14 Comments
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Vicky Hammond's avatar

Thank you so much Carole, for bringing Yaël Eisenstat, Jessica González, Roger McNamee, and Zamaan Qureshi to the table to help us understand wtf is going on. I am 70+, Canadian, chronically online (X and Bluesky), and trying hard to be responsible and informed. This was very enlightening, and does encourage me somewhat.

You are a champion, and I am grateful for your leadership. Off I go now to share this insightful conversation with my small circle, hopefully to let these ripples spread. Stay safe and well!

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Laura Westbrook's avatar

Corporate capitulation, DOGE taking over our data, firing the wonderful government workers in all the different areas (SS, NIH, NOAA, Medicare, SNAP, the list is long)

People snatched off the street, and yes, starving children in Gaza and the people in the prison camps in Venezuela.

When the government bailed out the banks, there should have been serious financial consequences in the overpaid, over bonused heads. THAT’S the demand for future wealthy, powerful greedy top tier when they demand bailing out; we need to stop the pyramid style pyramid scheme of the top gets ALL the benefits with NONE of the risks.

Creeps made millions on the housing crisis and thousands of families had their lives horribly disrupted. That must not happen moving forward. We must stop rewarding the bad guys.

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Douglas Speicher's avatar

Carole, thank you for assembling such a stellar panel to discus what is the cancer metastisizing before our very eyes, the korruption and dismemberment of democracy via the disinformation machines built and lent by billionaire oligharchs to the authoritarian ,totalitarian, fascist political forces in their consolidation of power.

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Phil's avatar

Corporate greed by silicone majors has to be stopped AND reversed.

Every country in the world should impose an immediate digital tax on these negative social media outfits for 'permission' for their platforms to be used in their country- discounted for WHEN they clean up their impartial and dangerous activities

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Shannon Starks's avatar

Thank you for assembling this team of experts. I need to watch again and take notes to share. One reason I'm able to maintain some degree of hope for the world's future is that there will always be a group of people who refuse to give in to oppression.

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hw's avatar

I agree with Roger...it's unfathomable to me that people still use SM platforms...literally funding the oligarchs underming democracy.

I also agree that the tech/business community fundamentally misread Trump and Musk...both men are fueled by grievance and grandiosity...lacking any principles, they shift alliances on a dime.

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Rach Moo's avatar

Thank you! Subscribing from Australia.

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The Citizens's avatar

Oh WOW. Thank YOU! Spread the news, we love Aussies :-)

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JayJay's avatar

Go Roger!!

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Ali Collins's avatar

I live in the belly of the beast. San Francisco has witnessed a tech takeover. During the downturn in 2008, politicians invited tech billionaires into our city and the city has never been the same. When they realized they could not manipulate local political organizations they founded their own astroturfs and alternate media to undermine democratic leadership. The disruption unleashed by COVID was the perfect storm which allowed them to take over local politics and at the same time infiltrate the Democratic Party. Many top Democrats have been recipients of funding which has made it difficult to call out alt-right and neo-segregationist political activity in the tech sector. San Franciscans are now living on a surveillance state. With the recent election of the current administration, local tech billionaires are now openly involved at the highest level in dismantling our government. Many of us have been tracking this activity, but our voices have been muted by algorithms and corporate media. Independent media is critical right now in keeping the public informed.

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Just thinkin''s avatar

Yup. And history teaches us Autocracy’s a car crash waiting to happen

https://justhinkin.substack.com/p/autocracy-a-suicide-machine?r=3cs2wr

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Anna Keller's avatar

Thank you all for all your work!!! Please keep going.

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MsDi's avatar

Regarding what Roger said regarding using other platforms not Google platforms, he said to use Signal. Signal if everyone remembers is what JD Vance and other Trump admin members were using to discuss the bombing of Yemen. Then I read from numerous people that Signal is controlled by nefarious entities. Proton is one platform for Email that I understand is a good one to use. What other safe...for now platforms do people recommend?

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The Citizens's avatar

Ohhh what did you hear about Signal - we use it and it is foundation owned..

We have a few suggestions on alternatives over here. https://the-citizens.com/action/take-action-against-big-tech/

Also one of our community keeps this updated regularly https://www.rebeltechalliance.org/stopusingbigtech.html

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