The social media platforms have taken over the distribution of news globally. They treat a lie the same way you would treat a fact.
Maria RessaRead
Technology enabled Rappler's fast growth starting in 2012, but we were also among the first victims when social media was weaponized in 2016.
Interpretation
While technology can foster rapid growth, it can also be misused and lead to negative consequences.
Maria Ressa highlights the dual nature of technology's impact on society and organizations. On one hand, technology, particularly social media, has allowed for significant growth and expansion, as seen with Rappler. However, it can also be manipulated, leading to harmful outcomes, as the platform experienced when social media was weaponized against it in 2016.
In practice
During a TED Talk about the impact of social media on modern journalism.
The social media platforms have taken over the distribution of news globally. They treat a lie the same way you would treat a fact.
The difference between Rappler and other newsgroups in the Philippines is that journalists control Rappler both editorially and commercially. We make decisions that are bad for business but protect the public sphere.
If you want to rip the heart out of a democracy, you go after the facts. That's what modern authoritarians do. You lie. All the time. Then, you say it's your opponents and the journalists who lie.
Embrace your fear. Imagine what you're most afraid of, touch it and hold it so that you rob it of its power.
Let me go back to a fundamental thing we all used to agree on: information is power. That's why we became journalists in the first place.
In 14 months, my government, the Philippine 2 government, has filed 11 cases. I posted bail eight times, I've been arrested twice in five weeks, detained once, and the only thing I've done, my only crime is to be a journalist, to speak truth to power.
I realized that the future of aviation, to which I had devoted so much of my life, depended less on the perfection of aircraft than on preserving the epoch-evolved environment of life, and that this was true of all technological progress.
The biggest problem is that Facebook and Google are these giant feedback loops that give people what they want to hear. And when you use them in a world where your biases are being constantly confirmed, you become susceptible to fake news, propaganda, demagoguery.
Here I am, ninety years old and ready for the cooling board, using a brand new Macintosh computer, and there you sit, twenty-two and gorgeous, fresh as a new peach, yet scrawling on a yellow legal pad like an old maid in a Victorian romance.
Learning how to understand how technology evolves, using tools like a Technology Road Map, is what you need more than anything to ride on top of the tsunami instead of being crushed by it.
Why commit technological suicide by restricting the flow of talent into the United States?
I often tell my students not to be misled by the name 'artificial intelligence' - there is nothing artificial about it. AI is made by humans, intended to behave by humans, and, ultimately, to impact humans' lives and human society.
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