Free Speech

The photo sharing platform Instagram has launched the rise of many influencers ranging from aspiring models to artists, but now it is restricting what products these influencers can be paid to promote. “Across the Facebook company, we are updating our policies to include clearer rules for the paid promotion of certain goods and services such as vaping, tobacco, alcohol and diet supplements,”…

LGBTQ Privilege? YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki said the company consults with the LBGTQ community to make sure they don’t feel they are being censored. Wouldn’t it be nice if conservatives had such a seemingly favored group? Wojcicki spoke to Eugene Lee Yang of “The Try Guys” on Dec. 16 regarding YouTube’s harassment policy update and apparent efforts to appease the LGBTQ creator community’s…

Some in Big Tech have made swipes at Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg for his company’s free speech stance on political ads, and the hits keep on coming. The CEO of Twitter Jack Dorsey unfollowed Mark Zuckerberg handle “@finkd” in a set of circumstances that were mysterious but may have been intended as a public display. “Dorsey followed a twitter account, @bigtechalert, which exists only to report…

It’s the future you probably didn’t ask for -- being nagged by Artificial Intelligence to stop being “offensive” and “bullying.” Instagram touted its new anti-bullying Artificial Intelligence program in its Dec. 16 blog about  the social media giant’s “long-term commitment to lead the fight against online bullying.” Instagram claims the AI program “notifies people when their captions on a photo…

Facebook is taking another shot at improving its fact-check process, by adding a large group of part-time contractors to help sort information from disinformation. In an attempt to assuage the concerns of conservatives and free speech advocates wary of Big Tech bias, Facebook will be partnering with YouGov to select a politically diverse community of reviewers. 

The 2020 election is going to be fought online and the left has decided to create its own fact-check unit. The Democratic National Committee started a “counter-disinformation unit” to “serve[] as a knowledge base and intelligence unit” for the party.

Some content creators are concerned about the direction platforms are taking after recent policy change announcements. Will free speech be allowed on social media? YouTube’s Vice President and Global Head of Trust & Safety Matt Halprin released a blog on Wednesday, Dec. 11, titled “An update to our harassment policy.” Halprin proclaimed in the blog that YouTube would be taking a harder stance…

Facebook announced a new policy to label state-funded media on its platform. Qatar-backed outlet Al Jazeera has a problem with that. In a letter sent by the media outlet’s lawyers to Facebook’s Vice President Jennifer Gillian Newstead and Head of Global Policy Management Monika Bickert, Al Jazeera wrote that Facebook’s policy would cause “substantial and irreparable harm” to its reputation.

As the hashtag “#youtubeisoverparty” trended following a YouTube policy update, Steven Crowder warned viewers and fellow creators their days on the platform may be numbered. Yesterday, YouTube’s Vice President and Global Head of Trust & Safety Matt Halprin released a policy update titled “An update to our harassment policy,” which YouTube explained will allow it to crack down on “harassment…

The video sharing platform and sister organization to Google may be cracking down on free speech -- this time under the guise of protecting users from “harassment.” YouTube’s Vice President and Global Head of Trust & Safety Matt Halprin released a blog on Wednesday, Dec. 11, titled “An update to our harassment policy.” As of today, YouTube’s blog announced “a series of policy and product…

Ex-founder of Wikipedia Larry Sanger’s Twitter followers reported that they couldn’t see the tweets he had put out about a social media strike. “Who wants me to organize mass tryouts of decentralized social media networks?” Sanger tweeted on Dec. 2.

A Pinterest tech insider received an award for his part in blowing the whistle on Pinterest’s bias and censorship of conservative content. Whistleblower Eric Cochran received an Impact Award during the 3rd Annual Impact Awards hosted by Liberty Consulting President Ginni Thomas and by United Purpose last Wednesday. He received the prestigious award for what Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe…

“Journalists play a critical role in our society: keep the world honest and balanced. They are true servants of the people,” said Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey in a tweet from 2015. But it seems only certain kinds of journalists “play a critical role” on Twitter. Fox News host Pete Hegseth was censored by Twitter, apparently for posting a tweet that showed a screenshot of the manifesto said to have…

A former Facebook employee says that social media companies “owe it to democracy” to increase restrictions on Facebook’s political advertising and “fix the mess” they allegedly created. Facebook’s former government and politics client partner Clare O’Donoghue Velikić wrote an article for The Guardian on Dec. 6 on “how to fix social media’s political ads problem.”