YouTube, Facebook, Apple and Spotify all ban Alex Jones & Infowars

[norman]

Posted by James Newell (here)
Luckily there are several alternatives to youtube. They think they are too big to fail. I don't think so.
Twitter, and facebook is losing in price re their stocks and even goog. The people built them up, they can also let them crash.

Also get out of Netflix, it is going too pedo and degrading these days also.

The whole point of the device based censorship is that we won't even be able to access the alternatives. This a wide scale program.

Then add the internet of things into the mix, and it's STAZI time.

[Bill Ryan]

Posted by norman (here)
In this edited/trimmed section of Friday's Alex Jones show, he spent over an hour explaining the full extent of what big tech and various agencies are really up to and are on the brink of clamping down on us with.

Here's an idea to grapple with. How about instead of monetising your content on youtube, youtube actually charges you to use their service? . . . . it's on it's way quite soon, along with a heart crushingly depressing array of draconian measures. The latest rollout is device based censorship and monitoring linked into a social score system. Perhaps the biggest reason for Trump to declare a state of emergency is to supersede Obama's state of emergency with which he nobbled the internet before Trump got into office, but which is only just now coming to full fruition.

Alarmingly important news, but what do we do ?

MP3
https://app.box.com/s/wg5lrvodqdmbrol93d61gyzkafjz4kyy

***

Here's the video:

• https://media.infowars.com/videos/1c...e16be9c7cd.mp4

Microsoft, Google, And Apple To Implement Live Device Access Within 3 Months

Alex Jones breaks the news that, within 3 months, Microsoft, Google, and Apple will complete the implementation of a monitoring system that gives them live-time access to any of your devices for the purpose of censoring material and thereby altering the behavior of their own product users.

[Tintin]

And here's Whitney Webb's MintPress article (posting the text only - no images or links - below) cited by Alex Jones in that extremely important show:

"Newsguard separates sites it deems worthy and sites it considers unreliable by using a color-coded rating — green, yellow, or red — and more detailed “nutrition labels” regarding a site’s credibility or lack thereof. Rankings are created by Newsguard’s team of “trained analysts.” The color-coding system may remind some readers of the color-coded terror threat-level warning system that was created after 9/11, making it worth noting that Tom Ridge, the former secretary of Homeland Security who oversaw the implementation of that system under George W. Bush, is on Newsguard’s advisory board."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How a NeoCon-Backed “Fact Checker” Plans to Wage War on Independent Media

As Newsguard’s project advances, it will soon become almost impossible to avoid this neocon-approved news site’s ranking systems on any technological device sold in the United States.

by Whitney Webb | January 9th 2019

MINNEAPOLIS — Soon after the social media “purge” of independent media sites and pages this past October, a top neoconservative insider — Jamie Fly — was caught stating that the mass deletion of anti-establishment and anti-war pages on Facebook and Twitter was “just the beginning” of a concerted effort by the U.S. government and powerful corporations to silence online dissent within the United States and beyond.

While a few, relatively uneventful months in the online news sphere have come and gone since Fly made this ominous warning, it appears that the neoconservatives and other standard bearers of the military-industrial complex and the U.S. oligarchy are now poised to let loose their latest digital offensive against independent media outlets that seek to expose wrongdoing in both the private and public sectors.

As MintPress News Editor-in-Chief Mnar Muhawesh recently wrote, MintPress was informed that it was under review by an organization called Newsguard Technologies, which described itself to MintPress as simply a “news rating agency” and asked Muhawesh to comment on a series of allegations, several of which were blatantly untrue.

However, further examination of this organization reveals that it is funded by and deeply connected to the U.S. government, neo-conservatives, and powerful monied interests, all of whom have been working overtime since the 2016 election to silence dissent to American forever-wars and corporate-led oligarchy.

More troubling still, Newsguard — by virtue of its deep connections to government and Silicon Valley — is lobbying to have its rankings of news sites installed by default on computers in U.S. public libraries, schools, and universities as well as on all smartphones and computers sold in the United States.

In other words, as Newsguard’s project advances, it will soon become almost impossible to avoid this neocon-approved news site’s ranking systems on any technological device sold in the United States. Worse still, if its efforts to quash dissenting voices in the U.S. are successful, Newsguard promises that its next move will be to take its system global.

Red light, green light . . .
Newsguard has received considerable attention in the mainstream media of late, having been the subject of a slew of articles in the Washington Post, the Hill, the Boston Globe, Politico, Bloomberg, Wired, and many others just over the past few months. Those articles portray Newsguard as using “old-school journalism” to fight “fake news” through its reliance on nine criteria allegedly intended to separate the wheat from the chaff when it comes to online news.

Newsguard separates sites it deems worthy and sites it considers unreliable by using a color-coded rating — green, yellow, or red — and more detailed “nutrition labels” regarding a site’s credibility or lack thereof. Rankings are created by Newsguard’s team of “trained analysts.” The color-coding system may remind some readers of the color-coded terror threat-level warning system that was created after 9/11, making it worth noting that Tom Ridge, the former secretary of Homeland Security who oversaw the implementation of that system under George W. Bush, is on Newsguard’s advisory board.

As Newsguard releases a new rating of a site, that rating automatically spreads to all computers that have installed its news ranking browser plug-in. That plug-in is currently available for free for the most commonly used internet browsers. NewsGuard directly markets the browser plug-in to libraries, schools and internet users in general.

According to its website, Newsguard has rated more than 2,000 news and information sites. However, it plans to take its ranking efforts much farther by eventually reviewing “the 7,500 most-read news and information websites in the U.S.—about 98 percent of news and information people read and share online” in the United States in English.

A recent Gallup study, which was supported and funded by Newsguard as well as the Knight Foundation (itself a major investor in Newsguard), stated that a green rating increased users likelihood to share and read content while a red rating decreased that likelihood. Specifically, it found 63 percent would be less likely to share news stories from red-rated websites, and 56 percent would be more likely to share news from green-rated websites, though the fact that Newsguard and one of its top investors funded the poll makes it necessary to take these findings with a grain of salt.

However, some of the rankings Newsguard itself has publicized show that it is manifestly uninterested in fighting “misinformation.” How else to explain the fact that the Washington Post and CNN both received high scores even though both have written stories or made statements that later proved to be entirely false? For example, CNN falsely claimed in 2016 that it was illegal for Americans to read WikiLeaks releases and unethically colluded with the DNC to craft presidential debate questions to favor Hillary Clinton’s campaign that same year.

In addition, in 2017, CNN published a fake story that a Russian bank linked to a close ally of President Donald Trump was under Senate investigation. That same year, CNN was forced to retract a report that the Trump campaign had been tipped off early about WikiLeaks documents damaging to Hillary Clinton when it later learned the alert was about material already publicly available.

The Washington Post, whose $600 million conflict of interest with the CIA goes unnoted by Newsguard, has also published false stories since the 2016 election, including one article that falsely claimed that “Russian hackers” had tapped into Vermont’s electrical grid. It was later found that the grid itself was never breached and the “hack” was only an isolated laptop with a minor malware problem. Yet, such acts of journalistic malpractice are apparently of little concern to Newsguard when those committing such acts are big-name corporate media outlets.

Furthermore, Newsguard gives a high rating to Voice of America, the U.S. state-funded media outlet, even though its former acting associate director said that the outlet produces “fluff journalism” and despite the fact that it was recently reformed to “provide news that supports our [U.S.] national security objectives.” However, RT receives a low “red” rating for being funded by the Russian government and for “raising doubts about other countries and their institutions” (i.e., including reporting critical of the institutions and governments of the U.S. and its allies).

Keeping the conversation safe for the corporatocracy
Newsguard describes itself as an organization dedicated to “restoring trust and accountability” and using “journalism to fight false news, misinformation and disinformation.” While it repeatedly claims on its website that its employees “have no political axes to grind” and “care deeply about reliable journalism’s pivotal role in democracy,” a quick look at its co-founders, top funders and advisory board make it clear that Newsguard is aimed at curbing voices that hold the powerful — in both government and the private sector — to account.

Newsguard is the latest venture to result from the partnership between Steven Brill and Louis Gordon Crovitz, who currently serve as co-CEOs of the group.

Brill is a long-time journalist — published in TIME and The New Yorker, among others — who most recently founded the Yale Journalism Initiative, which aims to encourage Yale students who “aspire to contribute to democracy in the United States and around the world” to become journalists at top U.S. and international media organizations. He first teamed up with Crovitz in 2009 to create Journalism Online, which sought to make the online presence of top American newspapers and other publishers profitable, and was also the CEO of the company that partnered up with the TSA to offer “registered” travelers the ability to move more quickly through airport security — for a price, of course.

While Brill’s past does not in itself raise red flags, Crovitz — his partner in founding Journalism Online, then Press+, and now Newsguard — is the last person one would expect to find promoting any legitimate effort to “restore trust and accountability” in journalism. In the early 1980s. Crovitz held a number of positions at Dow Jones and at the Wall Street Journal, eventually becoming executive vice president of the former and the publisher of the latter before both were sold to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp in 2007. He is also a board member of Business Insider, which has received over $30 million from Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos in recent years.

In addition to being a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Crovitz proudly notes in his bio, available on Newsguard’s website, that he has been an “editor or contributor to books published by the American Enterprise Institute and Heritage Foundation.” Though many MintPress readers are likely familiar with these two institutions, for those who are not, it is worth pointing out that the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) is one of the most influential neoconservative think tanks in the country and its “scholars,” directors and fellows have included neoconservative figures like Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, John Bolton and Frederick Kagan.

During the George W. Bush administration, AEI was instrumental in promoting the invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq and has since advocated for militaristic solutions to U.S. foreign policy objectives and the expansion of the U.S.’ military empire as well as the “War on Terror.” During the Bush years, AEI was also closely associated with the now defunct and controversial neoconservative organization known as the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), which presciently called, four years before 9/11, for a “new Pearl Harbor” as needed to rally support behind American military adventurism.

The Heritage Foundation, like AEI, was also supportive of the war in Iraq and has pushed for the expansion of the War on Terror and U.S. missile defense and military empire. Its corporate donors over the years have included Procter & Gamble, Chase Manhattan Bank, Dow Chemical, and Exxon Mobil, among others.

Crovitz’s associations with AEI and the Heritage Foundation, as well as his ties to Wall Street and the upper echelons of corporate media, are enough to make any thinking person question his commitment to being a fair watchdog of “legitimate journalism.” Yet, beyond his innumerable connections to neoconservatives and powerful monied interest, Crovitz has repeatedly been accused of inserting misinformation into his Wall Street Journal columns, with groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation accusing him of “repeatedly getting his facts wrong” on NSA surveillance and other issues. Some of the blatant falsehoods that have appeared in Crovitz’s work have never been corrected, even when his own sources called him out for misinformation.

For example, in a WSJ opinion piece that was written by Crovitz in 2012, Crovitz was accused of making “fantastically false claims” about the history of the internet by the very people he had cited to support those claims.

As TechDirt wrote at the time:

Almost everyone he [Crovitz] sourced or credited to support his argument that the internet was invented entirely privately at Xerox PARC and when Vint Cerf helped create TCP/IP, has spoken out to say he’s wrong. And that list includes both Vint Cerf, himself, and Xerox. Other sources, including Robert Taylor (who was there when the internet was invented) and Michael Hiltzik, have rejected Crovitz’s spinning of their own stories.”

The oligarch team’s deep bench
While Brill and Crovitz’s connections alone should be enough cause for alarm, a cursory examination of Newsguard’s advisory boardmakes it clear that Newsguard was created to serve the interests of American oligarchy. Chief among Newsguard’s advisors are Tom Ridge, the first Secretary of Homeland Security under George W. Bush and Ret. General Michael Hayden, a former CIA director, a former NSA director and principal at the Chertoff Group, a security consultancy seeking to “advise corporate clients and governments, including foreign governments” on security matters that was co-founded by former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, who also currently serves as the board chairman of major weapons manufacturer BAE systems.

Another Newsguard advisor of note is Richard Stengel, former editor of Time magazine, a “distinguished fellow” at the Atlantic Council and Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy under President Barack Obama.

At a panel discussion hosted last May by the Council on Foreign Relations, Stengel described his past position at the State Department as “chief propagandist” and also stated that he is “not against propaganda. Every country does it and they have to do it to their own population and I don’t necessarily think it’s that awful.”

At a Council on Foreign Relations forum about "fake news," former Editor at Time Magazine Richard Stengel directly states that he supports the use of propaganda on American citizens - then shuts the session down when challenged about how propaganda is used against the third world

Other Newsguard advisors include Don Baer, former White House communications director and advisor to Bill Clinton and current chairman of both PBS and the influential PR firm Burson Cohn & Wolfe as well as Elise Jordan, former communications director for the National Security Council and former speech-writer for Condoleezza Rice, as well as the widow of slain journalist Michael Hastings — who was writing an exposé on former CIA director John Brennan at the time of his suspicious death.

A look at Newguard’s investors further illustrates the multifarious connections between this organization and the American political and corporate elite. While Brill and Crovitz themselves are the company’s top investors, one of Newsguard’s most important investors is the Publicis Groupe. Publicis is the third largest global communications company in the world, with more than 80,000 employees in over 100 countries and an annual revenue of over €9.6 billion ($10.98 billion) in 2017.

It is no stranger to controversy, as one of its subsidiaries, Qorvis, recently came under fire for exploiting U.S. veterans at the behest of the Saudi government and also helped the Saudi government to “whitewash” its human rights record and its genocidal war in Yemen after receiving $6 million from the Gulf Kingdom in 2017.

Furthermore, given its size and influence, it is unsurprising that the Publicis Groupe counts many powerful corporations and governments among its clientele. Some of its top clients in 2018 included pharmaceutical giants Eli Lilly, Merck, Pfizer and Bayer/Monsanto as well as Starbucks, Procter & Gamble, McDonalds, Kraft Heinz, Burger King, and the governments of Australia and Saudi Arabia. Given its influential role in funding Newsguard, it is reasonable to point out the potential conflict of interest posed by the fact that sites that accurately report on Publicis’ powerful clients — but generate bad publicity — could be targeted for such reports in Newsguard’s ranking.

In addition to the Publicis Groupe, another major investor in Newsguard is the Blue Haven Initiative, which is the venture capital “impact investment” fund of the wealthy Pritzker family — one of the top 10 wealthiest families in the U.S., best known as the owners of the Hyatt Hotel chain and for being the second largest financial contributors to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign.

Other top investors include John McCarter, a long-time executive at U.S. government contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, as well as Thomas Glocer, former CEO of Reuters and a member of the boards of pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co., financial behemoth Morgan Stanley, and the Council on Foreign Relations, as well as a member of the Atlantic Council’s International Advisory Board.

Through these investors, Newsguard managed to raise $6 million to begin its ranking efforts in March of 2018. Newsguard’s actual revenues and financing, however, have not been disclosed despite the fact that it requires the sites it ranks to disclose their funding. In a display of pure hypocrisy, Newsguard’s United States Securities and Exchange Commission Form D — which was filed March 5, 2018 — states that the company “declined to disclose” the size of its total revenue.

Why give folks a choice?
While even a quick glance at its advisory board alone would be enough for many Americans to decline to install Newsguard’s browser extension on their devices, the danger of Newsguard is the fact that it is diligently working to make the adoption of its app involuntary. Indeed, if voluntary adoption of Newsguard’s app were the case, there would likely be little cause for concern, given that its website attracts barely more than 300 visits per month and its social-media following is relatively small, with just over 2,000 Twitter followers and barely 500 Facebook likes at the time of this article’s publication.

To illustrate its slip-it-under-the-radar strategy, Newsguard has gone directly to state governments to push its browser extension onto entire state public library systems, even though its website suggests that individual public libraries are welcome to install the extension if they so choose. The first state to install Newsguard on all of its public library computers across its 51 branches was the state of Hawaii — which was the first to partner with Newsguard’s “news literacy initiative,” just last month.

Aloha, Hawaiian libraries! The state has added the NewsGuard extension to the computers patrons use in all its public libraries. Thanks to #Microsoft for sponsoring news literacy. http://bigislandnow.com/2018/12/17/l...y-partnership/ …

According to local media, Newsguard “now works with library systems representing public libraries across the country, and is also partnering with middle schools, high schools, universities, and educational organizations to support their news literacy efforts,” suggesting that these Newsguard services targeting libraries and schools are soon to become a compulsory component of the American library and education system, despite Newsguard’s glaring conflicts of interest with massive multinational corporations and powerful government power-brokers.

Notably, Newsguard has a powerful partner that has allowed it to start finding its way into public library and school computers throughout the country. As part of its new “Defending Democracy” initiative, Microsoft announced last August that it would be partnering with Newsguard to actively market the company’s ranking app and other services to libraries and schools throughout the country. Microsoft’s press release regarding the partnership states that Newsguard “will empower voters by providing them with high-quality information about the integrity and transparency of online news sites.”

Since then, Microsoft has now added the Newsguard app as a built-in feature of Microsoft Edge, its browser for iOS and Android mobile devices, and is unlikely to stop there. Indeed, as a recent report in favor of Microsoft’s partnership with Newsguard noted, “we could hope that this new partnership will allow Microsoft to add NewsGuard to Edge on Windows 10 [operating system for computers] as well.”
Newsguard, for its part, seems confident that its app will soon be added by default to all mobile devices. On its website, the organization notes that “NewsGuard will be available on mobile devices when the digital platforms such as social media sites and search engines or mobile operating systems add our ratings and Nutrition Labels directly.”

This shows that Newsguard isn’t expecting its rating systems to be offered as a downloadable application for mobile devices but something that social media sites like Facebook, search engines like Google, and mobile device operating systems that are dominated by Apple and Google will “directly” integrate into nearly every smartphone and tablet sold in the United States.

A Boston Globe article on Newsguard from this past October makes this plan even more clear. The Globe wrote at the time:

Microsoft has already agreed to make NewsGuard a built-in feature in future products, and [Newsguard co-CEO] Brill said he’s in talks with other online titans. The goal is to have NewsGuard running by default on our computers and phones whenever we scan the Web for news.”

This eventuality is made all the more likely given the fact that, in addition to Microsoft, Newsguard is also closely connected to Google, as Google has been a partner of the Publicis Groupe since 2014, when the two massive companies joined Condé Nast to create a new marketing service called La Maison that is “focused on producing engaging content for marketers in the luxury space.” Given Google’s power in the digital sphere as the dominant search engine, the creator of the Android mobile operating system, and the owner of YouTube, its partnership with Publicis means that Newsguard’s rating system will soon see itself being promoted by yet another of Silicon Valley’s most powerful companies.

Furthermore, there is an effort underway to integrate Newsguard into social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. Indeed, as Newsguard was launched, co-CEO Brill stated that he planned to sell the company’s ratings of news sites to Facebook and Twitter. Last March, Brill told CNN that “We’re asking them [Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft and Google] to pay a fraction of what they pay their P.R. people and their lobbyists to talk about the problem.”

On Wednesday, Gallup released a poll that will likely be used as a major selling point to social media giants. The poll — funded by Newsguard and the Knight Foundation, which is a top investor in Newsguard and has recently funded a series of Gallup polls relating to online news — seems to have been created with the intention of manufacturing consent for the integration of Newsguard with top social media sites.

This is because the promoted findings from the study are as follows:“89% of users of social media sites and 83% overall want social media sites and search engines to integrate NewsGuard ratings and reviews into their news feeds and search results” and “69% would trust social media and search companies more if they took the simple step of including NewsGuard in their products.” However, a disclaimer at the end of the poll states that the results, which were based on the responses of 706 people each of whom received $2 to participate, “may not be reflective of attitudes of the broader U.S adult population.”

With trust at Facebook nose-diving and Facebook’s censorship of independent media already well underway, the findings of this poll could well be used to justify its integration into Facebook’s platform. The connections of both Newsguard and Facebook to the Atlantic Council make this seem a given.

Financial censorship
Another Newsguard service shows that this organization is also seeking to harm independent media financially by targeting online revenue. Through a service called “Brandguard,” which it describes as a “brand safety tool aimed at helping advertisers keep their brands off of unreliable news and information sites while giving them the assurance they need to support thousands of Green-rated [i.e., Newsguard-approved] news and information sites, big and small.”

At the time the service was announced last November, Newsguard co-CEO Brill stated that the company was “in discussions with the ad tech firms, leading agencies, and major advertisers” eager to adopt a blacklist of news sites deemed “unreliable” by Newsguard. This is unsurprising given the leading role of the Publicis Groupe, one of the world’s largest advertising and PR firms, has in funding Newsguard. As a consequence, it seems likely that many, if not all, of Publicis’ client companies will choose to adopt this blacklist to help crush many of the news sites that are unafraid to hold them accountable.

It is also important to note here that Google’s connection to Publicis and thus Newsguard could spell trouble for independent news pages that rely on Google Adsense for some or all of their ad-based revenue. Google Adsense has long been targeting sites like MintPress by demonetizing articles for information or photographs it deemed controversial, including demonetizing one article for including a photo showing U.S. soldiers involved in torturing Iraqi detainees at the infamous Abu Ghraib prison.

Since then, Google — a U.S. military contractor — has repeatedly tried to shutter ad access to MintPress articles that involve reporting that is critical of U.S. empire and military expansion. One article that has been repeatedly flagged by Google details how many African-Americans have questioned whether the Women’s March has aided or harmed the advancement of African-Americans in the United States. Google has repeatedly claimed that the article, which was written by African-American author and former Washington Post bureau chief Jon Jeter, contains “dangerous content.”

Given Google’s already established practice of targeting factual reporting it deemed controversial through Adsense, Brandguard will likely offer the tech giant just the excuse it needs to cut off sites like MintPress, and other pages equally critical of empire, altogether.

An action plan for the genuine protection of journalism
Though it is just getting started, Newsguard’s plan to insert its app into every device and major social-media network is a threat to any news site that regularly publishes information that rubs any of Newsguard’s investors, partners or advisors the wrong way. Given its plan to rank the English-language U.S. news sites that account for 98 percent of U.S. digital news consumption, Newsguard’s agenda is of the utmost concern to every independent media page active in the United States and beyond — given Newsguard’s promise to take its project global.

By linking up with former CIA and NSA directors, Silicon Valley Giants, and massive PR firms working for some of the most controversial governments and corporations in the world, Newsguard has betrayed the fact that it is not actually seeking to “restore trust and accountability” in journalism, but to “restore trust and accountability” in news outlets that protect the existing power structure and help shield the corporate-led oligarchy and military-industrial complex from criticism.
Not only is it trying to tank the reputations of independent media through its biased ranking system, Newsguard is also seeking to attack these alternative voices financially and by slipping its ranking system by default onto all computers and phones sold in the U.S.

However, Newsguard and it agenda of guarding the establishment from criticism can be stopped. By supporting independent media and unplugging from social media sites committed to censorship, like Facebook and Twitter, we can strengthen the independent media community and keep it afloat despite the unprecedented nature of these attacks on free speech and watchdog journalism.

Beyond that, a key way to keep Newsguard and those behind it on their toes is to hold them to account by pointing out their clear conflicts of interest and hypocrisy and by derailing the narrative they are carefully crafting that Newsguard is “non-partisan,” “trustworthy,” and true guardians against the scourge of “fake news.”

While this report has sought to be a starting point for such work, anyone concerned about Newsguard and its connections to the war machine and corrupt corporations should feel encouraged to point out the organization’s own conflicts of interests and shady connections via its Twitter and Facebook pages and the feedback section on Newsguard’s website. The best way to defeat this new tool of the neocons is to put them on notice and to continue to expose Newsguard as a guardian of empire, not a guardian of journalism.

Correction | An earlier version of this story wrote that CNN’s collusion with the Clinton campaign was illegal. However, upon further investigation, MintPress News could not corroborate that such a move was, in fact, illegal, though it is clearly in breach of journalistic ethics. As a consequence, the sentence in question was changed to say that CNN “unethically colluded” with the Clinton campaign. MintPress apologizes for the error and thanks its readers for bringing this oversight to our attention.

Top Photo | This photo, edited by MintPress News, shows Primedia chairman and CEO Tom Rogers, left, talking with Newsguard CEO Steven Brill after a New York news conference announcing Brill as the chariman and CEO of Media Central, Jan. 4, 2001. Ed Bailey | AP

Whitney Webb is a staff writer for MintPress News and a contributor to Ben Swann’s Truth in Media. Her work has appeared on Global Research, the Ron Paul Institute and 21st Century Wire, among others. She has also made radio and TV appearances on RT and Sputnik. She currently lives with her family in southern Chile.

[James Newell]

Posted by norman (here)

Posted by James Newell (here)
Luckily there are several alternatives to youtube. They think they are too big to fail. I don't think so.
Twitter, and facebook is losing in price re their stocks and even goog. The people built them up, they can also let them crash.

Also get out of Netflix, it is going too pedo and degrading these days also.

The whole point of the device based censorship is that we won't even be able to access the alternatives. This a wide scale program.

Then add the internet of things into the mix, and it's STAZI time.

Yes you are right. It is Stazi time. Will Trump enact the Doj on them, or is he going to beg off? If he doesn't act, free speech on the net will be a thing of the past. And Trump will be a small blip on the screen.

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
Microsoft, Google, And Apple To Implement Live Device Access Within 3 Months

Alex Jones breaks the news that, within 3 months, Microsoft, Google, and Apple will complete the implementation of a monitoring system that gives them live-time access to any of your devices for the purpose of censoring material and thereby altering the behavior of their own product users.

Are there -any- technical details in this video, past the several times repeated "IN YOUR PHONE", and vague mentions of controlling or blocking or overlaying censored material or websites?

[norman]

Posted by Paul (here)

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
Microsoft, Google, And Apple To Implement Live Device Access Within 3 Months

Alex Jones breaks the news that, within 3 months, Microsoft, Google, and Apple will complete the implementation of a monitoring system that gives them live-time access to any of your devices for the purpose of censoring material and thereby altering the behavior of their own product users.

Are there -any- technical details in this video, past the several times repeated "IN YOUR PHONE", and vague mentions of controlling or blocking or overlaying censored material or websites?

Technical, no.

I'm already aware that ipads are nobbled. I suppose Windows 10 is too, but I struggle to even "use" Win 10 so much that I keep on returning to older systems to get work done and I'm still not too familiar with it as regards it's finer points with on line access issues. I assume that the background software is already in place waiting for the system to be used.

I've no idea what's going on with smart phones, but I can guess.

[Clear Light]

Posted by Tintin (here)
And here's Whitney Webb's MintPress article (posting the text only - no images or links - below) cited by Alex Jones in that extremely important show:

"Newsguard separates sites it deems worthy and sites it considers unreliable by using a color-coded rating — green, yellow, or red — and more detailed “nutrition labels” regarding a site’s credibility or lack thereof. Rankings are created by Newsguard’s team of “trained analysts.” The color-coding system may remind some readers of the color-coded terror threat-level warning system that was created after 9/11, making it worth noting that Tom Ridge, the former secretary of Homeland Security who oversaw the implementation of that system under George W. Bush, is on Newsguard’s advisory board."

Posted by Paul (here)

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
Microsoft, Google, And Apple To Implement Live Device Access Within 3 Months

Alex Jones breaks the news that, within 3 months, Microsoft, Google, and Apple will complete the implementation of a monitoring system that gives them live-time access to any of your devices for the purpose of censoring material and thereby altering the behavior of their own product users.

Are there -any- technical details in this video, past the several times repeated "IN YOUR PHONE", and vague mentions of controlling or blocking or overlaying censored material or websites?

Oh, I'd suggest that Alex's assertion of some kind of a "monitoring system" is somewhat of an exaggeration with regards to the integration of "Newsguard" eh ?

For now, at least, it seems the only integration is on a browser-by-browser basis, for example :

Microsoft rolling out NewsGuard feature to Microsoft Edge beta on Android devices (9 Jan 2019)

Microsoft recently announced its partnership with popular News Rating website NewsGuard to help users spot fake news with ease. This NewsGuard feature was rolled out to Edge for iOS preview users last year. Today, Microsoft is rolling out this feature to Edge for Android beta users. You can enable this feature by going to Settings-> News rating and toggle the ‘Display rating on address bar’ option.

So, it's *not* like they're updating the Operating System but merely the Apps which run on the Device ...

[ThePythonicCow]

Damn - Jim Stone's website is down, whether I try to access it as http://jimstone.is, or using the latest IP address I've seen it at, http://82.221.129.208

[Clear Light]

Posted by Paul (here)
Damn - Jim Stone's website is down, whether I try to access it as http://jimstone.is, or using the latest IP address I've seen it at, http://82.221.129.208

Oh, it seems ok now ... 5:25pm GMT, about one hour since you posted Paul, I've no problems accessing it

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by Clear Light (here)

Posted by Paul (here)
Damn - Jim Stone's website is down, whether I try to access it as http://jimstone.is, or using the latest IP address I've seen it at, http://82.221.129.208

Oh, it seems ok now ... 5:25pm GMT, about one hour since you posted Paul, I've no problems accessing it

Yup - Jim says he was just rebooting his server - had me worried a bit:

Site outage not due to an attack

The server needed a re-boot. No big deal, but while trying to solve the problem I lost one of the morning's reports, and could not do anything for a few hours. So I worked on the alt income plan. Hmm, what did I try to post? I'll try to remember . . . .

[Kryztian]

Free Press describes itself on it's Twitter page: "We’re a nonpartisan organization fighting for your rights to connect and communicate."

[Tintin]

@Kryztian

Ah, so you received that mail as well?

Here was my response to that email (their original email is posted below my reply here), as politely as I could voice it, yesterday (and I did want to say a LOT more). For the record I am a supporter of Alex Jones. but, here it is all the same - it will be interesting to see if they thank me for all I have done in my response, but, I'm not holding my breath:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
16 Jan at 2:42 PM
To: info@freepress.net


"Dear team

Thank you for sending this message through.

I am a champion of free speech regardless of its content - you can also call that an anti censorship stance.

Remember this?

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"

If you don't, then see here for a reminder: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evelyn_Beatrice_Hall

This is a very ill conceived message to be sending to your subscribers and displays a frightening lack of critical thinking, and sensible grounded discernment of any kind whatsoever, and contradicts your 'Free Press' moniker.

Here's what you state towards the end of your messages:

"Free Press and Free Press Action Fund are nonpartisan organizations fighting for your rights to connect and communicate."

Unless you are Alex Jones it would seem when a particularly partisan stance is clearly taken and the rights to connect and communicate are applied somewhat selectively.

If you can't see this blatant contradiction then I would be really rather concerned. The message is so heavily biased in its leanings in a particular direction that it is very hard to draw a clear distinction between its content and a National Socialist Party manifesto item from the 1930s.

Jordan Peterson, by way of only one example amongst many, has extraordinarily intelligently, articulately, and eloquently pointed out the extreme danger in the sort of proselytising, so inherent in this message. You may do very well indeed to spend some time listening to him, very closely.

I have no political affiliation and choose to study, learn, share, and inspire anyone in whose company I may be at any time and welcome intelligent, informed, and stimulating conversation, even if there are areas of disagreement. That's freedom of speech. In my view Alex Jones is a shining example of an intelligent individual voicing his views.

One of the most frightening accelerated developments in the last two decades (and more) is a lack of clear definition.

It has become a contagion.

Phrases are bandied around as if there is a consensus - this is assumed - that we all agree (in an Orwellian group think sort of a way) on the meaning of certain terms, without recourse to learning of their etymology, from their original source for dissemination, sources some of which would raise many an eyebrow, if an effort is made to investigate further.

The author of this 'Free Press' email is compelled to define what hate-speech is: there is no legal definition either here or in the USA. So, why is this term being used so glibly here, and by so many more widely? Similarly: 'conspiracy theorist'. Alex Jones may be better described as a conspiracy analyst (see Gore Vidal).

Alex Jones has an inalienable right to state his views, his way, and not be persecuted for them in any way whatsoever. This missive from you here is tantamount to a persecution of sorts.

I've always maintained that if you don't like a message that you are receiving, that it makes you feel uncomfortable (and sometimes it really should actually) then you can always just change the channel. Maybe if just left alone it would be starved and left with no option but to eat itself.

I applaud you for the good work that you have done, in the past, but regrettably am now left with no option but to withdraw my support for your organisation and unsubscribe from future mailings.

I've just hopped to another channel you see.

With all good wishes
[REDACTED]


Their message:

From: "Free Press Team, FreePress.net" <info@freepress.net>
To: [REDACTED]
Sent: Tuesday, 15 January 2019, 23:07
Subject: Alex Jones is back on Facebook

Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is so racist, homophobic and xenophobic that Apple, Facebook, Spotify, Twitter and YouTube banned him and his show InfoWars from their sites in 2018.1 But now he’s returned to Facebook with multiple new pages and the social-media giant has allowed him to resume profiting off lies and hate.2

Tell Facebook to banish these new pages — including Infowars LIVE, NewsWars and Prison Planet.TV — that showcase Alex Jones’ hate.

Jones is the Pizzagate conspiracy theorist who in 2016 claimed a gay-owned Washington, D.C. pizzeria was host to a child sex ring — inspiring one of his followers to shoot up the place with an AR-15 rifle. Jones is also behind the awful lie that parents who lost their young children in the horrifying Sandy Hook elementary-school shooting are paid actors, subjecting those grieving parents to death threats, harassment and physical confrontations.3

When Facebook kicked Jones off last August, it explained that he had violated its hate-speech and bullying policies, and that he had glorified violence and used dehumanizing language to describe transgender people, Muslims and immigrants.4 Now that Jones is back on the platform he’s doing the exact same thing.5 We cannot allow Facebook to ignore this. Tell the company to remove Alex Jones immediately.

Alex Jones has made his name by profiting from hate and conspiracy theories that harm people of color, Muslims, LGBTQ people, immigrants and victims of mass violence, among others. If Facebook allows him to remain on its platform the entire community will be less safe, and the platform itself will be guilty of making money off of Jones’ carefully coordinated hate-profiteering machine.

Pressure Facebook to dump Infowars LIVE, NewsWars and Prison Planet.TV!

A few months ago Free Press and dozens of partners launched the Change the Terms6 campaign, pressuring social-media companies like Facebook to adopt model corporate policies that ban hateful activities and racism from their sites, and improve enforcement, due process and accountability. Alex Jones is a perfect example of a hate pundit that violates our model policies and Facebook needs to act now before his hateful lies endanger any more lives.

Thanks for all that you do—

[Valerie Villars]

Tintin, their reply to you is disgraceful. It's like trying to deal with City Hall in New Orleans after receiving a camera ticket. They just send you form letters, if you are lucky, or ignore you all together, thus proving the old adage "You can't fight City Hall".

That was a beautifully written letter and deserves a thoughtful reply. Unfortunately these days, it seems no one knows how to back their stance. They only know how to back themselves into a corner by their own inconsistencies and scream "hate speech".

Oh well, never let reason and logic get in the way of a good, albeit ridiculous, fighting stance. Let's all yell "I'm right and you're wrong" as loud as we can while all refusing to hear the other side because we have covered our ears.

Letter writing is an art. I guess they don't appreciate good art.

[Tintin]

Posted by Valerie Villars (here)
Tintin, their reply to you is disgraceful. It's like trying to deal with City Hall in New Orleans after receiving a camera ticket. They just send you form letters, if you are lucky, or ignore you all together, thus proving the old adage "You can't fight City Hall".

That was a beautifully written letter and deserves a thoughtful reply. Unfortunately these days, it seems no one knows how to back their stance. They only know how to back themselves into a corner by their own inconsistencies and scream "hate speech".

Oh well, never let reason and logic get in the way of a good, albeit ridiculous, fighting stance. Let's all yell "I'm right and you're wrong" as loud as we can while all refusing to hear the other side because we have covered our ears.

Letter writing is an art. I guess they don't appreciate good art.

Val, you're a diamond, and, just to be clear, my response was on top of the message, to anybody checking in. Their message on bottom, and my response on top.

Anyways: yes, Val, absolutely right and not for the first time. And, no, I'm not for one moment either going to think this is shallow fun. It isn't. It is critically important that folk can get on this, their own way. And it disappoints me hugely that folk can't be grown up (mature) about what's happening.

That's a disease too. Making everything juvenile, and frighteningly immature seems to be 'cool'.

Fork that.

[norman]

There should be a "What is Fascism Roadshow" that tours every town. It boggles my mind how these people can't see their own hypocrisy.

Whoever it was that worked out how to entrain young minds with a PC fixation is a genius and a scoundrel. The extent of the blind spot on the flip side of it is extinction level mischief.

[Kryztian]

Posted by Tintin (here)
@Kryztian
Ah, so you received that mail as well?

Fortunately, I am not on that list, although I have joined other organizations that sounded noble and humane in their intent but turned out to be globalist, fascists institutions, just like "Free Press" probably is. I found this on Twitter, retweeted by Wikileaks with the title "An effective illustration of press freedom in 2019"

Not a fan of Alex Jones, his gravely voice, his interviewing style where he overwhelms his sometimes very interesting guests and gets in the way of their saying intelligent things, or the rare and occasional deprecatory comment he makes about a persons gender, religion, or sexuality. Nevertheless, I deeply appreciate his showing up at Bilderberg Meetings and breaking into Bohemian Grove and exposing the strange and bizarre behavior of elites of the planet. I appreciate the many guests like Rosalind Peterson and Brigitta Jonsdottir who will never be interviewed in a place like CNN or MSNBC or FOX. So by silencing Alex Jones, "Freepress" (hard not to vomit while seeing the irony in that name) is silencing them too.

One Jones interview I never expected and found quite fascinating was his interview with Louis Farrakhan. After years of watching mainstream media coverage of Farrakhan on CNN, I was shocked in Jones's interview to see how complex, intelligent and enlightened this Farrakhan was. It's interesting that organization like "Freepress" (oops, there went my lunch) defends the rights of the mainstream media to present an African-American Islamic leader and his 50,000 as freakish stereotypes while Alex Jones allows him his own voice, and we are to assume that Jones is the racist?????

[norman]

Alex clarifies his position regarding Joe Rogan, before Mike Adams joins him to talk about the current state of censorship/shadow banning.

Mike Adams also accuses Joe Rogan and Jack Dorsey of illegal "cahooting" by not declaring their joint financial interest in the promoted topic ( crypto currency ) of their recent Joe Rogan Podcast interview.


MP3
https://app.box.com/s/a5ini3njlttkb8x73p8vmgu3hla4quy4

[Hervé]

From Jim Stone:

Alex Jones targeted for final removal from the web

Here's the claim:

He's "laundering money" via "fake supplement sales" to "support illicit activity"

This is not a joke, and is totally confirmed. They want to shut him down by killing off his supplements, which are supporting Infowars. They are calling it money laundering. This means that anything any alt media web site comes up with to survive will be considered money laundering to support alt media. This is dangerous turf folks, see this:

What the FDA's Supplement Crackdown Means for Placebo Kingmaker Alex Jones

It's a well known fact large eBay dropshipping stores and online supplement sales is used to launder money for organized crime, govt and corporate dark budgets, and cults. Guess who was shown as a poster child for this crackdown: What the FDA's Supplement Crackdown Means for Placebo Kingmaker Alex Jones

Alex Jones will have to navigate new regulatory reforms to retain his multi-million dollar snake-oil empire. On Monday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner announced policy changes specifically aimed at the dietary supplements industry, warning that "bad actors" have hawked dangerous products with unsubstantiated claims for far too long.

While the push is largely an effort to crack down on cannabidiol (CBD) oils and drugs making false claims about Alzheimer's, sellers of dietary supplements like Jones are expected to come under greater scrutiny by regulators.

"Where people like Alex Jones are going to run into the FDA is with over-labelling. Is what's on the label actually in the product?" Peter Pitts, a former associate commissioner at the FDA, told Observer. "And that obviously ties back to quality manufacturing. Alex Jones doesn't own the manufacturing, he just puts it into bottles and sells it. The other issue is communications. If you're a dietary supplement, you can't make drug claims."

Jim Stone's comment:

So there you have it. They could not get rid of Alex by taking away his ads and all the other crap they did, so they are going to sic the FDA on him! OF ALL THE GALL!!! UNBELIEVABLE abuse of power.

This article on this topic originally had comments but they removed them when they did not like how they went!

And here's why they want Alex gone: Approximately 75,000 people showed up for Trump's El Paso rally. And fewer than 500 showed up for Beto. Yet now, the MSM is trying to get away with pushing 15,000 for Beto and 7,000 for Trump. Since Alt media makes it impossible for them to get away with this type of thing (they can say it all they want to little effect with the Alt media in the way) they are going to the most enormous lengths possible to kill off alt media.

I think I hit a nerve with the meteor in Venezuela report, because ever since posting it, all donations have been blocked. The one that did "get through" was one I sent through, but a call to people in the U.S. confirmed it is blocked and whatever systems they have in place allowed my test to go through.

This report on Alex, and possible permanent blockage (it could just be Fundrazr) of this site, in conjunction with several other alt media sites getting defunded in recent days means there's an enormous push underway to wipe out all dissenting voices.

Facism is doing most of the work, but as it turns out, Alex overcame that so now they are going to try to crush him directly with the federal government itself.

Things are going to get a bit crazy soon, you can bet on that!

[Hervé]

Chase bank de-platforms conservative performance artist and Rebel Media host Martina Markota

Tyler Durden Zero Hedge
Wed, 20 Feb 2019 21:45 UTC

Two weeks after Chase Bank announced that it would no longer do business with Proud Boys Chairman Enrique Tarrio, Conservative performance artist and Rebel Media personality Martina Markota has become the latest conservative media figure to be targeted by the bank which has made no secret of its support for liberal causes (see its decision to cut ties with the gun industry).

In an interview with Big League Politics, Markota explained that the account that was shuttered had been linked to an Indiegogo campaign that Markota had used to raise more than $34,000 for a graphic novel that she had been working on, which made the decision to shut down the account more of a financial burden for her.

Markota was mailed a letter form the bank, which she shared on twitter.

Martina Markota‏Verified account @MartinaMarkota Feb 19

No one has reached out to me about my chase business account ending business with me. This is a huge deal for me as I have an active indiegogo campaign with over $33,000 in jeopardy. I’m not an e celeb enough to care about?

59 replies 233 retweets 691 likes

Martina Markota‏Verified account @MartinaMarkota Feb 19

An app issue is not the same as a mailed statement in the bank. I’m sick of outrage culture, some people are dealing with real legitimate issues in life, stop trying to co opt victim points

6 replies 12 retweets 153 likes

Martina Markota‏Verified account @MartinaMarkota Feb 19

Chase doesn’t close accounts via APPs. They send you an official letter in the mail. Wake up people.

4 replies 14 retweets 151 likes

Martina Markota‏Verified account @MartinaMarkota

THIS is what a closed account looks like. NOT an app glitch

6:47 PM - 19 Feb 2019
28 replies 48 retweets 204 likes

When she contacted the bank to try and figure out why the account had been shut down, Markota said they refused to give her a reason. She believes that the decision was politically motivated due to her support for President Trump.

Upon getting notice of her account shutdown, Markota contacted Chase Bank by phone to ask why her account was shut down.

"They refused to tell me why," Markota stated. "They said they have the right to end our relationship and not tell me why."

She began to believe that her bank account shutdown was was politically motivated after reading Big League Politics' story on Tarrio. This suspicion is well warranted considering the fact that her outspoken support for President Trump has exposed her to a torrent of harassment in recent years.

Markota added that she has been the victim of harassment from former coworkers when she was a burlesque dancer.

Markota's former co-workers from her burlesque days have been on a crusade to make her life miserable ever since she came out as a Trump supporter.

Their harassment got so bad that Markota is pursuing legal action against the most vicious tormentor.

If political motivations were in fact behind her de-platforming, that would make Markota the latest in a string of conservatives including Alex Jones, Laura Loomer and Jordan Peterson who have been financially targeted for their political views by what are still perceived as unbiased, apolitical organizations, when in reality financial isolation and boycotts is precisely how outspoken, ideologically opposing voices get silenced.


Related:

• Chase Bank suspends conservative Jewish activist Loomer from online banking account - already banned by Paypal

• Hypocritical democratic socialist Ocasio-Cortez counts big bank, private equity firm among top donors

• Sargon of Akkad and the rise of financial blacklisting

• As users leave Patreon due to censorship based on political bias, the rabbit hole goes deeper

• Jordan Peterson and Dave Rubin announce plans to leave Patreon in protest of censorship of political commentators

[ThePythonicCow]

From Good Morning America Pinterest blocks vaccination searches to avoid spreading anti-vaccination information, via ABC News. via The Blaze, via Q Research on 8 Chan:

============

Pinterest reveals crackdown on anti-vaccine posts and searches

by By Katie Kindelan, February 21, 2019

Pinterest, known for its inspiration on everything from cooking to party ideas and workouts, has been blocking vaccination-related searches for the past year.

The search engine confirmed the policy after it was first reported Thursday in the Wall Street Journal. Searches related to vaccines and vaccination fall under the company’s health misinformation guideline that was put in place in 2017, a company spokesperson told “Good Morning America.”

Pinterest, which claims more than 250 million monthly active users, started blocking certain vaccine and cancer-related searches last year because "results were leading to harmful misinformation."

“We want Pinterest to be an inspiring place for people, and there's nothing inspiring about misinformation,” the Pinterest spokesperson said in a statement. “That's why we continue to work on new ways of keeping misleading content off our platform and out of our recommendations engine."
Pinterest users can save vaccine information to their boards, but the search engine does not save misinformation about vaccines.

“We proactively take action on Pins and boards that contain health misinformation, and we encourage anyone who might be encountering this content to report it to our team,” the spokesperson said.

The spotlight on Pinterest’s proactive steps to eliminate the spread of vaccine misinformation comes as an outbreak of measles in the Pacific Northwest affects mostly children who have not been immunized. Immunization rates in Washington state, the epicenter of the outbreak, have been dropping in recent years, data shows.

Health officials in southern Washington state said last week they have confirmed 53 cases of measles, of which 47 are people who were not immunized against measles, according to the Associated Press.

Measles used to be a deadly disease for children in the United States, infecting an estimated three to four million people, causing 48,000 hospitalizations and killing 400 to 500 people each year in the decade before the vaccine became available in 1963, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In 2000, the disease was declared eliminated, meaning that there was an absence of continuous transmission for more than 12 months — although smaller outbreaks, such as the one in Washington, continue to pop up occasionally.

Experts say that parents who don't vaccinate their kids tend to be affluent and better educated.

Peter Hotez, a vaccine advocate and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, told ABC News last month that most parents are trying to "do the right thing for their kids" but are stymied by misinformation and false studies — the kind of online content that Pinterest is trying to block.

"The phony information on the websites on the internet; it's being amplified on social media," he said.

Pinterest relies on guidelines from the World Health Organization (WHO) and CDC to help determine if content violates its guidelines of prohibiting "advice where there may be immediate and detrimental effects on a Pinner’s health or on public safety."

Vaccines are universally backed by respected scientists and federal agencies, including WHO and the CDC, which offers an immunization schedule as a guide for parents.

ABC News' Meghan Keneally contributed to this report.

============