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Who Raises More Money Democrats Or Republicans

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Who Raises More Money Democrats Or Republicans

The Fundraising Arm Of The Us Democratic Party Raised More Money In July Than Its Republican Counterpart Helped By Big Contributions From Billionaire Donors Including Investor George Soros And Former Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt Disclosures Filed On Friday With The Federal Election Commission Showed The Democratic National Committee Raised About $131 Million Last Month Above The $129 Million Raised By The Republican National Committee

Reuters

The fundraising arm of the U.S.Democratic Party raised more money in July than its Republican counterpart, helped by big contributions from billionaire donors including investor George Soros and former Chief Executive Eric Schmidt.

Disclosures filed on Friday with the Federal Election Commission showed the Democratic National Committee raised about $13.1 million last month, above the $12.9 million raised by the Republican National Committee. The RNC still had more money in the bank at the close of the month – $79 million compared to nearly $68 million held by the DNC – although Democrats narrowed the gap.

Raising more money does not necessarily translate into Election Day victory, but a big bank account helps U.S. parties support their candidates’ campaigns and pays for ads and polling. Democrats have narrow majorities in the U.S.Senate and the House of Representatives, and losing control of either in the November 2022 contests would be a blow to Democratic President Joe Biden’s agenda.

While the DNC has raised slightly more than the RNC this year, Republicans have been spending money more aggressively. It also spent more in July, shelling out $1 million to JDB Marketing Inc, a Mount Pleasant, South Carolina firm that specializes in direct mail fundraising.

Some of the DNC’s largest outlays during the month were also to support fundraising efforts, including more than $1.1 million to RWT Production, a direct mail firm from Annandale, Virginia.

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Democrats Raised Twice The Money Republicans Did In Five 2020 Races That Could Determine Control Of The Senate

U.S.Senate2020 ElectionDemocratic PartyRepublican Party

Democratic challengers raised nearly twice the amount Republicans did in first-quarter fundraising in five must-watch races that could determine who controls the Senate, the latest campaign finance figures showed.

Republican incumbents facing tough re-elections races in Arizona, Colorado, Kentucky, Maine and North Carolina all raised significantly less cash than their Democratic rivals in the first three months of 2020.

These contests are some of the best opportunities Democrats have to flip the seats and regain the Senate majority in November. They’re rapidly becoming some of the most expensive and contentious matchups in the country. In Kentucky, for example, the multi-million dollar ad war between Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Amy McGrath started 16 months before Election Day.

In some races, such as Maine and North Carolina, Democrats actually doubled the amount of cash brought in by their Republican challengers. In Maine, state representative Sara Gideon raised nearly three times more money than four-term incumbent Susan Collins.

The Senate is now made up of 53 Republicans, 45 Democrats and two independents who caucus with the Democrats. Democrats need to win four seats to regain control of the chamber, or three seats if the vice president is a Democrat. The vice president serves as the “president of the Senate” and can cast tie-breaking votes.

Thirty S&p 500 Ceos Vote For Biden With Their Wallet Though They Dont Contribute As Much As Trumps 15 Do

S&P 500 chief executives have combined to give more money to Trump’s campaign than Biden’s, even as the Democratic challenger has more S&P CEOs as donors.

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As the Nov. 3 election sparks record campaign contributions, the CEOs of S&P 500 companies are helping to fund the war chests of President Donald Trump and challenger Joe Biden, while also contributing to other Republican and Democratic politicians.

In their political giving as individuals, these chief executives have combined to give more to Trump than Biden. Some 15 CEOs whose companies are components of the S&P 500 US:SPX have donated a total of $2.489 million to Trump’s principal campaign committee, its joint fundraising groups with the Republican National Committee or pro-Trump super PACs.

Meanwhile, 30 chief execs have contributed $536,100 to Biden’s main campaign committee, its joint groups with the Democratic National Committee or pro-Biden super PACs. These figures come from a MarketWatch analysis of processed Federal Election Commission data on individual contributions made between January 2019 and August 2020. Anyone who held the CEO job in 2019 or 2020 at a company that was part of the S&P 500 is included.

S&P 500 CEOs giving their own money to Trump’s campaign

* Former CEO who held the position during the FEC’s 2020 election cycle that started Jan. 1, 2019

Total $536,100.00

* Former CEO who held the position during the FEC’s 2020 election cycle that started Jan. 1, 2019

Companies’ responses

Here’s How The Deficit Performed Under Republican And Democratic Presidents From Reagan To Trump

This article was updated Aug. 2 to include a graph with the annual federal deficit in constant dollars.

A viral post portrays Democrats, not Republicans, as the party of fiscal responsibility, with numbers about the deficit under recent presidents to make the case.

Alex Cole, a political news editor at the website Newsitics, . Within a few hours, several Facebook users postedscreenshots of the tweet, which claims that Republican presidents have been more responsible for contributing to the deficit over the past four decades.

Those posts racked up several hundred likes and shares. We also found , where it has been upvoted more than 53,000 times.

“Morons: ‘Democrats cause deficits,’” the original tweet reads.

Reagan took the deficit from 70 billion to 175 billion. Bush 41 took it to 300 billion. Clinton got it to zero. Bush 43 took it from 0 to 1.2 trillion.Obama halved it to 600 billion. Trump’s got it back to a trillion.Morons: “Democrats cause deficits.”

— Alex Cole July 23, 2019

Screenshots of the tweet on Facebook were flagged as part of the company’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed.

At PolitiFact, we’vereportedextensively on how Republicans and Democrats often try to pin the federal deficit on each other — muddying the facts in the process. So we wanted to see if this Facebook post is true.

Some people confuse the federal deficit with the debt — but they’re two separate concepts.

Featured Fact-check

The First Modern Campaign Finance Restrictions Were Soon Followed By A Boom In Pac Spending

FEC, Corrado, Center for Responsive Politics

In the early 1970s, and particularly after the election spending abuses revealed in the Watergate scandal, Congress put new limits on donations to candidates. But the overall amount of money in politics didn’t decline. The money instead started going to PACs, or political action committees, rather than candidates. Thousands of new ones were formed, and they started raising hundreds of millions of dollars each year overall. This shows a problem for would-be campaign finance regulators: If one particular aspect of election spending is regulated or capped, big money will try to find another way in.

Congress Responds More To The Preferences Of The Wealthy Than To Those Of Average People

Gilens and Page, “Testing Theories of American Politics

Who really matters in our democracy — the general public, or wealthy elites? These charts, from a study by political scientists Martin Gilens of Princeton and Benjamin Page of Northwestern, seek to answer that question. The first one — the flat line — shows that as more and more average citizens support action on an issue, they’re not any more likely to get what they want. That’s a shocking finding in a democracy. In contrast, the next chart shows that as more economic elites want a certain policy change, they do become more likely to get what they want. Specifically, if fewer than 20 percent of wealthy Americans supported a policy change, it only happened about 18 percent of the time. But when 80 percent of them were in support, the change ended up happening 45 percent of the time. There’s no similar effect for average Americans.

Big Problems With Small Money Republicans Catch Up To Democrats In Online Giving

Alex Seitz-Wald

WASHINGTON — Republicans are beginning to catch up with Democrats in online fundraising, creating for the first time in modern history a political landscape where both parties are largely funded by small donations — for better or, some say, for worse.

Democrats, who have dominated online fundraising since the early days of the internet, have claimed that the billions they raise in small donations are evidence that they are the party of the people, less reliant on wealthy donors and business interests than the GOP.

Republicans have spent years playing catch-up, mostly unsuccessfully. But now, just in time for the 2022 midterm elections, they are starting to pull even, thanks in large part to former President Donald Trump and his army of online devotees.

“This is the harvest of the seeds of digital infrastructure Republicans have been planting for years,” said Matt Gorman, a GOP strategist who worked for the party’s congressional campaign arm during the last midterm election. “That’s why you’re seeing things like freshman members of the House raising over $1 million . In 2018, we were begging folks to raise a fifth of that.”

Even out of office, Trump continues to raise massive sums of money, largely online. He announced Saturday that his political groups had collected nearly $82 million in the first half of the year , giving him a war chest of more than $102 million.

Democratic Party Committees Raised More Money Than Republican Committees In 2013

Paul Blumenthal

WASHINGTON — The three major Democratic Party committees raised $16 million more than their Republican Party counterparts in 2013.

The Democratic committees raised $193 million for the year, compared with $177 million for the three Republican committees, according to reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.

The fundraising success for the Democratic committees stems from big numbers posted by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. The DCCC raised $75.8 million, the most of any party committee, while the DSCC pulled in $52.7 million. Both committees topped their Republican counterparts by more than $15 million.

“Our substantial fundraising lead is the result of one major dynamic: Americans are ready to replace this broken Republican Congress with leaders who have the right priorities and who will focus on solving problems,” DCCC Chairman Steve Israel said in a statement.

The Republican National Committee, however, beat the Democratic National Committee in head-to-head fundraising for the year. In 2013, the RNC raised $80.6, almost $16 million more than the $64.7 million pulled in by the DNC.

The money raised by these committees will finance large advertising purchases in battleground House and Senate races, among other things.

Report: Trump Has Raised More Money In California Than Most Democrat Candidates

California is well known as arguably the most liberal state in America, however recent statistics may shock both Democrats and Republicans.

It looks like there may be more Trump supporters in the “deep blue” state of California than most people think.

According to the news site Cal Matters, President Trump comes in third place for the most money raised in California out of all the Democratic candidates. He is just behind Mayor Pete Buttigieg of Indiana and Senator Kamala Harris who resides in California.

Check out what Cal Matters reported:

This may come as surprise to the president, the national media and more than a few Californians, but there are plenty of Trump supporters in the “Resistance State,” too. And since the beginning of the year, they’ve been spending a lot of money to keep the president in the White House.

New campaign finance statistics show that President Donald Trump raised $3.2 million—more money from the California donor class than all of his Democratic challengers, but two.

Not only that, but the Trump campaign collected more from itemized small donors—those who gave in increments of less than $100 at a time—than anyone else in the field. The president bested even Democratic contender Bernie Sanders in the small-donor sweepstakes.

But it’s not all pixie dust for Trump in California: 89% of all itemized presidential campaign donations from Californians went to contenders out to defeat him.

More than $3 million has come since the beginning of this year.

Democratic Senate Hopefuls Are Raising Tons Of Money They’re Also Spending It

Congressional races heat up as Dems try to fl…02:14

Democratic Senate hopeful Jaime Harrison of South Carolina raised $57 million between July and September. Sara Gideon in Maine raised more than $39 million in that same period. And Mark Kelly in Arizona brought in $38.7 million.

These eye-popping numbers shattered the previous record for fundraising, Beto O’Rourke’s $38 million cash haul in the third quarter of 2018.

Now the Democrats are spending that money in the face of massive Republican super PAC funds. And it’s left many Republican candidates with more cash on hand than the Democrats in the final weeks of the race.

In South Carolina, where the Senate race is unexpectedly tight, Harrison’s $57 million in three months was double Republican incumbent Senator Lindsey Graham’s $28 million haul, a state record for a Republican. Records show from July through September, Harrison spent more than $55 million. According to his October FEC filing, Harrison paid AL Media LLC more than $42 million over three months for TV, radio and digital advertising. He also spent another $6.5 million for digital advertising and services to Mothership Strategies, and $2 million to Blueprint Strategy LLC for radio and billboard advertising. $641,000 went to “direct mailing services.” That amounts to more than $51 million spent on ads and direct mail alone.

Who Is Richer Democrats Or Republicans The Answer Probably Wont Surprise You

Which of the two political parties has more money, Democrats or Republicans? Most would rush to say Republicans due to the party’s ideas towards tax and money. In fact, polls have shown about 60 percent of the American people believe Republicans favor the rich. But how true is that? can help you write about the issue but read our post first.

Presidential Campaign Spending Is Overwhelmingly On Tv Ads In Swing States

Data: Kantar, Analysis: John Sides, Washington Post

Presidential campaign money goes overwhelmingly to purchasing TV ads in just a few swing states. This map shows where ad spending was heaviest in 2012: Florida, Virginia, and Ohio, where more than $150 million was spent. Iowa, North Carolina, Colorado, and Nevada saw more than $50 million each. But most of the country saw nothing at all. Presidential campaigns have become a quadrennial stimulus bill for purple states funded by donors in red and blue states.

Democratic Party Enters 2021 In Power And Flush With Cash For A Change

The Democratic National Committee has a roughly $75 million war chest, raising the party’s hopes of keeping power in 2022 and accelerating a Democratic shift in the Sun Belt states.

After years of flirting with financial disaster, the Democratic Party entered 2021 not only in control of the White House, the House and the Senate but with more money in the bank than ever before at the start of a political cycle.

The Democratic National Committee will report to the Federal Election Commission on Sunday that it ended 2020 with $38.8 million in the bank and $3 million in debts, according to an advance look at its financial filings. In addition, there is roughly $40 million earmarked for the party, left over from its joint operations with the Biden campaign, according to people familiar with the matter. This gives the Democrats a roughly $75 million war chest at the start of President Biden’s tenure.

“This is a number that is unimaginable,” said Howard Dean, a former party chairman.

Party data, resources and infrastructure undergird candidates up and down the ballot, and Democratic officials are already dreaming of early investments in voter registration that may accelerate the political realignment Democrat are hoping to bring about in key Sun Belt states.

“We had to juggle who we were going to pay,” Tom Perez, who until earlier this month was the chairman of the D.N.C., said of the early part of his tenure, which began in 2017.

The Supreme Court Has Struck Down Many Limitations On Election Spending

Over the past four decades, Congressional attempts to regulate the campaign finance system have repeatedly been stymied by the Supreme Court on First Amendment grounds. This table lists the major cases in which the court has ruled campaign finance restrictions unconstitutional — and how closely divided the court has been in every case. The first major such case was Buckley v. Valeo, in 1976, which struck down much of the newly-adopted campaign finance infrastructure in the name of free speech. The next major campaign finance overhaul — the 2002 McCain-Feingold law — survived an initial court challenge in 2003. But after Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was replaced with the more conservative Sam Alito in 2006, the court had a majority that objected to major provisions of the law. Since then, a series of 5-4 decisions have narrowed the scope of permissible campaign finance regulations further and further.

Us Democratic Fundraising Arm Outraises Republican Counterpart In July

Jason Lange

Supporters of Democratic U.S. presidential nominee Joe Biden gather with their cars for a socially distanced election celebration as they await Biden’s remarks and fireworks in Wilmington, Delaware, U.S. November 7, 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

WASHINGTON, Aug 20 – The fundraising arm of the U.S. Democratic Party raised more money in July than its Republican counterpart, helped by big contributions from billionaire donors including investor George Soros and former Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt.

The RNC still had more money in the bank at the close of the month – $79 million compared to nearly $68 million held by the DNC – although Democrats narrowed the gap.

Raising more money does not necessarily translate into Election Day victory, but a big bank account helps U.S. parties support their candidates’ campaigns and pays for ads and polling.

Democrats have narrow majorities in the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives, and losing control of either in the November 2022 contests would be a blow to Democratic President Joe Biden’s agenda.

Soros, a famed investor and a bogeyman of conservatives due to his status as a major donor for liberal causes, gave the DNC at least $250,000 in July.

Who Raised More Money In A Majority Of Tight House Races Democrats Did

Total reported in the most competitive House races

DEMOCRATS RAISED $172MILLION

With the midterm elections just weeks away, Democratic candidates have outraised their Republican opponents in a majority of the 69 most competitive House races, according to fund-raising numbers filed by the candidates on Monday. Some of the biggest earners include two Democratic women: Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey’s 11th District and Amy McGrath in Kentucky’s Sixth District.

Many Democratic candidates raised large sums from small donations online. Democrats are betting on small donor energy to make a difference in tight races.

Facing a host of tough races, Republican Party leaders have begun pulling money away from some struggling incumbents, especially in suburbs where President Trump is unpopular.

How much candidates in the most competitive House races have raised

*Incumbent shown with an asterisk.

DISTRICT

Republicans Winning Money Race As They Seek To Take Over House In 2022

The National Republican Congressional Committee announced Wednesday that it had raised $45.4 million in the second quarter of 2021, the most it has ever raised in three months of a non-election year, as Republicans seek to take over the House in 2022.

House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy This story has been updated with additional developments Wednesday.

The Most Famous Political Figures Can Make Millions In Speaking Fees

CNN

For the top echelon of famous and recognizable political figures, there’s another way to cash in after leaving offices — by giving high-priced speeches to corporate groups. Former politicians and aides from both parties participate in this practice — the more famous they are, the higher the fee they tend to be able to charge. But the undisputed king of speaking fees is Bill Clinton, who charges at least $250,000 per speech — and charged $750,000 for at least one. This chart, based on data assembled by CNN, shows how speaking fees have made Clinton over $100 million since he left office.

How Trumps Team Spent Most Of The $16 Billion It Raised Over 2 Years

Biden and Trump spar in final presidential debate

President Donald Trump‘s reelection team kicked off 2020 with what seemed like an unbeatable cash advantage, boasting a massive fundraising operation, bolstered by the joint efforts of the Republican Party.

Fast-forward 10 months and they’ve burned through a whopping $1.4 billion of the more than $1.6 billion raised over the last two years, struggling to keep up with former Vice President Joe Biden, more than what former President Barack Obama’s reelection campaign and the Democrats had raised and spent by the end of the 2012 cycle.

The revealing figures, released as the two presidential candidates debated on stage Thursday night for the last time before Election Day, came after the campaign blew through $63 million in the first two weeks of October alone — a critical time when it only brought in $44 million. The vast majority of the money spent during that time — nearly $45 million — went to television and online advertising, according to the latest disclosure report filed to the Federal Election Commission, as Biden and pro-Biden efforts ramped up his ad spending.

MORE: Trump campaign trailing behind Biden in funding, weeks before Election Day, new filings show

MORE: Trump commits to familiar playbook to define Biden in tamer final debate: ANALYSIS

So where has the president’s money gone?

MORE: Trump heads into final campaign stretch forced to play defense against Biden

Questions about staff payments

The Massive Difference In How Democrats And Republicans Raise Money

You probably have a preconceived notion of where the political parties raise their money. Republicans get lots of donations from wealthy individuals and corporate interests; Democrats get money from less rich individuals and a somewhat overlapping set of corporate interests. Well, we have news for you: That perception is completely correct.

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At least, that is, for the parties’ Governors Associations. On Tuesday, organizations and candidates that raise money for political campaigns had to file quarterly reports with the Federal Election Commission. The Democratic Governors Association and the Republican Governors Association both reported how much they’d raised between April 1 and June 30. The RGA did much better, about $24 million raised versus under $14 million, although the DGA had more donors, about 1,500 to 400.

When money is given to these groups, which can accept unlimited donations unlike their federal counterparts, the organizations have to document who gave, and how much, and when. Organizations that give just list an address; individuals have to identify their employer. Which lets us see pretty easily how those two groups break down.

And so, we see that the RGA got a much larger percentage of their donations from organizations than did the DGA.

far86 times

Who are these beneficent individuals? The DeVos family, of Amway fame. Las Vegas megadonor Sheldon Adelson. And Kotch? Koch? Someone named “David Koch,” if you’ve heard of him.

Congressional Staffers Can Take Trips Funded By Foreign Governments

Washington Post

After the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal, Congress put several new restrictions on gifts that could be offered to members of Congress or their staffers. Yet there’s one significant loophole that remains — Congressional staffers are allowed to take trips abroad funded by foreign governments.The Washington Post’s TW Farnam reported on paid trips taken by Congressional staffers last year, and the map here is our depiction of Farnam’s findings. Between 2006 and 2011, 226 staffers took trips to China, 121 to Taiwan, and 65 to Saudi Arabia — where those countries’ governments footed the bill.

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morganbelarus · 5 years ago

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Someone Imagines What Everything Would Look Like If It Had A Cats Face And The Result Is Funny Yet Disturbing

Cats… they’re everywhere. You see them following you on the streets. You see them staring back at you from your computer screen. Your significant other texts you their pictures while you’re in lectures or at work. You even see them when you look at other animals and random things. Wait a minute, that last one doesn’t sound quite right.

Well, unless you’ve ever stumbled on the ‘Koty Vezde’ (‘Cats are Everywhere’) internet page on Instagram. If you haven’t (and even if you have), then you’re in for a real treat. We’ve collected the best, the funniest, most amusing photoshopped images of random animals and things with furry feline faces.

So go make yourself a cup of wholesome hot tea and prepare to have your spirits lifted. As you scroll down through what is arguably the highest form of art ever conceived by mankind, upvote your favorites, and leave a comment explaining which hybrid cattos you loved most and why. Be sure to share this post with anyone you think might be having a tough week. We’re sure they’ll thank you.

The ‘Cats are Everywhere’ Instagram account is still fledgling but going fairly strong, having captured the attention of over 2,000 devoted fans.

This might not seem like a lot to some of you, but it’s not all about the follower count: it’s the quality of the content that really matters. With over 187 posts on Instagram, we’re sure that the page will keep bringing us amusing (excuse me, I mean ameowsing) pictures.

According to National Geographic, ancient DNA shows that cats domesticated themselves. Which just goes to show how independent they are even in matters of giving up their freedom.

Apparently, cats lived for thousands of years alongside people before officially becoming domesticated. And during all that time, their genes barely changed from those of wildcats. Of course, apart from one factor — the cute dots and stripes of the tabby.

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Original Article : HERE ;

Someone Imagines What Everything Would Look Like If It Had A Cats Face And The Result Is Funny Yet Disturbing was originally posted by MetNews

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allbestnet · 7 years ago

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Top 1000 Upvoted Books In Reddit History

1 . The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

2 . A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin

3 . The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

4 . A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin

5 . To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

6 . The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

7 . The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

8 . The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

9 . The Road by Cormac McCarthy

10 . 1984 by George Orwell

11 . The Dark Tower by Stephen King

12 . Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

13 . The Stand by Stephen King

14 . Lord of the Flies by William Golding

15 . The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

16 . Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card

17 . American Gods by Neil Gaiman

18 . Dune by Frank Herbert

19 . Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

20 . One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

21 . Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

22 . Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

23 . A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

24 . The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut

25 . The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

26 . Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein

27 . The Old Man And The Sea by Ernest Hemingway

28 . The Stranger by Albert Camus

29 . Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

30 . Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy

31 . The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

32 . Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

33 . Good Omens by Neil Gaiman

34 . Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

35 . Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

36 . The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

37 . A Storm of Swords by George R.R. Martin

38 . A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

39 . East of Eden by John Steinbeck

40 . Foundation by Isaac Asimov

41 . The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown

42 . Ulysses by James Joyce

43 . A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway

44 . The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

45 . A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

46 . The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner

47 . Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

48 . The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien

49 . Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

50 . The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

51 . A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle

52 . The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

53 . Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace

54 . The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher

55 . A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin

56 . The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

57 . The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

58 . The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss

59 . Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

60 . The Shining by Stephen King

61 . The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

62 . The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch

63 . Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

64 . Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig

65 . The Martian by Andy Weir

66 . Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls

67 . John Dies at the End by David Wong

68 . House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

69 . One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey

70 . Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

71 . No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy

72 . The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

73 . Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse

74 . The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett

75 . The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein

76 . The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

77 . Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson

78 . For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway

79 . Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon

80 . The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon

81 . Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

82 . Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

83 . The Gunslinger by Stephen King

84 . The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

85 . Animal Farm by George Orwell

86 . Hyperion by Dan Simmons

87 . A Feast for Crows by George R.R. Martin

88 . Neuromancer by William Gibson

89 . All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque

90 . As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner

91 . Oryx and Crake by Margaret ATWOOD

92 . Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond

93 . On the Road by Jack Kerouac

94 . The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera

95 . Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut

96 . Fifty Shades of Grey by E L James

97 . A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M Miller

98 . The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco

99 . The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe

100 . The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

101 . 23337 by Stephen King

102 . The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

103 . His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman

104 . The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

105 . Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

106 . Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

107 . The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

108 . The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick

109 . The Once and Future King by T. H. White

110 . Salem’s Lot by Stephen King

111 . Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

112 . Children of the Mind by Orson Scott Card

113 . His Dark Materials Trilogy by Philip Pullman

114 . Looking for Alaska by John Green

115 . American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

116 . The Giver by Lois Lowry

117 . Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

118 . A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn

119 . The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett

120 . Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson

121 . Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

122 . The Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks

123 . Anathem by Neal Stephenson

124 . The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

125 . The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

126 . Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami

127 . A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking

128 . A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin

129 . 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami

130 . Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein

131 . Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

132 . A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving

133 . Night by Elie Wiesel

134 . Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

135 . The Art of War by Sun Tzu

136 . How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

137 . The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

138 . All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

139 . A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

140 . Stardust by Neil Gaiman

141 . A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

142 . Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee

143 . Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl

144 . Hamlet by William Shakespeare

145 . The First Law Trilogy by

146 . Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

147 . In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust

148 . If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino

149 . Wool by Hugh Howey

150 . In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

151 . Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo

152 . Old Man’s War by John Scalzi

153 . Moby Dick by Herman Melville

154 . The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

155 . The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien

156 . The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

157 . And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie

158 . The Trial by Franz Kafka

159 . The Forever War by Joe Haldeman

160 . Ishmael by Daniel Quinn

161 . Under the Dome by Stephen King

162 . University by Bentley Little

163 . War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

164 . The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien

165 . The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood

166 . Dubliners by James Joyce

167 . Watchmen by Alan Moore

168 . Misery by Stephen King

169 . A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce

170 . We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

171 . The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

172 . The End of the World by Various

173 . Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

174 . The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

175 . Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

176 . A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

177 . Finnegans Wake by James Joyce

178 . The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King

179 . World War Z by Max Brooks

180 . The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

181 . Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut

182 . The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien

183 . The Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami

184 . A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith

185 . The Call of the Wild by Jack London

186 . Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk

187 . The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

188 . The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson

189 . Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury

190 . The Drawing of the Three by Stephen King

191 . Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton

192 . White Noise by Don DeLillo

193 . The Secret History by Donna Tartt

194 . A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin

195 . Candide by Voltaire

196 . The Player of Games by Iain M. Banks

197 . The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

198 . Redwall by Brian Jacques

199 . Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes

200 . The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

See rest of the list at my medium blog

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mediacommsandorangejuice · 8 years ago

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A variation on the last essay about internet culture and media. I didn’t finish the referencing and I talk about tenplay instead of kickstarter. I don’t remember why I changed it before handing it in, but here’s the other version anyway.

The rapid onset and evolution of the internet has, and continues to, create huge changes to the way media texts are produced, distributed, and understood. The most powerful feature of the internet is its facilitation of polylogical communication – connecting hundreds, thousands of people and allowing them to interact and collaborate creatively in a completely democratic or decentralised environment (ref: lecture). Reddit is an excellent example of how this power has changed the production and consumption of texts, while Tenplay exemplifies the old structure struggling to maintain its status quo while keeping up with the 21st century. Reddit has been described as “The gateway to everything interesting going on in the world” (Grey, 2015). It is a hub of news, discussion, and user generated content about every possible topic. The website has given rise to countless global communities, which have then developed their own dialects of acronyms and images that outsiders would have difficulty understanding. Tenplay offers nothing new, and only the barest minimum of customisation options, it only shows evidence of changing distribution methods.

The internet has wrought huge changes to the way texts are produced, distributed, and understood, and Reddit demonstrates all of these. It embodies every aspect of the definition of Polylogical communication. According to Watson (2015) polylogical communication is democratic or decentralised, universal, and mostly unmediated; allowing overlapping communication of any type (one-one, one-many, many-many, etc.). Reddit is “a beautiful fractal” (Grey, 2015) of ‘subreddits’, forums dedicated to any and all possible subjects, and the popular topics of each are decided by the democratic ‘upvote’ system in which users vote content up or down depending on their preference and its relevance. Anyone can join the website and immediately starting submitting content of their own and discussing others content. Although most subreddits have moderators to ensure content is relevant and respectful, discussions are otherwise unmediated. As well as the many-many communication seen in the threads, Reddit also has a private messaging system allowing one-one communication. Subreddits such ‘I Am A’, in which users reveal an interesting job or hobby of theirs and then field questions about it, or ‘Ask A Scientist’ also offer a modicum of one-many communication. Frequently a discussion in one subreddit will require a link to another, and when a subreddit focusses on a particularly popular topic it will often fracture into several smaller subreddits to avoid clutter.

If Reddit is the epitome of polylogical communication, Tenplay is dialogical. Dialogical communication is mostly from the producer to the user, but with limited feedback from the audience (Watson, 2015). Tenplay offers replays of TV shows shown on the Ten, One, and Eleven freeview channels, as well as having a free membership feature offering further features. Members can create playlists of videos, enter competitions, and vote in polls for reality TV shows. The customisation options, competitions, and social media integration add a limited amount of feedback for users, but the predominant direction of communication remains from the producer to user.

The focus on polylogical communication by Reddit and similar websites has allowed significant changes in the way texts are produced, distributed and understood. The biggest feature of Reddit that allows these changes is the existence of global, interest-based communities. Users of the website are provided with a place to find and talk to others who share their interests, and from these relationships they can create new content, remix existing content, and share anything they create with an audience they know will like it. Perhaps the biggest impact these communities have had though, is on the way content is understood.

Websites like Reddit, and even specific subreddits or groups of subreddits, have given rise to new dialects native to the internet. Text-based communication lacks the audio and visual cues that allow a nuanced understanding of verbal speech. To make up for this, internet users have employed a variety of creative tactics. As most early users, and many current users of these websites have at least a basic understanding of programming, it is unsurprising that syntax and expressions from various programming languages have been coopted to express various emotions. For example, when typing a piece that is intended as sarcastic, users will often add ‘/s’ to signify both the presence and end of sarcasm. Another tactic is to simply write a description of the emotion or emotive action a user wishes to convey. This would be surrounded by some form of parentheticals, for example ‘*screams*’. Alternately users integrate visual representations of their emotions. This can range from ever-evolving emoticons (most recent ones including non-latin characters to convey more complex situations) to reaction images (often unrelated and usually captioned photographs or cartoons). These new ways to communicate all affect the way content is understood, and often also contribute to remix culture, for example turning a still from a TV show into a reaction image.

While Reddit drives changes in the production, distribution, and understanding of content, Tenplay is very much a reaction to them. The website was launched in 2013, 8 years after the YouTube, and 5 years after Netflix launched its online streaming service (Ref) (Ref) (Ref). The distribution of video and TV shows was changing, and traditional media had no choice but to adopt the trends to stay relevant. Users were demanding more control over when and how they consumed media, which forced the creation of these catch-up services. The production of the content continued in the traditional way, and changes in understanding seem to have barely been considered. Although Tenplay offers some customisation and interactive features, the website still follows a dialogical communication method. Conversations are limited to the producer and the user, there is no comment section or forum where fans can talk to each other about the content.

The internet has brought about a lot of changes to the way media texts are produced, distributed, and understood. While both Reddit and Tenplay are evidence of these changes, one is a driver of them while the other is a reaction. Changing trends in distribution forced catch-up streaming services like Tenplay to become a reality, with changes in production and understanding of the texts being held in the status-quo. Meanwhile community based website like Reddit are hubs for remixing and discussion of content. Their polylogical focus allows changes to occur rapidly at all three levels, production, distribution, and understanding of media content.

Bibliography

CPG Grey. 2013. “What is reddit?” YouTube video, posted September 9, 2013. Accessed October 21, 2015. https://youtu.be/tlI022aUWQQ

King, Andrew. 2015. “Remix Culture.” Accessed October 22, 2015. https://blackboard.qut.edu.au/bbcswebdav/pid-6004631-dt-content-rid-5157449_1/courses/KCB101_15se2/KCB101%20-%20Week%2011.pdf

Network Ten. 2015. “Tell me about tenplay!” Accessed October 23, 2015. http://tenplay.com.au/faqs#TellMe

Network Ten. 2015. “My TV.” Accessed October 23, 2015. http://tenplay.com.au/general/my-tv

Reynolds, Megan. 2013. “Tenplay launch helps Ten to strong catchup numbers.” Accessed October 25, 2015. http://mumbrella.com.au/homelands-audience-jumps-consolidated-ratings-catch-tv-184407

Turner, Aiden. 2015. “TENplay cracks Apple TV in TV Everywhere push.” Accessed October 24, 2015. http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/computers/gadgets-on-the-go/tenplay-cracks-apple-tv-in-tv-everywhere-push-20150130-131vha.html

Watson, Anne-Francis. 2015. “Digital Media & Remix Culture.” Accessed October 21, 2015. https://blackboard.qut.edu.au/bbcswebdav/pid-5803896-dt-content-rid-4345549_1/xid-4345549_1

Wikipedia. 2015. “Netflix.” Accessed October 25, 2015. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netflix#Internet_video_streaming

Wikipedia. 2015. “Youtube.” Accessed October 25, 2015. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YouTube

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #sem 1 2015 #media comm texts #kcb101

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totally-addicted-to-twice · 5 years ago

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i don’t wanna sound all ‘omg the old days are so much better’ but i fuckin MISS the days of the internet before everything got consolidated into a few hellsites

like i have nothing inherently AGAINST social media sites, i wouldn’t be active on here if i did, but i just miss traditional internet forums and the sense of community you got with them and i really wish forums weren’t a dying breed

i mean when i was 13-14, i posted on probably 10-15 different forums, albeit all at different levels of activity and now i’m 23 and i browse like three different forums and i’m only genuinely active (as in posting and participating) on two of them

but really in comparison to the current web’s seeming replacement for traditional forums (reddit) i can literally explain why i think traditional forums are so much better than that site

first off and this is one of the big ones for me: the layout of the sites and threads within them. - on reddit, comment threads of a post are arranged starting with ‘best’ and you can choose ‘top’, ‘new’, ‘controversial’, ‘old’, and ‘q&a’. BUT every comment also has its own comment chain itself that could end up being so long you have to open it to a new page to see all the replies and comments in THAT can have comment threads - conversely on forums, posts and replies are ALWAYS in the order they were posted in. you have the op’s initial post and all the replies. any ‘comment chains’ flow in the thread, you don’t suddenly have another thread in the thread of XxxsefirothismyluvxxX and garth_turds having a conversation, all their quotes and replies are part of the original thread. and that’s just so much easier to read

second is the lack of real personalization on reddit - sure, on reddit you might have a flair on your post depending on the subreddit and on new reddit you can have a profile pic and banner on your profile but other than that? literally every comment blends in with each other, there’s nothing that distinguishes your comments from anything else unless you’re the op, a mod, or an admin - on forums, you generally WILL have different levels of personalization. of course WHAT you can do may vary depending on the site, but practically every forum will at least allow you to have an avatar displayed next to your posts which also, imo, helps with communities because hey it’s easier to tell who someone is when they have an avatar that you recognize vs uhh trying to remember their username compared to the probably hundreds+ you’ve seen that day on reddit

third and last the lack of brigading on forums - just in case anyone who reads this doesn’t really use reddit, brigading is when members from one subreddit go into another subreddit and mass downvote threads and comments, post spam stuff, and just generally try to fuck stuff up. it can also be when a single user gets mass downvoted. now this is officially against reddit rules but it’s still a not uncommon thing, especially when it comes to political subs - can’t do this shit on forums because forums generally don’t have an upvote-downvote feature. i do post on one that has a ‘like’ feature but that literally does nothing beyond giving you a notif if someone liked one of your posts and showing who liked that post on the post itself. plus like compare a forum with say a few hundred or a few thousand active accounts vs reddit where a single subreddit ITSELF could have hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of accounts visiting it. much easier to police when you have a smaller community to begin with

#text post #reddit #forums

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codystrum · 6 years ago

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Tweeted

#Quora Update. In the less that two weeks I’ve been on the platform my ten frank, experienced, savvy, and often refd replies have been viewed about 8 thousand times. I find that astounding as my opinions are usually not popular but frank and jaded. #BTS (though often upvoted) pic.twitter.com/KgKu4ga96j

— Charles Emery - DJ Sensei C (@DjSenseic) May 23, 2019

#IFTTT #Twitter

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patriotsnet · 4 years ago

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Who Raises More Money Democrats Or Republicans

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/who-raises-more-money-democrats-or-republicans/

Who Raises More Money Democrats Or Republicans

Reuters

Some of the DNC’s largest outlays during the month were also to support fundraising efforts, including more than $1.1 million to RWT Production, a direct mail firm from Annandale, Virginia.

READ MORE ON:

Democrats Raised Twice The Money Republicans Did In Five 2020 Races That Could Determine Control Of The Senate

U.S.Senate2020 ElectionDemocratic PartyRepublican Party

Thirty S&p 500 Ceos Vote For Biden With Their Wallet Though They Dont Contribute As Much As Trumps 15 Do

S&P 500 chief executives have combined to give more money to Trump’s campaign than Biden’s, even as the Democratic challenger has more S&P CEOs as donors.

+0.47%

S&P 500 CEOs giving their own money to Trump’s campaign

* Former CEO who held the position during the FEC’s 2020 election cycle that started Jan. 1, 2019

Total $536,100.00

* Former CEO who held the position during the FEC’s 2020 election cycle that started Jan. 1, 2019

Companies’ responses

Here’s How The Deficit Performed Under Republican And Democratic Presidents From Reagan To Trump

This article was updated Aug. 2 to include a graph with the annual federal deficit in constant dollars.

A viral post portrays Democrats, not Republicans, as the party of fiscal responsibility, with numbers about the deficit under recent presidents to make the case.

Those posts racked up several hundred likes and shares. We also found , where it has been upvoted more than 53,000 times.

“Morons: ‘Democrats cause deficits,’” the original tweet reads.

— Alex Cole July 23, 2019

Screenshots of the tweet on Facebook were flagged as part of the company’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed.

Some people confuse the federal deficit with the debt — but they’re two separate concepts.

Featured Fact-check

The First Modern Campaign Finance Restrictions Were Soon Followed By A Boom In Pac Spending

FEC, Corrado, Center for Responsive Politics

Congress Responds More To The Preferences Of The Wealthy Than To Those Of Average People

Gilens and Page, “Testing Theories of American Politics

Big Problems With Small Money Republicans Catch Up To Democrats In Online Giving

Alex Seitz-Wald

Democratic Party Committees Raised More Money Than Republican Committees In 2013

Paul Blumenthal

WASHINGTON — The three major Democratic Party committees raised $16 million more than their Republican Party counterparts in 2013.

The Democratic committees raised $193 million for the year, compared with $177 million for the three Republican committees, according to reports filed with the Federal Election Commission.

The money raised by these committees will finance large advertising purchases in battleground House and Senate races, among other things.

Report: Trump Has Raised More Money In California Than Most Democrat Candidates

California is well known as arguably the most liberal state in America, however recent statistics may shock both Democrats and Republicans.

It looks like there may be more Trump supporters in the “deep blue” state of California than most people think.

Check out what Cal Matters reported:

New campaign finance statistics show that President Donald Trump raised $3.2 million—more money from the California donor class than all of his Democratic challengers, but two.

But it’s not all pixie dust for Trump in California: 89% of all itemized presidential campaign donations from Californians went to contenders out to defeat him.

More than $3 million has come since the beginning of this year.

Democratic Senate Hopefuls Are Raising Tons Of Money They’re Also Spending It

Congressional races heat up as Dems try to fl…02:14

These eye-popping numbers shattered the previous record for fundraising, Beto O’Rourke’s $38 million cash haul in the third quarter of 2018.

Who Is Richer Democrats Or Republicans The Answer Probably Wont Surprise You

Presidential Campaign Spending Is Overwhelmingly On Tv Ads In Swing States

Data: Kantar, Analysis: John Sides, Washington Post

Democratic Party Enters 2021 In Power And Flush With Cash For A Change

The Democratic National Committee has a roughly $75 million war chest, raising the party’s hopes of keeping power in 2022 and accelerating a Democratic shift in the Sun Belt states.

“This is a number that is unimaginable,” said Howard Dean, a former party chairman.

“We had to juggle who we were going to pay,” Tom Perez, who until earlier this month was the chairman of the D.N.C., said of the early part of his tenure, which began in 2017.

The Supreme Court Has Struck Down Many Limitations On Election Spending

Us Democratic Fundraising Arm Outraises Republican Counterpart In July

Jason Lange

The RNC still had more money in the bank at the close of the month – $79 million compared to nearly $68 million held by the DNC – although Democrats narrowed the gap.

Raising more money does not necessarily translate into Election Day victory, but a big bank account helps U.S. parties support their candidates’ campaigns and pays for ads and polling.

Soros, a famed investor and a bogeyman of conservatives due to his status as a major donor for liberal causes, gave the DNC at least $250,000 in July.

Who Raised More Money In A Majority Of Tight House Races Democrats Did

Total reported in the most competitive House races

DEMOCRATS RAISED $172MILLION

Many Democratic candidates raised large sums from small donations online. Democrats are betting on small donor energy to make a difference in tight races.

Facing a host of tough races, Republican Party leaders have begun pulling money away from some struggling incumbents, especially in suburbs where President Trump is unpopular.

How much candidates in the most competitive House races have raised

*Incumbent shown with an asterisk.

DISTRICT

Republicans Winning Money Race As They Seek To Take Over House In 2022

House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy This story has been updated with additional developments Wednesday.

The Most Famous Political Figures Can Make Millions In Speaking Fees

CNN

How Trumps Team Spent Most Of The $16 Billion It Raised Over 2 Years

Biden and Trump spar in final presidential debate

MORE: Trump campaign trailing behind Biden in funding, weeks before Election Day, new filings show

MORE: Trump commits to familiar playbook to define Biden in tamer final debate: ANALYSIS

So where has the president’s money gone?

MORE: Trump heads into final campaign stretch forced to play defense against Biden

Questions about staff payments

The Massive Difference In How Democrats And Republicans Raise Money

arrow-right

And so, we see that the RGA got a much larger percentage of their donations from organizations than did the DGA.

far86 times

Who are these beneficent individuals? The DeVos family, of Amway fame. Las Vegas megadonor Sheldon Adelson. And Kotch? Koch? Someone named “David Koch,” if you’ve heard of him.

Congressional Staffers Can Take Trips Funded By Foreign Governments

Washington Post

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nothingman · 6 years ago

Link

BuzzFeed News; Getty Images (3)

The alt-right and white nationalist trolls who frequent Twitter and backwater message boards have found another gathering place online: the commenting platform Disqus.

Used by publications like Rolling Stone and TMZ, Disqus says it gets about 2 billion unique visitors each month. It supports anonymous commenting and allows its users to comment on any Disqus-enabled site — a single Disqus account is a gateway to discussions on thousands of sites. It also hosts its own channels. And lately some of those channels have become rallying points for white nationalists and white supremacists looking to red-pill users in discussions around contentious, already-politicized news events. And while Disqus has a hate speech policy that should prevent or temper this, it doesn't seem to be particularly vigorous about enforcing it. The trolls are free to plot.

Said one Disqus user, "This strategy of taking over the top comments with fact-based comments seems to have been paying off as we've picked up support along the way from people who might have been on the fence... or just completely unawares." Another suggested using fake, sock-puppet Disqus accounts to flood comment sections. “If you had 20 guys with 10 socks each, you could dramatically force the narrative in the correct direction and also distract the mods and regular posters using various methods,” they observed.

For anonymous alt-right trolls like "the Dank One," last August’s Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, was one such indoctrination opportunity — a news event that provided one of the internet’s white identity movements a shortcut to the national stage. Determined to capitalize on it, the Dank One and countless others mobilized on Disqus to spread pro-white, alt-right propaganda to what they hoped was a newly energized audience.

“The White pill [a reference to persuasive pro-white propaganda] is in the comments section of the Breitbart Charlottesville ***Live Wire*** article,” the Dank One wrote to a fellow Disqus user by the name of Anime Nazi Troll 3000 on Aug. 13. Dank’s post was a supposed statement of victory; his bogus, “sock puppet” Disqus accounts had upvoted a handful of pro-white messages, pushing them to the very top of the article’s nearly 70,000-long Disqus comment thread.

“Breitbart readers desperately need pro-White perspective, and many reading the comments are now getting it,” the Dank One wrote. “I’ve been working those comments under various socks for over 2 years, and I can tell you with certainty that getting pro-White material to the top and not having it deleted is an accomplishment.”

Evangelist trolls like the Dank One are hardly an anomaly on Disqus. A trove of screenshots as well as spreadsheets filled with thousands of Disqus comments from sites like Breitbart, Infowars, and National Review Online viewed by BuzzFeed News revealed a vibrant network of pro-white, anti-black/Muslim/LGBT commenters. Beyond this, Disqus itself currently hosts a number of anti-Semitic, pro-white user forums. And despite frequent pleas from critics and activists to police the rampant hate speech on its platform, Disqus hasn’t yet meaningfully addressed the problem: The extremist communities continue to flourish.

“When the worst parts of the internet want to try and be a little more mainstream, they go to Disqus,” E.J. Gibney, an independent researcher who has methodically tracked and collected extremist content on the platform for nearly two years, told BuzzFeed News. “That’s because Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and even Reddit will eventually shut them down. But they have a home on Disqus.”

Disqus is not unaware of this. Its terms of service explicitly forbid targeted harassment, hateful language, and “communities dedicated to fostering harassing behavior.” In a February 2017 blog post on hate speech, Disqus Director of Marketing Mario Paganini wrote, “Language that offends, threatens, or insults groups solely based on race, color, gender, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, or other traits is against our network terms and has no place on the Disqus network. Hate speech is the antithesis of community and an impediment to the type of intellectual discussion that we strive to facilitate.”

And yet the speech Paganini describes flourishes on Disqus. The company continues to host comments on white nationalist and white supremacist publications like Red Ice and Fash the Nation. Disqus is also the comment platform for Christopher “the crying Nazi” Cantwell’s website. His posts, with titles like “Happy Mothers Day! — Now Get Back in the Kitchen” and “How to Get Away With Murder (If You’re Not a Nazi)," are littered with racial and anti-gay comments. Under the “How to Get Away With Murder” post, users have posted promotional flyers from the neo-Nazi terrorist organization Atomwaffen, whose members have reportedly been linked to five murders.

How does Disqus’s professed commitment to eradicating hate speech jibe with the prevalence of hate speech on its platform? The answer is muddy at best. “Disqus will handle reports of service violations, but there are some real world limitations in volume and speed,” Disqus CEO Daniel Ha told BuzzFeed News via email. “Disqus can do a better job in handling these violation reports, and that is what the service strives to do.”

Ha did not say whether the company plans to take action against sites like Cantwell’s that appear to violate Disqus’s rules. Nor did he answer a series of questions regarding specific instances of hate speech on Breitbart or the existence of Disqus communities used to orchestrate coordinated trolling campaigns.

To be fair, Disqus in 2017 did roll out some technical solutions intended to help its paid users police toxic comments. More recently, the company debuted “pre-moderation” tools for threads and extra flagging options, and it partnered with other organizations to share API information to map trolling behavior.

Disqus, which was acquired in December by the marketing tech company Zeta Global for a reported $90 million, is not legally responsible for policing hate, whether it be on its own site or those of other publishers. Like Facebook, Google, and Twitter — who all have substantial hate speech problems of their own — it is protected under the "Safe Harbor" provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which absolves platforms of liability for the activities of their users.

Ha alluded to this in an email to BuzzFeed News, noting, “Disqus doesn’t actively moderate content, but rather the service helps publishers handle unsavory things.” Similarly, many sites with polarizing commenting communities opt not to take responsibility for their users’ comments. In its terms of use, Breitbart notes that it “does not control or endorse” any information users post on its site. “Therefore, Breitbart specifically disclaims any responsibility,” it reads.

“There’s hate speech and imagery and incitements of violence and nobody is taking responsibility for any of it,” Gibney told BuzzFeed News. “It’s like a human shrug emoji — everyone's hands in the air. And so it continues.”

But Disqus does not claim to be a neutral platform; the company has taken a strong public stand against hate speech, going so far as to amend its terms of service in April 2017 to enforce full platform removals “if a publication is dedicated to toxic or hateful discourse.” And Disqus has, on occasion, enforced these rules, removing the alt-right sites Occidental Dissent, Return of Kings, and (newly reborn) altright.com.

Disqus’s desire to remain neutral while also taking a hardline stance on speech has resulted largely in inaction. “Since we first contacted Disqus, their CEO Daniel Ha has gone from ‘let’s work on it together’ to ‘we’re building toxicity tools’ to ‘we believe in freedom of speech’ to dead silence,” a representative from Sleeping Giants told BuzzFeed News of its contact with the company. “These are the rules that they, themselves, wrote. It’s crazy that they won’t enforce them.”

“These are the rules that they, themselves, wrote. It’s crazy that they won’t enforce them.”

In March, Gibney contacted Disqus to inquire about its hosting of comments for the Daily Westerner, a racist news site that publishes articles with tags like “nigger,” “spic,” and “Jew.” On March 23, according to an email viewed by BuzzFeed News, in response to his inquiry, Disqus’s head of business operations Kim Rohrer told Gibney the company would soon be “starting the process of removing Daily Westerner from the Disqus platform.” On May 9 Disqus was still hosting comments for the Daily Westerner. The site appears to have shut down of its own accord around May 17.

To illustrate the severity of the problem, Gibney began tracking comments on Breitbart stories that he alleges violate Disqus’s prohibitions against hate speech and targeted harassment. Since he started in March 2017, he’s amassed thousands of examples. On one November 2017 article titled “LaVar Ball Does Not Credit Trump for Son’s Release After China Arrest,” he collected 623 anti-black comments. The list, viewed by BuzzFeed News, includes racial slurs, references toward restoring slavery, and incitements to violence like “Grab a rope a find a tree. Fukc [sic] these people.”

A sampling of the 623 anti-black comments on one November 2017 Breitbart article.

Gibney also found more than 200 anti-Muslim comments across Breitbart articles. Similarly, he collected 298 anti-immigrant comments on one April 2018 Breitbart story about the Mexican border. Separately, in one week in January 2018, Gibney used Disqus’s tools to alert Breitbart to 100 explicitly racist comments (a full list of those 100 comments can be found here). After a seven-day waiting period, just 26 were removed. Among those that remained: “Burn that banner! Faggots, transgenders, are all freaks and they should all be shot dead.”

After being contacted by BuzzFeed News, Breitbart removed the other racist comments Gibney had flagged. It provided the following statement through a spokesperson:

The Buzzfeed article is an example of politically motivated “gotcha journalism” at its very worst. Of the comments you found, over half show obvious efforts to evade our word filter that eliminates such comments before publication. Most of the rest use expressions that have multiple meanings and cannot be automatically filtered. The premise of your article is fatally flawed Breitbart News receives approximately 4 million comments on its articles each month, which equals roughly 48 million a year. Breitbart uses the Disqus publishing and moderation platform. In addition to a continuously updated word filter, all are subject to a user flagging system. Comments that receive a very low number of flags from audience members are automatically withdrawn from visibility, pending moderator review. Even one flag triggers a manual review, but with thousands of such flags a day, occasionally, a comment that does not satisfy our terms and conditions is not eliminated. And by occasionally, we point out that your 100 comments represents less than 3 comments for every 100,000 placed on the site each month.

Even beyond our real and determined efforts to eliminate the types of comments referenced in this article, many commenters have been banned but then reappear using different screen names. It is very disappointing that Buzzfeed would publish such an obvious and lowbrow attempt to interfere with Breitbart News and our audience of more than 20 million monthly.

Given the comments we see on Buzzfeed articles,* we know you agree that it is impossible to eliminate all objectionable speech from commenting systems. But, we will continue to refine our systems and safeguards, and our efforts to minimize it.

Beyond Breitbart comments, Disqus appears to be providing an important network to members of the alt-right and prominent far-right personalities who’ve been banned on other social platforms. BuzzFeed News viewed what appear to be still-active Disqus accounts for a number of users of the racist /r/CoonTown subreddit that was banned in the summer of 2015. Also present: what appear to be profiles for Daily Stormer founder Andrew Anglin; Charlottesville rally organizer Eli Mosley; and hacker, troll, and Daily Stormer webmaster Andrew “Weev” Auernheimer. Gibney also identified hundreds of Disqus profiles that contain hateful imagery — like swastikas and Klan images — or racial slurs in their names or avatars.

Via Disqus

A screenshot of the Mickey's Clubhouse Disqus channel.

A number of pro-white and alt-right users have created their own bloglike communities inside Disqus’s platform in order to share stories, comment, and coordinate influence trolling campaigns (which the trolls dub “raids”). One channel called Mickey’s Clubhouse — whose popular topics include Jews, Holohoax, Censorship, White Genocide, and Jew World Order — appears to be home to a number of users coordinating the infiltration of comment sections on Breitbart and other conservative publications. The goal, as evidenced by their comments, is to flood conservative-leaning publishers with pro-white and anti-Semitic content in order to win hearts and minds and indoctrinate others to their politics.

“I've got a good VPN service and some sock accounts ready to go over there,” one Mickey’s Clubhouse member wrote. “Going to hide the power levels until the time is right ;-) There is a troll storm on the horizon, and we've got people preparing accounts, but it is going to take patience and preparation.”

Dating back to August 2016, Disqus channel threads viewed by BuzzFeed News allude to a number of troll raids on sites like Breitbart and National Review Online (which abandoned Disqus as a commenting platform in August 2016, in part due to trolls). A user named FL Cracker alluded to conducting similar raids and red-pill influence campaigns on Infowars’ website, which also uses Disqus for commenting. “The main reason I have so many sock puppets is Breitbart,” another Disqus user, with the handle KEK, wrote in Mickey’s Clubhouse in October 2017, adding they “could also use one sock to ‘bait’ another into a short conversation.”

Rather than operate in their own walled-off communities, the screenshots show that the trolls actively use Disqus as a means to pepper vulnerable targets relentlessly with their messages in the hope of wearing them down and converting them.

“We should ideally be aiming to have maximum impact by targeting high impact sites such as Breitbart, where we have a better chance of reaching normies,” a Mickey’s Clubhouse user wrote in 2017. “Take the fight to the enemy, rather than sticking to smaller disqus channels or friendly sites."

And, according to the trolls, it’s working.

Members of Mickey’s Clubhouse brag that Disqus “raids” on Breitbart and other websites are crucial to indoctrinating new white nationalists. The user, whose display name is “Daisy,” describes the raids as “outreach,” noting that they help to “push the Overton window in the right direction. … I do honestly believe ‘outreach’ has an effect. I think people even read the comments more than they'll read the articles!” they wrote. In screenshots viewed by BuzzFeed News, Mickey’s Clubhouse users frequently mentioned a now-quiet Disqus channel called “Shock N’ Awe" that, according to one user, “is dedicated to pushing our narrative over on Breitbart.” In mid-2017 when it was still active, the channel had over 450 Disqus users.

And there’s no sign they’re planning to let up, especially with the midterm elections approaching.

"There's a lot of people on Twitter and Gab who are interested in claiming the Breitbart comments as we approach the 2018 congressional election season, especially since Breitbart came out against our boy [a fringe Wisconsin congressional candidate with links to the alt-right] Paul Nehlen," the Dank One wrote on Mickey’s Clubhouse this past February.

“It does seem as though more and more people are waking up,” Daisy wrote in a separate thread. “I remember when we first started out on BB over a year ago it was such an uphill battle to begin with, and now it seems as though the [Jewish question] gets raised more and more … the efforts we have all been putting in have been paying off and this will only grow. Perseverance is key.” ●

* BuzzFeed uses Facebook comments, which don't allow people to use pseudonymous account names.

To stay up on more stories like this, subscribe to Infowarzel, a newsletter by the author of this piece, Charlie Warzel.

Charlie Warzel is a senior writer for BuzzFeed News and is based in New York. Warzel reports on and writes about the intersection of tech and culture.

Contact Charlie Warzel at [email protected].

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