Snap Inc. may be in for the same reckoning at the hands of investors suffered by rivals Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc. when it reports earnings Tuesday.

The self-described camera company has stated that second-quarter revenue, which it is set to report after the closing bell on Tuesday, will see year-over-year growth slow down “significantly” from the first quarter’s 54%. Snap’s SNAP, -0.38% user growth could also take a hit from the implementation of Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR, the same types of issues that led to big declines for Facebook FB, +0.38% and Twitter TWTR, +0.79% after those companies issued earnings last month.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/snap-earnings-after-facebook-and-twitter-disaster-whither-snapchat-2018-08-06

The Crackdown Continues: Twitter Suspends Libertarian Accounts, Including Ron Paul Institute Director

One day after what appeared to be a coordinated attack by media giants Facebook, Apple, Spotify and Google on Alex Jones, whose various social media accounts were banned or suspended in a matter of hours, the crackdown against alternative media figures continued as several Libertarian figures, including the Ron Paul Institute director, found their Twitter accounts suspended.

Two more casualties of the Twitter purge of antiwar voices: @ScottHortonShow, the new editorial director of https://t.co/QNAmINHNCX, and @DanielLMcAdams, director of the Ron Paul Institute.

Are you next?

— Justin Raimondo (@JustinRaimondo) August 6, 2018

On Monday, Twitter suspended the editorial director of antiwar.com Scott Horton, former State Department employee Peter Van Buren, and Dan McAdams, the executive director of the Ron Paul Institute.

Scott Horton, Peter Van Buren, and Dan McAdams have been suspended from Twitter.

If you go to their accounts, you will see their old tweets, but they are prohibited from making new tweets. They were reported by @KatzOnEarth for criticizing his posts. Please complain to Twitter. pic.twitter.com/kaWAqasLKQ

— Antiwar.com (@Antiwarcom) August 6, 2018

Horton was reportedly disciplined for the use of "improper language" against journalist Jonathan M. Katz, he said in a brief statement, while McAdams was suspended for retweeting him, he said. Past tweets in both accounts were available to the public at the time of the writing, unlike the account of Van Buren, which was fully suspended.

According to TargetLiberty, Horton and McAdams fell victim of Twitter’s suspension algorithm after objecting to Katz’s quarrel with Van Buren over an earlier interview.

Hey @ThomasEWoods , @scotthortonshow can’t tweet out his interview of Peter Van Buren @wemeantwell from last week because Twitter suspended both of their accounts. Can you?https://t.co/zIYVZeOfPG

— Phil Brown (@philinexile) August 7, 2018

RIP @WeMeantWell pic.twitter.com/TwtO1QD17d

— 11811 (@kirchin) August 5, 2018

The suspensions come days after Twitter suspended black conservative Candace Owen from Twitter for highlighting the algorithmic hypocrisy of Twitter by replacing the word “white” with “Jewish” in a series of tweets modeled on those by New York Times editor Sarah Jeong.

just after controversial conservative Alex Jones, and his podcast InfoWars, were kicked out from most social media platforms, prompting conservative to accuse the social networks of collusion in a collective crackdown on non-mainstream voices. The Silicon Valley giants were criticized by the US political establishment for failing to prevent alleged Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. Meanwhile, critics now say the pressured media giants are engaging in political censorship, using their market dominance and lack of legislated neutrality requirements to target descent voices ahead of the midterm elections.

More:

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-08-07/crackdown-continues-twitter-suspends-libertarian-accounts-including-ron-paul

Nigel Farage: If Twitter wants to target conservative speech then treat it like the biased publisher it is

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2018/08/07/nigel-farage-if-twitter-wants-to-target-conservative-speech-then-treat-it-like-biased-publisher-it-is.html

Tech companies gave massive platforms to conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones. Is the crackdown finally here?

By Matt Pearce and David Pierson

Aug 07, 2018

For more than a decade, tech companies have built massive social media platforms on a simple principle: Take the power of publishing that was long reserved for traditional outlets like newspapers and television stations, and give it to everyone, without censorship.

But that era of idealism appears to be over, as some of Silicon Valley’s titans acknowledge that their services have become breeding grounds for foreign espionage, white nationalism and conspiracy mongering. Reluctantly, the companies have taken on a 20th-century role: gatekeeping.

On Monday, Apple, Facebook, YouTube and Spotify kicked prominent conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his popular Infowars outlet off their services after years of mounting public pressure for the media giants to take more responsibility for the content that appears on their wide-open platforms.

Since the 2016 election of President Trump, tech companies have responded to lawmakers and activists, and taken steps to identify and remove accounts linked to white nationalists who grew emboldened by Trump’s campaign and Russian hackers who federal officials say aided his election.

But the move against Jones — a Trump supporter whose impassioned paranoia has drawn millions of followers — marks a clear escalation in Silicon Valley’s attempt to clean up its mess.

Facebook said in a statement that it took down four Jones-related pages not for spreading “fake news” through conspiracy theories but for “repeated violations” for “glorifying violence, which violates our graphic violence policy, and using dehumanizing language to describe people who are transgender, Muslims and immigrants, which violates our hate speech policies.”

More here:

https://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-alex-jones-20180807-story.html

Trump’s Biggest Media Fans Struggle to Stop QAnon’s Spread

By William.Sommer@thedailybeast.com (Will Sommer)

Pro-Trump media personalities are scrambling to prevent the QAnon conspiracy theory from catching on with the GOP grassroots, after a Trump rally last week brought the bizarre movement to mainstream attention.

The pundits are starting to worry that QAnon supporters — who believe in outlandish claims outlined in anonymous internet posts that Trump is engaged in a good-versus-evil struggle against a global pedophile cabal — will be used by Democrats and the media to make all Trump voters look crazy. Already, QAnon supporters are showing up at Trump rallies.

Lee Stranahan, a former Breitbart reporter who now hosts a radio show at Russian-owned Sputnik, said he has struggled to convince QAnon believers that their theory is fake.

“It’s not just dumb, it’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen,” Stranahan told The Daily Beast. “It’s unprecedentedly dumb in the history of American politics.”

So far, though, it’s not clear that the pushback from the various pro-Trump personalities will dissuade anyone. Their tweets attacking QAnon are often besieged with replies from fans who believe in QAnon and are now shocked to see that their political heroes don’t.

Further complicating the effort, the pro-Trump figures now trying to fight QAnon have often embraced equally outlandish conspiracy theories themselves. And everyone involved supports Trump, who built his political career pushing the conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was actually born in Kenya.

The QAnon pushback kicked off in earnest over the weekend, with various prominent Trump supporters attacking the conspiracy theory. Jacob Wohl, a young Trump supporter who has built a following on Twitter, declared that QAnon was “complete and utter nonsense.” Conservative columnist Kurt Schlichter called the theory “vaguely entertaining nonsense.” In a Reddit post, former White House press secretary Sean Spicer shot down a question about whether QAnon was “legit” with a one-word reply: “no.”

Scott Adams, the Dilbert creator who positioned himself as a pro-Trump thought leader, said in a video Sunday that QAnon believers were making all Trump supporters look “like a bunch of idiots.”

“Maybe do it a little quieter, because it’s not helping the brand,” Adams said.

More:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump%E2%80%99s-biggest-media-fans-struggle-to-stop-qanon%E2%80%99s-spread/ar-BBLB7Ju?li=BBnbcA1&srcref=rss