Facebook Decides Which Killings We're Allowed to See 293
Minutes after a police shooting took place in the Falcon Heights suburbs of Minnesota, a Facebook Live video was published on the social juggernaut website. The death of Philando Castile, 32, was documented in harrowing detail thanks to the live streaming tool offered by the social media giant. The 10-minute video was streamed via smartphone by a woman identified in media reports as Diamond Reynolds. She narrates the video with a mix of eerie calm and anguish. The video was removed from Facebook due to, as company says, a "technical glitch." The video has since been restored, but with a "Warning -- Graphic Video," disclaimer. Motherboard notes that Facebook has become the de-facto platform for such controversial videos, and that there's a pattern in these so called glitches -- as they happen very often time after a questionable content is streamed. This makes one wonder whether it is up to Facebook to decide which kind of controversial videos one should be able to watch The publication writes: As Facebook continues to build out its Live video platform, the world's most popular social network has become the de-facto choice for important, breaking, and controversial videos. Several times, Facebook has blocked political or newsworthy content only to later say that the removal was a "technical glitch" or an "error." Nearly two-thirds of Americans get their news from social media, and two thirds of Facebook users say they use the site to get news. If Facebook is going to become the middleman that delivers the world's most popular news events to the masses, technical glitches and erroneous content removals could be devastating to information dissemination efforts. More importantly, Facebook has become the self-appointed gatekeeper for what is acceptable content to show the public, which is an incredibly important and powerful position to be in. By censoring anything, Facebook has created the expectation that there are rules for using its platform (most would agree that some rules are necessary). But because the public relies on the website so much, Facebook's rules and judgments have an outsized impact on public debate.
It is Their Site (Score:2, Informative)
It is Their Site. So they make Their rules.
Based on their business model.
Re:It is Their Site (Score:4, Insightful)
so comcast can do DPI and remove bad review on there ISP link right?
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Making a joke / what kind of BS they can put into an EULA
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Usually it's not the baking that's the issue, it's the delivery... But you have a good point..
Re:It is Their Site (Score:4, Insightful)
Why can Facebook decide to pull a video but a baker can't decide not to bake a cake?
Usually it's not the baking that's the issue, it's the delivery... But you have a good point..
If Facebook was pulling videos based upon the poster's expressed sexual preference he might have a good point. But as far as I can tell, they don't, so he doesn't.
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Why can Facebook decide to pull a video but a baker can't decide not to bake a cake?
Usually it's not the baking that's the issue, it's the delivery... But you have a good point..
If Facebook was pulling videos based upon the poster's expressed sexual preference he might have a good point. But as far as I can tell, they don't, so he doesn't.
Hey what if the violent video gets them off sexually? Now does Facebook have no right to pull the video?
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Why can Facebook decide to pull a video but a baker can't decide not to bake a cake?
A baker can't decide not to bake a cake for a gay wedding.
Re:It is Their Site (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't discriminate based on race, religion, sexual preference. You can discriminate based on whether or not somebody decides to wear a shirt. This is the way it is because at large, we deem it to be fair and prevent people from being discriminated against based on characteristics that are fundamental to living as they want or were born.
We don't deem being able to live your entire life without wearing a shirt to be fundamental to living your life freely. Pretty fucking simple.
Re:It is Their Site (Score:5, Informative)
It is Their Site. So they make Their rules.
Based on their business model.
So what? Because they're a business acting in their self-interest that makes it proper and ethical and we're not supposed to discuss or criticize them?
In a free market system consumers are supposed to discuss and judge products and the companies that make them, that's not a bug, that's one of the basic mechanisms that makes free markets work.
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So what? Because they're a business acting in their self-interest that makes it proper and ethical and we're not supposed to discuss or criticize them?
Sure you are. And he is doing just that. His statement that they can do whatever they want does not imply that you can't discuss it. That's just his position on the matter. Don't like it? Offer an alternative viewpoint.
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So what? Because they're a business acting in their self-interest that makes it proper and ethical and we're not supposed to discuss or criticize them?
In a free market system consumers are supposed to discuss and judge products and the companies that make them, that's not a bug, that's one of the basic mechanisms that makes free markets work.
Except you know that's not how this goes. This turns into people talking about what someone running a web site should allowed or forced to do. The headline itself is already into irrational territory on this.
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facebook has the right to make its own rule in its platform/site, but others have a right to point out (and disseminate with means available) the fact that facebook( ad seller/employer with vested commercial and political interests) is acting like a gatekeeper with hidden criteria on how it decides what to pass and not pass.
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It is Their Site. So they make Their rules.
Based on their business model.
So how does it benefit Facebook's business model to be reading a discussion thread in which half the videos have been replaced by "Video removed for some mysterious reason"?
At least it's good to know FB has priorities (Score:3)
They're only permitting the naughty-bits of human bodies in settings "generally recognized as art." It's just so much more dangerous to society to see the image of a female nipple or other male/female naughty-bits than it is to see live-streamed images of graphic violence. (Notwithstanding the fact that we all have those same bits ourselves, simply covered by clothing.)
I'm not advocating anything-goes - I'm not sure what I'm advocating. But I know something is out of balance, here.
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Killing people is OK, "making" people (sex) is not.
I blame religion.
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Where in my (very) few words above did I say I was blaming Islam (only)?
Or, in your view, Islam is a religion, whereas christian belief is not? Then what is it, the "Truth"?
If so, you are among the people who are carrying on the hypocracy.
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Islamophobe much?
Islamosensitive much?
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Islamophobe much?
yeah he is obviously blaming those fundamentalist muslims who were early settlers in North America. I think they are called 'Puritans'.
Or wait, were they Christians? I have a fucking lot of difficulty telling your religions apart sometimes; Christians, Jews, Muslims, all the same to me. I don't even know how you tell each other apart.
Re:At least it's good to know FB has priorities (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not advocating anything-goes - I'm not sure what I'm advocating. But I know something is out of balance, here.
I can tell you what's out of balance because I've said it here before. Facebook, Twitter, and friends have become the new AOL. The younger generation has precious little concept of the "internet." For them, the "internet" is their news feed on Facebook. I know a bunch of people that don't even bother to use Google anymore even though Google is a household name. I hear uninformed people talk about the "dark web," and they aren't referring to tor sites, they're referring to anything outside of the smartphone apps that constitute their walled garden social media experience.
This is Slashdot, so the audience here is a little older and more technically minded than most. For me, my first exposure to the internet was Usenet, then IRC, both completely uncensored mediums with no corporate agenda. That's what we think of when we think of the internet but we're squarely in the minority. Hell, even sites like Slashdot have occasionally had to censor comments [slashdot.org] and that was before they had corporate overlords to answer to.
It's not that Facebook is inherently evil, it's just that it's a large for-profit corporation; they started by censoring what's politically popular to censor, hate speech, ISIS videos, and the like, because they don't want their name tarnished by the association. Then they expanded to censoring other things -- firearms are no longer allowed to be sold in their marketplaces -- that have limited mainstream appeal, because they concluded that the cost benefit wasn't there for them.
In theory, what they do with hate speech is no different than Applebee's declining to host the local KKK's meet and greet, but in practice they've become so large that they're essentially a gatekeeper to the online community, and as noted it's hardly limited to hate speech. Once you decide that you're going to censor your platform -- and the motivations are too strong to resist for a for-profit enterprise -- it's obvious that you're not going to be able to stop at "hate speech," however defined.
I don't know what the solution to this is but it does sadden me when I think of how we escaped AOL only to replace it with Facebook and Twitter.
Re:At least it's good to know FB has priorities (Score:4, Insightful)
It is all pretty straightforward.
(1) Media make money when they hide nudity.
(2) Media make money when they show violence.
These two rules are used over and over again because...
(3) Companies want to maximize profit and have not the slightest care nor concern for human beings
Not a surprise... (Score:5, Insightful)
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But it's a "problem" in the sense that people need to make themselves aware of that, and exercise their ability to do things like stop using Facebook. It's not one that requires a law or regulation or such (and I say that as a liberal who's not opposed to government action in cases where it makes sense - this isn't one of them). Sunlight is the disinfectant needed - that and some sense on the part of peopl
Facebook is a private company. (Score:2, Insightful)
How much are you willing to bet that Facebook doesn't receive National Security Letters with a gag order instructing them to voluntarily remove dangerous content? Just because Facebook can legally censor, doesn't mean that the censorship Facebook is doing is in fact legal, and even if it were it doesn't mean we have to approve of it.
Legality =/= Morality
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Facebook is a private company.
No, they are not. [google.com] Even ignoring commonly recognized and respected social responsibilities, they are, at the very least, responsible to their shareholders (the public).
Facebook can do whatever it wants, and allow whatever it wants to be shown on its site.
Also not true. They must obey the law, same as anyone else.
Reality is nuanced and multi-faceted, and sweeping generalizations are rarely insightful and usually don't add much to a discussion.
The reason this matters has little to do with what Facebook is allowed to do, and much more to do with what they should do. For better or worse (hint:
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Spectrum has been sold, very little wired infrastructure is publicly owned.
Besides which, your fascist plan will fail against network neutrality.
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...the public can restrict them from transmitting what they want over infrastructure and property that doesn't belong to them....
Not really. Facebook is transmitted over airwaves that are leased/owned by private telecom companies. The public has little say in what these common carriers are allowed to transmit in cases like this.
Net neutrality anyone? (Score:2)
Facebook is transmitted over airwaves that are leased/owned by private telecom companies. The public has little say in what these common carriers are allowed to transmit in cases like this.
Even if the telecom companies choose to include Facebook and Wikipedia without charge but bill the user by the bit for viewing any other website? The public, as lessor of the airwaves, can impose "net neutrality" rules to end this practice.
ISPs feed the beast by zero-rating Facebook (Score:2)
If people are getting all their information through Facebook, then THAT's the real problem.
To what extent is ISPs' exclusion of Facebook traffic from subscribers' monthly data allowance one of the causes of that problem? Zero rating has contributed to misuse of Wikimedia Commons to share infringing copies of non-free video [slashdot.org].
Thank you FB for watching over my soul! (Score:2)
Private Company (Score:5, Insightful)
Newspapers can decline to cover whatever stories they wish. TV news can decline to show whatever footage they wish. Facebook is a private company, and can block whatever content it chooses to block.
The only really scary thing here is the fact that "two thirds of Americans get their news from social media". No wonder the country is so fucked up.
Re:Private Company (Score:5, Insightful)
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The only really scary thing here is the fact that "two thirds of Americans get their news from social media". No wonder the country is so fucked up.
Before the internet, most people got their "news" from rags like the National Enquirer and New of the World--the top selling newspapers in America. Being stupid and being mis-informed isn't new and it isn't happening because of the internet or the world wide web or facebook or that new-fangled thang called electricity. Entertainment attracts more people than information does.
Re:Private Company (Score:5, Insightful)
-- Mark Twain
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Newspapers can decline to cover whatever stories they wish. TV news can decline to show whatever footage they wish. Facebook is a private company, and can block whatever content it chooses to block.
The only really scary thing here is the fact that "two thirds of Americans get their news from social media". No wonder the country is so fucked up.
In other words, if you want to avoid censorship, start by not posting something someone else's server?
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The only really scary thing here is the fact that "two thirds of Americans get their news from social media". No wonder the country is so fucked up.
Those numbers were probably pulled out of the air and don't reflect reality. Consider that probably at least 1/3 of Americans don't do social media at all - not in any form including Facebook - and then out of the ones who do, some percentage of them will not get their news from it. I have friends, family and former classmates who don't do any kind of social media and refuse to ever do it. If you're a young person and everybody you know is under 30 that may not be true, but there are tons of people over
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> The only really scary thing here is the fact that "two thirds of Americans get their news from social media". No wonder the country is so fucked up.
Because things were so much better when everyone got their news from conglomerates? Reliability of the source has been an issue for literally centuries. Back in the day, "Remember the Maine, to hell with Spain" was what Hearst shoved down everyone's throats. And today Rupert Murdoch loves to tell everyone that global warming is a myth and the Muslims are
Re:Private Company (Score:4, Informative)
Back in the day, "Remember the Maine, to hell with Spain" was what Hearst shoved down everyone's throats.
Hearst's papers also documented the Spanish concentration camps [loc.gov] in Cuba, which were responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths [pbs.org].
What? (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:What? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Facebook is not even a significant percentage of the entire internet
That appears to be incorrect:
"[Facebook] drives a quarter of all web traffic."
-http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/04/facebook-is-eating-the-internet/391766/ [theatlantic.com]
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Between WWW and Streaming video you've got 99.9999% of all internet traffic. Your SSH session or video game isn't even a single percentage of internet traffic. For all intents and purposes the internet is the WWW and streaming..
... on Facebook, because it's their platform. (Score:3)
Back in Grandpa's Day (Score:3)
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(sarcasim)
Oh no, they didn't.... And don't forget we USED to have the "fairness doctrine" for media outlets too..
(/sarcasim..)
Two Parts (Score:3)
There are two distinct parts to this topic:
Note that FB has usage rights and they could censor stuff, and they do. They block terrorist propaganda, for example. The question here is should it be an all or nothing, or as-decided-by-FB? Regarding the lawsuits, note that in the U.S. there are number of protections on media reporting of minors (as an example). If FB allows such reporting unfiltered, can they be held accountable? I would hope not, but it depends on what the court would agree.
What happened to the OpenWatch droid ap?? (Score:2)
a while back there was an ap you could get for your phone that was just for this kind of thing.
where did it vanish to??
Where do you _really_ get your news? (Score:2)
Before we fall into minority hysteria over Facebook mind control, it's important to note that the control of news has been in upheaval since the rise of the internet. And if social media is bias, its biggest competitor--whoever's flashy headline reaches the top of search engine results--is even more so. The internet has given us the means to insulate our selves from detracting opinions at a level that rivals--or perhaps mirrors--the days of isolated, like-minded communities. It has also given us unprecedent
Facebook is NOT the only online social media (Score:2)
If they make a mistake and refuse to show something, there are many other options to post your stuff.
If it is truly newsworthy, one of the others will publicize it, and Facebook will be the one that bears most of the consequences of their mistake.
Story is not interesting, or worth commenting on (except to say that it is not worth commenting on). Never should have been greenlit
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But, in the conservative groups, like Slashdot, the row over the inaccessibility of the video gets covered more than the dead guy shown in it.
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Facebook is not the problem here (Score:3)
When everything that isn't Facebook is paywalled (Score:2)
People treat facebook as if it is the entire fucking web; they have this power only because people have given it to them (intentionally or not).
It's intentional. See Internet.org Free Basics [wikipedia.org].
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Developers (Score:5, Informative)
If you're a software engineer or a system administrator, you probably already know exactly what the technical glitches are. People are trying to throw a shitfit without understanding technology. "Facebook" isn't just a single server with a single purpose. Information has to be distributed from the content source to the content consumers. If an account normally has a reach of 5-10 viewers, it is easy to have them stream internally though a single server that is handling several streams at once. They are shoved on this particular data delivery path based on past low viewer counts... then all of a sudden they stream something that hits a 100k+ reach? Yes, the content then needs to be moved to high capacity and more dedicated servers. This isn't an instant process. The easiest explanation to the laymen is a "technical glitch", because how many people outside of technology even know what a server or routing digital data even is? This exact scenario DOES happen with other content too, but only when it involves something controversial does it become a conspiracy and censorship theory. A great example of other content that has had this exact issue was the selfie taken at the Grammys that had overf 1,000,000 shares. Yes, that took out an entire Twitter datacenter. Not just a server, the whole datacenter went offline for some time.
Re:Developers (Score:5, Insightful)
If the glitch is due to a video being slashdotted, then the complaint becomes Facebook's lack of transparency about the cause. I imagine that a notice to the following effect might have been better received: "This video has become incredibly popular. Please wait a moment while we prepare to handle the crowd."
nonsense (Score:2)
facebook isn't deciding anything. there are hundreds of places to post your videos, and it's virtually pennies to spin up your own web-site and host a few videos on your own infrestructure.
second, it's been a long time since we've had public blood sports and hangings and executions. Does anyone want to see crimes live? No news media outlet has shown that kind of stuff in my lifetime. I have no desire to see it either.
It's not censorship just because facebook takes it down. Censorship is about ensuring t
Regulate Facebook as a public utility (Score:4, Interesting)
It's the all-purpose solution to every complaint. Also, I'm sure Facebook supports this sort of regulation elsewhere. Why not apply it where it's needed most?
de-facto bullshit. (Score:2)
"...Facebook has become the de-facto platform for such controversial videos..."
And how the hell did anyone come up with this, as if YouTube suddenly disappeared overnight?
Give me a break. The world does not revolve around one social media platform. I wish more Facebook narcissists would realize that.
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I wish more Facebook narcissists would realize that.
But people really do care about the inane shit I post, or is that shit post.
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And how the hell did anyone come up with this, as if YouTube suddenly disappeared overnight?
Facebook: "Welcome to Facebook"
YouTube: "The site youtube.com does not participate in your plan's zero rating program. Your account has 0 MB remaining. To continue to youtube.com, please enter your payment information."
Folks, have your license and registration ready (Score:4, Informative)
I was pulled over one night for speeding, and happened to have my camera tripod on the passenger seat. The officer asked what it was, and I made the mistake of reaching over to grab it so he could get a better view. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the officer reach for his gun. They are extremely jumpy about any sudden movements with your hands. Leave your hands in sight at all times, like on the steering wheel.
As for Facebook, what probably happened is when you upload a video it gets put onto a single server that happens to host your FB wall. If the video goes viral, it needs to be moved to a higher capacity server or server farm, to better handle the load.
Re:Folks, have your license and registration ready (Score:5, Insightful)
How about we stop having panicky gunmen micromanage everyone's driving?
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How about we stop having panicky gunmen micromanage everyone's driving?
OK. Will you personally stop the people who shoot cops in the face when they're pulled over for having invalid tags, and for driving drunk or recklessly? You've got that all under control so that the police dealing with assholes all day long for a living won't have a single concern about getting killed because someone's driving on a highway at night with no lights on?
Thanks for stepping up and preventing all of those assaults and murders. The cops will be hugely relieved that their lives are no longer a
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Not that I'm defending the shooting, but by now everyone knows what the police officer will want when they pull you over. Get your license out of your wallet and registration/insurance out of the glove compartment, and have them ready in your hands while the officer is walking towards your car.
Leave your hands in sight at all times, like on the steering wheel.
Those two things you've said are self-contradictory. If the police officer comes over, is the officer going to see you rummaging in your glovebox for your registration (and think you're reaching for a gun)? Or is the officer going to see you with your hands in sight at all times?
Re:Folks, have your license and registration ready (Score:5, Insightful)
Is that a reasonable assumption? For the first couple of years I lived in the US I don't think it was obvious to me that I should even stay in the car when pulled over. When if my wallet was in my bag in the back of the car? No reason to take it into the front just in case I'm pulled over, after all, especially when you come from a part of the world that has no requirement to carry identification in the car in the first place. Certainly back in the UK I wouldn't assume I couldn't leave the car. This peculiar interaction where the driver has to follow careful rules that are only practically spread through word of mouth and watching TV shows, just in case the cop gets nervous, isn't really optimal, and I don't think assuming that "everyone knows" is a reasonable view of the world..
Re:Folks, have your license and registration ready (Score:4, Insightful)
Put yourself in the Cop's shoes and THINK about what they are concerned about, preferably in advance, and don't do anything stupid and you are very unlikely to get shot. Here are my rules.
1. Limit movements as much as possible when the cop is near the car (both you and your passengers). Get your license, insurance card and registration out onto the dash if you can before they arrive but be sure to be ready to sit still before they approach. Have EVERYBODY in the car put their empty hands in their laps and sit quietly. STAY IN THE CAR, unless instructed otherwise and turn off that radio.
2. Make sure the officer can see as much as possible. Turn on interior lights, roll down your tinted windows.
3. IF you need to move or reach for something, ASK PERMISSION. "Sir, my insurance card is in the center console. May I reach for it?" Then announce what you are doing "OK, I'm going to get my insurance card out of the center console now."
4. No matter what the cop tells you to do, COMPLY, even if you don't think the cop is acting lawfully. If you are one of those who has purposed not to consent to any searches, refuse the 'may I look in your trunk?" requests with a polite "No officer, I do not consent to a search of my trunk" but ALWAYS be respectful, nonthreatening and compliant as much as you can. If you really believe the officer is in the wrong, complain LATER.
5. Remember that the officer usually just wants to walk away from the traffic stop alive. And that this is one of the most dangerous thing they do. If you go out of your way to keep the officer feeling safe, by showing your hands, moving slow and not being threatening in your attitude you will make their day that much easier. An officer who is more relaxed is more likely to let you go with a warning too, so who knows, all your efforts may pay off.
I remember a time when I got pulled over in the dead of night with 5 people in a 69VW Bug. I stopped, turned on the dome light and had to tell a girl in the back to keep quiet (she was going off about how unfair it was I got pulled over). It was cold and I had my winter jacket on. There was no way I was going to get my driver's license out while sitting in the car so I explained to the officer the issue. I asked if I could get out of my car. He gave me permission and I got out, stood facing away from him and pulled my wallet from my back pocket and my license from it. I showed him both hands before I turned around and wasn't surprised that he had his weapon in hand. I let him approach me to get the license. Where I think I deserved the ticket, he didn't write one. But I could have been easily been shot because that kind of stop is incredibly dangerous tor cops, dead of night, car full of people, some 6'6" guy in a long coat reaching into his back pocket. I kept him as comfortable as I could by being as non-threatening as I could and I think it paid off for me.
Folks, have your anal lube ready (Score:3, Insightful)
Put yourself in the Rapists's shoes and THINK about what they are concerned about, preferably in advance, and don't do anything stupid and you are very unlikely to get shot. Here are my rules.
1. Limit movements as much as possible when the rapist is near the car (both you and your passengers). Get your panties, bra, and pants off onto the dash if you can before they arrive but be sure to be ready to sit still and spread your legs open before they approach. Have EVERYBODY in the car put their empty hands in
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And how do you propose we FIX that issue? I can think of three ways... (Assuming we really intend to do law enforcement and don't want to just fire all the cops out there..)
1. Roast all the cops, condemn them all because some segments of the population seem to be shot at by cops more often and send them to hours of diversity and sensitivity training -- Not going to help at all.
Actually not a bad idea. While there are only a few "bad apples" the police culture is to accommodate and protect those bad apples.
The problem isn't police protecting themselves, in the majority of these incidents there's virtually no hint of danger for the officers, it comes from police officers being able to use force, including deadly force, with basically no consequence.
Police culture needs to change.
2. Mount protests and fire up segments of the population and do all you can to stir up civil unrest over something, stage riots even. (Remember Ferguson MO?) - Again Absolutely NOT helpful at all. This just foments bad attitudes towards police officers, destroys the property of the innocent and causes more folks to get shot. Why? Because you end up having MORE confrontations with bigger attitudes. More folks start to not trust the police and stupidly act out their distrust and disrespect. This results in more violent confrontations and shootings.
Not protesting wasn't particularly helpful either. There's a short term increase in tension but the goal
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Get your license out of your wallet and registration/insurance out of the glove compartment, and have them ready in your hands while the officer is walking towards your car. If it's night, turn your dome light on so he can see inside the car.
That's how you get shot. You turn on your hazard lights, you pull over and you put both hands on the steering wheel at 10 and 2 and do NOTHING until the cop walks to your car.
When he asks you for something, you tell him where it is and that you need to reach/move to get it and is he OK with that. You do it slowly and deliberately and one step at a time.
You start digging around in your car before he's come to your window to talk to you? Of course you're hiding evidence, you're grabbing a weapon, you're d
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Wow. So you ran a red light and now you deserve to die because you reached for your glovebox out of habit. Land of the free indeed.
Yeah. I remember all the propaganda about the nazi and commie secret police, and how we were the land of the free.
Well, they say that one becomes what one hates, so, here we are.
The largest prison population in the world.
Land of the free indeed.
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Not that I'm defending the shooting, but by now everyone knows what the police officer will want when they pull you over. Get your license out of your wallet and registration/insurance out of the glove compartment, and have them ready in your hands while the officer is walking towards your car.
No, don't do this.
Context: I'm a concealed carry instructor, and what I'm going to say is from the training I received from the state police when I got certified as an instructor.
Per the state police, here's what the cops want you to do when you're pulled over: Put your car in park, turn off the ignition and put your hands where they can see them. On the wheel, or on the dash -- or if you think the officer might have some particular reason to be worried, put them out the window. When the officer approac
Re:Folks, have your license and registration ready (Score:5, Insightful)
"Lowering the windows is especially important if your state allows you to tint all of the side windows."
This is a good suggestion, and I will incorporate it into my submission routine.
Too bad there's no way to remove the tint from our skins during a traffic stop.
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Not that I'm defending the shooting, but by now everyone knows what the police officer will want when they pull you over. Get your license out of your wallet and registration/insurance out of the glove compartment, and have them ready in your hands while the officer is walking towards your car. If it's night, turn your dome light on so he can see inside the car.
What country is this? I'm in South Africa, I get pulled over perhaps twice a month, sometimes four times a month (happened just yesterday), so in my lifetime I've been pulled over well over a hundred times.
Sometimes I get out the car, a few times I got into an argument with the cop simply out of boredom. At night I don't turn the dome light on. I don't bother with keeping my hands on the wheel, I'm normally outside the car digging in my pockets (looking for my license) before the cop approaches. A few time
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From what I read, he only told the cop he was armed _as_ he was reaching for his wallet.
If that's true, it IS what killed him.
And that makes all kinds of sense. If he had told the cop he was armed, the cop would have first secured the weapon, not asked for his ID.
How is this any different (Score:4, Insightful)
How is this any different from what the newspapers and or TV news used to do ? Editors and in some cases for TV the FCC always ruled over what could and would be published, and often it took a day or 2 before that happened. In the age of instant gratification people expect the news to be available seconds after it happened, or as it happens but that doesn't allow for any sort of verification or fact checking. The power of social media can be wonderful or terrible, it has shown great and horrible things, but without clarification we've seen what a misunderstanding can do to someone's life, and I think we can see that kind of instant publicity often drives what some people can and will do. In some cases it is better not give the bad guys what they want but to sensor some details to aid in criminal investigation and preserve the privacy and dignity of victims or families. I think there is certainly room for discussion and some rules need to be established for what can and will be seen. There are other ways to publish video content, e.g. YouTube and if Facebook becomes undependable or tyrannical then some other source of app will fill in the gap.
Note : I don't use Facebook but manage to keep abreast of current events.
FACEBOOKISTAN (Score:3)
Facebookistan Site [facebookistan.org]
Watch on YouTube Facebookistan english version [youtube.com]
Several thoughts on all of this.... (Score:3)
First of all, the whole "technical glitch" claim when this new "live content" is suddenly pulled *could* be legitimate. I'm not saying Facebook has done much to deserve the benefit of the doubt based on its actions in the past.... but it's quite possible these live streams of very popular "breaking news story" type content are overloading the servers they're getting hosted on. Maybe FB has to pull stuff when it gets too many simultaneous views and move it elsewhere, to keep it from impacting performance of the rest of the site? I don't know what they have to juggle behind the scenes to keep everything working properly, but I imagine there's a lot of this manual intervention required. Even our MS Exchange mail hosting service has struggles with automatic load-balancers and regularly pins the blame on them when strange things start happening with devices not receiving mail.
Second, I think there have to be some expectations set with "social media" as a whole. Just because social media sites are adding capabilities like live-streaming video doesn't make them a substitute for a commercial news station. At best, they have the same status as your run of the mill blogger. Certainly, some breaking news happens thanks to these sites distributing it first. But there's no guarantee the content will reliably stay online to reference it for others to view or read it, and it's liable to be presented with a strong bias attached.
IMO, there's a weird symbiotic relationship between news media and social media going on. While social media is happy to grab up a lot of the "eyeballs" that would traditionally have watched television news or read printed news instead? The news media benefits, in turn, by selectively rebroadcasting some of the content, straight from social media sites, vs. incurring the expense of sending news teams to record that content themselves all the time. Even if we're talking only printed news -- they can literally break new stories based solely on what they saw happen or read about on social media.
Re:THIS JUST IN! (Score:5, Insightful)
News at 11: CNN, Reuters, ABC, WashPo, Huffington, Faux News, and every other news source also decide which killings, rapes, assaults, incidents, political mishaps and weather event to report.
Re:THIS JUST IN! (Score:4, Insightful)
Companies back biased reporting. News at 11
The phrase is "film at eleven" - you're hearing this on the news, so the news is now".
But yes, we've already seen Facebook uses their platform to support their political objectives. That's been obvious for a while really, and most conservatives have left Facebook/Twitter/etc to avoid supporting them in any way. No doubt that was the goal of progressives all along, or anyway delights them.
But an echo chamber that feeds directly into your selection bias is harmful to everyone. Sadly, that's all we seem to have these days, in both new media and old - it's on you to read both conservative and liberal blogs (or, for the elderly, both listen to talk radio and read the paper). Just realize that social media is a progressive echo chamber these days, so you're not going to find perspective if all you consume is social media, MSNBC, and liberal blogs.
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Re:THIS JUST IN! (Score:4, Insightful)
Reality has a liberal bias, so the conservatives fled Facebook because they are unhappy with reality.
This is what confirmation bias looks like. When you're part of the "community-based reality", everything your read or hear shows how smart you are, and what idiots the fools on the other side must be - after all, you never see evidence to the contrary!
Re:THIS JUST IN! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:THIS JUST IN! (Score:5, Funny)
Except nobody left Facebook. It's just a bunch of people posting their Goodbye Cruel World messages - on Facebook. Then checking in to see how many "likes" they got for quitting Facebook. And then rage-quitting for ten minutes.
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most conservatives have left Facebook/Twitter/etc
I really, really doubt that's true, unless by 'conservative' you mean some subset of 'non-RINOs' whose numbers are too small to really worry about anyway
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However, I have conservative relatives who use FB a lot and have their own echo chamber of "news" from what they get through FB.
It works both ways.
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NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, NY times, etc etc etc.
You are thinking of the 'openly communist' media. Even there they hold up their propaganda tradition with 'Democracy Now' (News from a non-reality based perspective).
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That's been obvious for a while really, and most conservatives have left Facebook/Twitter/etc to avoid supporting them in any way.
Most conservatives have left Facebook? Who votes up this bilge.
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Most people have some time they fritter frivolously.
Try saying "fritter frivolously on Facebook" ten times fast.
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Why hasn't there been a drop in the number of Facebook or Twitter hits daily?
Claiming the media is against you is a well-established political sport. It's just noise. We live in a world now where everything that we don't like must be a conspiracy, because our feelings can't possibly be wrong.
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This always confused me. My entire life, I have lived in the Central Time Zone, and we get our film at 10PM every night.
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A shot might have been in some papers. But the story at the time was her wig flew off her head. The picture is so grainy you can't tell what it is.