Thread by @iowahawkblog

Daily Beast editorial meeting

Together we can wipe out the scourge of insolent forklift drivers, plumbers, and rodeo clowns

My 1A stance; to wit, FB/Twitter/YT etc have every right to host or ban whomever they want, for whatever reason. I also hold that the 1A protects not just "journalists," whatever tf that word means, but everybody, including people I don't like. /1

https://twitter.com/akhanukov/status/1135520284453351426

So this rando made (fact in dispute I guess) a slowed down video of Pelosi, not that different from any TV campaign attack ad, shared by some FB Trumpalos. Most anyone with a functioning cortex saw it as a semi-funny satire. Funny or not, completely legal. /2

Lest I forget, I also understand that OMG the rando supposedly made like $1000 from the deceptively edited video, equivalent to what Sean Hannity or Rachel Maddow make for 18 seconds of their babbling. Once again, completely legal. /3

*fact check: Maddow's salary is $7mm, Hannity's is $15mm, so at 200 shows/year, that's $35k or $75k per hour show, or $1000 every 102 seconds (Maddow) or 48 seconds (Hannity). God forbid I be accused of promoting Russian dezinformatsiya. /4

anyhoo, prompted by the aforementioned rando's shocking FB insolence, and a thirst for a 2020 Pulitzer Prize, the Daily Beast decided this was a job for... SuperInvestigator! TO THE JOURNALISMOBILE! /5

I should add that the Daily Beast's crusade to uncover the secret identity of the dastardly video-slowing supervillain Captain Rando is also completely legal. /6

I should also also add that the intrepid superhero reporter assigned by the Daily Beast to get to the bottom of this Watergate-level scoop spent 5 years in prison and was banned from the internet for felony fraud. /7

And I will also also also add that if the Daily Beast wants to hire their Woodwards and Bernsteins from the exit gate of the local minimum security white collar crime prison, that's their business and completely legal. /8

Anyway, thanks to helpful concerned citizens working at FB with the patriotic courage to ignore FB's terms of service agreement, we learn that Captain Rando is none other than... Forklift Guy On Probation! Huzzah! The Republic is saved!
/9

So far, nobody in this stupid story has done anything illegal, insofar as the story is concerned. This isn't about stupid people doing criminal shit, it's about criminal people doing stupid shit. /10

The most astonishing thing to me is the media thought process at work here. If a media outlet is anti-Trump (which in our current mass stupidity I guess I need to underscore is completely legal), wtf did they actually think they would accomplish here? /11

I suppose if you had the foresight of a gnat, maybe you think that Operation Get The Rando will scare future icky randos from promulgating videos and memes you don't like. /12

Or maybe -just maybe- you will end up bringing more attention to them then they already had, turn the Randos into sympathetic folk heroes, make yourselves look like clueless vindictive dopes, and solidify Trump's canard about the media as "enemies of the people." /13

me: this is exactly the kind of stupid shit that will end up helping Trump
you: why are for Trump hurrr durrr /14

https://twitter.com/BillyJingo/status/1135546064147271681

PS: you lose. /15

I won't belabor this thread further, because as a longtime internet rando myself I seriously doubt anyone in the Professional Journalisming biz will take heed of anything from it. Just to be safe, I'm off to make sure my juvenile records are still sealed. /16