We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Monday, January 16, 2017

Fake News: The Latest Weapon in Information Space

Click here to access article by Tony Cartalucci from New Eastern Outlook.
In any struggle, adaptation is required. With Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms joining the so-called war on “fake news,” those who seek to maintain the rise of the alternative media and a balance of power across information space must identify the special interests driving this agenda, as well as various means to undermine and overcome it.
Because Facebook (which I don't use) has joined the directors of the US Empire to spy on you and to limit what you read as real or significant news and opinion, it is urgent that activists find another means of sharing information among each other. Cartalucci presents another alternative (which I have not yet used) in the form of Freenet.
Geopolitically, a successful, widely used, and disruptive P2P social networking platform that undermines or entirely breaks Facebook’s control over social media evens the playing field and allows individuals and states to once again get their side of the story out to the public on equal footing to the “fact checkers” seeking to combat “fake news” on Facebook, Twitter, and other centralized platforms dominated by Western tech-giants.