Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Egypt's New Law Targets Social Media, Journalists For 'Fake News' (reuters.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the intentionally-vague dept.

Egypt's parliament passed a law Monday giving the state powers to block social media users and penalize journalists for publishing fake news. "Under the law passed on Monday social media accounts and blogs with more than 5,000 followers on sites such as Twitter and Facebook will be treated as media outlets, which makes them subject to prosecution for publishing false news or incitement to break the law," reports Reuters. From the report: The Supreme Council for the Administration of the Media, headed by an official appointed by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, will supervise the law and take action against violations. The bill prohibits the establishment of websites without obtaining a license from the Supreme Council and allows it to suspend or block existing websites, or impose fines on editors. The law, which takes effect after it is ratified by Sisi, also states that journalists can only film in places that are not prohibited, but does not explain further. Supporters of Sisi say the law is intended to safeguard freedom of expression and it was approved after consultations with judicial experts and journalists. But critics say it will give legal basis to measures the government has been taking to crack down on dissent and extend its control over social media.

79 comments

  1. um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Anybody else expecting this to be used to punish people who raise facts that the 'dear leader' (of whatever country) finds distasteful?

    First we get powerful people using fake news to bend the minds of voters into idiot sheep

    Next we get powerful people using the fear of fake news to charge and persecute people who disagree with them, even if they do so using facts

    Does anybody else feel that we are moving backwards in time and will soon be serfs to our lairds?

    1. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      'Fake news' is the new 'Racist' - to be used to shut down anything the government/media/internet companies don't like.

      If you can't convince them with reason, call them names and ban them from speaking.

    2. Re:um, yeah... by KiloByte · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Anybody else expecting this to be used to punish people who raise facts that the 'dear leader' (of whatever country) finds distasteful?

      Was there a single instance of such a law not meant exclusively for this exact purpose?

      --
      The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
    3. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Starting with the Magna Carta. there was a long history of laws that raised the status of commoners and eliminated the powers of rulers.

      We seem to have been moving backwards recently

    4. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This was about Egypt. Did you read the summary or the article? There is no such equivalent committee here in the US. And the US press bashes our politicians on a daily basis with a free hand. So what are you referring to then? A few obnoxious people currently in the executive branch who are more bark than bite? The only real point you made is you want public money for something. It's written in the Bill of Rights. Freedom of the press. It's right there. 1st Amendment. So why are you bashing the US, which is one of the few countries that has a primary constitutional law that says you cannot infringe on freedom of the press.

    5. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In case you haven't noticed, just having the amendment isn't enough. More must be done in not just here, but a lot of places.

    6. Re: um, yeah... by datavirtue · · Score: 2

      Yeah....it was called the fairness doctrine.

      --
      I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
    7. Re:um, yeah... by youngone · · Score: 5, Interesting
      That's not actually true, although it is widely believed apparently:

      Research by Victorian historians showed that the original 1215 charter had concerned the medieval relationship between the monarch and the barons, rather than the rights of ordinary people, but the charter remained a powerful, iconic document, even after almost all of its content was repealed from the statute books in the 19th and 20th centuries. Magna Carta still forms an important symbol of liberty today, often cited by politicians and campaigners, and is held in great respect by the British and American legal communities, Lord Denning describing it as "the greatest constitutional document of all times – the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the despot"

      That is from the Wikipedia article.
      Your point is not without merit however. Al Sisi rules largely due to the military support of the US, as he is seen as an enemy of the Muslim Brotherhood.
      I understood the US has a law that forbids the supply of military aid to any government that takes power in a coup, so the US just declared that there was no coup.
      Problem solved.

    8. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To many people think their 1st Amendment Rights are being violated if you don't agree with what they say or publish. And 5 minute news cycles leaves no time for fact checking. All we get are sensationalist headlines used to generate clicks coupled with content that never comes close to matching up with the headline. Lies of omission and ignoring or blurring the context in which an article or speech is created has become the journalists SOP today. And any major or minor news outlets should get rid of their "editorial line" which is just another way of declaring their bias and intention of shaping anything they publish to support their editorial line. The NYT and the Washington Post have become National Enquirer on steroids.

    9. Re:um, yeah... by Hallux-F-Sinister · · Score: 1

      That's not actually true, although it is widely believed apparently:

      Research by Victorian historians showed that the original 1215 charter had concerned the medieval relationship between the monarch and the barons, rather than the rights of ordinary people, but the charter remained a powerful, iconic document, even after almost all of its content was repealed from the statute books in the 19th and 20th centuries. Magna Carta still forms an important symbol of liberty today, often cited by politicians and campaigners, and is held in great respect by the British and American legal communities, Lord Denning describing it as "the greatest constitutional document of all times – the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the despot"

      That is from the Wikipedia article. Your point is not without merit however. Al Sisi rules largely due to the military support of the US, as he is seen as an enemy of the Muslim Brotherhood. I understood the US has a law that forbids the supply of military aid to any government that takes power in a coup, so the US just declared that there was no coup. Problem solved.

      So true. So minitrue...

      --
      Our reign has gone on long enough. Indeed. Summon the meteors.
    10. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Public money used to guarantee freedom of the press just means using public money to taint the press based on the politics of who is running the government. The press needs to remain independent. Public funding of any sort becomes state media touting the state line.

      The thing about Fox News is they don't pretend that their opinion hosts are not opinionated. They have hard news reporting which stays fairly focused on news without the commentary. Editorial decisions might decide what news gets the most air time, but it is fairly accurate. It can just be conveniently one sided at times based on what stories they actually report on.

      The problem is other networks such as MSNBC which conflate their commentary and news. There's nothing wrong with biased commentary so long as you're honest about what it is. Portraying slanted commentary as hard news is the problem. Jumping on stories before getting the facts because the story fits a narrative is wrong. Posting now, creating an outrage echo chamber on social media, then retracting later after the damage has been done is wrong. There is far too much of that from the more liberal media in the US. They're so determined to nail Trump on any rumor, they've forgotten how to be real reporters.

    11. Re: um, yeah... by unimacs · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The fairness doctrine required broadcasters to provide air time to the discussion of controversial issues of public importance and they had to provide contrasting views of those issues.

      A radio station or TV network could broadcast any point of view that they liked as long as they gave air time to somebody with an opposing view.

      So, nothing like the Egyptian law at all really.

      Many think that today's more polarized political environment is partly the result of the FCC dropping the fairness doctrine instead of expanding it to cover more types of media. Unfortunately, today it's all too easy to insulate oneself in their own little news bubble where opposing points of view are never heard and anything from outside that bubble is "fake".

      Imagine a world where giving time to opposing viewpoints was considered normal and proper. Imagine a world where conservative speakers would be welcomed at a liberal college...

    12. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Public money used to guarantee freedom of the press just means using public money to taint the press based on the politics of who is running the government. The press needs to remain independent. Public funding of any sort becomes state media touting the state line.

      That is why you have to setup a bunch of independent outlets that check each other. It is not a trust based system, but a system where everyone has a motive to out mistakes by everyone else. One small outlet in nowhere oregon could point out mistakes in a major florida outlet, and if confirmed get their correction ran. If an outlet shows a pattern of bias, then there could be a call for disenfranchisement, where the public would also have a roll and all allegations verified in a court of law.

      Yes, its going to be a lot of work to setup, and yes a naive approach would be worse than useless, but ultimately the only alternative is the pure for profit networks, or the small sights and outfits that mostly copy each other, along with some that just make up crap. Real investigative journalism is expensive.

      In short, do whatever it takes to get the job done, and make sure it is credible.

      If you have to divert _half_ the military budget to making sure the average american is as well informed as is practical, then that is not too high a price, since without that our democracy is in trouble.

    13. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Egypt attitude seems perfect for creimers. Why don't we send ours there?

    14. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nice try, but sadly you can't use Trump as a source for anything but grade A bullshit. He is somewhere around false or misleading statement 3500 according to the washington post, and they are a legitimate news agency, even if you don't like Amazon.

      Clinton didn't rig a primary, though some in her party wanted her and put their thumb on the scale. Did bernie get a fair shake? probably not, but it was hardly rigged. Bernie was also one of the ones that got help from Russia. I'm sure he didn't want it, but before they thought Trump had a shot they were just focusing on general chaos. Bernie is a good man, and any comparison to Trump can only come to the conclusion that by comparison, Trump is not. At minimum Trump was disloyal at helsenki, and a disloyal president is one we certainly can't afford to go unchecked.,

      Fake news is news that is wholly or partly made up to convey a meaning significantly different than a neutral reading of the actual facts would convey. That's it. Doesn't matter who coined the term, as long as it is used correctly. The actual hard news reporters at Fox are not fake news. They may choose to emphasize some parts rather than others, and cover certain stories rather than others, but they are credible, as are many other networks and news services, including CNN and the Times.

      If you want to blame CNN for something, you can blame them for all the free press they gave Trump. That was disgraceful and should not have happened, but guess what, Trump gets viewers. That is the problem when News and profit are in an unholy marriage. It is not unique to CNN.

      Any of the republican candidates were better than Trump, as well of course as both of the democratic ones. The only one nearly as slimy was Cruz, and at least I think he is loyal to the country. Trump has lost even that. I've noted that a lot of Trump support is the Faustian bargain to try to finally overturn Roe V Wade. Another big chunk is people who think Trump must be doing the right thing cause he is making democrats mad. Those two section are significant. The first is just an ends justify the means thing, when it almost never does, and the second is just the admiration of the strong man/Bully/jerk.

    15. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Uranium One, where the Clintons sold of US uranium to Russia while Mueller looked away. Where's the MSM outrage about that? Oh, right, don't bite the hand that feeds.

      DNC/FBI spying on Trump, paying foreign spies to generate dossiers on their political adversaries. Actual collusion here. Crickets from the MSM.

      John Brennan, a known liar and rendition/torture advocate, whom WaPo was calling on Obama to fire as recently as 2014, is now being quoted and given praise by that same media outlet simply because he's on the anti-Trump bandwagon.

      Conspiracy by FBI agents to work against a candidate to prevent him from winning an election. MSM? Nope. Wrong team. say nothing.

      Clandestine email server containing classified documents which non-entitled people got their hands on. When discovered, they refused to give it to the FBI for analysis. President meets DOJ in panicked landing-strip meeting. Rather than arresting and confiscating the server for analysis, the FBI did nothing. Some emails get leaked, implicating the DNC primary rigging. Russia is blamed even though there is evidence that they were leaked by an inside party. The outrage is on Russia for exposing the truth, instead of on the crime that was exposed.

      Out of the blue accusation that Trump colluded with Russia, and no evidence to back it up? BRING ON THE SPECIAL COUNSEL! We'll take decades if we have to to get something, ANYTHING, on Trump. In the meantime, we don't need facts, because we KNOW it's TREASON!11!1

      There is a mountain of corruption in US government, but it ain't Trump.

    16. Re: um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The fairness doctrine......that emphasized both political parties, at the expense of third parties? It was a doctrine that reinforced the status quo

    17. Re: um, yeah... by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      The BBC tired really hard to do what you suggest for a while. The problem is that it ended up giving credibility to people who had none, elevating fringe views and conspiracy theories to the same level as mainstream science, for example.

      Left/right politics is one thing, but journalists need to decide if they want to balance every story about vaccines with some anti-vaxxers. That of course means they will always be criticised, accused of bias and called fake news by someone.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    18. Re: um, yeah... by The+Cynical+Critic · · Score: 2, Insightful

      What the BBC did for years was try to discredit conservatives as a whole by having the conservative viewpoint represented by the same fringe conservatives (i.e conservative crazies) over and over again in an attempt to give people the impression these people (crazies) represented conservatives as a whole. This giving the crazies some form of credibility is just pure irony considering their real goal.

      I'm by no means a fan of the tories, but once I realized that the BBC was doing was just straw manning the conservative viewpoint using crazies I concluded they simply can't be trusted for news analysis. Mind you I'm still looking for a reliable source for analysis as everybody has a pretty bad slant these days.

      --
      "Why should I want to make anything up? Life's bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it."
    19. Re: um, yeah... by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      So we'll check you off in the 'no opposing viewpoints' column, then.

      There's a plummy job waiting for you in Brussels!

    20. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Donna Brazile, the head of the DNC at the time, said Clinton rigged the primary process to make sure she won and Sanders lost.

      If you want to call the person in charge of the DNC a liar, who was part of the scheme, fine. But I did not make it up, Trump did not make it up, Fox News did not make it up, Donna Brazile even wrote a book about it. Sander is currently suing based on what she told him.

      Clinton literally RIGGED a primary and you defend her. Your opinions on democracy no longer matter.

    21. Re:um, yeah... by Layzej · · Score: 2

      The point is that descriptive writing is very rarely entirely accurate and during the reign of Olaf Quimby II as Patrician of Ankh some legislation was passed in a determined attempt to put a stop to this sort of thing and introduce some honesty into reporting. Thus, if a legend said of a notable hero that “all men spoke of his prowess” any bard who valued his life would add hastily “except for a couple of people in his home village who thought he was a liar, and quite a lot of other people who had never really heard of him.” Poetic simile was strictly limited to statements like “his mighty steed was as fleet as the wind on a fairly calm day, say about Force Three,” and any loose talk about a beloved having a face that launched a thousand ships would have to be backed by evidence that the object of desire did indeed look like a bottle of champagne.

      Quimby was eventually killed by a disgruntled poet during an experiment conducted in the palace grounds to prove the disputed accuracy of the proverb “The pen is mightier than the sword,” and in his memory it was amended to include the phrase “only if the sword is very small and the pen is very sharp.” - the Colour of Magic

    22. Re: um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      BBC too left wing? Fox News is what you're after.

    23. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      LOL this is all shit but you don't know that

    24. Re: um, yeah... by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Which conservative crazies are you referring to?

      The Tories have a deliberate policy of not making key people available for interview, or only doing one easy interview that they know will let them get their prepared statements out.

      Then they let the crazies give a more extreme view to shift the political discourse to the right and make themselves look more moderate and reasonable. Trying to occupy that centre, moderate ground by shifting people's perception of where it is.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    25. Re: um, yeah... by The+Cynical+Critic · · Score: 1

      The idea that the tories would intentionally parade the crazies the BBC uses to (mis)represent their own viewpoint is simply laughable. While they may not be the cleverest bunch of people, as shown by how they've messed up literally everything related to brexit, they're not stupid enough to intentionally use crazies as ambassadors for the party like that.

      As for supposedly not making key people available for interview, you do realize that ministers and other key people in government and party leadership do have quite a lot of things they need to take care of do besides talking to the media? As highly as the media thinks of itself, people with proper jobs and responsibilities just aren't going to be at their beck and call 24/7.

      --
      "Why should I want to make anything up? Life's bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it."
    26. Re: um, yeah... by The+Cynical+Critic · · Score: 1

      In terms of bias the BBC is like cutting up the underside of your forearms (straight cut from the wrist to the elbow, i.e the wrist cut that will actually kill you if you do it right) while Fox News is like jumping in front of a speeding train (i.e a certain and very messy death). One is obviously much worse, but being less bad than Fox News, which people called "Faux News" about a decade before "Fake News" became a thing, isn't exactly much to aspire to.

      --
      "Why should I want to make anything up? Life's bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it."
    27. Re: um, yeah... by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Okay, which crazies are you talking about here? It's hard to discuss without knowing specifically who you object to.

      Are we talking Farage? Redwood? Boris?

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    28. Re: um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      State sponsored media is not freedom. âoeKill itâ is ABSOLUTELY not freedom. You have failed to understand a foundational concept of democracy, but Icguess that par for the course for a boot licking red hat.

    29. Re: um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Parties arenâ(TM)t states. They are a private cooperative of likeminded voters who agree to vote as a bloc. The concept of primary elections is relatively new, and the rules and processes vary wildly from place to place. Does the DNC suck? Sure, but what exactly does that have to do with the electoral college? You know, the only democratic process documented for the election of President. I canâ(TM)t help it if the only people getting their names on the ballot for Elector are making loyalty pledges to a mostly out-of-state group that came up with a name instead of doing their Constitutional duty to wisely vet and vote for the best candidate for the office, but apparently that isnâ(TM)t the part that upsets you.

    30. Re: um, yeah... by The+Cynical+Critic · · Score: 1

      It's funny how the examples you bring up are mostly just plain eurosceptics and idiots... The fact that you can limit your scope like that and previously made the claim that the tories are intentionally putting on crazies to move the overton window to make themselves look more reasonable it's pretty clear you know exactly who I'm talking about.

      --
      "Why should I want to make anything up? Life's bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it."
    31. Re: um, yeah... by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      Come on, give us a name.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    32. Re:um, yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Uranium One, where the Clintons sold of US uranium to Russia while Mueller looked away. Where's the MSM outrage about that? Oh, right, don't bite the hand that feeds.

      Probably because the story is BS.
      *) Clinton did not have the power to veto this, only the President does.
      *) Clinton was one of nine people on the panel. Other people on the panel said that Clinton didn't intervene in any committee matters. You can make of that what you will.
      *) There was nothing illegal about the sale of the company.
      *) Almost all donations related to Uranium One made it to the Clinton Foundation came years before Clinton became Secretary of State.

      DNC/FBI spying on Trump, paying foreign spies to generate dossiers on their political adversaries.

      Christopher Steele was not a "foreign spy," he retired a decade ago. He was a private investigator on Russian and Ukraine matters. He investigated and compiled evidence of Russian interference of five major EU countries.

      A conservative publication hired Fusion GPS to gather dirt on a few candidates during the Republican primary, but the publication canceled the work when Trump won the primary. They were then hired by the DNC and the Clinton campaign, and Steele shared the dossier with US intelligence officials, since he thought it was too important for only political enemies to have. Note that the DNC and Clinton campaigns did not hire or know about Christopher Steele; he wasn't even on Fusion GPS's payroll. They found out when CNN leaked Steele's identity.

      Also, it's disingenuous to imply that our strongest ally (UK) and our greatest adversary (Russia) are somehow equivalent, that foreign is foreign and that's the only thing that matters with collusion.

      (And I don't have all day to deal with the rest of those bullshit points)

  2. News for Trolls, Stuff for Clicks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    trolls unleash!

  3. Fake News? No by 110010001000 · · Score: 0

    Unfortunately "Fake News" has morphed into "News the Government Doesn't Want To Hear". This is oppression of the Press.

    1. Re:Fake News? No by jedidiah · · Score: 1

      > Unfortunately "Fake News" has morphed into "News the Government Doesn't Want To Hear". This is oppression of the Press.

      If you think stuff like this in regards to Egypt is "news", then you simply haven't been paying attention.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
    2. Re:Fake News? No by gravewax · · Score: 1

      To be fair it didn't Morph into that, Trump always defined Fake News as news he didn't want to hear.

  4. All the big players by Okian+Warrior · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Anybody else expecting this to be used to punish people who raise facts that the 'dear leader' (of whatever country) finds distasteful?

    First we get powerful people using fake news to bend the minds of voters into idiot sheep

    Next we get powerful people using the fear of fake news to charge and persecute people who disagree with them, even if they do so using facts

    Does anybody else feel that we are moving backwards in time and will soon be serfs to our lairds?

    We do the same thing in the US, except it isn't the government doing it. Facebook, Google, Twitter - everyone wants to have their hand in what is right and proper for the general public to view, they all have political bias, and have wildly publicized failures.

    I should point out that the InfoWars article on spirit cooking turned out to be correct in all its particulars - that specific article is not in any way fake news.

    That's a pretty clear philosophical point to make: do you censor sites or individual articles? At what point does a site get censored as being predominately fake news?

    That specific article was politically inconvenient for the anointed hero of many people, so in that particular instance do you think any sort of "social consensus" could be reached as to whether or not it's fake?

    ABC news reported that Paul Manafort pleaded guilty to 5 charges of manslaughter, which is pretty specific, damaging, and completely fake. Is ABC news a "fake news" site?

    Youtube articles on the subject of guns have now been marginalized removed from ad income and blocked... on what appears to be a social whim: outrage whipped up by some teenagers in a highly-publicizes shooting. Those articles used to be, and still are, completely legal and not offensively violent or lewd. Is the "fake news" system being used to force a political agenda?

    Everyone seems to find it their duty to correct our invalid thinking and gently guide us to the correct groupthink.

    It's not just the middle east that's moving to restrict speech, it's all the big players.

    (For reference, dig into today's controversy about [Papa John's founder] John Schnatter using the "n-word" on a corporate phone call. It's readily apparent form the evidence what really happened - see if you think there's any real controversy there. Much of what's being reported is completely fake.)

    1. Re:All the big players by unimacs · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I think it would be worth the effort to separate opinion and speech from news. The FCC should re-adopt the fairness doctrine and make it apply to a wider variety of media.

      If you want to be considered a "news" source, then you should be required to provide time and/or space to opposing points of view. Something that's presented as "news" should be prominently retracted or corrected when proven to false, - like what ABC news did when they mistakenly showed a banner that said Manafort had plead guilty to 5 counts of manslaughter. If a site/network/station is not willing to be held to that level of accountability then they should clearly identify themselves as a source of opinion and not news.

    2. Re:All the big players by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your article is kind of cool, but then it goes off the deep end:

      Some are even linking the spirit cooking revelation to claims that the Podesta emails contain “code for child sex trafficking” that is hidden behind mentions of types of food.

      Yeah......no. You can use that technique anywhere: "Some are linking Okian Warrior to murderous Maoist separatists in Nepal." Not true, but makes you think.

    3. Re:All the big players by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      We don't need censorship, we need trust. The foundation of post-truth politics is that no news is trustworthy, therefore Infowars and random blogs are as reliable as organisations with a long history of truthful reporting.

      The other day someone told me they wouldn't believe it until they had seen a Pastebin. That's where they are at now, trusting an anonymous Pastebin post above all else.

      We can fix this by first making the phrase "fake news" synonymous with gullibility and trying to hide something. We are half way there.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    4. Re:All the big players by Bongo · · Score: 0

      The word “fake” can suggest there’s such a thing as “real”, but all factual events are open to interpretation, so that’s the first point. The second point is that, being open to interpretation doesn’t mean there’s no such thing as truth and reality, rather, truth can only be revealed by taking a point of view, so to understand any truth claim, one needs to see it alongside the point of view which was used to reveal it. Eleven thirty AM is meaningless without knowing which time zone the time device is set to. So that’s how news should be reported - - like a science experiment where you aren’t just told a result but you can see the methods used - - and then people can, if it matters to them, understand whether it makes sense, and what to make of that news. The notion that we just trust authorities, is long dead, or should be, because there are so many different vested interests and news is always partly an interpretation anyway.

    5. Re:All the big players by Whibla · · Score: 1

      I think it would be worth the effort to separate opinion and speech from news.

      While I tend to agree with you on this, it's unfortunately not nearly as simple to implement such a policy as many people seem to believe it would be, and that's completely ignoring any bias introduced by deciding what not to report on. Moreover, opinion and bias can be inferred by the viewer, rather than explicit, so we consequently end up with a situation where we (the hypothetical judges, deciding how to separate facts from opinion) can't agree on what constitutes what.

      The FCC should re-adopt the fairness doctrine and make it apply to a wider variety of media. If you want to be considered a "news" source, then you should be required to provide time and/or space to opposing points of view.

      Again, while I tend to agree with you (not that the FCC's rules are any of my 'business', not being an American, and with the BBC already supposedly subscribing to such a doctrine), there has always been a huge flaw in virtually every implementation of the fairness doctrine, probably due to 'erring on the side of caution' by broadcasters not wanting to violate the rules(1): "Crackpots" get far more legitimacy and airtime than 'common sense' would suggest they should. One obvious (albeit contentious) example of this would be evolution(2). e.g. A news report detailing new hominid finds in Asia, along with the results of DNA testing, which shed further light on our 'deep-time' family tree as well as our historical movements would give equal time to a religious fundamentalist whose 'facts' to counter the narrative would come almost exclusively from their religious text(s) or their personal revelations. All of a sudden the fair and balanced reporting becomes ludicrously supportive of a fanciful minority viewpoint.

      Of course something be difficult to implement is no good reason not to try, but I'd be very wary of simple solutions to complex (read emotive) problems...

      Something that's presented as "news" should be prominently retracted or corrected when proven to false, - like what ABC news did when they mistakenly showed a banner that said Manafort had plead guilty to 5 counts of manslaughter. If a site/network/station is not willing to be held to that level of accountability then they should clearly identify themselves as a source of opinion and not news.

      With this I can completely agree. And when you say 'prominently', may I add: with equal or greater prominence than the original misinformation. A 'lie' on the front page of a daily newspaper should not be corrected by anything less than the front page.

      There's a reason for the saying "A lie has reached the far side of the globe before the truth has even got its boots on"...

      (1) Well, more likely not wanting to be fined or otherwise punished for being found liable for violating the rules, but the end result is essentially the same.

      (2) I'm sure you can think of your own, better, examples. I was originally going to use one (*cough* climate change) but ... <Flamebait>

    6. Re:All the big players by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We don't need censorship, we need trust. The foundation of post-truth politics is that no news is trustworthy

      Incorrect. It's actually quite the opposite. The foundation of post-truth politics is we have too much trust instead of skepticism. People choose to just blindly trust in sources that tell them what they want to hear.

      Infowars and random blogs are as reliable as organisations with a long history of truthful reporting

      That's true through. They ARE both equally reliable (or rather, unreliable). Past performance is not indicative of future performance. The rational way to go to is not trust any of them and use multiple sources, cross reference, be skeptical, maybe even do your own research.

      The other day someone told me they wouldn't believe it until they had seen a Pastebin.

      It's ironic you complain about random blogs, but this here is a statement fitting for a random blog. You've put yourself in a a catch 22 here.

      If we are supposed to trust your statement, it wouldn't be fair to infowars and other random blogs.

      If we don't, well then you're the one spreading post-truth politics, being the very thing you complain about.

    7. Re:All the big players by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      We do the same thing in the US, except it isn't the government doing it.

      If it isn't the government doing it, even by proxy, then it isn't the same thing.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    8. Re:All the big players by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The other day someone told me they wouldn't believe it until they had seen a Pastebin. That's where they are at now, trusting an anonymous Pastebin post above all else.

      This is deceptive as all hell. Here is the incident in question. Normally the parent poster is pretty shady, but I don't think they've lied so brazenly about something that can be so trivially checked.

      We can fix this by first making the phrase "fake news" synonymous with gullibility and trying to hide something.

      You sure are doing your part.

    9. Re:All the big players by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We do the same thing in the US, except it isn't the government doing it. Facebook, Google, Twitter - everyone wants to have their hand in what is right and proper for the general public to view, they all have political bias, and have wildly publicized failures.

      The difference is that those companies actually have virtually no power at all, other than whatever their users choose to give them.

      You can easily glue your eyes to the black mirror all day (in fact, you simply don't have enough hours) without encountering any of those companies and without them having the slightest influence on what you read. If you want to. It's just that last part that has everyone rolling their eyes.

      When someone complains about Facebook, the question should always be "Why have you decided to go to all the additional effort and inconvenience to make sure you only read what's on Facebook?"

      I should point out that the InfoWars article on spirit cooking turned out to be correct in all its particulars - that specific article is not in any way fake news.

      You might be right. It's hard to tell, because I clicked that and read it for 2-3 seconds before I saw that it was so irrelevant (to anything and everything) and boring. People choosing to read National Enquirer and InfoWars instead of something informative or interesting, is exactly the kind of thing I was talking about. Why bother? What do we get out of reading boring, irrelevant stuff? Not much (but there is something, and I'll mention it below). We have little incentive to go to the extra trouble to distract ourselves, but we do it. So now people are talking about how religious people cook instead of cooking in general, as though shaming religious people is ever going to solve religion.

      That's a pretty clear philosophical point to make: do you censor sites or individual articles? At what point does a site get censored as being predominately fake news?

      People go to so much trouble to censor for themselves (at least here in USA) (and I mean to limit what they read, not limit what they, themselves, say) that the government and corporations will never be taken seriously as threats. Censorship is obsolete once you teach people to be stupid enough. National Enquirer, InfoWars, reality TV, etc are all we want and most of our media is trying to be just like that.

      Everyone seems to find it their duty to correct our invalid thinking and gently guide us to the correct groupthink.

      Everyone finds it their duty to do that to themselves. It's not someone else who tells you that you're only going to watch videos on Youtube (which, for whatever reason, doesn't have as many fun gun videos as they used to). You can still watch videos, but you decide that you're not going to, that you're going to stick with Youtube. It's not even new; 30 years ago a lazy person might leave a TV on a same channel all the time instead of getting bored with whatever's showing and then channel surf.

      Youtube will never have the capacity to limit what we see in any way, but if you throw in people who want to be limited, they can use youtube to limit themselves. Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, self-censorship is exercised by the strong, tiring, inconvenient, excruciatingly boring effort of the beholder. I made that sound bad, but from the viewer's point of view, you just have to keep your eye on the prize: ignorance. Sweet, valuable ignorance.

      It's not just the middle east that's moving to restrict speech, it's all the big players.

      That might be right in the middle east (I'm not sure) but in America, you are exactly, perfectly wrong. It's the very smallest players that are doing it. The big players are powerless. Youtube can't make you watch them, but

    10. Re:All the big players by Agripa · · Score: 1

      ABC news reported that Paul Manafort pleaded guilty to 5 charges of manslaughter, which is pretty specific, damaging, and completely fake. Is ABC news a "fake news" site?

      I have always thought so along with their contemporaries.

    11. Re:All the big players by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How high are you?

      --highdude702

    12. Re:All the big players by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      moron

    13. Re:All the big players by Bongo · · Score: 1

      Ok so my comment was too terse. But we've known, as a culture, for hundreds of years, that reality isn't just given, it is semi-constructed by a perceiving mind, and whatever is really out there, we only see what our mind allows us to see. Even if you choose to report an event with 100% fidelity, you still have to choose which details constitute the "event" and which are irrelevant. Like the insurance claim for the Twin Towers collapse, the best legal minds had to decide whether it counted as one event or two, as that affected the insurance payout. This is basic, practical, "how do we know what we know" stuff.

      Or you might prefer what John Wayne said: "people say things are not black and white, and I say, well why the hell not?"

  5. New news, in Egypt. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Help me understand what we refuse histor

  6. Alternative press by TigerPlish · · Score: 1

    I wonder if this kind of attack on the media will foster the growth of underground press... and by that I mean a press, with ink and paper, in a basement.

    After all, if you censor the modern mainstream way of publishing, an alternative is bound to spring up.

    Hey, was not our own revolution partly fueled by basement presses?

    --
    The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
    1. Re:Alternative press by Rockoon · · Score: 3, Insightful

      ink and paper are gone

      the underground is well lit within the digital world

      --
      "His name was James Damore."
    2. Re:Alternative press by wtrmute · · Score: 1

      Ink and paper? That's a great way to make sure you will need to either go corporate or be very, very limited in scope. You might as well hire a monk to copy your pamphlets...

  7. The USA is looking great by AHuxley · · Score: 3, Insightful

    With its freedom of the press, freedom of speech and freedom after speech. The entire occupation gets fully protected from any gov.

    --
    Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  8. Why do so many people believe the news is fake? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It might be because the common thrall living today sees a reality different from what is reported in the news. In the 1950s nobody thought the news was fake. However today if CNN tells me the ocean is salty, a lot of people are inclined to at least travel to the beach and see for themselves.

  9. Egypt is now a military dictatorship ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Posting this anonymously, because I am Egyptian, and the regime there is brutal, and I don't want to endanger myself or my family.

    The parliament that passed this law is a joke. It was hand picked from a fake party that was created by intelligence officers, to guarantee that no real opposition faces Sisi, the military officer who took control of Egypt and became president.

    Here is an thorough article by an investigative journalist: Anatomy of an Election.

    The journalist, Hossam Bahgat, who uncovered all this is now harassed continuously. That includes forced disappearance and illegitimate detention and questions by the military (not even a civilian court).

    You can see a sample of his other works relating to the situation in Egypt here.

    This is just a small snapshot, and there are thousands of political and human rights activists are either harassed, jailed, or otherwise intimidated into silence.

    1. Re:Egypt is now a military dictatorship ... by Whibla · · Score: 1

      Thank you for those links. Extremely interesting and informative!

      Alas, having posted elsewhere, I cannot give you a mod point, hence the reply.

      Parliamentary lists are, in my opinion, the antithesis of democracy, especially these days when parliaments are dominated by large political parties. The first of your linked articles has added another data point to the mountain of evidence that supports this contention.

      Stay safe!

  10. Trump is going to hang, you treasonous faggot. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Psst, you're a faggot, and we're going to hang you from your punk ass faggot nazi neck until your bitch ass is dead. Pass it on, faggot traitor. We're going to literally tear your faggot guts out and wear them like mardi gras beads.

    Trump earned the gallows, not prison, but you need your bitch head caved the fuck in. You're going to water the tree of Liberty, punk ass traitor. #Legacy #Mueller

    1. Re:Trump is going to hang, you treasonous faggot. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And we get the voice of reason and tolerance. Add in the homophobic slurs for the added bonus. The anti-Trump brigade never fails to delivery hypocrisy.

    2. Re:Trump is going to hang, you treasonous faggot. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They're probably not even anti-Trump. They're trolling, and political trolling is the easiest, cheapest way to troll these days. You're just feeding the troll and buying into their narratives.

  11. What went wrong in Egypt? by jonwil · · Score: 1

    You had a bunch of protests by the population that lead to the ousting of a dictator (Hosni Mubarak) and democratic elections that resulted in Mohammad Morsi becoming president. But then things unraveled and the military kicked out the democratically elected president.

    What happened and what went wrong? Were the elections in 2011 and 2012 that brought Mohammad Morsi to power not free, fair and legitimate? Did Morsi break the law or otherwise do bad things? (i.e. was the actions to kick him out of office the Egyptian equivilant of impeachment?)

    Was Morsi kicked out because of pressure from the US and its allies? (I think I remember something about Morsi considering ending support for Israel and supporting Palestine instead, that would be a reason for the US and its friends to push for some sort of action)

    Is it like Thailand where action was taken because Morsi was doing things that went against the best interests of the country? Was there a concern that Morsi was planning to set up an Islamic dictatorship of some sort similar to countries like Iran?

    1. Re:What went wrong in Egypt? by Zumbs · · Score: 3, Informative

      A number of things went wrong.

      First and foremost, after ousting the dictator by popular mobilization, the rebel leaders allowed the army to take power in a year long interim period and send the masses home. This broke the power of the masses. Furthermore, it allowed the deep state to use its propaganda to demobilize the hearts and minds of the population. Contrast this to Tunisia where the elections were held shortly after the uprising.

      One of the arguments for the interim period was partly to set the stage with some rules to govern the elections, but also for opposition parties to get ready. Everybody knew that the Muslim Brotherhood would win if the elections were held immediately (and they were likely right). So, the army got the rest of the opposition leaders to agree to an interim period by pointing out that they would not win an immediate election.

      As you remember, Mohammad Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood won the election, fair and square. When he won, he started to gather power in his hands and in the hands of his supporters. Some say it was because he was an autocrat trying to become a dictator. And they may have been right. However, looking back at modern Egyptian history (the revolution of 1952), he is likely to have anticipated that the army was gearing up for a coup and he was simply trying to get ready. Note that the two opinions do not conflict: He could have been both trying to become a dictator and anticipated a coup at the same time.

      His power grab did serve to give the army both an excuse (that he was grabbing a lot of power) and got them the support of most of the opposition. Thus, the army could go in, take power and start a nasty campaign of repression against the Muslim Brotherhood with the support of the opposition. After having finished off the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Sisi could then turn on the remaining opposition as well as the ringleaders in the uprising against Mubarak, effectively finishing the counter revolution.

      What went wrong? Comparing Egypt with Tunisia should show it clearly: Whenever the masses has ousted a nasty dictator, the rulers are on the defensive. That is when you apply pressure to get changes. If you demobilize the masses, you demobilize the force that put the rulers on the defensive and the major source of revolutionary power. This gives the rulers the time to regroup and start all sorts of campaigns to make it hard to remobilize the masses, setting the stage for counter revolution. As we saw in Egypt.

      --
      The truth may be out there, but lies are inside your head
    2. Re:What went wrong in Egypt? by Agripa · · Score: 1

      Were the elections in 2011 and 2012 that brought Mohammad Morsi to power not free, fair and legitimate?

      They were legitimate but neither free nor fair:

      In the first round, with a voter turnout of 46%, the results were split between five major candidates: Mohamed Morsi (25%), Ahmed Shafik (24%), Hamdeen Sabahi (21%), Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh (17%), and Amr Moussa (11%), while the remaining 2% were split between several smaller candidates. The elections set the stage for the divisions that were to follow, along Islamist and secular lines, and those opposed to and those supporting the former political elite. Islamist candidates Morsi and Fotouh won roughly 42% of the vote, while the remaining secular candidates won 56% of the vote.

  12. The term is over used by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think the coined term "fake news" is over used. I think more accurately its more filtered or skewed to reflect the writers viewpoint which we used to call opinions or the editorial page in newspapers. In my opinion journalism has taken a back seat to people's own agenda's and its made news less about reporting a factual story but more about pushing a ideology or viewpoint.