Actors Recorded Videos for 'Vladimir.' It Turned Into Russian Propaganda. (wsj.com) 70
Internet propagandists aligned with Russia have duped at least seven Western celebrities, including Elijah Wood and Priscilla Presley, into recording short videos to support its online information war against Ukraine, according to new security research by Microsoft. From a report: The celebrities look like they were asked to offer words of encouragement -- apparently via the Cameo app -- to someone named "Vladimir" who appears to be struggling with substance abuse, Microsoft said. Instead, these messages were edited, sometimes dressed up with emojis, links and the logos of media outlets and then shared online by the Russia-aligned trolls, the company said.
The point was to give the appearance that the celebrities were confirming that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was suffering from drug and alcohol problems, false claims that Russia has pushed in the past, according to Microsoft. Russia has denied engaging in disinformation campaigns. In one of the videos, a crudely edited message by Wood to someone named Vladimir references drugs and alcohol, saying: "I just want to make sure that you're getting help." Wood's video first surfaced in July, but since then Microsoft researchers have observed six other similar celebrity videos misused in the same way, including clips by "Breaking Bad" actor Dean Norris, John C. McGinley of "Scrubs," and Kate Flannery of "The Office," the company said.
The point was to give the appearance that the celebrities were confirming that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was suffering from drug and alcohol problems, false claims that Russia has pushed in the past, according to Microsoft. Russia has denied engaging in disinformation campaigns. In one of the videos, a crudely edited message by Wood to someone named Vladimir references drugs and alcohol, saying: "I just want to make sure that you're getting help." Wood's video first surfaced in July, but since then Microsoft researchers have observed six other similar celebrity videos misused in the same way, including clips by "Breaking Bad" actor Dean Norris, John C. McGinley of "Scrubs," and Kate Flannery of "The Office," the company said.
Vlad Tepes (Score:2)
Vlad Tepes looks like an amateur these days.
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I misread this as "Vlad Tapes", wondering if there was some bootleg vampire videos making the rounds.
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I am pretty sure Vlad in Vlad Tepes comes form Vladislav, not from Vladimir.
Definitely Post-Information Age (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Definitely Post-Information Age (Score:5, Insightful)
Haven't seen what's been going on in the U.S. of late, have you?
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If everyone around you is an idiot, then you don't stand out as the idiot in the crowd. Thus, it is in the idiots' best interests to try to infect those around them with the idiocy virus as well.
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Re:Definitely Post-Information Age (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Definitely Post-Information Age (Score:5, Insightful)
It can be taught, but it's hard to learn. To be able to actually tell bullshit from reality, you already have to know a lot of stuff. Most people are simply not willing to make that investment. Believing has always been more appealing than knowing, simply by virtue of simplicity. To know something you must understand it. No way around it. And to understand it, you first of all may well have to know something else or you have no chance of understanding.
That's hard. That requires effort.
Believing, on the other hand, is simple. Just say "I believe you" and you're done.
Believing is simply easier and more appealing than knowing. Always have been, always will be.
Or do you think religions would still be a problem if it was any other way?
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Quite the opposite. Our pleasure center gets a dopamine hit every time we learn something new. No kidding.
Unfortunately, our pleasure center doesn't care whether what we learn is true or false, as long as we consider it a revelation. That's why conspiracy nuttery is so popular among the, let's say, less mentally gifted people. They, sadly, rarely got that dopamine hit so far. Usually when they learned something, everyone was already going "yeah, what else is new?", but with the conspiracy, they are now the
Disbelieving is simple [Re:Definitely Post-Inf...] (Score:2)
Believing, on the other hand, is simple. Just say "I believe you" and you're done.
And, likewise, disbelieving is simple. Just say "I don't believe you" and you're done.
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And, likewise, disbelieving is simple. Just say "I don't believe you" and you're done.
And that misses an important fact, people want to believe and once they believe it's hard to convince them that their belief is wrong due to another fact, people take it as an personal attack on their belief when you tell them they are wrong.
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And, likewise, disbelieving is simple. Just say "I don't believe you" and you're done.
And that misses an important fact, people want to believe and once they believe it's hard to convince them that their belief is wrong due to another fact, people take it as an personal attack on their belief when you tell them they are wrong.
And that misses another important fact, people want to disbelieve, and when they are committed to their disbelief it's hard to convince them that their disbelief is wrong due to another fact, people take it as an personal attack when you tell them they are wrong.
Re:Disbelieving is simple [Re:Definitely Post-Inf. (Score:4, Insightful)
Sadly, no.
To fool someone, you only have to overcome his intellect. That's easy.
To convince someone he has been fooled, you have to overcome his pride. That's far, far more difficult.
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Sadly, no. To fool someone, you only have to overcome his intellect. That's easy. To convince someone he has been fooled, you have to overcome his pride. That's far, far more difficult.
They can be fooled by believing what is not true, or by disbelieving what is true.
Re:Definitely Post-Information Age (Score:4, Insightful)
I would say it's a lot easier than that. You get a *huge* percentage of the benefits by asking two questions:
- Who has actually put in the years of effort required to understand the topic? Don't listen to the opinions of anyone else, they're basically worthless. That includes the entire media industry. Consider the subject experts if they're *actually* experts, but if the talking heads voice an opinion onit's a safe bet they're either spouting paid propaganda or just making shit up to pander to their audience. Assume it's a lie.
- Do they have any incentive to lie to me? Don't believe anyone who is going to get power or money from you believing them, or who is being paid by those who will. They may not always be lying, but the moment profit and truth parts ways, they will be. And a disheartening number of experts are willing to sell their opinion.
A bigger problem though is that a huge part of the power structure in the US and abroad is actively hostile to teaching critical thinking skills. Especially many politicians and religious leaders.
Con-men and authoritarians of all stripes will always be opposed to critical thinking, and between the two they seem to have a majority among policymakers these days. And probably most days.
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First question: They don't care, because what these people who studied the subject for years know is the "old" and "wrong" knowledge, but they now have "alternative" knowledge that these people wouldn't even touch because of their "sunk cost fallacy", i.e. they are so invested n the old style that they must defend it at all cost.
Yes, I've heard that argument before. Especially when it comes to "alternative" medicine, "alternative" physics, or any "alternative" bullshit someone wants to sell to you.
And the s
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Certainly - the arsenal used to reject critical thinking is vast. There's been lots of vested interest in improving it through most of human history.
That doesn't mean that critical thinking itself is difficult. The problem is that a huge swath of the population actively reject it, and no amount of rational argument can change an opinion that wasn't reached rationally.
And of the two groups, the rejectors are generally far more emotionally invested in spreading their world view. Unsurprisingly, since their v
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One of the key reasons to reject it is comfort, and I already detailed that one. But there's more.
There's the emotional aspect as you correctly identified. I want it to be that way because I'm invested in that world view. Sunk cost and all that. But there's a third one.
Nobody likes to be a loser. And, well, let's be honest here, most people will never amount to much. They will somehow exist but don't expect them to ever "count". And people don't like the feeling that their life is basically worthless. That
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I wonder how long the Disinformation Age will last.
It comes just before the Idiocracy [wikipedia.org] ...
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For that, people would first of all have to develop critical thinking skills. Most are devoid of even the most basic form of critical thinking.
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I wonder how long the Disinformation Age will last.
How long do you think stupid people will exist for? That's your answer.
There is no "disinformation age" by the way. War propaganda has existed since the day we started carving shit in stone tablets. The only thing that has changed is how clever we've gotten to find new ways of spreading it.
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I wonder how long the Disinformation Age will last. On the plus side, maybe it will motivate people to unplug and normalize healthy skepticism and critical thinking skills.
I have a bit of a pet theory that major new communication technologies initially cause some sort of mass conflict before the culture adapts to it.
The printing press arguably led to the Protestant Reformation, which caused some pretty significant upheaval.
And I doubt Hitler would have been nearly as effective in establishing Nazism in Germany without the Radio and Television.
All these arguments about online free speech, moderation, anonymity, and disinformation, are still us trying to figure out how to adapt
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On the plus side, maybe it will motivate people to unplug and normalize healthy skepticism and critical thinking skills.
Unfortunately, half of intent of disseminating lies in media is to encourage disbelief. If the target audience believes it, great; if they disbelieve it, that's also good-- it trains people to routinely disbelieve all news, so when their own corruption is exposed, their people just say "fake news."
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I wonder how long the Disinformation Age will last. On the plus side, maybe it will motivate people to unplug and normalize healthy skepticism and critical thinking skills.
The problem is that it's the same as the old propaganda but "using a computer"... which as we all know makes it totally different /s
Social media is still something that's relatively new, so we're still figuring out how to use it, where it fits in our lives, so on and so forth. In another few years, maybe a decade, we'll know how to treat information from social media. I suspect a lot of it will end up being treated like "letters to the editor" type stuff, something which is written by a perpetually angry
Doesn't surprise me (Score:1)
Re:Doesn't surprise me (Score:4, Funny)
Like it would have been any more difficult with most of the population.
Russia (Score:4, Funny)
Russia has denied engaging in disinformation campaigns.
Oh well we should look elsewhere then, because Russia would never give out disinformation about their disinformation campaigns. /rolleyes
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Sure, but there are also Russians being _paid_ to do this. Those bored 4chaners are chumps for doing this for free.
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Why would Russia need disinformation when the US was openly planning for war with Ukraine years before SMO, and the head of NATO has been boasting that NATO enlargement is what caused the war.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/rese... [rand.org]
https://youtu.be/Zf5xEBwBhds [youtu.be]
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Why would Russia need disinformation
Russia spends billions of dollars a year on propaganda.
when the US was openly planning for war with Ukraine years before SMO,
The war between Russia and Ukraine is presently in its 9th year.
and the head of NATO has been boasting that NATO enlargement is what caused the war.
The exact opposite is true. Stoltenberg was boasting NATO enlarged as a RESULT of Russia's war of conquest. He is trying to convey the very thing Putler claimed he went to war to prevent resulted in the exact opposite occurring - NATO expansion.
Putler said a lot of things all of them nonsensical from genocide claims against Russians, fighting Nazis, nuclear proliferation, secret bio labs
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Russia needs propaganda like people living in the Sahara need to import sand. It is trivial to shred the entire narrative on Russia and Ukraine by citing facts and western media and officials. Like Biden in 1997 warning that aggressive NATO expansion could lead to war with Russia.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts... [youtube.com]
On some other planet where it was Putin who overthrew their elected president
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The US has openly planned for war with literally every single country on Earth. To not do that would be a complete failure of the Department of Defense. And you know what? I'd be willing to bet that any other country or organization with global ambitions of any sort has likely done the same, regardless if those ambitions are to maintain the status quo or annexing neighbors - that means NATO, Russia, China very likely have done exactly the same.
For example, I assure you they have up-to-date invasion plans
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Willful obtuseness isn't helping your case. Does the US have a file somewhere on how they might send tanks into Toronto - probably. Have they actually done anything to make that actually happen? Of course not.
On Ukraine, they did. Same neocon Victoria Nuland that admitted to biolabs in Ukraine last spring is on video - in front of banners for American oil companies like a Bond villain - bragging about the billions spent to subve
John C. McGinley? (Score:2)
Is this even necessary (Score:2)
Russia has denied engaging in disinformation campaigns.
Can't we just sub in "Russia never admits anything, even if it's a good thing".
Why bother anymore? They're an authoritarian state. Russia's gonna Russia.
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Well, Putin did declare martial law, cancel elections, ban a religion, jail opponents, ban opposition parties, and sized control of media.
Oh wait, that was Zelensky.
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Well, Putin did declare martial law, cancel elections, ban a religion, jail opponents, ban opposition parties, and sized control of media.
Well, Putler declared martial law in the territories he has been trying and failing to illegitimately conquer.
Putler is world renowned for jailing, poisoning and defenestrating his opponents.
All remaining non-state run independent media was shut down after the start of the war because Putler is far too much of a coward to withstand criticism. In Putler's Russia you get locked up for calling Putlers war of conquest a "WAR". Reporters have been jailed for merely speaking the truth.
Oh wait, that was Zelensky.
Ukraine declared martial l
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It's not that Russia never admits anything, it's that their first instinct is to lie, even when the truth would result in a better outcome for them.
Words of encouragement (Score:1, Flamebait)
I certainly hope Putin recovers from his serious bout of little man's disease.
Re: Words of encouragement (Score:1, Flamebait)
I hope Russia recovers from their Putin disease.
There can be no peace with Russia as long as they let him sit in the big chair.
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Can't they just spray bleach on him?
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Putin has approval ratings around 80%. Russia has suffered devastating invasions from western imperialists (Napoleon) and Naxis (WWII) so totally weird how a leader opposing both is popular.
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Putin has approval ratings around 80%.
It would be Putin's wet dream to have Chinese approval ratings. https://www.rfa.org/english/ne... [rfa.org]
"One favored source is an annual report by U.S. public relations company Edelman that details the level of public trust in national institutions in up to 28 countries. The report consistently lists the Chinese government as among the most trusted by its citizens. Beijing was ranked No. 1 globally in both 2023 and 2022, with 89 percent and 91 percent of Chinese expressing trust in the government, respectively."
A
Re: Words of encouragement (Score:2)
They gave my comment the same rating.
Amazing how there are still Russian trolls with mod points on this cesspit.
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Putin has approval ratings around 80%.
Putler has some work ahead of him if he ever expects to catch up with Hitler's 90%.
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Again with the "Putler" as you simp for literal Nazis.
Sounds like a lot of work .... (Score:1)
Where? (Score:2)
There's more than one Vladimir involved... (Score:2)
Why not turn it around and make it about the Littlest Spymaster?
Sounds like the Republican Party. (Score:1)
The plural of "emoji"... (Score:2)
... is "emoji".
They knicked the idea... (Score:2)
C'mon ruskies, can't you be a little more creative with your publicity stunts? How about studying up on the "Yes men"? They've got some great pranks.