Gatekeeper Google’s Censorship Agenda
by Stephen Lendman (stephenlendman.org – Home – Stephen Lendman)
Google and Facebook intend halting what they call “fake news” – an unstated aim to censor truth-telling on vital issues, wanting content diverging from the official narrative restricted or blocked.
Google transformed itself from search engine to gatekeeper. Its personnel tasked with eliminating what it calls extremist content is being increased to over 10,000, including for its YouTube subsidiary – a virtual army of censors.
In an interview with the London Telegraph, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki said “(w)e will continue the growth of our teams, with the goal of bringing the total number of people across Google working to address content that might violate our policies…”
She claimed “bad actors are exploiting” the Internet site to “mislead, manipulate, harass or even harm.”
The worst ones are given priority space, major media “bad actors,” featuring disinformation instead of what news consumers most need to know.
Founded in February 2005, bought by Google in November 2006, YouTube is now the fifth most popular web site globally, according to Time magazine in October 2017 – after Google, Amazon, Wikipedia and Facebook. Time lists WikiLeaks at number 12 in popularity.
According to Wojcicki, YouTube developed a “computer learning” technology able to identify and remove unwanted content, what it calls inappropriate videos, adding:
“In the last year, (the company) test(ed) new systems to combat (what she called) emerging and evolving threats…tighten(ing) our policies on what content can appear on our platform” – intending to eliminate what it wants removed.
Eliminating radical extremism and other offensive content is one thing, blocking or censoring legitimate alternative views another entirely.
Google, its YouTube subsidiary, Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites are powerful tools for what power brokers want disseminated, restricted, blocked or censored.
The Internet is the last frontier of digital democracy, the only reliable independent space for real news, information and analysis.
It lets anyone freely express views on any topics – unless corporate gatekeepers undermine the public interest, where things are now heading, including the end of Net Neutrality in America if Trump and his FCC chairman Ajit Pai get their way.
A previous article explained his scheme involves letting ISP giants establish toll roads or premium lanes, charge extra for speed and free and easy access, control content, as well as stifle dissent and independent thought – a dismal prospect.
He’ll ban states from imposing their own Net Neutrality rules, forbidding them from overriding federal rules.
A free and open Internet is threatened by hostile gatekeepers and corporate predators wanting it exploited for maximum profits.
The fight for digital democracy enters a new phase – on streets and courts to try saving it.
On December 14, a Net Neutrality rally will be held in Washington, tens of thousands likely coming to try saving what’s unacceptable to lose.
Similar activism is needed to stop Google, YouTube, Facebook and other online companies from blocking and censoring legitimate content on their sites.
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My newest book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."
