This week…
I learned that the police and Islamic religious authority raided a private queer Halloween party in KL. When I was living there, I would attend events like this, so this really makes me feel all sorts of things I cannot really put into words right now. I have a complicated relationship with home and home, you know?
Anyway, I told the spouse, and she checked in with our queer friends in KL and kept me posted because I’d think of them, but I also don’t have the energy? I am bad at it. I spent the weekend away from Malaysian content online until this morning—to find Ning Baizura openly expressing solidarity with the queer community in light of the event. As I said, I stayed away from Malaysian news, but I think she could be the only Malaysian celebrity to be an outspoken ally, which I think is just about almost as terrifying as being openly queer in Malaysia. So, anyway, go stream her music.
And now, a selection of top stories on my radar, a few personal recommendations, and the chart of the week.
Elon Musk tweets then deletes unsubstantiated conspiracy theory about Pelosi attack
Twitter’s new owner continues to spread dangerous and misleading information on the platform. In a screen-grab taken by writer Molly Jong-Fast, Elon Musk is shown replying to Hillary Clinton with a story that appears to be fake and defamatory.
In the initial tweet, Clinton shared an article from LA Times, which reported that David DePape had a history of spreading far-right conspiracy theories online. DePape was charged with breaking into the home of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and violently assaulting her husband this week.
Musk responded to the tweet with an article from one Santa Monica Observer, suggesting there was more to the story than meets the eye. Santa Monica Observer is an imposter website (made to look authentic) that publishes propaganda and conspiracies with little to no credible sources. The site, which has since gone offline, claimed that Paul Pelosi appeared to be drunk during the attack.
Well, for one, being drunk does not give anyone the right to beat you up in your own home. For the rest, I will let you flex your critical thinking muscles. Anyway, Musk has deleted his tweet, but screenshots are forever.
Racist tweets quickly surface after Musk closes Twitter deal
Drew Harwell, Taylor Lorenz and Cat Zakrzewski for WaPo:
An emboldened cast of anonymous trolls spewed racist slurs and Nazi memes onto Twitter in the hours after billionaire industrialist Elon Musk took over the social network, raising fears that his pledge of unrestricted free speech could fuel a new wave of online hate.
The flood of racist posts was among the most prominent signs of how Twitter had changed in the first hours of Musk’s ownership. But those who were expecting even bigger changes, such as the restoration of former president Donald Trump’s account and the layoff of hundreds if not thousands of Twitter employees, will have to wait longer.
Musk on Friday tweeted that he would make “no major content decisions or account reinstatements” until the convening of a new “moderation council.” He promised that the council would have “widely diverse viewpoints” but offered no other information about who would be on it, how its members would be selected, what authority it would have or whether its views would be binding on the company.
People are fleeing Musk’s Twitter for Mastodon, but what is it?
Jonathan Lamon for Mobile Syrup:
…Mastodon isn’t just an open-source Twitter-like social network. When you dig in a little more, there are quite a few differences. Most notable (and likely most confusing for newcomers) are servers. Mastodon isn’t a centralized social network like Twitter, where everyone goes to the same place. Instead, it’s a ‘federated network’ consisting of various servers (also called instances) that represent different communities.
Mastodon likens servers to email address domains like Gmail, Outlook, etc. Users pick a server to host their account, but can still interact with people on other servers as long as they know their address.
There are weaknesses to Mastadon. For example, servers are often interest-specific or location-specific. If you have a broad range of interests, you might find it hard to choose a specific instance, and end up in a general one like mastadon.social. That makes it harder to connect with hardcore enthusiasts in your areas of interest. And if you do pick a focused server, you’ll learn that every server has its own rules. When servers don’t see eye to eye policy-wise, they could block each other for the pettiest of reasons, and you end up having to choose sides and disconnected from the other. Switching servers is possible, but while you will retain your followers, your posts will disappear with the migration.
There are also privacy issues. Without getting into the details, if you do use Mastadon, treat everything you post, including private messages, as public. Best to use end-to-end encrypted messaging services for private conversations. No one should be sharing sensitive information through direct messages on any social media platform anyway.
If you’re on Mastodon, add me @tinacarmillia@mastodon.social.
What I read, listen, and watch…
I’m reading about the changing tide of consumer-focused health websites by Tom Cleveland on TJCX.
I’m listening to Nature Podcast on racism in health care.
I’m watching a CBC News investigation into the landslide that killed five people in BC in November 2021, which uncovered serious threats posed by logging roads across Canada.
Reviews, opinion pieces and other stray links:
Rishi Sunak’s height: The psychology of why we care about how tall leaders are ($) by Kasia Delgado for iNews.
Mondrian painting has been hanging upside down for 75 years by Philip Oltermann for The Guardian.
Adobe now charging extra to use Pantone colours because we live in capitalist hell by Noor Al-Sibai for Futurism.
Chart of the week
Not too sure if they are too complex than necessary, or necessarily complex for the full picture, but here are a few visualised financial analyses of Big Tech companies by French investor Bertrand Seguin, the founder of App Economy Insights who publishes How They Make Money (where you can find more information on these visualisations).