Tag: big tech

Meta to spend up to $65 bln this year to power AI goals, Zuckerberg says

Meta Platforms plans to spend between $60 billion and $65 billion this year to build out AI infrastructure, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Friday, joining a wave of Big Tech firms unveiling hefty investments to capitalize on the technology.

As part of the investment, Meta (META.O) will build a more than 2-gigawatt data center that would be large enough to cover a significant part of Manhattan. The company — one of the largest customers of Nvidia’s (NVDA.O) coveted artificial intelligence chips — plans to end the year with more than 1.3 million graphics processors.

“This will be a defining year for AI,” Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post. “This is a massive effort, and over the coming years it will drive our core products and business.”

Zuckerberg expects Meta’s AI assistant — available across its services, including Facebook and Instagram — to serve more than 1 billion people in 2025, while its open-source Llama 4 would become the “leading state-of-the-art model”.

Shares of the company were 1.6% higher in early trading.

Big technology companies have been investing tens of billions of dollars to develop AI-related infrastructure after the meteoric success of OpenAI’s ChatGPT highlighted the potential for the technology.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced that OpenAI, SoftBank Group (9984.T) and Oracle (ORCL.N) will form a venture called Stargate and invest $500 billion in AI infrastructure across the United States.

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EU Updates Digital Rules Requiring Big Tech To Allow ‘Reporters’ To Monitor Hate Speech

Under a revised code of conduct on online speech, the European Commission says that Big Tech signatories need to allow a network of “monitoring reporters” to regularly monitor hate speech notices.

On Jan. 20, the European Commission announced that updated hate speech guidelines will be folded into the Digital Services Act (DSA).

The DSA is an EU-wide regulation that regulates the obligations of digital services.

Part of this requires social media platforms to remove, and take other specified steps to deal with, what is deemed disinformation. The DSA fully came into force in 2024.

Under the revised code, companies that are signed up must allow a network of “monitoring reporters” that are nonprofit or public entities with expertise on illegal hate speech to regularly monitor how the signatories are reviewing hate speech notices.

They will have to review at least two-thirds of hate speech notices received from monitoring reporters within 24 hours.

The EU said that the updated code of conduct, a voluntary instrument, builds on a 2016 code on “countering illegal hate speech online.”

European Commission Spokesperson Thomas Regnier told The Epoch Times by email that Facebook, Instagram, and X are among the signatories of the new code of conduct. These platforms were also part of the previous code of conduct, initiated in 2016, he said.

It was also signed by Dailymotion,  Jeuxvideo.com, LinkedIn, Microsoft-hosted consumer services, Snapchat, Rakuten Viber, TikTok, Twitch, and YouTube.

The EU also wants signatories to present “country-level data broken down by the internal classification of hate speech (such as race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity or sexual orientation).”

Some of the monitoring reporters include Amnesty International Italia, German organisation HateAid, and the French Ministry of the Interior’s dedicated portal to cybercrime, PHAROS.

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HHS Secretary Becerra Defends Biden Admin’s Big Tech Censorship, Blames Disinformation for Public Distrust

US Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Xavier Becerra is about to step down, along with the rest of the Biden administration. Not only that, but it also seems likely that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will take over that post.

Ouch.

That aside – the exit of Becerra might be the end, and the conclusion of a “synopsis” of this particular political drama – but the start goes way back to 2020, the pandemic, its (mis)handling, and all the wrongs that impacted both people’s physical and mental health, and facilitated rampant online censorship, for many years.

It makes for an interesting read that the Washington Post decided to give Becerra a lot of space to state his case – but less so because of anything the soon-to-be former official actually had to say, or any ideologically heavy narrative the media outlet in question itself, felt the need to peddle in this context, one more time.

(There’s a point in the article where the Covid pandemic is described – now in January 2025 – as merely “receding”?)

These seemingly last-ditch delusional efforts are being made all over the place and this one has Becerra at one point addressing the elephant in the supposedly purely scientific room – what about the rampage of online censorship around Covid?

Believe it or not, it’s the victim card that Becerra chose to play here. “I can’t go toe to toe with social media,” he is quoted as lamenting by the Washington Post, bringing up things like “instantaneous misinformation” as the culprit for citizens now expressing low trust in the outgoing government.

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Celebrities and Tech Leaders Launch Campaign, Asking For Donations To Fund New Social Media Agenda

A coalition of celebrities and tech figures—including actors Mark Ruffalo and Alex Winter, author Cory Doctorow, musician Brian Eno, journalist Carole Cadwalladr, writer and podcaster Akilah Hughes, and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales — have launched the Free Our Feeds initiative and are asking for donations to fund their idea. Their mission is to reclaim and expand the AT Protocol, the decentralized framework Bluesky operates on, in an effort to wrestle control from billionaires and corporate interests.

But what do these celebrities have in mind? Free speech? Likely not.

Bluesky, originally conceived within Twitter as a censorship-resistant social media platform, has drifted far from its founding principles. Designed to offer users an open, decentralized space for free expression, Bluesky was intended to prevent centralized control over online discourse. However, it has increasingly been influenced by advocates for stricter content moderation, undermining its foundational goal of safeguarding free speech.

Despite these intentions, the Free Our Feeds campaign might raise some eyebrows. The group is asking for $30 million over three years—starting with $4 million through a GoFundMe campaign—to fund a public-interest foundation. While decentralization is a promising concept, past examples like Mastodon and even Bluesky reveal how these platforms can quickly fall under the sway of those who seek to control speech. Decentralized technologies have been used to censor content and sever connections between platforms that support free speech, raising doubts about how truly independent these systems can remain.

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Despite Sweeping Updates To Facebook Policies In Favor Of ‘Free Expression,’ Restrictions On Marijuana-Related Accounts Remain

Despite new changes to content moderation announced earlier this week, Meta—the owner of Facebook, Instagram and Threads—appears not to be changing its practices around marijuana, continuing to block search results on the social media platform for terms such as “marijuana” and “cannabis” and instead displaying a notice encouraging users to report “the sale of drugs.”

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced a number of changes to content policies and moderation on Tuesday, such as stepping away from practices like third-party fact checking in favor of a community notes model, in which users are responsible for flagging questionable content. The company said it’s also “getting rid of a number of restrictions on topics like immigration, gender identity and gender that are the subject of frequent political discourse and debate.”

“We will allow more speech by lifting restrictions on some topics that are part of mainstream discourse,” the company said as part of the announcement, “and focusing our enforcement on illegal and high-severity violations.”

“Up until now, we have been using automated systems to scan for all policy violations, but this has resulted in too many mistakes and too much content being censored that shouldn’t have been,” the company added.

To many in the cannabis space—including some medical marijuana patients, cannabis content creators, news outlets and even government agencies—that feels like an apt description of how they’ve have been treated by the company, which has historically removed or limited the visibility of marijuana-related accounts.

But the new changes—touted under the banner of “free expression”—don’t appear to affect the handling of cannabis on Meta’s platforms.

Neither Facebook nor Meta replied to Marijuana Moment’s request for clarifications on the new policies this week, but the only mention of drugs in the new announcement is the company’s stated intent to “continue to focus” its content moderation systems “on tackling illegal and high-severity violations, like terrorism, drugs, fraud and scams.”

“For less severe policy violations, we’re going to rely on someone reporting an issue before we take action,” it says.

It’s unclear exactly when all the changes will be deployed. Facebook said it would implement the use of community notes “over the next couple of months, and will continue to improve it over the course of the year.” It didn’t provide a timeframe for changes to content moderation policies.

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Mark Zuckerberg Orders Removal of Tampons From Men’s Bathrooms at Meta Offices and Social Media Users Have Humorous Thoughts

Meta and Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg’s red pilling continues unabated, and social media is taking particular note of one significant change he has made.

As TGP readers know, Mark Zuckerberg has done a complete 180 on multiple issues since President Trump destroyed Kamala Harris in the 2024 election. These include getting rid of far-left ‘fact checkers,’ bringing more conservatives into his company, and giving to Trump’s inaugural fund.

But his latest move may be the most decisive of all. The New York Times reported that Zuckerberg made additional changes on Tuesday, including removing the transgender and nonbinary “themes” on its Messenger chat app and getting rid of tampons in the men’s bathrooms at Meta offices.

You read that right. Meta had TAMPONS in the men’s washrooms before Zuckerberg was finally hit by reality.

From the New York Times:

That same day at Meta’s offices in Silicon Valley, Texas and New York, facilities managers were instructed to remove tampons from men’s bathrooms, which the company had provided for nonbinary and transgender employees who use the men’s room and who may have required sanitary pads, two employees said.

Users on X responded to the news with several humorous memes, many targeting Minnesota Governor and failed VP candidate Tim Walz.

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EU Officials Pressure Meta and X to Enforce Censorship: Threats Linked to “Fact-Checkers” and Disinformation Investigations

This week’s statement by CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and the realization that Meta’s policy shift regarding free speech on the giant’s social platforms doesn’t necessarily end with the US – is clearly sending shivers down the spine of a particular political class in Europe.

The one that, at least currently, gets to do all the talking – and gets that talking reported as gospel by legacy media.

And so, officials in a number of EU countries as well as some members of the European Parliament (MEPs) are scrambling to respond to Meta’s announcement – in a way, it seems, simply as an emergency measure to protect their narrow political, rather than what may be their nations’ long term, greater interest.

The people’s interest, meanwhile, is always the same: being able to speak freely as the very first point of assurance, that we do indeed, live in a democratic way.

But – the bureaucracy obviously has a different agenda.

Meta, as the first of the true tech giants to “turn the free speech ship around” does appear to be following in the footsteps of what Twitter/X has already been doing for several years.

And Meta’s change in policy is, in the grand scheme of things, still minor – Meta is simply now dropping the notorious third-party “fact-checkers.”

But, a number of EU officials and representatives of various agencies are wasting no time making themselves and their priorities known. And free speech, by way of welcoming less online censorship, does not come across as any priority.

Instead, they are warning Meta against abandoning the services of the “Censorship Central” – aka, “fact-checkers” – while at the same time looking to “energetically” pursue the existing investigation against X.

German Federal Network Agency head Klaus Muller is one of those appearing to be trying to stem the free speech tide, all the way to threatening to impose “sanctions” against Meta – should the company decide to extend its new, freedom-respecting policies to Europeans, after Americans start enjoying this privilege first.

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Here’s Everything You Still Can’t Say on “Free Speech” Meta Platforms

Meta’s recent announcement of plans to “restore free expression” on its platforms is accompanied by an extensive list of content restrictions, raising questions about the breadth of speech allowed under the new rules. While CEO Mark Zuckerberg claimed the company is “getting back to its roots” with a focus on open discourse, the detailed policies suggest significant limitations remain.

The updated guidelines categorize prohibited content into two tiers. Tier 1 bans dehumanizing speech, such as comparisons to “animals” or “pathogens,” and stereotypes such as claiming that certain groups control financial, political, or media institutions. Allegations of serious immorality or criminality, such as calling someone a terrorist or pedophile, are also prohibited.

The policy also forbids mocking alleged hate crime victims, using targeted slurs, or expressing harmful wishes, such as hoping someone contracts a disease or experiences a disaster. Even expressions as simple as saying someone “makes me vomit” fall under the banned list when targeting individuals based on protected characteristics.

Tier 2 extends restrictions to statements that support exclusion or segregation, such as denying someone access to spaces, jobs, or social services. Insults based on character, mental capacity, or physical worth are similarly prohibited, though some exceptions are made for gender-based insults in specific contexts, like romantic break-ups.

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Facebook Claims it Will Allow More Free Speech Now

Admitting it has gone too far, Meta’s platforms of Facebook and Instagram are ending their ‘fact checking’ programs and restrictions on speech to allegedly restore free expression, according to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a video posted Tuesday.

“We’re going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms,” Zuckerberg said. “More specifically, we’re going to get rid of fact-checkers and replace them with Community Notes similar to X, starting in the U.S.” 

The shift to an X-style model with community notes replacing the heavy hand of internet censorship will be rolled out over the next few months, according to Zuckerberg.

“This is a great opportunity for us to reset the balance in favor of free expression. As Mark says in that video, what we’re doing is we’re getting back to our roots and free expression,” Meta’s chief global affairs officer, Joel Kaplan said in an interview with Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends” Tuesday.

The fact checking program was put in place following the Democrats loss of the 2016 election. Its purpose was to manage user’s content and censor what it deemed as ‘misinformation’. The move was initiated by political pressure, explained Zuckerberg.

“After Trump first got elected in 2016, the legacy media wrote nonstop about how misinformation was a threat to democracy. We tried in good faith to address those concerns without becoming the arbiters of truth,” Zuckerberg said. “But fact checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they created, especially in the U.S.”

Meta’s man went on to discuss specific topics that will no longer be taboo on his website.

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Cracking Down on Big Tech: New Bill’s Plan to Expose Government Collusion

A new legislative effort has been launched in the US Senate in order to prevent any future instances of government Tech collusion from flying under the legislators’ radar.

The Transparency in Bureaucratic Communications Act, introduced by Republican Senator Eric Schmitt, would have inspectors general (IGs) inform Congress in detail about any communication, and circumstances of that communication, between the agencies these watchdogs are in charge of, and companies benefiting from Section 230 protections.

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

Judging by a press statement by Schmitt, the concern is that, even with the government accused of such collusion now on its way out, what he refers to as “the deep state” might still continue to “work” with Big Tech.

“The incoming Republican Congress cannot allow deep-state bureaucrats to continue censoring the free speech of our constituents any longer (…) We will find the bureaucratic rot and we will rip it out,” Schmitt stated.

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