Why engage on the platform when it’s rigged by a narcissist? Like the Greyrock method, disengage.

Twitter only has value so long as it has network effect. People leaving diminish it. So why not?

What part of accurate labeling is it being "rigged"?

Tesla and SpaceX combined have obtained $5 billion in subsidies from the US government. NPR’s budget subsidy is less than one percent (~$3M).

The label is not accurate, it’s a weapon of childish behavior.

Indeed, SpaceX must have "state affiliated media" label...

SpaceX doesn’t report the news.

I was sarcastic, sorry if it wasn't clear.

They have not. You are relying on a false headline that calls things like contracts, loans, zev credits from other automaters as ' government subsidies', which is obviously incorrect.

Tesla is only just now receiving subsidies to produce batteries from the IRA that was passed last year, but previously had received no subsidies from the federal government

Are Tesla or SpaceX media companies? I thought they were in manufacturing.

You are comparing apples to oranges.

It feels like you’re attempting to make excuses for bad faith behavior through contortions of criteria. That is a choice, but not one I think that would stand up to scrutiny (based on the facts of the matter and Elon’s very public history of how he exists and operates).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandolini's_law

No really SpaceX isn’t a media company.

State funded is not the same as state affiliated. The government doesn't have any editorial control of NPR.

>The government doesn't have any editorial control of NPR.

Yeah, it's not like the government literally put their own guy as NPRs CEO: https://www.usagm.gov/who-we-are/management-team/john-lansin...

NPR hired him away from the USAGM; "selected by NPR's corporate board". https://www.npr.org/2019/09/05/758047287/npr-names-veteran-m...

"Russia Today hired its CEO, Ivan Muchosranov, away from Russian People's Propaganda Bureau; selected by RT's independent corporate board"

xD

Yeah, no. https://medium.com/dfrlab/question-that-rts-military-mission...

> RT’s parent company, TV-Novosti, is registered as a state-owned Autonomous Non-commercial Organization (ANO) with the Russian Ministry of Justice. According to TV-Novosti’s official filings with the Ministry, it is almost entirely funded by the state budget, with the exact figure ranging annually between 99.5% and 99.9%.

So if it was instead registered as a private company, with, say, Medvedev as CEO, it would be fine?

That would depend entirely on the specific details, including that 99% funding number. If you wanna allege specifics about NPR beyond "they once hired someone who used to work for the government", go for it.

So here's where we disagree: to me, any institution led by Medvedev won't be independent; funding formalities don't matter at all.

Also, once again: there's a fundamental difference between "used to work" and "was a CEO".

I'd be very skeptical of Medvedev, yes. The burden of proof for his independence would be... high.

Do I think Lansing is anything comparable? No.

He who pays the piper calls the tune.

True but it does lean heavily in one political direction. If it is receiving any federal funding then it should be pushed to neutrality, and remove the one-sidedness of their news programing.

I think NPR would be very upset if the government required political neutrality as part of its funding.

NPR seems plenty neutral to me. Neutral is not defined as the midpoint between our two main US political parties (as your username would suggest you know).

I always hear more than one side to each story, when they're long enough, and a good mix of brief stories about either side, positive and negative.

I am a regular listener to at least Morning Edition and All Things Considered, and I can assure you their reporting is very biased to the Left.

The credulous reporting of politically left ideas, policies, and positions on news stories without even strawman explanations of competing ideas is very frequent.

I listen to podcasts for long form, fair discussions of issues, but NPR used to (seemed to?) hew to an objective ideal of reporting, and the new crew happily crusades for their team/goals.

Or maybe your perception of what is actually neutral is too skewed by American political extremism. It seems any source that isn’t ranting about trans folk and teachers being groomers or that the 2020 election was stolen is somehow “left leaning” to many people in this country.

When Trump threatened to cut their funding because they weren't friendly enough to him, their funding increased from donations quite a bit. They're making content their listeners want.

Having standards and self respect isn't rage quitting.

Not at all ragequitting and not degrading to NPR. Staying on the platform tacitly implies NPR accepts the label ...which would be degrading, from their perspective.

If NPR doesn’t wish to accept the label it should refuse government funding.

So any company accepting grants is a state-affiliated company?

Honestly I kinda like it. I would extend it to any company accepting tax breaks.

Imagine the headline 'The church of the Last days, a state-affiliated non-profit, is warning that the end is near'.

McDonalds, a state funded eatery,... (because they accept tax breaks)

Amazon, a state funded company,... (because they shopped around for the best tax breaks)

Or any single other company that does what a company does by making any deal they can to better their bottom lines by taking tax breaks or gov't funding in any form would need to be called state funded.

It sort of loses its stigma from that view point.

The "known to the state of California to cause cancer" of funding-labeling.

i was thinking the cookie consent banner numbing, but yeah, i've always joked that i'm glad to live in a much less carcinogenic state than california.

Any media company accepting grants from the state is indeed state affiliated, yes.

If Twitter wants to survive it should stop antagonizing large users to make political statements

The policy isn’t political, it applies to all government funded media accounts.

BBC just had their state-affiliated label removed.

https://twitter.com/BBC

It’s been replaced with “publicly funded” which I think will also apply to NPR.

Which makes you wonder why it was never applied.

I think people should be slower to act.

Around the time they left, the label had already been improved to mention funding instead of affiliation.

If they could just be a bit chill about it, is quite possible within a month it might have been replaced with a approximate-percentage-funding label, which should not be particularly offensive.

Would be really slick to see all media accounts have company ownership / funding listed.

"people" here refers to elmu,

and the acting refers to his label changes,

right?

Both. Elon's approach to all this is pointlessly erratic, alienating himself from numerous people and orgs he could really use as allies. He might be right that moving entirely to paid verification is needed... but even if that is needed, it could be rolled out over a long time, with much less alienation of the user base.

NPR could benefit from a bit of patience also: realize how erratic the counterparty is, and wait a bit to see what shakes out.

asking NPR to be patient while elmu abuses and insults them is like asking an abused spouse to just stick around in case their abuser with a history of abuse & gaslighting suddenly and inexplicably cleans up their act

at the very least, twitter & elmu have to understand their actions were wrong and show conciliation for wronging them – if they're incapable of that bare minimum, there's obviously no hope of them cleaning up their act

Or maybe they realize there's no benefit of being on Twitter anymore and they're not willing to take disrespect from a trollish man-child?

It's a pit of right-wing extremism and some of the most fawning sycophancy I've ever seen.

Experiences seem to vary a lot. Some people report the Twitter feed changed radically for the worse. Others (including me) have found it's about the same. I think it must depend greatly on what accounts you follow.

How, specifically, does it degrade anybody to stop using Twitter?

I think it speaks well of NPR.