Trump cites Facebook exec’s comments downplaying Russian ad influence on election

You’d be forgiven for missing Donald Trump’s multiple retweets of Facebook executive Rob Goldman over the weekend. Perhaps you were spending time with family, watching Black Panther or just attempting to forget politics for a moment by ignoring the manic flurry of social media updates from the leader of the free world.

But in amongst a deluge of tweets that blamed Democrats for failing to preserve DACA, called out the FBI over the recent school shooting in Florida on the FBI and affectionately referred to a member of congress as “Liddle’ Adam Schiff, the leakin’ monster of no control,” the President cited Facebook’s VP of Ads as evidence against claims that his campaign colluded with Russia.

“The Fake News Media never fails,” Trump tweeted over the weekend. “Hard to ignore this fact from the Vice President of Facebook Ads, Rob Goldman!”

Trump was citing Goldman’s own Twitter dump over the past week, responding to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s recent indictment of 13 Russian citizens charged with interfering in the presidential election.

“Very excited to see the Mueller indictment today,” Goldman wrote. “We shared Russian ads with Congress, Mueller and the American people to help the public understand how the Russians abused our system. Still, there are keys facts about the Russian actions that are still not well understood.”

Of course, Mueller’s findings haven’t exactly exonerated Facebook in all this. The site, along with its subsidiary Instagram, were mentioned by name 41 times in the indictment.

Goldman’s Twitter storm acknowledges that the social media behemoth has certainly been a centerpiece of Russia’s misinformation campaign, but adds, “The majority of the Russian ad spend happened AFTER the election. We shared that fact, but very few outlets have covered it because it doesn’t align with the main media narrative of Tump and the election.”

Trump spotted the opening and quickly cited it as evidence of the “fake news” campaign to link his election to Russian meddling. While it’s understandable that he would seize upon this sort of statement from a Facebook executive in an on-going effort to put these investigations behind him, among other things, the tweets don’t address the impact that non-advertisement Facebook posts played in the election.

After all, Facebook previously told Congress that Russian-linked ads may have reached as many as 10 million users in the U.S., while the posts from Russian agents were believed to have reached as many as 126 million Americans.

Comments

What is your preferred smartphone screen size

Screen envy. We all have it. Or do we? See, that’s the thing, I’m just not so sure. One thing I am sure about is that our phone screens have gotten progressively bigger and bigger over the last few years. The funny thing is, we as a society have taken that ball and run with it, like we just don’t care. But I always thought we did care? Some time ago, when phones were in the sub-5” range, we used to have a term called “phablet” which described an almost absurdly big phone. The definition varied from person to person. I always considered a phone with a screen 5.5” or bigger to be a phablet. The Galaxy Note fell into that category. The Lumia 1520 certainly did. There are others as well. I was safely ensconced in the 4.5” area at the time with my Lumia 920. What did I know? Leon’s getting laaaaaaaarrrger But slowly, phones started topping the 5” mark. I’m not talking about phablets here, I’m talking about normal flagship phones – the Galaxy S4 (barely) and the HTC One (M7) are ...

Best Web Design Company in Pondicherry

#Technology has two faces. We all feel it, but sometimes can’t find words to describe it. #Ebooks are the best example to show the 0-1 nature of emotions the #technology evokes. #itwhere provide a #Best #solutions to #Growyourbusiness feel free to drop a #Mail info@itwheretech.co.in www.itwheretech.co.in

Facebook Now Supports PGP To Send You Encrypted Emails

You can now instruct Facebook to encrypt every email it sends to you so nobody — not even the NSA — is likely to be able to read your messages anytime soon. All you have to do is import your public PGP key into your Facebook settings and you’re good to go. The problem here, of course, is that most people have no idea how public/private key email encryption works and how to even get started with it. In the wake of Edward Snowden’s leaks, a number of organizations, including Google, promised to completely hide the complexities of end-to-end email encryption from regular users. Very few of these products have materialized so far, however — not for lack of trying, but because this is actually a very complex problem, both from a technical and user experience perspective. Facebook uses the well-established PGP scheme (the GNU Privacy Guard implementation of OpenPGP, to be precise) to encrypt messages and tools lik...

eGym raises $45M Series C for cloud-connected gym equipment and fitness software

eGym , the Munich-based startup that offers cloud-connected gym equipment and supporting cloud software and app for the fitness training floor, has closed $45 million in Series C funding. The round was led by new investor HPE Growth Capital, while existing investors, including Highland Europe, also participated. The problem that eGym is looking to solve is that, whilst gyms have moved from a bodybuilder market to a mass market in the last 20 years, the technology in gyms lags behind. That’s despite the fact that better use of technology can help to reduce customer churn, the biggest pain-point of both gym operator and gym users. Comprising of an app for both gym user and trainer, combined with the company’s connected strength machines, the eGym Cloud makes it possible for gym members to receive better fitness instruction and an evolving and personalised fitness plan based on data collected as they workout. And by providing a better workout feedback loop, gym goers can get an i...

LeafLink Raises $750K To Become Salesforce For The Cannabis Industry

LeafLink , an NY-based wholesale management platform for the cannabis industry, has closed a $750k seed round led by group of NY angel investors. The software platform is designed to support participants in a B2B supply chain, providing basic tools designed to save money for retailers and allow producers to get better pricing for their product. These tools will include a centralized location to view correspondence between buyers and suppliers, inventory and order tracking tools, and a portal to discover new products and services so users can source leads and close deals from within the platform. Founders Ryan Smith and Zach Silverman explained that they “believe cannabis regulation and distribution is moving toward mimicking the alcohol industry with regional distributors and nonsensical supply chain participants”. By focusing on creating a supply chain similar to the alcohol industry, the company hopes to eventually be the universally accepted way for buyer...

Exciting Technology

Search This Blog