Tornado Alley (PROG)

[ergo sum]

Each day, in an office outside Phoenix, a team of young writers and editors curates reality.
In the America presented on their news and opinion website, WesternJournal.com, tradition-minded patriots face ceaseless assault by anti-Christian bigots, diseased migrants and race hustlers concocting hate crimes. Danger and outrages loom. A Mexican politician threatens the “takeover” of several American states. Police officers are kicked out of an Arizona Starbucks. Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential candidate, proposes a “$100 billion handout” for black families.
The Western Journal is not quite a household name. Until recently, some of its most prolific writers used pseudonyms. Though it publishes scores of stories each week about national politics, the company has no Washington bureau, or any other bureaus. Indeed, it rarely dispatches reporters into the world to gather news firsthand.
In the parallel universe of Facebook, though, The Western Journal has been among the most popular and influential publications in America, shaping the political beliefs of more than 36 million deeply loyal readers and followers. In the three years ending in March, according to a New York Times analysis, Western Journal’s Facebook posts earned three-quarters of a billion shares, likes and comments, almost as many as the combined tally of 10 leading American news organizations that together employ thousands of reporters and editors.
But in the last year, as Facebook and Google tried to rein in their own freewheeling, largely unregulated information ecosystems, The Western Journal’s publishers have been thrust into a high-stakes clash between the tech industry and Washington.
The Western Journal rose on the forces that have remade — and warped — American politics, as activists, publishers and politicians harnessed social media’s power and reach to serve fine-tuned ideological content to an ever-agitated audience. Founded by the veteran conservative provocateur Floyd G. Brown, who began his career with the race-baiting “Willie Horton” ad during the 1988 presidential campaign, and run by his younger son, Patrick, The Western Journal used misleading headlines and sensationalized stories to attract partisans, then profit from their anger.
But Silicon Valley’s efforts to crack down on clickbait and disinformation have pummeled traffic to The Western Journal and other partisan news sites. Some leading far-right figures have been kicked off social media platforms entirely, after violating rules against hate speech and incitement. Republican politicians and activists have alleged that the tech companies are unfairly censoring the right, threatening conservatives’ ability to sway public opinion and win elections.
Those attacks have been led by President Trump. While he and his aides once credited his 2016 upset victory to the power of Facebook and Twitter, they now routinely accuse the same companies of bias.
In July, Mr. Trump hosted a “social media summit” featuring conservative activists who claim to have been censored online. His administration is drafting an executive order that would impose federal oversight of the platforms’ content-moderation policies, a startling departure from decades of deregulatory orthodoxy on the right.
Now The Western Journal — like Mr. Trump — is battling the very technology firms that enabled its rise. Its Facebook traffic has declined sharply. Google News blacklisted the publication last year for what Google ruled were deceptive business practices. Apple News followed suit in June, saying one or more Western Journal stories had advocated “views overwhelmingly rejected by the scientific community.”

more https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/21/us/facebook-disinformation-floyd-brown.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage