02/16/2025
This is a post I made Monday morning February tenth. I was responding to this news:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/trump-abolishes-the-wasteful-penny-in-mid-super-bowl-social-media-rant/ar-AA1yK2fb?ocid=msedgntp&pc=HCTS&cvid=e6e481d1da1c45dfa671fa7f2d81c9e7&ei=63
The headline speaks for itself. I wrote:
"Are people going to be told that pennies are no longer legal tender, and if you have jars of pennies that you have been saving for years, you will be told that you cannot cash them in for the dollar per hundred pennies rate that America has had since 1793? And the other coins?
One of the ways I have always saved money is by simply filling piggy banks with the change I receive in transactions. I have at least $1000 in coins of all values, which I have kept against any dire emergencies. Are nickels, dimes and quarters also going to be declared worthless to those of us who save money in the traditional way-- setting our small change aside?
The rate the coin-turn-in machines like the one at my local bank remove when you use them is 15 percent. It looks to me like our government-- or the Trump-Musk administration-- and come to think of it, the billionaire cabal at the head of technological, computerized businesses, some of whom are Trump appointees-- the ones pushing this artificial intelligence, AI, a scourge upon humanity-- is pressuring Americans to operate in a cashless society."
When I clicked “submit” on the MSN-run comments section, it was rejected. The algorithm said that it was rejected because it did not comply with Community guidelines, and invited me to “Please try another one.”
Now, I have memorized long ago the four Community guidelines, and they are not unreasonable at all. First, no profanity— if one is not offended by cusswords, there are plenty of real-news sources like Raw Story at which to comment on stories.
Second, no explicit s*x. That seems reasonable, people only looking for gratification can go elsewhere.
Third, No harassing, bullying or threatening persons. Heck, I remember comments boards on AOL around the turn of the century, and the degree of unmistakable threatening, racial hate (hey, some racists appreciated having a fake username so they could say whatever they wanted with no personal responsibility) on those old boards where there really was freedom, because the process of engineering social media for popular control was not nearly as developed as it is today.
And fourth, no stealing or attempting to steal from or defraud persons. Computer fraud and scams have been an international growth industry for many years. It is reasonable for Microsoft to include a service by which such possible scams can be reported. On one occasion a Microsoft agent who answered when I called the support number engineered the end of an unusual computer problem.
However, on another occasion just last year my computer was rendered unusable by a scammer impersonating Microsoft which said, with flashing lights and buzzers, that the Trojan and other viruses my computer contained were a threat, thus my machine was disabled, and I must call technical support immediately.
My computer-repair place, UBreakitWefixit, verified that the puter contained no viruses, told me that it was undoubtedly a scam, and made it work again, which it has done to this day. Personally, I have been wary enough of scams to have lost no money by one since the last time I contacted “technical support”, in 2006.
The comment I made on this story does not remotely violate any of these stated guidelines that I have explained. But it was rejected by Microsoft. So, I removed the following part:
"and come to think of it, the billionaire cabal at the head of technological, computerized businesses, some of whom are Trump appointees-- the ones pushing this artificial intelligence, AI, a scourge upon humanity--"
And the comment sailed on through.
There are only two conclusions one can reach: that the technicians maintaining, operating, adjusting, whatever it is that humans can be said to do with an algorithm, have made adjustments to it that cause it to reject unnamed violations having nothing to do with the stated “Community guidelines,” or that there are actual people employed whose work it is to scan comments boards and reject those which express unfavorable comments about the Trump-Musk government and aspects of the electronic industry in general, including AI.
This not the first time I have made comments about the dominance of the computer in-— and over-- people’s lives and had them rejected by Microsoft.
However, this is the first time I have ever decided to save the part of the post I removed which was verboten and present my case against Microsoft censorship publicly on other social media where more of my readers are— Facebook.
I wonder how many members of the online commenting community in general have encountered the kind of censorship I have described.
And I avoid X-formerly-Twitter at all costs.
