AP: EXPLAINER: Why is Facebook banning Myanmar military pages?. “Facebook announced Thursday that it is removing all remaining Myanmar military and military-controlled pages from its site and from Instagram, which it also owns. It said it will also block advertising from military-linked businesses. The decision follows a Feb. 1 coup in which the military removed elected leaders from power and jailed others.”
Reuters: India plans new social media controls after Twitter face-off. “Chafing from a dispute with Twitter, India plans to oblige social media companies to erase contentious content fast and assist investigations, according to a draft regulation.”
9 News Australia: Facebook set to end ban on Australian news. “Facebook is set to end its ban on Australian news appearing on its platform just six days after the controversial decision was implemented. Facebook has told the Federal Government it intends to restore Australian news pages ‘in the coming days’ following amendments to the News Media and Digital Bargaining Code.”
Grand Forks Herald: North Dakota House approves bill targeting social media companies for censorship. “The proposal would bar social media sites with more than 150 million active users from censoring North Dakotans’ posts based on race, religion or viewpoint. The bill would would also open up social media companies to civil lawsuits from residents who believe they’ve been blacklisted from the sites.”
CNET: Google will reportedly lift ban on political ads this week. “Google is reportedly set to resume accepting political ads on all its platforms after temporarily blocking them following the Capitol Hill riot in January. The search giant told advertisers it will be accepting political ads starting Wednesday, according to a report on Monday from Axios.”
NiemanLab: As Facebook pulls news in Australia, rural and elderly Australians will be hardest hit. “A study of local news consumption by the News and Media Research Center at the University of Canberra shows 32% of people in regions with populations under 30,000 have been turning to social media to fill the news gap. Newspaper closures and job losses have hit areas outside Australian cities hard. More than 100 local news outlets have closed during the Covid-19 pandemic. Removing news from Facebook will further restrict the choices of people with already limited access to news.”
Rolling Stone: Sex Workers Worry They’re Going to Be Purged From Twitter. “Compared to other social platforms, Twitter has historically been relatively adult-friendly, allowing adult content on its platform where competitors like Instagram and Tumblr have purged such content from their sites. Still, it’s not uncommon for individual sex workers’ accounts to be suspended from large platforms for violating terms of service when users attempt to skirt guidelines about nudity or sexual content. It’s rare, however, for the accounts of large websites like ModelCentro or Clips4Sale to be subject to such treatment.”
BBC: Facebook in Australia: What happened after news was blocked?. “It quickly became clear that one effect of the tech giant’s move was that in addition to news providers, emergency services were also being blocked. Some Australian government health-department and emergency-services pages found that their Facebook accounts had been affected.”
Cheddar: Exclusive: Misinformation Increased After Capitol Riots Despite Social Media Bans. “Advertising analytics company DoubleVerify found in a report looking at trends from 2020 and the beginning of this year that there was a 21 percent increase in ‘inflammatory news and political content’ on websites, a term the company used to classify fake news and misinformation, in the week following the January 6 riots. It also found hate speech increased three times in the 10 days after the events compared to the same period before.”
Fast Company: Facebook has banned Australian news, but there’s a workaround. “It’s unlikely that the news ban will last forever, at least in its current form….But in the meantime, Facebook users are stuck without a way to share reliable information on the world’s largest social media platform. That’s not ideal, given how easily misinformation can flourish on Facebook instead. Fortunately, there is a workaround.”
CNET: Facebook pulled news in Australia. Here’s why that matters everywhere. “Thanks to Facebook’s decision, people and publications in Australia can no longer post news stories. In fact, users can’t even see news stories. Posts from international publishers like the New York Times don’t appear in Australian feeds at all. The implementation has been chaotic. Facebook has accidentally blocked various government pages, including two official health agencies amid a pandemic. Some publications are blank not just in Australia, but around the world. Many of my US colleagues can’t see the posts on CNET’s Facebook page.”
BBC: Pete Evans: Instagram ban for Australian chef over conspiracy theories. “Australian celebrity chef Pete Evans has been banned from Instagram, weeks after his Facebook page was removed for repeatedly sharing misinformation about the coronavirus.”
CNN: Parler comes back online one month after going dark . “Parler, the social network favored by conservatives, came back online Monday with a redesigned website one month after it was suspended by Amazon Web Services and effectively driven offline.”
USA Today: Do Facebook, Twitter and YouTube censor conservatives? Claims ‘not supported by the facts,’ new research says. “Despite repeatedcharges of anti-conservative bias from former President Donald Trump and other GOP critics, Facebook, Twitter and Google’s YouTube are not slanted against right-leaning users, a new report out of New York University found. Like previous research, ‘False Accusation: The Unfounded Claim that Social Media Companies Censor Conservatives,’ concludes that rather than censoring conservatives, social media platforms amplify their voices.”
CNET: Facebook’s oversight board asks for public comment on Trump case. “Facebook’s content oversight board is accepting public comment on the social network’s decision to indefinitely bar Donald Trump from posting to his account because of concerns the now-former president could incite violence like the Jan. 6 insurrection at Capitol Hill.”
