{"id":1440692,"date":"2022-04-15T15:31:01","date_gmt":"2022-04-15T19:31:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1440692"},"modified":"2022-04-15T15:31:13","modified_gmt":"2022-04-15T19:31:13","slug":"billionaire-owned-wapo-complains-about-billionaires-owning-social-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/billionaire-owned-wapo-complains-about-billionaires-owning-social-media\/","title":{"rendered":"Billionaire-Owned WaPo Complains About Billionaires Owning Social Media"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">16<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fbillionaire-owned-wapo-complains-about-billionaires-owning-social-media%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1440692&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p class=\"subheading\">The <em>Washington Post,\u00a0<\/em>a newspaper owned by billionaire Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, published an op-ed from former Reddit CEO Ellen Pao calling for regulations \u201cto prevent rich people from controlling our channels of communication\u201d \u2014 without a trace of irony.<\/p>\n<p>Every major social media platform is already owned by billionaires, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/tech\/2022\/04\/14\/elon-musk-trolls-saudi-royals-over-free-speech-record-after-prince-rejects-twitter-bid\/\">including the Saudi Arabian prince\u00a0Al Waleed bin Talal<\/a>, and this has been the case since the earliest years of those platforms.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"gmxrevmore\" class=\"H\"><\/figure>\n<p>It wasn\u2019t until self-declared free speech absolutist Elon Musk <a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/tech\/2022\/04\/04\/bokhari-urged-on-by-conservatives-elon-musk-becomes-twitters-largest-shareholder\/\">became the largest shareholder in Twitter<\/a>\u00a0that the outcry from regime elites, of which Pao\u2019s article is a part, started.<\/p>\n<p>Pao is horrified by the prospect of Musk influencing Twitter, at once arguing that social media companies are \u201cfree to establish some limits\u201d on speech (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/politics\/2015\/07\/03\/estimated-6-million-readers-affected-as-reddit-moderators-revolt-against-corrupt-management\/\">as Pao herself notoriously did as CEO of the previously free speech-friendly Reddit<\/a>) while fretting that Musk will use his influence to relax those limits.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_13939532\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Jack-Dorsey-and-Twitter-employees.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-13939532\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Jack-Dorsey-and-Twitter-employees.jpg\" alt=\"Jack Dorsey and Twitter employees\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jack Dorsey and Twitter employees<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Pao argues that Musk\u2019s influence would represent a \u201cbig step backward\u201d from heroic Jack Dorsey achievements like removing \u201chate and harassment,\u201d adding \u201clabels for misleading content,\u201d and \u201cbann[ing] Donald Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B2\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<p>Free speech, argues Pao, hurts \u201cmarginalized racial and ethnic groups\u201d while empowering the privileged.<\/p>\n<p>The Reddit CEO concludes that the government needs to pass regulations that \u201cprevent rich people from controlling our channels of communication,\u201d and allow CEOs to feel safer making changes to their platforms that their customers hate.<\/p>\n<p>Such regulations, argues Pao, would \u201cwould give executives cover to do things they know should be done but which they are afraid to try, out of fear of political backlash or a revolt by some users.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pao is familiar with alienating a platform\u2019s userbase. Her tenure at Reddit, which saw the platform rapidly undermine its founding commitments to free speech, was met with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.breitbart.com\/politics\/2015\/07\/03\/estimated-6-million-readers-affected-as-reddit-moderators-revolt-against-corrupt-management\/\">massive user backlash and boycotts<\/a>. Now Pao wants CEOs to be able to foist the blame for unpopular decisions onto government regulations.<\/p>\n<p>It was Pao\u2019s warning against \u201crich people controlling channels of communication\u201d that drew the attention of social media, because the former Reddit CEO chose to publish her opinions in the\u00a0<em>Washington Post\u00a0\u2014 <\/em>a channel of communication owned by a billionaire.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B3\" class=\"a8d adSo\"><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cThis is an actual sentence published last week by the <em>Washington Post<\/em>, the newspaper owned by Jeff Bezos,\u201d marveled journalist Glenn Greenwald.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">This is an actual sentence published last week by the Washington Post, the newspaper owned by Jeff Bezos:<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/gSpFLwGymw\">https:\/\/t.co\/gSpFLwGymw<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/JgKsoT8i1a\">pic.twitter.com\/JgKsoT8i1a<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ggreenwald\/status\/1514665405096337413?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">April 14, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">How dumb do you have to be to believe that journalists \u2013 who work at Bloomberg and the Bezos-owned WPost or Comcast or CNN \u2013 are worried about billionaires controlling media (). <\/p>\n<p>They&#8217;re only petrified that the *wrong* billionaire, one who may not censor for them, might reign.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ggreenwald\/status\/1514942552985808899?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">April 15, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\u201cHow dumb do you have to be to believe that journalists \u2014 who work at Bloomberg and the Bezos-owned WPost or Comcast or CNN \u2014 are worried about billionaires controlling media,\u201d asked Greenwald later in the day.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re only petrified that the *wrong* billionaire, one who may not censor for them, might reign.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News.\u00a0He is the author of\u00a0<a class=\"x5l\" href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/DELETED-Techs-Battle-Movement-Election\/dp\/154605930X\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener external\">#DELETED: Big Tech\u2019s Battle to Erase the Trump Movement and Steal The Election.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Washington Post,\u00a0a newspaper owned by billionaire Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, published an op-ed from former Reddit CEO Ellen Pao calling for regulations \u201cto prevent rich people from controlling our<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":172,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1440692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1440692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/172"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1440692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1440692\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1440692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1440692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1440692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}