[BIG THREAD] MeWe, the “anti-Facebook” social media platform, is overflowing with anti-vaccine content. What’s worse, administration are distinctly aware of this, but choose to do nothing. The philosophy behind MeWe’s creation is resulting in deadly misinformation.

Meet MeWe founder and CEO, Mark Weinstein. He created the platform in direct response to Facebook’s notorious exploitation of user data. He also wanted to have a space without what he calls censorship. In doing so, he opened the door to a plethora of junk science.
Defending it in a NY Post op-ed, Weinstein says, “Censorship is often counter­productive. Banning content proves to the conspiracy-minded that it must be valuable because the authorities don’t want them to see it.” To him, removing dangerous misinfo worsens the problem. Link ↓
https://t.co/i1uNcvz9Kh
Weinstein recently posted a statement on the site saying that it isn’t the job of a social media company to regulate its content beyond illegal activity. He indicated that views on health and medicine were not to be moderated, acknowledging the sizable anti-vax community.
With this all in mind, here are the consequences of Weinstein’s philosophy. Bear in mind each post taken seriously can endanger yourself and those around you.
Tries to legitimize anti-vax conspiracy through an invitation of an anti-vax doctor to Senate hearing about covid treatments. Said doctor belongs to an association that view vaccine mandates as “a violation of human rights”. Link ↓
https://t.co/Nz4pwELoUh
Attempts to use slowed covid vaccine rollout as evidence of ineffectiveness and to label the determined science behind it baseless.
Claims that covid vaccines can result in HIV.
Uses out of context article to prove testing for covid is unnecessary. This was published in August 2020. At the time, most medical experts were directly contradicting the CDC’s position.
Uses out of context article to say vaccine is unsafe because doctors are refusing it. When read, it clearly states most doctors’ reasoning is because of mistrust in government and pharmaceutical industry. They are not decrying the science itself. Link ↓
https://t.co/EVkqUq8s5C
@mewe you are endangering lives in the face of a pandemic that has killed over 400,000 Americans. In one interview, Mark Weinstein said he was calling Facebook on its BS. Well, now I’m calling you on yours. #Covid_19

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Recently, the @CNIL issued a decision regarding the GDPR compliance of an unknown French adtech company named "Vectaury". It may seem like small fry, but the decision has potential wide-ranging impacts for Google, the IAB framework, and today's adtech. It's thread time! 👇

It's all in French, but if you're up for it you can read:
• Their blog post (lacks the most interesting details):
https://t.co/PHkDcOT1hy
• Their high-level legal decision: https://t.co/hwpiEvjodt
• The full notification: https://t.co/QQB7rfynha

I've read it so you needn't!

Vectaury was collecting geolocation data in order to create profiles (eg. people who often go to this or that type of shop) so as to power ad targeting. They operate through embedded SDKs and ad bidding, making them invisible to users.

The @CNIL notes that profiling based off of geolocation presents particular risks since it reveals people's movements and habits. As risky, the processing requires consent — this will be the heart of their assessment.

Interesting point: they justify the decision in part because of how many people COULD be targeted in this way (rather than how many have — though they note that too). Because it's on a phone, and many have phones, it is considered large-scale processing no matter what.
This is NONSENSE. The people who take photos with their books on instagram are known to be voracious readers who graciously take time to review books and recommend them to their followers. Part of their medium is to take elaborate, beautiful photos of books. Die mad, Guardian.


THEY DO READ THEM, YOU JUDGY, RACOON-PICKED TRASH BIN


If you come for Bookstagram, i will fight you.

In appreciation, here are some of my favourite bookstagrams of my books: (photos by lit_nerd37, mybookacademy, bookswrotemystory, and scorpio_books)