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The GDI calls itself “independent”—but if it depends on funding from governments and public institutions like the European Commission, what kind of independence is that?

Hortly before Christmas, the U.S. State Department slapped visa sanctions on five individuals whom it described as being agents of a “global censorship-industrial complex” bent on restricting the freedom of speech of Americans. The headliner of the sanctions list was, of course, Thierry Breton, the former EU internal market commissioner, who spearheaded efforts to enforce the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) during the last years of his tenure in the Commission. But the directors of three organizations allegedly involved in censorship activities were also sanctioned: HateAid, the Global Disinformation Index, and the Center for Countering Digital Hate.

As discussed in my recent portrait of HateAid, the German organization is directly integrated into the DSA censorship system as a so-called trusted flagger of allegedly illegal or harmful online content. Under the DSA, online platforms and search engines are required to give priority treatment to the notifications of ‘trusted flaggers’ precisely because they have been certified as ‘trusted’ by EU member state governments—in this case, the German government.

But even though it does not have ‘trusted flagger’ status, another of the organizations targeted by the U.S. sanctions has likewise been a major player in the EU’s efforts to ‘regulate’ online speech, which in fact began many years before the passage of the DSA. Moreover, it, too, has important, if largely unclarified, ties to Germany. The organization in question is the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), whose executive director and best-known figure, Clare Melford, was placed on the sanctions list.

Although it had already come under scrutiny from right-leaning media and politicians in the U.S., GDI gained particularly wide public attention in April 2024 when the British website UnHerd revealed that it had been placed on a ‘dynamic exclusion list’ by the organization and was losing advertising revenue as a result. ‘Defunding disinformation’—or, more precisely, alleged purveyors of disinformation—by compiling this sort of advertising blacklist is the stated goal of GDI.

GDI is usually identified as a British organization in news reports, and it is that in the sense that it has a London office and Melford is British. But it is not only that, as the below entry from the European Commission’s CORDIS database makes clear. The GDI receives funding from the European Union as a German organization with its headquarters in Berlin.

Moreover, GDI also receives funding from the German government itself—or at least was receiving such funding when it last deigned to acknowledge its funding sources.

Thus, when UnHerd went public with its beef with GDI in 2024 and raised the issue of GDI’s funding by the British government’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), it soon turned out that FCDO had already ceased funding the organization. The U.S. State Department had done likewise, following a similar controversy involving conservative media in the United States. As UnHerd noted in a follow-up report, FCDO and Disinfo Cloud, a now defunct platform that was funded by the U.S. State Department, quickly disappeared from the funders list on the GDI website. European Union and the German Foreign Office—Auswärtiges Amt—remained, as can be seen in the below screen cap from the site as it appeared on 19 April 2024.

Meanwhile, the entire funders list has been purged from the GDI website. As it so happens, the German Foreign Office, located in Berlin’s central ‘Mitte’ district, is about a five-minute drive from GDI’s Friedrichstrasse 114 address, which is likewise in Berlin Mitte.

In 2018, the European Commission rolled out its first formalized effort to combat alleged online ‘disinformation’ in the form of the so-called Code of Practice on Disinformation, a supposedly ‘self-regulatory’ industry code into which the Commission recruited all the major online platforms and search engines. GDI was founded that very year.

In June 2022, shortly before the passage of the DSA, the Code of Practice was strengthened, and the EU-funded European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO) was given a seat on a Permanent Task Force on Disinformation that was created under it. Melford serves on the EDMO advisory board. Last year, the Code of Practice was elevated to the status of a Code of Conduct, meaning that platforms can use Code participation as a means of demonstrating compliance with the DSA.

In a 2021 presentation to the European Parliament titled “Monetizing Disinformation in the EU,” Melford identified not only the Russian media RT and Sputnik as purveyors of ‘disinformation’ but also the American media Breitbart, The Epoch Times, and The Western Journal (see the below visual). The following year, Ursula von der Leyen would, of course, ban RT and Sputnik from operating in the EU—a ban that did not only cover their broadcasting but was also dutifully applied by online platforms.

In its early years, GDI was indeed generously funded by the British government. But GDI submissions to the EU lobby register already made its eagerness to be serviceable to the coalescing EU censorship regime unmistakably clear. Thus, GDI data circa May 2022 notes,

We are working globally but see a clear and unique opportunity at the EU level to advance the code of practice on disinformation to defund sites. We are keen to leverage our knowledge of this topic for meeting the EU’s commitment to this issue.

The submitted information also refers to “the weekly evidence we compile and share with EU contacts”—notably, on “ads funding disinformation (on COVID-19 conspiracies, for example).”

Lobbyfacts.eu, which assembled the above-cited data, was also able to document numerous meetings between GDI and European commissioners or their staff between 2020 and 2022. These included meetings with the offices of all the commissioners most actively involved in the Code of Practice and the preparation of the DSA: Thierry Breton (Internal Market), Margrethe Vestager (Europe Fit for Digital Age), and Věra Jourová (Values and Transparency).

Interestingly, the May 2022 data still lists a major grant of nearly €1.5 million from FCDO. Since, however, the British funding began to dry up (the last FCDO contribution was in 2023), GDI has taken to listing Disinformation Index Inc. as its main donor. See, for instance, the most recent register data here.

This is to say that GDI lists itself as its main donor! ‘Disinformation Index Inc.’ is the name used by an American branch of GDI. As we will see momentarily, this lack of transparency is typical for the organization—and indeed extends to the American branch as well, thus rendering GDI’s funding almost entirely opaque.

The current version of the register entry notes that “The Global Disinformation Index is tracking and supporting EU commitments to combat disinformation as outlined in the EU Code of Conduct on Disinformation and the Digital Services Act,” and Lobbyfacts.eu has been able to document five more meetings with European Commission officials—including one just last week! The most recent meeting was with the Commission’s current point person on the DSA, Executive Vice President Henna Virkkunen.

In 2022, following controversy over the GDI’s targeting of conservative U.S. media, the American branch of the organization released tax returns to the DC-based news outlet The Washington Examiner. The returns, however, not only omitted the identity of donors but even redacted those of its own officers.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a 990 that excludes the names of officers and directors,” a lawyer specializing in non-profit law told The Washington Examiner at the time, “And I’ve looked at hundreds.”

In any case, the German government’s response to a parliamentary question (p. 82) shows that already in 2023, precisely as the British funding was being wound down, the German foreign office had begun funding GDI via, namely, its American branch, as can be seen below. “AA” is the Auswärtiges Amt, and “Disinformation Index Foundation” is another name associated with the American branch of GDI. That year, the AA contributed a relatively modest sum of €48,000.

As touched upon above, GDI is devoted to defunding alleged online purveyors of ‘disinformation’ by depriving them of their advertising revenues. Not coincidentally, this demonetization agenda is part of both the 2022 strengthened Code of Practice on Disinformation and the DSA. But the irony of this is that advertising revenues are, of course, precisely what allow non-paywalled websites to remain independent. GDI calls itself “independent”—namely, from the media whose reliability it claims to assess—but if it depends on funding from governments and public institutions like the European Commission, what kind of independence is that? The would-be ‘watchdog’ could be nothing more than a guard dog.

And why has GDI become so cagey about its funding sources since the FCDO funding dried up? Who exactly is funding the defunders?

Original article:  europeanconservative.com

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The new contempt that Trump has shown for the French president, who contacted him proposing a G7 summit in Paris, is worrying on many levels. But it seems to signal the end of NATO and the special relationship put on ice.

There are very few certainties in political life, but we can now safely assume that President Emmanuel Macron will never again send Donald Trump a private text message. This extraordinary episode – Trump posting the message on social media and then mocking the French leader – has sent shockwaves across European capitals and is revealing on multiple levels.

For Macron and France, it shows a new level of brazen contempt, which will further erode whatever political capital he has left and leave many French commentators asking whether America is still an ally at all.

For the rest of Europe, the message and its humiliating reception are telling. They show that Trump has given up on EU countries as potential partners in his broader vision for America. Macron’s text read like a plea, suggesting a last-minute G7 meeting and a special dinner – complete with the pomp and ceremony Trump enjoyed in London. Two main points in the message reveal the core European concerns: Greenland and Iran. Have European leaders seen solid intelligence suggesting Trump is close to a major strike against Iran? Likely. Do they believe their diplomatic skills could surpass those of Trump’s advisors in talking him out of it, given the unthinkable implications of an Iranian retaliation? Also likely.

Yet they are misreading Trump’s character and motivations. Macron is not the only one sending pathetic late-night messages after his diplomatic corps has shown its limitations. Trump recently wrote to the Norwegians, whining about their failure to award him a Nobel Peace Prize and hinting he would be less inclined to pursue peace efforts without their appreciation – falsely claiming to have stopped eight wars worldwide.

The truth is Trump has grown tired of courting relations that get him nowhere. Leaking such messages will simply make any EU leader wary of contacting him – exactly what he wants as he pushes ahead with his most radical ideas, namely Greenland and, arguably, Iran.

These two gambits, like Macron’s message, underline a point few EU leaders wish to accept: the United States is far from an ally if it proceeds alone with regime change in Iran and an invasion of Greenland. Recent troop deployments by EU countries to the Arctic underscore this concern. Some might even ask: could Europeans find themselves at war with the US? Trump’s response has been equally worrying: tariffs for those who oppose him. A standoff in Greenland proves that his hints to Norway – that he is prepared to dismantle NATO to serve American interests – are very real and genuinely unsettling for Europe.

Thus, the leaked text underlines a singular, chilling point: America is no longer a friend or ally and could even become an enemy under the Trump administration. In other words, all bets are off, and the EU must now consider a NATO without the US. This idea is not as far-fetched as it sounds. In Afghanistan in 2007, senior US officers told me that America had 8,000 soldiers “unattached” to the NATO-led ISAF mission. “Just in case things get a little outta hand,” one general explained. He meant that the US operated a dual command structure in case NATO partners challenged American dominance. Perhaps this is the future for Europeans – who will no doubt revive the old concept of an “EU army” mere hours after the ink dries on reports of the Macron–Trump exchange.

Macron, of course, may not grasp the full significance. The deluded leader believes he speaks for the entire EU, even when such stunts leave him publicly diminished. But he is not alone. The trio of France, the UK, and Germany have never had weaker, more pathetic leaders in their entire histories. We are at a new low, and Trump is all too happy to remind us.

A few new certainties now present themselves: the demise of NATO, with the US as its chief partner, is almost inevitable. This could trigger a crisis of confidence in the entire EU project, with German far-right groups, for the first time, openly calling for Germany to leave the Brussels bloc. A trade war is also likely, with increased European tariffs on US goods, and a more pragmatic narrative on Ukraine may take centre stage. In recent days, more EU leaders have called for dialogue with Russia – Macron’s text hinted at this too – so the Ukraine war could become a tool for Europe to navigate the new US crisis as it sees fit.

Many will conclude that Trump is, at best, an old man in crisis – or, at worst, someone losing his mind.

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Mossad is taking advantage of deadly riots that rocked Iran this month to solicit spies through a series of social media ads. In one of history’s strangest collaborations, the Israeli intel agency has purchased the ads through an LLC owned by Atlanta-based standup comic Desi Banks.

Days after anti-government rioters spread mayhem across Iranian cities, Israel’s Mossad published a new series of Farsi-language online recruitment ads. The Israeli foreign intelligence service has taken partial credit for the deadly unrest, pledging in a December 29 Twitter/X post that its agents were “in the field” with protesters. Now, it is escalating its infiltration efforts by soliciting spies inside Iran and throughout the Persian diaspora.

One of the most recent ads appeared January 14 on a Twitter/X account associated with Israeli intelligence, @payameabi. It featured a short AI video showing an Iranian protester seated defiantly in the middle of a street, confronting a phalanx of state security officers on motorbikes.

“Your role, Iranians abroad, is vital,” the tweet by @payameabi declares. “The final days of the regime have arrived. If you know someone who works in sensitive industries and centers, call us… Our organization is by your side.”

The text is followed by a link to a Google form which allows potential recruits to apply as Mossad informants, promising them protection and lucrative rewards. At the center of the recruitment form is an image of a tattooed arm holding a trash bag emblazoned with the logo of the Islamic Republic of Iran. It reads, “Build the future. Opportunities. It is right now.”

A separate Mossad recruitment ad also released on January 14 makes explicit reference to the violent upheaval inside Iran: “Our organization has heard the voice of you, the people of Iran, and is planning the final blows against the regime. Your compatriots inside Iran are engaged in a fateful struggle, and we intend to help you. As Iranians far from the homeland, you feel a sense of helplessness these days, which is understandable, but some of you can play a vital role in this stage.”

Similar solicitations appear on a Telegram channel called BlueMessage. One which appeared this month amid the riots that shook Iran features another AI-created image showing a forlorn-looking young man standing apart from a grim urban crowd of austere Iranians. “Your role is vital,” the Mossad appeal states. “We can help you and Iran.”

Mossad recruiting Iranian agents through Atlanta standup comedian’s company

The Mossad has placed several recruitment ads on YouTube and other Google-owned social media platforms through Desi Banks Productions LLC, an eponymous company owned by a Black, Atlanta-based comedian. Known for urban-themed standup comedy and online video sketches like “How Them Pimps Used to Be Back in the Day,” “Going to Yoga with a White Girl for the First Time,” and “How it Be When a Skinny Dude is With A Big Girl,” Banks might be the unlikeliest conduit for highly sensitive Mossad operations. On the other hand, the comedian’s apolitical profile and likely need for production support might have made him the perfect candidate for an intelligence agency seeking to conceal its fingerprints.

Is Banks aware that his company is responsible for buying Mossad recruitment ads on Google? Or did Israeli intelligence rely on another entity to deceive Banks?

The Grayzone visited the address listed in Desi Banks Productions’ corporate records in hopes of questioning the comedian. It took us to a downscale condominium complex at 1195 Milton Terrace SE in Atlanta’s Chosewood neighborhood. No one appeared to be home at the address, nor was it possible to leave a note in a mailbox seeking comment from Banks.

Banks did not respond to a September 2025 query from Jack Poulson, the reporter who first revealed the comedian’s apparent role in the Mossad ad campaign. At the time of publication, the standup comic is on tour in Philadelphia, PA. A January 18 afterparty planned by Banks at the nightclub NoTo Philly was cancelled seemingly at the last moment.

According to a September 2025 report by Poulson and Lee Fang, the Mossad recruitment ads have appeared in 19 countries around the world, but the only country in which each one appeared was Germany. There, the Mossad has solicited information from family members of Iranian nuclear scientists.

The Mossad has not only claimed a pivotal role in the insurrectionist riots which spread mayhem across Iran this January, it received credit for the disorder from former CIA director Mike Pompeo, who declared on his Twitter/X account, “Happy New Year to every Iranian in the streets. Also to every Mossad agent walking beside them…”

Tamir Morag, a correspondent for Israel’s Channel 14, echoed Pompeo. “We reported tonight on Channel 14: foreign actors are arming the protesters in Iran with live firearms, which is the reason for the hundreds of regime personnel killed,” he stated on Twitter/X. “Everyone is free to guess who is behind it.”

Though the comedian Desi Banks has remained silent on his company’s apparent role as a Mossad shell, at least one of his colleagues has expressed suspicion about his activities. In an interview with Wallace “Wallo” Peeples, a motivational speaker and former long-term prisoner known for his commentary on “the game,” Banks was visibly uncomfortable when asked if “somebody” had visited him “to help you go the next level.”

“You might see somebody who’s not that talented, or not that funny, or whatever, and all of a sudden they be all the way up here, and you trying to figure out how that happened… Have anybody came to visit you?” Wallo asked Banks.

“Nahhhh,” Banks replied, averting his gaze. “I don’t think they gonna try to do that. Hell naw.”

Original article:  thegrayzone.com

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You can literally just be sitting there not saying or doing anything and still find yourself getting arrested and prosecuted for an antisemitic hate crime. They have the authority to do this presently, under the laws that already exist.

A mentally disabled Australian woman is being prosecuted for antisemitic hate crimes after accidentally pocket-dialing a Jewish nutritionist, resulting in a blank voicemail which caused the nutritionist “immediate fear and nervousness” because she thought some of the background noises in the recording sounded a bit like gunshots.

We’re being told we need more of this. There’s “hate speech” legislation presently in the works to make this worse. Australia’s controversial Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism Bill appears to be explicitly crafted to dramatically increase the scale, frequency and consequences of the exact sort of dynamics we’re seeing in this case, and to eradicate opposition to Israel throughout the nation.

This is how overextended Australia’s freakout over “antisemitism” already is. You can literally just be sitting there not saying or doing anything and still find yourself getting arrested and prosecuted for an antisemitic hate crime. They have the authority to do this presently, under the laws that already exist. The argument for this bill is that our present horrifyingly tyrannical and abusive system is insufficiently authoritarian and tyrannical, and that prosecutors need more power to police speech far more forcefully.

Australians are being asked to trust a system that would take a woman with an intellectual disability to prosecution in a court of law over an accidental butt-dial to a person of Jewish faith with the authority to send people to prison for years over their political speech. And this is happening after we just spent years watching Australian authorities roll out authoritarian measures to stomp out criticism of Israel and quash protests against an active genocide.

This is madness, and it needs to be brought to a screeching halt. Immediately. This entire country has lost its damn mind.

The Bondi attack isn’t the reason, it’s the excuse. All these laws being rolled out to stomp out criticism of Israel in Australia were sought for years before the shooting occurred.

Immediately after the attack last month I tweeted, “Not a lot of info about the Bondi shooting yet but it’s safe to assume it will be used as an excuse to target pro-Palestine activists and further outlaw criticism of Israel in Australia, as has been happening to a greater and greater extent in this country for the last two years.”

They could have proved me wrong, but instead they’ve spent this entire time proving me one hundred percent correct. The frenzied efforts to crush anti-genocide protests and silence speech that is critical of Israel and Zionism in these subsequent weeks has plainly established this.

There is no connection between pro-Palestine demonstrations and the Bondi attack. None. It had nothing to do with Palestinians, and it had nothing to do with anti-genocide demonstrations. It’s a completely made-up claim that Israel’s supporters have been circulating in Australian consciousness through sheer repetition. They’re just pretending to believe it’s true in order to promote the information interests of a genocidal apartheid state.

Israel’s supporters need to use propaganda, deception, censorship and oppression to promote their agendas, because it’s all they have. They don’t have truth. They don’t have arguments. They don’t have morality. All they have is brute force. They are shoving support for Israel and its atrocities down our throats whether we like it or not, and if we refuse what we’re being force-fed they will punish us. That’s the only tool in their toolbox.

This needs to be ferociously opposed. The more Israel and its supporters work to assault our right to oppose their abuses, the more aggressively we need to oppose them. We are no longer fighting against war and genocide in the middle east, we are fighting against an assault on our own civil rights. It’s personal now. They’re coming for us directly.

Original article:  caitlinjohnstone.com.au

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Following the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores, global attention has turned to the question of who U.S. President Donald Trump’s “next target” might be. Washington’s blatant disregard for international law once again demonstrates the United States’ self-appointed role as a global judge and executioner.

According to Trump’s own statements, “options” such as Mexico, Colombia, and Greenland are allegedly on the table. Yet amid these discussions, an unusual voice has emerged from Kazakhstan:

“Трамп, Қазақстанға назар сал.”
(“Trump, pay attention to Kazakhstan.”)

This phrase—roughly translated as “Trump, focus on Kazakhstan” or “Pay attention to Kazakhstan”—has been turned into a social media campaign by a segment of the Kazakh opposition. Far from being a mere protest slogan, the call reflects a politically dependent and passive mindset that seeks solutions to domestic political issues through U.S. intervention.

The message openly implies that U.S. President Trump should subject Kazakh leader Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to the same fate as Maduro—namely, abduction by a foreign power. Attempting to legitimize the forcible detention of a country’s leader under the banner of “democracy” lays bare how the concept of human rights is being cynically instrumentalized. The campaign, accompanied by various photomontages, is being promoted by members of the Kazakhstan-based “Atajurt Kazakh Human Rights Initiative.”

Founded around 2017, Atajurt initially emerged as a volunteer human rights movement focusing primarily on alleged rights violations against ethnic Kazakhs and other Muslim communities in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. While the organization defines itself as human rights–oriented, critics in Kazakhstan and across the region—particularly those opposed to U.S. influence—have long accused Atajurt activists of being pro-Western and of advancing American geopolitical interests. The selective invocation of human rights—raised only when it aligns with Western strategic priorities—has only reinforced these criticisms.

The campaign addressing Trump was launched by Serikzhan Bilash, one of the organization’s founders and a well-known civil society activist. Bilash’s rhetoric stands in stark contradiction to any claim of political independence or national dignity.

Bilash was detained in 2019 on charges of inciting ethnic hatred, later left Kazakhstan, and ultimately settled in the United States. From there, he promoted the campaign on social media with the following message:

“Trump, pay attention to Kazakhstan!!!
Write this sentence on a white piece of paper, take a photo or video, and share it on social media!!!”

Appealing to Washington—particularly to a leader notorious for interventions and regime-change operations—to shape Kazakhstan’s political future reveals both political desperation and deep-seated inconsistency within segments of the Kazakh opposition.

The illustration shared by Bilash features the campaign’s main slogan alongside Kazakhs in traditional attire holding the national flag, accompanied by the word “Democracy.” Yet invoking “democracy” rings hollow when viewed against the backdrop of America’s destructive legacy in Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, and Venezuela.

Another prominent figure among pro-Western Kazakh “human rights” circles, Margulan Nurdangazyuly, has also been highly active on social media throughout the campaign. His posts further blur the line between human rights advocacy and explicit calls for foreign intervention.

Nurdangazyuly shared dozens of photos bearing the campaign slogan, including one in which Tokayev’s image was digitally superimposed onto a photograph of Maduro after his abduction by U.S. forces. Turning the kidnapping of a head of state into propagandistic or humorous visual content starkly illustrates how ethical boundaries are abandoned in the name of political messaging.

Despite being one of the campaign’s leading voices addressing Trump, Nurdangazyuly also shared an image stating, “The people of Kazakhstan will arrest Tokayev ourselves.” This contradictory stance—simultaneously calling for U.S. intervention while invoking “national will”—stands out as a clear example of political hypocrisy.

Numerous social media posts echoing the demand for Trump’s “attention” toward Kazakhstan have circulated online. Collectively, these posts indicate that a segment of the opposition prefers appealing to power centers in Washington rather than engaging their own society.

The campaign has failed to generate significant resonance within Kazakhstan, and no official response or sanction has been issued by Kazakh authorities regarding the posts. In this sense, its overall impact appears limited.

Nevertheless, such initiatives by self-described human rights activists lend credence to the frequently raised—and frequently denied—accusations of pro-American alignment. Entrusting the resolution of domestic political issues to a power whose record is marked by coups, invasions, and regime-change operations undermines both the political legitimacy and moral coherence of any opposition movement. The expectation of “external intervention,” constructed through such actions, ultimately calls into question the credibility of opposition forces—regardless of geography.

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There is a direct link between our establishment’s struggle against social media and ‘fake news’ and the growing perception of politicians as dishonest.

As a critic of Germany’s 19th-century censorship regime warned in 1901, “Police meddling with art are like bulls in a china shop.”

A modern version, following last week’s shocking statements by Daniel Günther (CDU), Minister President of Schleswig-Holstein, might read: “Politicians meddling with press freedom are like sparks in a powder keg.”

Exposing his censorious instincts during a talk show, Günther indicated he would like to see alternative news platforms banned. It began with him ranting for minutes about the influence social media now has on politics. Mentioning specifically the pro-populist news portal Nius, he spoke of “enemies of democracy.” Articles by Nius, he claimed, were “completely devoid of facts,” adding that “as a rule, nothing in the articles concerning me is true.” When the presenter asked whether these portals should be “regulated, censored, and in extreme cases even banned,” he replied, “Yes.”

Günther’s comments were so inflammatory that even many in the mainstream felt embarrassed. He is a well-meaning man who wanted to do the right thing but expressed himself clumsily, they claim. Those on the other side disagree: He’s a dangerous authoritarian who shouldn’t be in a position of responsibility—”an arsonist dressed up as a respectable citizen who has declared war on press freedom,” argues lawyer Joachim Steinhöfel, who has filed a lawsuit against him. Since the next election in his state isn’t due until 2027, it will be a while before Günther’s voters get a final say.

Naturally, he sees the well-deserved backlash against him as vindication of his statement about social media. Yet the outcry shows that the times are over when politicians, following the arrogance of power, could believe they’d get away with playing themselves up as arbiters of truth and guardians of democracy (“our democracy,” as they like to call it). Thank goodness for social media, we should add.

Germany’s censorship problem runs deep

The problem, however, is that Günther’s statements, extreme as they were, are hardly exceptional. Germany is already deeply entrenched in state censorship and attacks on free speech.

Since 2021, it has had a particularly nasty and repressive lèse-majesté law: German Penal Code (StGB) Article 188 targets defamation (üble Nachrede) or insults (Beleidigung) against “persons in the political life of the people” (politicians and state officials) when done publicly or in media. It has led to thousands of citizens being dragged to court and even sentenced for alleged insults. Günther’s delusion that his rants and complaints about disrespectful media would be well-received is surely a result of the logic this law creates.

The trouble for our self-pitying political class, however, is that the more thin-skinned and censorship-prone they become, the more their authority—or what little remains of it—melts away. Put otherwise: the louder the complaints about “insults,” “lies,” or “falsities,” the more persistent and widespread the feeling that our politicians are not to be trusted and not up to their job.

The Enlightenment knew better

It was during the Enlightenment that the futility of censorship was highlighted by those fighting against it. “One can be sure no book or publication will entice more readers than when the press announces it has been banned, and that those who purchase it will be heavily fined; for one immediately suspects that it must speak the truth, otherwise they wouldn’t confiscate it,” noted a German brochure written in 1775.

Tellingly, one of the worries of those defending Günther is that many more people will now want to know what Nius says and writes. With his “misunderstandable” statements—as the head of one of Germany’s state broadcasters, Andreas Schmidt (NDR), likes to call them—Günther did Nius a big favor: “He provided grounds for a legal dispute and made the right-wing portal even better known than it already was,” Schmidt writes.

And indeed, people should be interested in what Nius and other government-critical outlets have to say—if only because the self-assessments by our politicians are often wrong. Ironically, the penchant to censor has put the age-old question of what is truth, and who holds the key to truth, back on the political agenda.

Who defines democracy?

Consider the accusation that Günther poses a threat to democracy—an accusation that he would undoubtedly dismiss as one of the many untrue things said about him on social media. If it were really wrong, Günther would correct himself in a credible way in an attempt to win back the trust he lost by exposing his censorious instincts. Instead, he continues to sulk and insult his critics, thereby confirming their views.

The self-defeating irony of censorship was revealed in another famous case last April. David Bendels, the editor-in-chief of the AfD-affiliated Deutschland Kurier, received a seven-month suspended prison sentence for sharing a satirical meme showing then-Interior Minister Nancy Faeser holding a sign that read “I hate freedom of speech.” The image was fabricated and, according to many, an especially nasty piece of “fake news.” However, by enforcing the sentence, the true essence of the meme was highlighted even more. As Turkish-German journalist Deniz Yücel—a man who was imprisoned in Turkey for speech crimes—aptly noted, by failing to condemn this verdict, Faeser effectively confirmed that she hates free expression. Only this week, a German court acquitted Bendels, ruling that the photomontage fell under the category of protected freedom of expression.

A pattern of dishonesty

There is a direct link between our establishment’s struggle against social media and fake news and the growing perception of politicians as dishonest. For example, when it emerged in December that Chancellor Merz had filed hundreds of complaints for insult under §188 prior to being elected, this only reinforced the perception of him as a two-faced politician. Was this the same Merz who had, at least apparently, criticized his predecessors for their thin-skinned persecution of citizens?

Other examples include when Berlin’s mayor, Kai Wegner, was exposed for lying just hours after one of his government spokespersons had urged the public not to trust social media and to rely only on government reports. This appeal came amid discontent with the government’s handling of the crisis during last week’s horrendous blackout in Berlin. When asked why he had taken so long to appear in public, the mayor said he had been coordinating emergency measures in his office all day. However, it later emerged that he had actually been playing tennis. The incompetence and the lie itself were bad enough, but this arrogant and ill-advised attempt by the government to present itself as the only authoritative source of information infuriated many Berliners even more.

As is prone to happen in such situations, there was certainly overheated speculation and questionable content on social media. However, the notion that our embattled political class can and should protect us from falsehoods and fake news is absurd and dangerous.

The real source of distrust

“It’s not the media who are responsible for the lack of trust, but it’s the fault of our politicians who have not earned the trust of the people,” said journalist Henryk Broder, and he’s right.

Nius can pride itself on being in good company. In the late 19th century, the highly influential German weekly Simplicissimus—known for its biting social and political critique and iconic red bulldog logo—was also threatened with a ban. The paper had published a brilliant poem by the famous Frank Wedekind mocking the Kaiser’s trip to the Holy Land. Arrest warrants were issued against the publisher, the cartoonist, and the poet himself (who spent six months in prison).

Many had hoped that those days were long over, but it has become more important than ever to speak truth to power. It’s good that there’s been such outrage against Günther. We must keep up the pressure to defend social media and the free press, even though our authoritarian elites would prefer to see them disappear today rather than tomorrow.

Original article:  The European Conservative

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L’intelligenza artificiale si sta rapidamente diffondendo come una piaga in tutto lo spettro di Internet. Ciò è piuttosto prevedibile, considerando che il modello delle grandi aziende tecnologiche per l’intelligenza artificiale è il tecno-feudalesimo, basato sul profitto e sul controllo mentale/sociale, e non sulla condivisione/espansione della conoscenza e sulla creazione di condizioni migliori per una cittadinanza ben informata.

L’intelligenza artificiale è per molti aspetti l’antitesi della civitas. Prima del boom dell’intelligenza artificiale, diversi livelli di Internet erano già stati distorti in una serie di campi minati in una fogna più grande della vita. L’intelligenza artificiale, controllata dalle grandi aziende tecnologiche, si era già rivelata in molti aspetti una frode. Ora è un’arma.

Su YouTube esistono diversi canali manipolati dall’intelligenza artificiale che rubano l’immagine e la voce di alcuni di noi, analisti politici indipendenti. Un elenco non esaustivo include come bersagli John Mearsheimer, Larry Johnson, Richard Wolff, Glenn Diesen, Yanis Varoufakis, l’economista Paulo Nogueira Batista e me stesso.

Non è un caso che tutti noi siamo analisti geopolitici e geoeconomici indipendenti, ci conosciamo personalmente e siamo ospiti più o meno degli stessi podcast.

Nel mio caso, ci sono canali in inglese, portoghese e persino spagnolo: raramente realizzo podcast in spagnolo, quindi anche la voce è falsa. In inglese, di solito la voce è approssimativamente clonata. In portoghese ha un accento che non possiedo. In diversi casi, il numero di spettatori è enorme.

Essenzialmente, questi provengono dai bot.

In tutti i casi, per quanto riguarda noi, i destinatari, tutti questi canali sono falsi. Ripeto: tutti questi canali sono falsi. In alcuni casi possono essere stati creati da “fan”, sicuramente con l’obiettivo di trarne profitto attraverso la monetizzazione.

Oppure l’intera truffa potrebbe essere parte di qualcosa di molto più sinistro: una strategia volta alla perdita di credibilità. Come in un’operazione dei soliti sospetti per seminare confusione tra il vasto pubblico di diversi pensatori indipendenti.

Non è un caso che molti spettatori siano già profondamente perplessi. Da qui la domanda più comune: “Sei davvero tu o è l’intelligenza artificiale?” Molti sembrano aver denunciato questi canali falsi, ma YouTube, finora, non ha intrapreso alcuna azione al riguardo. Gli algoritmi continuano a suggerire questi canali a un vasto pubblico.

L’unico modo realistico per combattere la truffa è presentare un reclamo a YouTube. Tuttavia, in pratica, ciò è piuttosto inutile. La direzione di YouTube sembra essere più interessata a cancellare occasionalmente i canali “scomodi” che mostrano pensiero critico e analisi.

Decifrare il codice della truffa

Quantum Bird, esperto di fisica e HPC (High Performance Computing), precedentemente impiegato presso il CERN di Ginevra, ha decifrato il codice della truffa:

“La proliferazione di agenti di reti neurali digitali di deep learning in grado di emulare la scrittura, la voce e il video degli esseri umani era inevitabile, e il loro impatto sulla ricerca scientifica, sulla produzione di conoscenza e sull’arte in generale ha un potenziale negativo che non è stato ancora analizzato completamente”.

Aggiunge: “Mentre scrittori e accademici stanno descrivendo in dettaglio la comparsa di testi a loro attribuiti, che replicano in una certa misura il loro stile e le loro opinioni, l’ultima moda è la fioritura di interi canali su YouTube e altre famose piattaforme Big Tech, che offrono video di produttori di contenuti popolari, che comunicano nella loro lingua madre o in altre lingue. In diversi casi, la qualità di questo materiale sintetizzato è sufficientemente alta da non consentire l’immediata identificazione da parte di uno spettatore medio. Nel contesto della comunità di analisi politica, l’impatto è evidente: revisionismo storico, erosione della reputazione e distorsione delle notizie e delle analisi”.

E qui Quantum Bird espone l’argomento decisivo dal punto di vista tecnologico:

“La sintetizzazione di questo tipo di contenuti richiede la disponibilità di campioni abbondanti e una capacità di calcolo massiccia, ben oltre la portata degli utenti domestici. Mentre la popolarità delle vittime di YouTube garantisce la prima condizione, la seconda suggerisce l’attività di attori statali o aziendali su larga scala, poiché i modelli avanzati di deep learning devono essere sviluppati e addestrati elaborando un’enorme quantità, in termini di ”spazio su disco”, di audio e video. La monetizzazione dei contenuti non copre i costi di questa operazione. Ironia della sorte, sono proprio la disponibilità e l’eccessiva esposizione di voce e video online a consentire questo tipo di attacchi”.

Eccoci qui. Benvenuti nell’era dell’intelligenza artificiale che trasforma la rete in una macchina infernale determinata a cancellare significato, cultura e storia, seminando profonda confusione intellettuale. Esattamente come vuole il tecno-feudalesimo.

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A.I. is fast expanding as a plague all along the internet spectrum. That’s quite predictable, considering the Big Tech model for A.I. is techno-feudalism, relying on profit and mind/social control, and not on sharing/expanding knowledge and creating better conditions for a well-informed citizenry.

A.I. in many aspects is the antithesis of civitas. Prior to the A.I. boom, several layers of the internet had already been distorted into a series of minefields across a large-than-life sewer. A.I. – as controlled by Big Tech – in many aspects had already revealed itself as a fraud. Now it’s a weapon.

There are several channels on YouTube manipulated by A.I., stealing the image and voice by some of us, independent political analysts. A not-extensive list includes as targets John Mearsheimer, Larry Johnson, Richard Wolff, Glenn Diesen, Yanis Varoufakis, economist Paulo Nogueira Batista and myself.

It’s not an accident that all of us are independent geopolitical and geoeconomic analysts, mostly know each other personally, and are guests in roughly the same podcasts.

In my own case, there are channels in English, Portuguese and even Spanish: I rarely do podcasts in Spanish, so even the voice is fake. In English, usually the voice is approximately cloned. In Portuguese it comes with an accent I don’t have. In several cases, audience numbers are huge. Essentially, these come from bots.

In all cases, as far as we, the targets are concerned, all these channels are fake. I repeat: all these channels are fake. They may at least in some cases be set up by “fans” – certainly with an eye for profit via monetization.

Or the whole scam may be part of something way more sinister: a strategy bent of loss of credibility. As in an operation by the usual suspects to sow confusion amongst the – large – audience of several independent thinkers.

It’s not an accident that quite a few viewers are already deeply puzzled. Cue to the most common question: “Is this really you, or A.I.?”  Many apparently have denounced these fake channels, but YouTube, so far, has done absolutely nothing about them. The algos keep suggesting these channels to large audiences.

The only realistic way to fight the scam is to file a complaint with YouTube. But that, in practice, is pretty useless. YouTube management seems to be more interested in occasionally erasing “inconvenient” channels displaying critical thinking and analysis.

Cracking the code of the scam

Quantum Bird, a physics and HPC (High Performance Computing) expert, formerly with the CERN in Geneva, has cracked the code of the scam:

“The proliferation of agents of deep learning digital neural networks capable of emulating writing, voice and video of human beings was inevitable, and their impact on scientific research, production of knowledge and art in general has a negative potential that has not been yet fully analyzed.”

He adds: “While writers and academics are detailing the springing up of texts attributed to them, and replicating to a certain extent their style and opinions, the latest fad is the blooming of whole channels on YouTube, and other notorious Big Tech platforms, that offer videos of popular content producers, communicating in their native language or other languages. In several cases, the quality of this synthesized material is sufficiently high not to allow immediate identification by an average viewer. In the context of the political analysis community, the impact is obvious: historic revisionism, erosion of reputations and distortion of news and analysis.”

And here Quantum Bird lays out the tech clincher:

“The synthetization of this type of content requires the availability of abundant samples and massive computational capacity, way beyond the reach of domestic users. While the popularity of the YouTube victims guarantees the first condition, the second one suggests the activity of large-scale state or corporate actors, since advanced deep learning models must be developed and trained by processing a huge quantity, in terms of “disk space”, of audio and video. The monetization of the content does not cover the costs of this operation. Ironically, it’s the availability and the excess exposure of voice and video online that allows this type of attack.”

Here we go. Welcome to A.I. turning the net into an infernal machine bent on erasing meaning, culture and History – and sowing deep intellectual confusion. Exactly like Techno-Feudalism wants it.

By Caitlin JOHNSTONE

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So it turns out Israel’s mistake was starting its genocide right after Palestinians gained the ability to quickly share video footage of what’s happening in Gaza, but right before the moment when any video footage shared online could easily be dismissed as AI.

Just today I saw two viral tweets that had received Community Notes from Twitter users warning that the posts featured AI-generated videos. Both were shared by right wing accounts with large followings, and both were used to spread Islamophobia.

The first was shared by Israeli-American pundit Emily Schrader, who has 194,000 followers on Twitter. The tweet features a fake CCTV video of a man in Muslim garb approaching a non-Muslim woman on the street in a way that’s meant to look intimidating before getting attacked by a house cat. As of this writing Schrader’s tweet has more than 612,000 views, and carries a Community Note that reads “AI generated. Time at top is a telltale sign. Also she starts off with a white and black bag then only black.”

The second was from a right wing British account called Basil the Great, which has over 210,000 followers. Their tweet features a fake video of an English-speaking teacher showing white children how to pray a Muslim prayer, captioned “I‘ve been sent this footage twice today. It shows a Muslim Teacher instructing British children in the ways of Islam in school. I hope it’s fake but it wouldn’t surprise me if it was real. In fact the left will probably say they don’t see anything wrong with this.”

It is not real. As of this writing the tweet carries a Community Note which reads “Video is AI generated. The teacher ‘sits’ on an invisible chair at the end of the video, which was not there at the beginning.” The video has had 1.7 million views.

This is Twitter, not Facebook, which had already been ravaged by fake AI content that’s been duping older users for nearly two years now.

Fake AI videos are now getting so good that they’re able to fool younger people who are much more aware of what’s out there. Australia’s ABC recently ran a segment where they showed different video clips to teens and asked them to determine which ones were real and which ones were AI, and they couldn’t do much better than randomly guessing.

For decades, video footage was the gold standard for evidence that something had occurred. For a few sweet years there was a period when anything significant that happened in public would usually be recorded on video, because in any group there was bound to be a few people with a smartphone in their pocket, and then those videos could be shared with the world as evidence that the significant thing had occurred. Now whenever there’s footage of a crime, or an act of government tyranny, or just a famous person doing something ridiculous in public, people aren’t going to believe it happened unless it’s corroborated by eyewitness testimony.

So in that sense we’ve sort of backslid to where we were before the invention of photography, when eyewitness reports were the only thing we had to go by. A video can help illustrate what the eyewitness is talking about, but without a physical witness willing to attest to its veracity, it’s often not going to be worth much in terms of proving that something happened.

Which of course serves the powerful just fine. Videos of genocidal atrocities, police brutality, and authoritarian abuses have been causing a lot of headaches for our rulers these past few years, so they’ll be happy to see the information ecosystem entering a new era where inconvenient video footage can be dismissed with a scoff.

Generative AI is making everything dumber. It’s crippling people’s ability to write, research, think critically and create art for themselves. It’s making it harder for us to discern truth from falsehood. It’s causing people to become divorced from their own humanity in weirder and weirder ways.

It’s getting harder and harder to know what’s real on the internet. That photo could be fake. That video could be fake. That song could have been made without any actual artist behind it. That essay could have been written by a chatbot. That social media account you’re interacting with could be a chatbot themselves. This is going to have a massively alienating effect on networking technologies whose initial promise was to help bring us all together.

When the internet first showed up people rejoiced at their ability to connect with others around the world who had the same interests and passions, saying “At long last, I’m not alone!” When AI showed up people started logging on to the internet and wondering, “Uhh… am I alone?”

Because you can’t be sure there’s anyone in there.

It reminds me of a passage from Charlotte Joko Beck’s “Everyday Zen”:

“Suppose we are out on a lake and it’s a bit foggy — not too foggy, but a bit foggy — and we’re rowing along in our little boat having a good time. And then, all of a sudden, coming out of the fog, there’s this other rowboat and it’s heading right at us. And…crash! Well, for a second we’re really angry — what is that fool doing? I just painted my boat! And here he comes — crash! — right into it. And then suddenly we notice that the rowboat is empty. What happens to our anger? Well, the anger collapses…I’ll just have to paint my boat again, that’s all. But if that rowboat that hit ours had another person in it, how would we react? You know what would happen!”

Beck is touching on the Buddhist doctrine of no-self here, which is a discussion for another day, but this parable has so many layers that say so much about humanity and human connection. The only reason we put so much mental energy and attention into our day-to-day interactions and relationships is because we assume we’re relating to other human beings like ourselves. We assume there’s somebody in the other rowboat.

Nearly all of the love, lust, anger, hatred, shame, guilt, passion, enthusiasm, attraction, aversion, delight and disgust we feel from moment to moment throughout this human adventure has to do with other humans. We don’t experience those big feelings toward inanimate objects like rowboats, cars or shopping carts, because we know there’s nobody in them. There’s no real connection to be had with them. Our big feelings come from our meetings with real people, real family, real lovers, real enemies, and real art from real artists.

AI is an empty rowboat, and the more it takes over the internet, the emptier it’s going to feel. People won’t feel like they can find the connection they’re craving in any of the areas that are dominated by artificial intelligence, and they’re going to go looking for it elsewhere. Maybe they’ll start going looking for it in places where there are physical people in physical bodies they can touch and make eye contact with, who they know for a fact are real people with real feelings and hopes and dreams like themselves.

And maybe that would be a good thing. Humanity is becoming too disconnected and dissociated as it is. We could all benefit from digging our roots into reality a bit deeper.

There are some technological developments where as an individual you have to draw a line for yourself. Modern civilization has made it possible to work from home and eat ten thousand calories a day without ever exercising or leaving your apartment, but most of us have the good sense not to do this because we know it would be very bad for our health. We’re going to have to start looking at AI the same way we look at McDonald’s: sure it’s there, but that doesn’t mean you have to consume it, because it’s really not good for you.

Original article: Caitlin Johnstone

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Desta vez, foi a Alphabet, mega-empresa detentora do Google, que revelou a pressão censória do governo Biden. A empresa junta-se ao coro puxado por Elon Musk, que ao comprar o Twitter deflagrou os Twitter Files, e continuado por Mark Zuckerberg, que ano passado já havia se queixado da pressão por censura. Com um perfil mais institucional, a empresa deu essa informação ao Congresso, por meio do seu advogado, Daniel Donovan.

Assim, temos a trinca das Big Techs estadunidenses ligadas à comunicação de massa expressando inconformidade com a censura governamental nos EUA: Elon Musk é dono do X (nome oficial do Twitter) e de uma rede privada de satélites que fornece internet; Zuckerberg é dono do Facebook e do Instagram; a Alphabet é dona do Google, que é ou tem quase tudo na internet: começou como buscador, mas tem e-mail, navegador, plataforma para aulas usada por instituições públicas, nuvens de arquivos, mapas com satélite, o sistema operacional de celular mais popular etc. O importante para o caso em tela é o Youtube, comprado em 2006 pelo Google, que hoje é assistido em aparelhos de TV até por idosos e compete com canais de TV.

Se o carro chefe dos Twitter Files era a censura de assuntos políticos na época das eleições, convém lembrar que as denúncias incluíam a censura de opiniões relativas à pandemia: covid, vacinas e lockdown. Essa censura foi o objeto da denúncia de Zuckerberg, e é o objeto do novo pronunciamento da Alphabet. Segundo a nova informação, a Casa Branca pressionava para derrubar conteúdos que manifestassem ceticismo quanto às supostas vacinas feitas a toque de caixa pela indústria farmacêutica. Eis as palavras do advogado da Alphabet: “Altos funcionários do governo Biden, inclusive da Casa Branca, procuraram a Alphabet repetida e continuadamente, e pressionaram a empresa no que concerne a certos conteúdos gerados por usuários relacionados à pandemia de COVID-19 que não violavam suas próprias políticas. Embora a empresa tenha continuado a desenvolver e aplicar suas políticas de maneira independente, os funcionários do governo Biden continuaram a pressioná-la para remover conteúdos não-violadores gerados por usuários.”

Isto soa como uma reivindicação de independência da Alphabet frente ao governo dos EUA. Afinal, lemos que a Alphabet tem suas políticas – que ela própria formula e implementa – e que o governo dos EUA tem as suas. O comunicado não revela inconformidade com alguma ilegalidade, mas sim com o mero fato de o governo atrapalhar a autogestão da empresa durante uma emergência pública.

Abstraiamos, por ora, as bizarrices cometidas pelo poder público na condução da pandemia: não é nenhum absurdo supor que o Estado tenha uma política pública referente à informação, e que essas políticas tenham precedência sobre as políticas de uma empresa privada referentes ao mesmo assunto. Na verdade, todo Estado tem alguma política pública referente à expressão. Até mesmo nos EUA, onde há a 2ª Emenda, há um histórico de censura que leva em conta interesses de Estado. A promoção do comunismo foi por muito tempo proibida, por exemplo. Se quisermos deixar de lado o aspecto propriamente político, podemos apontar para o fato muito mais elementar de que todo Estado que se preze deve proibir a divulgação de pornografia infantil e estupro, por exemplo. Não obstante, sites de pornografia pouco criteriosos com o material, como o Pornhub, se valem justamente da liberdade de expressão até para não colocar limites de idade para os usuários do site. Ou seja, os EUA não são um país sério: empresa lá, se tiver muito dinheiro, faz o que quer.

O desacordo entre o Youtube e o governo Biden chama tanto mais a atenção porque ambos estavam de acordo quanto à louvação da Pfizer. Em 22/7/2021, eu escrevia o seguinte no jornal brasileiro Gazeta do Povo: “Existe um canal de YouTube do próprio YouTube chamado YouTube Brasil. E o YouTube agora quer que eu aprenda tudo sobre covid com especialistas selecionados por ele. Agora, toda vez que abro o site, encontro uma montanha de sugestões de vídeos com uma pessoa confiável me instruindo sobre vacinas. […] Um vídeo despertou meu espanto pelo título: ‘Grávidas e puérperas podem se vacinar?’. Digo ‘espanto’ porque […] nunca um ‘divulgador de ciência’ recomenda cautela em relação a essas vacinas tão céleres. Ainda assim, esperava algum pudor, pois aqui no Brasil a Anvisa, depois da morte de uma procuradora (tinha que morrer alguém e tinha que ser alguém tão importante quanto uma procuradora), passou a recomendar que grávidas não fossem vacinadas com a vacina da AstraZeneca. Será que teriam coragem de mandar grávidas se vacinarem mesmo assim? Clico no vídeo. Uma tal Dra. Mariangela Simão explica a uma mulher de cabelo azul que os laboratórios não testaram as vacinas em grávidas, exceto a Pfizer, que tem um estudo recente que ‘mostrou que a vacina é segura e eficaz em gestantes.’ Por isso, e porque o Brasil está vacinando com a vacina da Pfizer, a grávida deve tomar a vacina, sim. […] Procurei por estudos da Pfizer em grávidas e o que encontrei foi uma matéria de 19 de fevereiro de 2021 da CBS anunciando que a Pfizer iniciara, nos Estados Unidos, o primeiro teste em grávidas. Ainda segundo a CBS, a Pfizer espera que o teste seja concluído em janeiro de 2023. Esse é o YouTube, que fica rotulando os outros de fake news e tirando vídeos do ar.”

Agora sabemos que os vídeos saíam do ar por pressão do governo Biden – ou seja, provavelmente esse governo estava censurando em nível global. Era, pode-se dizer, uma censura pró Big Pharma, já que tirava do ar qualquer conteúdo que incitasse a “hesitação vacinal”. Não obstante, o fato é que o Youtube estava divulgando ativamente propaganda da Pfizer. Pior ainda, propaganda enganosa. O Youtube fazia isso de graça? Nunca vemos o Youtube anunciar parcerias pagas; fica implícito que toda propaganda feita pela plataforma está nas interrupções dos vídeos. Ou bem o Youtube não aceita parcerias pagas, ou bem não é nada transparente. Se for o primeiro caso, é possível que ele faça a vontade dos seus maiores acionistas, entre os quais se contam fundos de investimento e bancos.

Os usuários que produzem conteúdo para as plataformas são seus clientes. Quando o governo dos EUA manda o Youtube, o X, o Facebook e o Instagram deletarem conteúdos, ele interfere nos negócios porque aborrece a clientela. Para as Big Techs, o melhor dos mundos é ganhar das duas pontas: promover a coisa hegemônica da vez (a vacina da Pfizer, por exemplo) e cultivar a clientela – que pode ser trapaceada com um shadow ban para não ficar chateada com a censura explícita.

Do novo episódio, não devemos concluir que os EUA marcham para uma maior liberdade de expressão. Os EUA marcham, isso sim, para o anarcocapitalismo, no qual os donos das entidades privadas censuram o que bem entendem, ou liberam o que bem entendem. Um exemplo de como isso funciona está sendo dado agora pelas universidades dos EUA, que são privadas e contam com muito dinheiro sionista.