Archives for October 2019

The latest campaign in Africa is the first well-documented case of Russia “franchising,” or outsourcing, its disinformation efforts to local parties, said Facebook and the Stanford researchers. It’s unusual for a nation to try to influence so many countries at once, they said.

Shelby Grossman, one of the Stanford researchers, said that Russians in some cases set up local media organizations in the African countries to employ locals who would post the propaganda and false content on Facebook. In other cases, the Russians hired existing media groups to do so.

Facebook said it was unclear specifically when the Russian activity in Africa started because the Russians took over some existing pages on the social network. But the posts ramped up last year when the influence networks bought Facebook ads. In total, the networks spent more than $87,000 on Facebook ads.

The networks often posted about political news, including elections in Madagascar and Mozambique. They sought to drive Facebook users from the platform and into public groups on WhatsApp and Telegram, which are encrypted messaging apps, to increase interaction. And they used Facebook Live videos, Google Forms and quizzes to draw people into their Facebook pages and groups.

Some of the Facebook pages pushing Russian disinformation were not sophisticated. A cluster of pages posing as Libyan news entities posted about Libyan issues, but the page managers were in Egypt, the Netherlands, Germany and other countries, said the Stanford researchers. Some of the pages experienced unnatural jumps in followers and other telltale signs of inauthentic behavior.

Mr. Gleicher said some of the Russian-run pages and groups also used compromised Facebook accounts that once belonged to real people but had been stolen and repurposed by hackers. He said that Facebook is still building out its automated systems for detecting compromised accounts, so the company still misses some and pulls in its investigative team to catch them.

Facebook said its investigation had “connected these campaigns to entities associated with” Mr. Prigozhin, but the company declined to say how. Mr. Prigozhin controlled the entity that financed Russia’s Internet Research Agency.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/technology/russia-facebook-disinformation-africa.html?emc=rss&partner=rss

With reporters rapt but ultimately dismissive of the event, we all moved onto the next viral oddity — mostly. Others are still proposing “storms,” like that of the video-game company convention BlizzCon on Nov. 1 in Anaheim, Calif., to make a serious political statement in a perplexingly lighthearted way.

On the Storm BlizzCon Facebook page, the memes are proliferating. Many feature Winnie the Pooh, banned by Chinese censors after the character has been used to mock the country’s president Xi Jinping.

The memes are funny, like those about rescuing aliens from Area 51, but a lot less fanciful, as they’re talking about an actual oppressive regime, not the possibility of E.T.s in the desert. So far, the event’s poster is calling for a “peaceful protest” of BlizzCon, encouraging attendees to “dress up as Pooh Bear and show the people of China this character again.”

It’s difficult to tell if the post is fully a joke or an off-color way to take a stand. If a peaceful protest stems from it, will it “cheapen a serious matter,” as Mr. Lazar felt Storm Area 51 did for government secrecy?

LDG Station, the Facebook account that posted this event, is also a YouTube channel that has been active for about two years. Its information page reads, “We’re going to entertain you … by any means necessary.”

Its most viewed video (watched almost 39,000 times) was posted on Sept. 20, featuring live footage from Storm Area 51 in Rachel, which people saw from all over the world.

Storming Area 51 brought the channel its highest traffic ever, so why not create similar content to keep people watching?

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/style/storm-area-51-alienstock-blizzcon.html?emc=rss&partner=rss

Yet the role of editor in chief, particularly at a mainstream beauty and fashion publication, is still a prestigious post. It’s just that today for young, ambitious people it often isn’t the destination, but maybe a layover on the way to more flexible and more lucrative pastures.

Elaine Welteroth, for example — one of Ms. Peoples Wagner’s predecessors as Teen Vogue editor — has spoken openly about how much more money she makes in her post-magazine career.

“Leaving the magazine business and working for myself has been an exponential leap in terms of earnings,” Ms. Welteroth said in a recent interview with The Cut.

Eva Chen, formerly of Lucky Magazine (and Teen Vogue), is now a children’s book author and head of fashion partnerships at Instagram.

Ms. Peoples Wagner, too, recently published a book, “Becoming a Fashion Designer,” a project she started before she signed on to Teen Vogue, but she is firmly focused on her day job. “We have one of the most inclusive, diverse staffs” of any Condé Nast magazine, she said. “Most of the people that I’ve hired have been women of color. And I’m really proud of that.”

And yet, she had said, back in her office, “If I had a daughter, I don’t know if I would want her to be in this industry.”

“I’d like to think that if I continue to make these changes and continue to implement these things, and show black girls with cornrows and Afros on covers, that maybe she would feel more included than I did,” she said. “That, to me, is success.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/style/teen-vogue-lindsay-peoples-wagner-race.html?emc=rss&partner=rss

But that was five years ago. Today, outrage feels like the only thing on social media. It seems one of the easiest ways to build followers is to be consistently angry about something, whether it’s racism, politics or food. And the more extreme the view, the better. In many ways, social media has become a hotbed for radicalization and misinformation and bigotry.

I believe social media helped lift the Black Lives Matter movement and raise our awareness of police brutality, but I also believe it helped the white nationalists who protested in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017. In my view, these are manifestations of the same phenomenon.

Technology itself has been famously ham-handed at dealing with race. There are questions about whether algorithms exacerbate bias, about why facial recognition makes more errors when trying to identify dark-skinned people.

Racism in technology is a serious problem, and I know there are many people who are much smarter than I am who are thinking about how to solve it.

In 2014, Stephen Hawking wrote a piece that I will never forget. He warned that artificial intelligence was advancing rapidly and that we needed to be honest with ourselves about whether or not we were prepared for what that meant. We are feeding machines with information everyday, and the information we choose to provide says a lot about who we are — our racism, our values, our strengths, our weaknesses.

In other words, when facial recognition software makes an error when identifying a person with dark skin, I believe that says more about us than it does about what the algorithm is capable of doing.

I think Mr. Hawking’s point was that you don’t have to spend all your time reading about neural networks and deep machine learning and A.I. and data streams to be concerned about this. Ultimately I think he was arguing this is a human rights issue. Interestingly, his article was published the same year that Facebook apologized for running psychological experiments on users without their knowledge.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/technology/personaltech/lauretta-charlton-race-related.html?emc=rss&partner=rss

Now the big question: Will it work?

Asked to describe what will keep their bosses happy, Mr. Erlicht said, “Critically acclaimed quality shows, first and foremost. Ultimately subscribers matter. But Day 1, high-quality, distinctive, critically acclaimed programming will drive everything.”

Well, the early reviews hit the internet this week and they were decidedly mixed.

In addition to “The Morning Show,” several other Apple series have been made available to critics, including: “Dickinson,” starring Hailee Steinfeld as the poet Emily Dickinson; “See,” a fantasy epic starring Jason Momoa that takes place in a future where everyone has gone blind; and a space drama, “For All Mankind,” co-created by Ronald D. Moore.

Apple has gone Hollywood for a reason. With iPhone sales flattening, the company sought out other ways to generate revenue. In addition to Apple TV Plus, it has unveiled a credit card and started a video-game subscription service.

Unlike Facebook and Google’s YouTube, which have tentatively dipped their toes in entertainment, Apple has gone all-in. Within a year, Apple TV Plus could have as much content as longtime cable networks like FX or Showtime.

Apple is going into the business at a time when tech rivals like Netflix, Amazon and Hulu have a huge head start in making original streaming fare. Apple will also face vigorous competition from the Walt Disney Company, ATT’s WarnerMedia unit and NBCUniversal. Disney Plus, offering decades of movies and shows, will be available Nov. 12. NBCUniversal’s Peacock streaming service and ATT’s HBO Max will be ready next year.

The next few months will suggest whether or not the executives in Cupertino, Calif., have the stomach for the unpredictable entertainment business. Before Apple TV Plus, the company only flirted with the idea, under Eddy Cue, its senior vice president for internet software and services. In 2017, Mr. Cue hired Mr. Erlicht and Mr. Van Amburg, who were the top executives at Sony’s television studio, as the heads of Apple TV Plus.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/business/media/apple-tv-plus.html?emc=rss&partner=rss

New Looney Tunes Cartoons and classics from the vault will also stream at HBO Max.

Series that seem in keeping with the HBO brand are also on the docket, including “Americanah,” a 10-episode limited series based on the book by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and starring Lupita Nyong’o and written by Danai Gurira, who will serve as executive producer; “Circe,” a 10-episode series based on Madeline Miller’s 2018 best-selling novel; and “Station Eleven,” a post-apocalyptic series adapted from the best seller by Emily St. John Mandel, to be directed by Hiro Murai, who is known for his work on the FX show “Atlanta.”

Ann Sarnoff, who was named the head of the Warner Bros. film and television studio in June, highlighted the studio’s upcoming slate — including the debut of “The Joker” — and its classic movie library, including films from Warner Bros., MGM and Criterion Classic, that will stream on HBO Max. Intended to replace the much-loved and now-defunct streaming site from Turner Classic Movies, Film Struck, the monthly offering will comprise classics that “can’t be seen anywhere else.”

There will also be competition and reality shows, including a matchmaking show produced by Ellen DeGeneres. Conan O’Brien, whose “Conan” is broadcast on TBS, will put together five stand-up comedy specials featuring up-and-coming comics for HBO Max, the company announced at the event.

HBO Max hopes to appeal to young viewers with four young-adult films from the uber-producer Greg Berlanti, including “UnPregnant,” which tracks two teenagers on a road trip to New Mexico to terminate a pregnancy before the start of college. A “Gossip Girl” reboot and “Grease: Rydell High,” a musical series, also play to that audience. On Tuesday, Mr. Berlanti revealed two new projects: “Green Lantern” based on the classic DC property and “Strange Adventures,” a one-hour anthology series featuring characters from across the DC canon.

HBO Max also announced that Elizabeth Banks, Issa Rae and Mindy Kaling will each produce a half-hour comedy series for the service. Ms. Banks will produce “DC Super Hero High,” a half-hour series set at a boarding school for gifted children. Ms. Rae’s show follows a female rap group from outside Miami trying to make it in the music industry. Ms. Kaling’s “College Girls” follows three freshman roommates at Evermore College in Vermont.

WarnerMedia made its presentation after ATT’s third-quarter earnings report, in which it announced a steep decline in its DirecTV subscribers and an overall decline in profit. Elliott Management, one of Wall Street’s biggest and most aggressive hedge funds, which owns about 1 percent of ATT shares, has been critical of the company’s move into entertainment. The success of HBO Max will figure into ATT’s ability to stave off those investors.

Randall Stephenson, the chief executive of ATT, closed the event, saying, “This is not Netflix. This is not Disney. This is HBO Max. This company in the next three years will invest $4 billion in building HBO Max.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/29/business/media/hbo-max-price.html?emc=rss&partner=rss