Did Facebook Change Its Rules to Placate the Right?

Former lobbyist/political advisor Joel Kaplan joined Facebook in 2011 to lead its Washington D.C. outreach, reports BuzzFeed news. But some employees said they were very unhappy with decisions made by both Kaplan and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg: In April 2019, Facebook was preparing to ban one of the internet’s most notorious spreaders of misinformation and hate, Infowars founder Alex Jones. Then…

Last-Minute TikTok Deal Averts Shutdown

“President Donald Trump said Saturday he’s given his ‘blessing’ to a proposed deal that would see the popular video-sharing app TikTok partner with Oracle and Walmart and form a U.S. company,” reports CBS News:
Mr. Trump has targeted Chinese-owned TikTok for national security and data privacy concerns in the latest flashpoint in the rising tensions between Washington and Beijing. The president’s support…

Google Search Upgrades Make It Harder for Websites to Win Traffic

Type a query into the Google search bar on a smartphone and there’s a good chance the results will be dominated by advertising. From a report: That stems from a decision in 2015 to test a fourth ad, rather than three, at the top of search results. Some employees opposed the move at the time, saying it could reduce the quality…