Thanks!... apk
The American approach being electing a president and then having 4 years of none stop press coverage of him and him alone and no coverage whatsoever of what goes on in congress, in the supreme court or the various governors mansions or local legislatures as if we were a dictatorships where this 1 person actually controlled the whole body of government. Turn on CNN -- it's all Trump 24/7. It's unwatchable drivel. We don't get real news from our media. We get a dog and pony showing centered around whoever is POTUS. The real governing gets zero coverage.
Hey man, if it avoids civil unrest of a billion people it might be justified.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
The only difference is that they use the "hate speech" smear to silence people.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
a little more on the "single party" side of things that, for instance, the US.
One party, two parties, same thing.
This will only handicap China. It'll pay dearly for its mistakes in the long run - self inflicted wounds.
However, our public education system is ...?!
...run by Democrats?
Seriously? The current head of the DoE is a god-bothering, slack-jawed, single-digit IQ, cuntsack of a Republican. And the Republicans have made no secret at all of wanting to destroy public education in this country in order to continue spreading unquestioning religious idiocy. So yeah... there's that.
I don't care much for the Democrats either, but at least they see the value in a decent, secular educated population.
"A government is a body of people usually -- notably -- ungoverned." -Shepherd Book
After all, the majority of people who read comments on this site will only ever encounter paid trolls employed by US corporations, or the US government... or maybe Israel. And tons of them, at that. Weird how /. almost never has articles about American-paid trolling, when it is perhaps the most damaging variety for americans.
From what I see, the people of China are happier than the people in the U.S. They can't vote and they're spied on but of the two, the first is the only difference between the U.S. and China. Besides, look who got voted in as President. That's what giving the vote to idiots gets you, doesn't it? As for happy news, isn't that what every State of the Union Address in living memory has put out to the public? Forget about the crumbling infrastructure and the endless poverty across the country, let's talk about the good things we've done. China isn't perfect, I know that very well, but neither is the U.S. The saying about the pot and the kettle comes to mind. As for human rights, the U.S. uses solitary confinement as torture plus they have GITMO for all the sickos who want to torture prisoners with their hands. Is that better than what we hear coming out of China?