onfocus

"In a letter to Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and in interviews with The New York Times, the Rev. Rob Schenck said he was told the outcome of the 2014 case weeks before it was announced. He used that information to prepare a public relations push, records show, and he said that at the last minute he tipped off the president of Hobby Lobby, the craft store chain owned by Christian evangelicals that was the winning party in the case."

Corrupt court.

"When one bidder asked for details about who owned what and where, Ingenious, the UK-based group working on behalf of the band, couldn’t get a straight answer from Gilmour and Waters. Most of the interested parties say they haven’t heard from the sellers in weeks."

When you see an email come in about setting up a meeting re: $500 million sale and you roll your eyes and click delete.

"Every election denier who sought to become the top election official in a critical battleground state lost at the polls this year, as voters roundly rejected extreme partisans who promised to restrict voting and overhaul the electoral process."

So we’ve got that going for us.

"The political media has substituted polling analysis, which is something only people managing campaigns really need, for substantive analysis of the positions of the candidates, something that voters need. "

Dewey defeats Truman, but permanent and across all media. Why? My theory is that Republicans own and control all media and reporters want to please their bosses. There won't be consequences for journalists who got this election so wrong--there will be promotions for cheerleading Republicans.

"Even if academic Twitter ends up largely moving to Mastodon, the big question is whether the general public will move there, too, allowing scientists to communicate with more than just each other. “When I tweet, I’m talking to my neighbor and the person in the grocery store and the teenager who is thinking about studying science in college,” Fiesler says. “That’s the beauty of scientists on social media.”"

My wife signed up for Mastodon yesterday to follow covid researchers. She doesn’t post, isn’t a scientist, and just wants to follow experts having public conversations. That’s just one data point but I think people will move to where conversations are happening. And if that conversation environment doesn’t also have to feed the advertising machine it could be healthier.

"Many of us with larger presences on the platform have seen a significant drop in our follower counts as people make good on their threat to exit. This is, of course, as much their right as it is Musk’s to buy the platform and run it as he pleases. But I think leaving is a mistake."

LOL I have to admit there is some Schadenfreude happening at this moment. Social media has been so awful for so long. Let me have this.

"Twitter is a disaster clown car company that is successful despite itself, and there is no possible way to grow users and revenue without making a series of enormous compromises that will ultimately destroy your reputation and possibly cause grievous damage to your other companies."

It's like a heroin addict thought his best move would be buying the entire heroin supply chain. Congrats, now you have an addiction AND all the problems of being in the drug trade. But Musk's personal disaster aside, does every online social space need to be run by a weirdo right wing authoritarian? That seems bad for everyone.

"Salma al-Shehab, a Saudi student living in the UK and attending Leeds University, was sentenced to 34 years in prison for having a Twitter account and following and retweeting dissidents and activists. She was arrested and convicted after returning home for a holiday."

Saudi Arabia partnered with Elon Musk to become the 2nd largest investor in Twitter. It doesn’t look like Musk is building a free speech platform.

"Police have not identified a motive for the attack on Pelosi’s husband. Judging by social media posts, the suspect appears to have been stewing in a mix of conspiracy theories about elections and the coronavirus pandemic."

So he was motivated by the mainstream Republican Party platform.

"Exxon Mobil broke records with its profits in the third quarter, raking in $19.66 billion in net income. The Irving, Texas company said Friday that it booked $112.07 billion in quarterly revenue, more than double the revenue it received last year during the same period."

record profits? in this economy?

"Humanity is unequivocally facing a climate emergency. The scale of untold human suffering, already immense, is rapidly growing with the escalating number of climate-related disasters. Therefore, we urge scientists, citizens, and world leaders to read this Special Report and quickly take the necessary actions to avoid the worst effects of climate change."

Please vote for leaders who take our climate emergency seriously. We need large collective actions to help make environmental stress easier for people.

"It was just so frustrating to be dealing with something so traumatic, and then just gamble with the outcome of Amanda's life unnecessarily,” says Josh.

Awful result of a long campaign to take health care options away from people and Republicans are campaigning on expanding this suffering.