I have to admit, I really found the learn to code meme genius. When the media was telling laid off miners to learn to code, although mining had been their life and they probably didn't have a clue about tech, it just showed how out of touch or blatantly nochalant they where towards the situation. So to see their own words of wisdom spat back at them was poetic, not only that but the salt that flowed too.
My own interest in this, was basically through having operation mockingbird on my mind. That moment in time when the CIA admitted Operation Mockingbird was a large-scale program of the United States CIA that began in the early 1950s and attempted to manipulate news media for propaganda purposes. It funded student and cultural organizations and magazines as front organizations. Why did it make me think of this? Because the government was in an almost month long shut down, was funds drying out the cause of the lay offs?
It turns out that there was a bill passed in may 10th 2016, H. R. 5181. Also known as the “Countering Foreign Propaganda and Disinformation Act of 2016”. This was at the arse end of the obama era and he must have seen the writing on the wall. Like most bills it's vague and seems in the best interests, but can be twisted anyway you want. The premise of it is that $20 million was allocated to combat foreign propaganda, for research purposes and also to fund media, students and zines, and it had a focus on foreign students who may be well versed in their countries propaganda. That funding was to run from 2017 through to 2018, ending in December.
To me it seems obvious now that there are simultaneous lay offs at vice, huffpo, buzzfeed etc, was due to the december cut off for funding, and then they try to coast along a little while without this cash and see what happens, then one month after the funding dries up the inevitable happens and they realise the only thing keeping them afloat was the funding. Buzzfeed was criticised for laying off a lot of diverse and lgbt workers, exactly the type that this project was probably aimed at funding, and probably creating the articles with the least traffic.
Also on another note, I noticed that Gawker has been picked up by some allegedly misogynistic frat boy, who reportedly said on being told about a non binary candidate "is it a woman?". Several writers who had already been hired have been reported as leaving before the new incarnation even reopened. Could this be the return to a more conservative or right leaning period in alt media?
Anyway, I digress, I was just dropping some info and was curious as to if it would be possible to get an FOI on successful applicants, or any applicants that tried to tap into this wonderful $20 million windfall of tax payers money that this bill probably doled out to leftist radicals to churn out propaganda. It is also interesting to note that although the funding ended at the end of 2018, the steering comittee selected was set up to run for 10 years from the bill until 2026. They must have intended to fund this further had it not been for a Trump victory.
