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“Liberal” is a word with many meanings. Not defining is bad enough. Hopping between definitions between sentences and hoping your readers don’t notice is just lame.

In most first world countries this is illegal.

You mean like, with a cable? Eewwwww gross!

The fish is not the only one here that’s “dumb”.

Wt actual f?

I generally think Satya is a fairly decent guy.

Microsoft is still a fucking shit show, but still.

Oh yes, this is generally classified as coordinated inauthentic traffic and moderated away regardless of content.

That is, that was the norm before platforms decided they kind of like fascism if it gets them less regulations and more tax cuts.

I mean, sure, but when a considerable number of the low information voters are uncritically spreading memes produced by domestic extremists inspired by narratives devised by state actors and pushed through state media, is it domestic or foreign? Does it even matter?

This is not a hypothetical. This is literally how major disinformation has spread since MH17, through Brexit, the 2016 election, Covid and beyond.

The Russians, the Iranians, the proud boys and uncle Jack in the family WhatsApp are all part of the same hydra of crap.

I also keep hearing "foreign disinfo" but that makes me chuckle. Of course it exists but it's not more potent than the domestic disinfo which is even more plentiful.

I’m not sure the distinction is easy to make, or all that meaningful.

The most powerful country in the world is a large disinformation piñata. You whack it with a few memes and poor decisions come out.

You can’t fault hostile intelligence for giving it a go, and there are a lot of hostile intelligence services.