New York Times: New Foils for the Right - Google and Facebook

The New York Times published a long-form article recently discussing the new documentary from Breitbart News Senior Editor-At-Large Peter Schweizer titled The Creepy Line.

The piece published in the New York Times, titled “New Foils for the Right: Google and Facebook,” discusses not only Schweizer’s new documentary but the general growing concern from conservatives that Silicon Valley tech companies are censoring right of center opinions on the Internet. The New York Times is finally noticing the work of conservative publications, including Breitbart Tech, in investigating liberal tech companies that have appointed themselves the arbiters of truth in the digital age.

The Times reached out to multiple conservatives to discuss the issue of tech companies monopoly of information in the modern age, including Breitbart News Editor-in-Chief Alexander Marlow.

“This could end up being the free speech issue of our time,” said Alex Marlow, editor in chief of Breitbart News, which has published articles accusing Google and Facebook of, among other sins, political bias. “The Silicon Valley elites are saying: ‘We don’t care what you want to see — we know what you should see. We know better.’”

The article also discussed James Damore and the panel he took part in at CPAC in Washington, covered by Breitbart Tech. The panel featured Damore, the engineer fired for his famous “viewpoint diversity memo,” which claimed that biological differences accounted for the lack of women in tech fields. Damore’s lawyer Harmeet Dhillon also appeared on the panel alongside Investigative journalist James O’Keefe.

The article notes that it’s not just those on the right worried about the power of tech companies, even those on the left — including the President of CNN — are worried about the growing reach of Google and Facebook.

Jeffrey A. Zucker, the president of CNN, derided Google and Facebook as “monopolies” and called for regulators to step in during a speech in Spain last month, saying the tech hegemony is “the biggest issue facing the growth of journalism in the years ahead.” And former President Barack Obama said at an off-the-record conference at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology last month that he worried Americans were living in “entirely different realities” and that large tech companies like Facebook were “not just an invisible platform, they’re shaping our culture in powerful ways.” The contents of the speech were published by Reason magazine.

The New York Times discussed the issue of Facebook’s new algorithm, which was updated to focus on posts from users friends and family. Many publishers on both sides of the political spectrum were upset and worried by this update with BuzzFeed even attempting to convince users to download their mobile app to counteract their reduced reach on Facebook’s platform.

The article notes that Breitbart Tech immediately took the social media platform to task with an article by Allum Bokhari on the effects of their updated algorithm, specifically how it affected conservatives including President Trump.

Right-wing media has pounced. In late February, citing statistics from the social analytics firm NewsWhip, Breitbart published an article on the effects on the president’s Facebook page with the headline “EXCLUSIVE: Trump’s Facebook Engagement Declined By 45 Percent Following Algorithm Change.” The drop, the article insinuated, occurred “following a year of pressure from left-wing employees and the mainstream media for ‘allowing’ the president to win the 2016 general election.”

The New York Times stated that Google has attempted some conservative outreach over the past few years, including at the Conservative Political Action Conference which the company has sponsored for the past three years. Google also held a party in a private suite at the convention, which was attended by Breitbart Tech reporters who left upon realizing the event was a blatant attempt to convince conservatives that Google was their new best friend.

Google, which has co-sponsored CPAC three of the past six years, held a lavish reception for attendees featuring an open bar and a roaring outdoor fireplace. Mr. Marlow, the editor of Breitbart, was asked in an interview what he thought about Google’s giving a party in the midst of a crowd that is gunning for it.

“The least they can do,” Mr. Marlow said, “is buy us a drink.”

Read the full article in the New York Times here.