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Dance like no one’s watching. Write like your fact-checking email will wind up an exhibit in the Musk v Altman trial.
Deepa Seetharaman
23.2K posts
Deepa Seetharaman
@dseetharaman
covering AI for @reuters. ex-@WSJ. Email: [email protected]
Find me on Signal: signal.me/#eu/SX-5fAfwgT…
- Selena Gomez emailed Sheryl Sandberg last year to take her to task about hate on Facebook, per @AP. apnews.com/article/race-a…
- New from @JeffHorwitz & me: Facebook spent years studying the its role in polarization, according to sources and internal documents. One internal slide laid out the issue like so. ”Our algorithms exploit the human brain's attraction to divisiveness.”
- A number that stopped me at my tracks: a man diagnosed with coronavirus spent six weeks in the hospital. His hospital bills totaled roughly $1.9M. wsj.com/articles/the-1…
- Legitimate scientists are trying to go viral on social media due to "sheer frustration with seeing the misinformation that is going out there.” But they’re drowned out by conspiracy theorists & anti-vaccine groups whose COVID posts do v well platforms.
- Good questions re that strange Priyanka Chopra - Nick Jonas piece. The writer @mRiah has apologized for it — and that’s good — but what about her bosses? How’d this happen?
- A couple Amazon employees bought condos in Long Island City *before* the company disclosed that would be its new HQ, and lawyers say that’s legal. wsj.com/articles/amazo…
- The Weather Channel quits Facebook. “We went along for the ride every single step of the way. But we noticed, over the course of two years, that we were being paid in all types of currencies — followers, shares, views — that did not feel like money."
- Surprised and bummed to not see Jennifer Lopez on this list. She was magnetic in Hustlers.The #Oscars nominees for best actress in a supporting role: Kathy Bates (Richard Jewell) Laura Dern (Marriage Story) Scarlett Johansson (Jojo Rabbit) Florence Pugh (Little Women) Margot Robbie (Bombshell)
- NEW from me: some light holiday reading about Joel Kaplan, one of the most controversial & influential executives at Facebook, & his growing ability to kill, postpone & shape $fb products that risk making conservatives angry.
- Ken Chenault is leaving Facebook’s board, following disagreements with $FB officials over political policies & mounting frustration that Zuckerberg wasn’t taking his advice, per sources. Story w/ @JeffHorwitz.
- “From 12:03 to 12:46, 911 dispatchers received numerous calls from within the classroom, including repeated calls from a child whispering that people were dead and begging ‘Please send the police now.’” wsj.com/articles/texas…
- Replying to @dseetharamanThe concern predates the election. A 2016 slide shows showed extremist content thriving in more than one-third of large German political groups. “64% of all extremist group joins are due to our recommendation tools.” “Our recommendation systems grow the problem.”
