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submitted 11 months ago by L4s@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

EU stops advertising on X over hate speech. Fines could follow next year::The European Union is pulling its advertisements from Elon Musk’s X for now, citing an “alarming increase” in hate speech and disinformation on the platform formerly known as Twitter.

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[-] seananigans@lemmy.world 77 points 11 months ago

This comment will make me sound like an idiot, but I’m just coming to believe that all of Musk’s decisions with X were targeted to this very outcome. To be the world’s centre of alt right propaganda. It just makes too much sense now.

[-] Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world 38 points 11 months ago

He's not that smart. He got stuck having to buy Twitter after his pump and dump backfired. His solution to having to buy Twitter was to cut costs by firing staff and use his celebrity to manufacturer engagement with troll posts.

The problem he missed was that staff was necessary to keep hate speech under control and his trolling meant to drive engagement would backfire from advertisers and regulators.

[-] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world 32 points 11 months ago

I wouldn't say idiot, just very naive when it comes to your assessment of Musk's ability to think ahead. He's basically a South African Alex Jones who started out rich(er) 🤷

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[-] r3df0x@7.62x54r.ru 16 points 11 months ago

There has been an increase in blatant racism and prejudice. I don't know if those users eventually get banned. If the right takes any action against blatant hate speech, shitheads like Tim Pool will start crying and denounce the platform as not allowing free speech. If they allow "free speech," then the shitheads eventually drive all the normal people off the platform. The only good thing is that Twitter already has a left wing population, so as long as they can maintain that, it should avoid turning to shit. It was also a mainstream platform so hopefully that should maintain the normie population.

Sites like Lemmy instances are better at allowing a wider range of "free speech" because as long as the instance population is large enough to keep the shitheads a minority, they can stick to their own subs and generally keep the bullshit quarantined.

[-] RandomVideos@programming.dev 9 points 11 months ago

Wasnt truth social already that?

[-] DemBoSain@midwest.social 7 points 11 months ago

I only know one person that uses truth social.

[-] jaybone@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago

But he has like 70 million followers.

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[-] seananigans@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago

Truth is USA only, so X has a much broader reach.

[-] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world 7 points 11 months ago

Taken out of context, "Truth is USA only" is one of the most jingoistic phrases ever 😂

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[-] camr_on@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I think it's not impossible that the goal was simply to discredit Twitter entirely

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[-] DieguiTux8623@feddit.it 40 points 11 months ago

Misinformation has already spread in the continent. This will be downvoted but "too little, too late" is the only thing that comes to my mind reading that piece of news.

[-] Skipcast@lemmy.world 30 points 11 months ago

Better late than never, I say

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[-] arc@lemm.ee 38 points 11 months ago

Elon was mulling pulling out of the EU and I really want this dumbass to follow through on that threat.

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[-] GiddyGap@lemm.ee 30 points 11 months ago

I feel like the EU is one of the few forces of good in the world these days.

[-] thriveth@lemmy.world 12 points 11 months ago

It is not. But it has been doing some right things when it comes to privacy protection and so on.

Still, Trump's border wall and caged children are merely cute compared to the shit going on at the borders of the EU.

[-] PlexSheep@feddit.de 12 points 11 months ago

I disagree. The EU is one of the best things that ever happened to us Europeans, who knows, we might be fighting another war if history went different.

Politically, the EU spins around between based decisions and crap like chat surveillance, but over all, it has been a major contributor to the high standard of life in Europe, I'm convinced of this.

[-] MBM 6 points 11 months ago

Still, Trump’s border wall and caged children are merely cute compared to the shit going on at the borders of the EU.

What kind of things should I think of?

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[-] jaybone@lemmy.world 28 points 11 months ago

What exactly does the EU advertise?

[-] Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago

I dunno. Like, cheese? EU cheese?

Maybe baklava?

It's a big place. I think. I dunno.

[-] jaybone@lemmy.world 8 points 11 months ago

Sorry if I misunderstood. I consider the EU to be a government body.

I assume cheese and baklava manufacturers are allowed to advertise wherever they like.

Does this mean the EU is not allowing these cheese and baklava companies to advertise where they want?

[-] Infinitus@lemmy.world 17 points 11 months ago

The EU is advertising itself and its initiatives, like DiscoverEU and other programs. They want their programs to be seen and used

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[-] laurelraven@lemmy.blahaj.zone 22 points 11 months ago

I imagine this will make musk's "thermonuclear lawsuit" lose a few teeth

[-] onlinepersona@programming.dev 8 points 11 months ago

Thermonuclear lawsuit? Even the name sounds ridiculous

[-] Clbull@lemmy.world 22 points 11 months ago

Is Elon Musk finally in the 'find out' stage of this whole fiasco?

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[-] lemann@lemmy.one 9 points 11 months ago

I love this, go get that refund! Should have happened a lot earlier though

[-] autotldr 8 points 11 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


In October, a few days after Palestinian militant group Hamas launched a deadly attack on Israel, the European Commission asked X to provide details of the actions it was taking to combat the spread of “illegal content and disinformation” on its platform.

A tidal wave of antisemitism, Islamophobia and misinformation has engulfed social media platforms in recent weeks since the unprecedented October 7 attack by Hamas, followed by air strikes and a ground offensive by Israel against the Hamas-controlled enclave of Gaza.

“It is unacceptable to repeat the hideous lie behind the most fatal act of antisemitism in American history at any time, let alone one month after the deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust,” White House spokesperson Andrew Bates said in a statement to CNN.

Germany’s Federal Anti-Discrimination Agency, which promotes equal treatment at work and in everyday life, announced on October 11 that it would stop using X entirely, citing an “enormous increase” in discriminatory and hateful speech on the platform.

“Ministries and state bodies should ask themselves whether it is still acceptable to remain on a platform that has become a disinformation network and whose owner spreads antisemitic, racist and populist content,” Ferda Ataman, Germany’s independent federal commissioner for anti-discrimination, said in a statement.

Sandra Wachter, a professor of technology and regulation at the Oxford Internet Institute, said they are required by the DSA to treat their boss like any other user by, for example, taking down his posts or flagging them as problematic if they break EU rules.


The original article contains 940 words, the summary contains 255 words. Saved 73%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[-] echodot@feddit.uk 8 points 11 months ago

That's not a good idea, if they don't advertise I won't know about the European Union.

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this post was submitted on 24 Nov 2023
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