The Media Controls Your Mind

[version]

HBO Doesn’t Dispute Using Fake Twitter Accounts to Undermine TV Critics

A dispute with a former HBO executive assistant has unearthed allegations in Rolling Stone that Casey Bloys directed employees to troll critics posting about network programming on social media from fake accounts.

www.hollywoodreporter.com

HBO has responded to allegations arising from a wrongful termination dispute with an ex-employee that accuse Casey Bloys, the network’s then-president of original programming, of commanding a “secret army” to push back against TV critics posting tepid reviews of HBO titles. In a statement, the company did not challenge claims that Bloys and another executive directed ex-HBO executive assistant Sully Temori to post from fake accounts, with the aim of undermining high-profile critics, as well as anonymous commenters on articles.

 

[sus]

This week's Twitter outrage:

...Turns out to be PR placement. The submarine doesn't exist and never will exist. The company allegedly offering it doesn't have anything close to the personnel or manufacturing deals in place to build it. The company has apparently never, in nearly twenty years of offering superyacht subs, actually built a sub. Their Instagram presence is 3D models and AI generated crew members:

But what you see above is the result of PR placement in news outlets—stoking class outrage is merely a means of getting more eyes and attention on the company, so their founder can continue charging exorbitant speaking fees.

When I worked in consulting, we'd place stories like this constantly. In fact I recognize some of the platforms in the search results, as publications that ran stories for us.

 

[ghost]

new thesis: mixed biscuits works for some british CIA knockoff as a disinfo officer to distract us and to disrupt our discussions of serious political questions. there's no way he's actually as stupid as he's pretending to be. it's simply not possible.

I think we should run him off the forum. Muting is okay but lets him disrupt the experience for newcomers. The only option is a permanent ban.

 

[ghost]

Where's the study proving that competitive hotdog eating doesn't cure borderline personality disorder? My mate says he tried it and it worked like magic, and I found a pamphlet that agrees.

just a reminder, mixed biscuits still hasn't debunked the hotdog bpd cure thesis

 

[sus]

The media are currently trying to convince people the new True Detective is better than the first one. I don't think it's working though.

It's funny watching it play out as there are these glowing headlines from professional critics then the comments are full of people saying they feel like they're going nuts reading this and are they watching the same show?

Seems it's generally accepted, whether it's true or not, that the networks are paying off reviewers and astroturfing social media.

Feels like there's a connection here with the Pitchfork Poptimism thread.

The defanging of independent criticism by corporate interests is getting laundered through the lens of social progress.

 

[version]

Feels like there's a connection here with the Pitchfork Poptimism thread.

The defanging of independent criticism by corporate interests is getting laundered through the lens of social progress.

Yeah, there's a theory Disney et al. bat away criticism by having client journalists push the idea a load of right wingers are trying to bring down a given film or show. The hope being to turn it into another political battleground and galvanize liberals and progressives into supporting it out of spite.

There are plenty of idiots moaning about women in leading roles or whatever, but you'll often see all criticism waved away as political and nothing to do with the quality of the writing, etc. Ghostbusters (2016) being a high profile example.

 

[Mr. Tea]

This week's Twitter outrage:

...Turns out to be PR placement. The submarine doesn't exist and never will exist. The company allegedly offering it doesn't have anything close to the personnel or manufacturing deals in place to build it. The company has apparently never, in nearly twenty years of offering superyacht subs, actually built a sub. Their Instagram presence is 3D models and AI generated crew members:

But what you see above is the result of PR placement in news outlets—stoking class outrage is merely a means of getting more eyes and attention on the company, so their founder can continue charging exorbitant speaking fees.

When I worked in consulting, we'd place stories like this constantly. In fact I recognize some of the platforms in the search results, as publications that ran stories for us.

'Christian Gumpold' could be a Pynchon character.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

there's no way he's actually as stupid as he's pretending to be.

Says the man who doesn't think modern architecture is boxier than older architecture (when not arguing with himself over essentialism)

 

[mixed_biscuits]

just a reminder, mixed biscuits still hasn't debunked the hotdog bpd cure thesis

Yes, there are thousands of books on that, just like NLP...or maybe it's the same person writing all of those books...the conspiracy theories, imagine!

 

[Clinamenic]

new thesis: mixed biscuits works for some british CIA knockoff as a disinfo officer to distract us and to disrupt our discussions of serious political questions.

Indeed, our deliberations in the "al FRESCO SHITTING" and "lets find woops the perfect linen suit for summer" threads have been known to host serious political dissent.

 

[WashYourHands]

new thesis: mixed biscuits works for some british CIA knockoff as a disinfo officer to distract us and to disrupt our discussions of serious political questions. there's no way he's actually as stupid as he's pretending to be. it's simply not possible.

I think we should run him off the forum. Muting is okay but lets him disrupt the experience for newcomers. The only option is a permanent ban.

as far as I’m aware, certain billionaires created the mythos around his mum being a slag

could you, perhaps, elaborate?

were they operating from a position of inside knowledge, was/is there an actual encrypted folder named “*SLAG TAPES*”?

best,
wyh

 

[ghost]

Says the man who doesn't think modern architecture is boxier than older architecture (when not arguing with himself over essentialism)

the buildings in the foreground are adaptions of very traditional chinese hutongs with updated building materials. the ones in the middle left are I'd say more pomo than modernist. You can see some modernist logic in the one on the top right, which has a much more soothing and less uneven texture than the ones lower down.

 

[WashYourHands]

The Dudes are cooking Biscuits



He never recovered from the media calling his mum a slag psi-op I initiated but you followed the bridgehead Tea couldn't get mm’s done in nearly 4 years

He’s reeling, metal glinting in his eye as the onslaught of guinea pig ritual killing ratchets up, the air thick with madness

 

[mixed_biscuits]

the buildings in the foreground are adaptions of very traditional chinese hutongs with updated building materials. the ones in the middle left are I'd say more pomo than modernist. You can see some modernist logic in the one on the top right, which has a much more soothing and less uneven texture than the ones lower down.

This doesn't even merit a 'nice try'. Where are the characteristic roofs? Where is the ornamentation? The whole point is that older buildings were more likely to disrupt harsh rectilinear shapes.

 

[ghost]

The roofs are characteristic. The ornamentation is minimal, as is true of most premodern buildings, due to the cost of ornament. That you believe this to be exceptional is because your eyes are blinded by survivorship bias—expensive buildings tend to stick around longer than more mundane ones.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

I see, you're appealing to non-existent evidence.

It's easier to make perfectly rectilinear forms now than in the past on account of advances in materials and construction technology; the shapes of the buildings of the past were softened by the practical limitations of the time.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

Older architecture, across cultures, more frequently employed fractal forms.

The brain likes fractals as they are all over the place in nature.

 

[Mr. Tea]

the buildings in the foreground are adaptions of very traditional chinese hutongs with updated building materials. the ones in the middle left are I'd say more pomo than modernist. You can see some modernist logic in the one on the top right, which has a much more soothing and less uneven texture than the ones lower down.

I'm assuming he meant 'modern' in the everyday sense of 'contemporary', as opposed to modernist, which is pretty old hat by now.

 

[luka]

biscuits is a bit dopey but he's not totally wrong in as much as the eye delights in detail and novelty. where there is redundancy it switches off and space becomes a kind of blank. you get that in berlin where there is a lot of regularity. it's becoming a problem in London too where whole blocks are demolished to be replaced with sheets of blue glass.

 

[luka]

terms like classical and modernist are not particularly helpful here.