Slander branding and topic-manipulation by Newsbreak
Newsbreak's robotic company culture cannot compute the grass growing on the forest floor.
I am a naive romantic person and so when Newsbreak came about I envisioned a new media that would be a melding of the many voices of social media with mainstream, a twenty-first-century media that was more connected with the authentic human narrative than its predecessor, but of course, I did not see what was staring me in the face: the robot.
Throughout my affair with Newsbreak, I only once had a conversation with a human. That happened when I contacted support to ask why my stats frequently reflect a one-to-one relationship of impressions to views. but even then I got a robotic response that only reiterated what impressions and views are. That too could have been the product of a script. Maybe it was. Maybe my belief that I was actually in contact with a real human was just my nativity and romanticism projected upon the world.
Since one’s only interaction with Newsbreak is delivered in the form of pre-programmed responses, the naive and romantic mind interprets these responses as though they were coming from a human.
Recently I posted How Paul LePage codified the global capitalist world order into the Maine statutes, which as you can see by clicking the link is now published on Newsbreak, just as it was originally submitted, but as you can also see from the image above, it was originally not approved with an assertion that the story is “misinformation” with a message that I can appeal it.
My spontaneous first reaction commented that Newsbreak gave no information to justify its assertion, and that was it. I wondered how one is supposed to appeal against an assertion that basically says nothing to explain itself.
Every time I opened up Newsbreak that message popped up in my face and repeatedly told me that I can appeal it and so I clicked again but since I had already responded once, NewsBreak would not allow me to say anything more despite that it kept repeatedly throwing this message in my face. One set of rules for Newsbreak, another for its creators.
Next, I received a questionnaire from Newsbreak, in all appearances a questionnaire which is sent globally to everyone, but still, I cannot help but marvel at the way such questionnaires are generated right at the moment when one is also trying to engage Newsbreak individually. A coincidence? - or just the way that people who are not allowed to speak in anything but pre-formatted messages communicate?
Lo and Behold, Newsbreak wants to know if I am interested in an email, without giving any further information about what that might be, No Thank You! Substack works for me. I am thinking of disabling the Medium email service as well and just do it all in Substack.
So I published the story on Substack. Formerly I was creating stories tailored for Newsbreak and another sort of story for Substack, but from now on in, I may publish Newsbreak stories on Substack, first.
Then I contacted Newsbreak support and wrote this:
Recently I posted How Paul LePage codified the global capitalist world order into the Maine statutes, sponsored and signed by Lepage during the time that Amazon was running its headquarters contest. The story is a slightly edited version of one that I originally published on Medium which has a note on it from Dialogue and Discourse, a well-respected publication, inviting me to submit to D&D. None of the edits pertain to any of the factual information and it is only factual information that can be fairly considered as misinformation.
I am an independent research journalist since 2009, specializing in reading Maine's economic development policy enacted in and since 1976 when Maine became a centralized economy. Based on my status as an independent researcher I was recruited by Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, an international academic journal to do reviews and as a result, you can find my researcher’s ID on Orcid.
I checked the story and did not find an instance where factual information about the Major Business Headquarters Expansion Act, or anything else was not referenced with a link to the source.
Your communication made an assertion about my story without providing any justification for the assertion, and then you gave me a warning. Your communication was delivered as it always is- as a robot. One assumes that somewhere behind the robot there are humans but it seems that your company disallows individualized human communication from your employees, which would include identifying what you are asserting is “misinformation” in my individual article.
Since you do not offer any clues providing a basis for your assertion- how is one to appeal it? As is Newsbreak gives my stories minimal distribution, classified in the “better than nothing” category, but when you start making allegations against my work and giving me warnings, it is no longer “better than nothing”.
A few hours later, without any further communication, How Paul LePage codified the global capitalist world order into the Maine statutes was published on Newsbreak
But despite the fact that the article was published the same message persists in popping up covering the whole page whenever I open the Newsbreak creators app.
Giving the benefit of the doubt to the notion that there are humans somewhere involved in decision-making policies at Newsbreak, what is that all about? It is still a warning- you better stop publishing the kinds of articles that you publish!
I can’t help but see the correlation between a corporate policy that disallows its employees to communicate other than in pre-formatted responses, and my answer to their question “Why did I join Newsbreak?” with “To have a voice in local politics” The human element reviewing my work is not allowed to speak in their own voices, and if there are no humans involved, you know, maybe robots have feelings too! How does it feel to be reviewing a story that expresses an individualistic point of view while working at a job where individualistic expression is prohibited?
I am taking the persistence of that slander branding message, thrown up in my face every time I open Newsbreak as intentional, over an accident. This puts the whole idea that Newsbreak cares about whether or not disinformation is distributed into doubt. My work is not misinformation. The absence of honest and complete reporting of legislation passed, or under consideration of being passed in Maine is intentional misinformation.
I sent another email to Newsbreak creators support
Recently I published a story that was not approved with an unexplained assertion that it was qualified as misinformation.
I appealed by pointing out that fact that the assertion does not justify itself. There was no reason given for portraying my work as misinformation and all facts in the story are linked to their source.
Without further communication, my article was published.
But the offensive message pops ups every time I open Newsbreak, covering the whole screen as an indicator that although my work was subsequently published, unchanged, Newsbreak is branding me as a publisher of misinformation and apparently keeping the “strike” against me on the record and throwing it in my face every time I click on the home link.
How should I be taking this?
This time I received an answer from support in a short amount of time saying they are overwhelmed so it might take a week to answer.
In other words, expect that you might see that slander branding thrown in your face every time you open Newsbreak, even though your article has been published. I am being punished, not for misinformation, but simply for writing what I write about. Does keeping this message in place every time I open the app qualify as brainwashing?
In these times that question is more relevant than it has even been.
I am not on Newsbreak’s monetization program because it requires 100 registered voters, which is the equivalency of Medium’s referral program. I also publish on Data-Based Investor website which will only take articles that are published first on the DBI website. It was explained to me by a human at DBI that is because the Google algorithm gives priority to the site where a story is published first. For me, that is not going to be Newsbreak. Substack is my first option because it is the voice of independent journalism and I am an independent research journalist. Power to the People!