Month: October 2017

Tom Petty Reportedly on Life Support

Tom Petty
Jason Tate

TMZ is reporting that Tom Petty has been put on life support following a cardiac arrest in his home.

Update: The latest report is that Tom Petty has passed away. He was 66.

Update #2: TMZ is now reporting that “[t]he singer is not expected to live through the day, but he’s still clinging to life.”

Update #3: Tom Petty’s manager has confirmed that Mr. Petty has passed away.

‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens

The Onion
Jason Tate

The Onion:

LAS VEGAS—In the hours following a violent rampage in Las Vegas in which a lone attacker killed more than 50 individuals and seriously injured 400 others, citizens living in the only country where this kind of mass killing routinely occurs reportedly concluded Monday that there was no way to prevent the massacre from taking place.

The Onion have been running this same piece, only changing the number of victims and the locations, since at least 2014.

Zuckerberg’s Preposterous Defense of Facebook

Facebook
Jason Tate

Zeynep Tufekci, writing for The New York Times:

In a largely automated platform like Facebook, what matters most is not the political beliefs of the employees but the structures, algorithms and incentives they set up, as well as what oversight, if any, they employ to guard against deception, misinformation and illegitimate meddling. And the unfortunate truth is that by design, business model and algorithm, Facebook has made it easy for it to be weaponized to spread misinformation and fraudulent content. Sadly, this business model is also lucrative, especially during elections. Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s chief operating officer, called the 2016 election “a big deal in terms of ad spend” for the company, and it was. No wonder there has been increasing scrutiny of the platform.

Facebook’s “if both sides are mad, we’re doing something right” defense is absolutely absurd.