Blocked no more
Last week, a district court in New York ruled that the US President cannot block someone on Twitter for differences in political views because such an act goes against their first amendment rights to participate in a “public forum.” After centuries of Trump preaching the value of free speech and open discourse, it seems he forgot to take into account the free speech of the everyday citizen.
The issue is a lot more complicated than it seems though. The court case was brought to the fore by seven individuals who were blocked by the President for their views on his personality and his federal decisions. The proceedings resulted in a 75-page verdict penned by United States district judge Naomi Reice Buchwald.
Twitter celebrated, as predicted. Chrissy Teigen posted a video of the ruling on her social media with the caption, “well, well, well, we meet again, @realDonaldTrump,” before showing her hilariously smug face. Other Twitter users shared screenshots of the fact that Trump blocked them; whether they’re organisations, celebrities or everyday people.
The public sphere that social media has become, inevitably became a lot more biased due to blocking. It changes the very meaning of public sphere itself. After all, aren’t democracies supposed to be a culmination of various inputs and perspectives, thus letting people make their own decisions?
Pooh’s back
My heart literally exploded with happiness as I watched the very adorable trailer for Disney’s Christopher Robin . What astounded me was the animation of Winnie-the-Pooh, whose fur is intricately brought to life, follicle by follicle. Clearly, the likes of Zootopia have set the bar very high for the animation of non-human personas in film.
The story follows Christopher Robin, who’s now all grown up and no longer wearing his trademark yellow T-shirt and blue shorts but rather full suit, hat and all. I’ll definitely be waiting for this one.
Privacy, updated
Have you noticed your inboxes are getting flooded, and I mean flooded, with emails about privacy updates to various platforms? Airbnb, Uber and Swiggy are just some of the websites I’ve taken membership with, and then there are the places I’ve completely forgotten about, like Student Beans.
Basically, websites around the world are updating their privacy schemes because of the latest protection schemes put in place by the European Union. Those on Twitter will be seeing ‘#GDPR’ as per the General Data Protection Regulation by the EU; on their website, “After four years of preparation and debate, the GDPR was finally approved by the EU Parliament on April 14, 2016. Enforcement date: May 25, 2018 — at which time those organisations in non-compliance may face heavy fines.” Companies must be very clear about users’ personal data used, while also providing consumers easy access to their own data, and to delete that data if they wish.
The memes that poured out of this proclamation are hilarious, especially to yours truly who studied media governance. Twitter user @mutablejoe made a fun rhyme of it, “He’s making a list. He’s checking it twice. He’s gonna find out who’s naughty or nice. Santa Claus is in contravention of article 4 of the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679.” Did you sing it in your head too? Phillip DeFranco made a sensual scene which has been shared about 30,000 times, “She enters your office unannounced. Before you can ask why, she closes in. Her hand glides across the table. To your arm. Then your tie. She grabs it and pulls you so close you can feel her heat. And that’s when it happens. She whispers, ‘We’ve updated our privacy policy...’”
Rants and rambling across cyberspace
