Update: After this article was published, Bluesky restored Kabas’ post and told 404 Media the following: “This was a case of our moderators applying the policy for non-consensual AI content strictly. After re-evaluating the newsworthy context, the moderation team is reinstating those posts.”
Bluesky deleted a viral, AI-generated protest video in which Donald Trump is sucking on Elon Musk’s toes because its moderators said it was “non-consensual explicit material.” The video was broadcast on televisions inside the office Housing and Urban Development earlier this week, and quickly went viral on Bluesky and Twitter.
Independent journalist Marisa Kabas obtained a video from a government employee and posted it on Bluesky, where it went viral. Tuesday night, Bluesky moderators deleted the video because they said it was “non-consensual explicit material.”
Other Bluesky users said that versions of the video they uploaded were also deleted, though it is still possible to find the video on the platform.
Technically speaking, the AI video of Trump sucking Musk’s toes, which had the words “LONG LIVE THE REAL KING” shown on top of it, is a nonconsensual AI-generated video, because Trump and Musk did not agree to it. But social media platform content moderation policies have always had carve outs that allow for the criticism of powerful people, especially the world’s richest man and the literal president of the United States.
For example, we once obtained Facebook’s internal rules about sexual content for content moderators, which included broad carveouts to allow for sexual content that criticized public figures and politicians. The First Amendment, which does not apply to social media companies but is relevant considering that Bluesky told Kabas she could not use the platform to “break the law,” has essentially unlimited protection for criticizing public figures in the way this video is doing.
Content moderation has been one of Bluesky’s growing pains over the last few months. The platform has millions of users but only a few dozen employees, meaning that perfect content moderation is impossible, and a lot of it necessarily needs to be automated. This is going to lead to mistakes. But the video Kabas posted was one of the most popular posts on the platform earlier this week and resulted in a national conversation about the protest. Deleting it—whether accidentally or because its moderation rules are so strict as to not allow for this type of reporting on a protest against the President of the United States—is a problem.
Bluesky will become just the same az elonx…
Ah, the rewards of moderation: the best move is not to play. Fuck it is & has always been a better answer. Anarchy of the early internet was better than letting some paternalistic authority decide the right images & words to allow us to see, and decentralization isn’t a bad idea.
Yet the forward-thinking people of today know better and insist that with their brave, new moderation they’ll paternalize better without stopping to acknowledge how horribly broken, arbitrary, & fallible that entire approach is. Instead of learning what we already knew, social media keeps repeating the same dumb mistakes, and people clamor to the newest iteration of it.
I miss the early days of the internet when it was still a wild west.
Something like I hate you myg0t 2 or Pico’s School would have gotten the creators cancelled if released in 2025.
You do remember snuff and goatse and csam of the early internet, I hope.
Even with that of course it was better, because that stuff still floats around, and small groups of enjoyers easily find ways to share it over mainstream platforms.
I’m not even talking about big groups of enjoyers, ISIS (rebranded sometimes), Turkey, Azerbaijan, Israel, Myanma’s regime, cartels and everyone share what they want of snuff genre, and it holds long enough.
In text communication their points of view are also less likely to be banned or suppressed than mine.
So yes.
Yet the forward-thinking people of today know better and insist that with their brave, new moderation they’ll paternalize better
They don’t think so, just use the opportunity to do this stuff in area where immunity against it is not yet established.
There are very few stupid people in positions of power, competition is a bitch.
You need some kind of moderation for user generated content, even if it’s only to comply with takedowns related to law (and I’m not talking about DMCA).
Fuck it is & has always been a better answer
Sure. Unless you live in a place that have laws and laws enforcement. In that case, it’s “fuck it and get burnt down”.
I had to hack an ex’s account once to get the revenge porn they posted of me taken down.
There’s a balance at the end of the day.
Illegal content has always been unprotected & subject to removal by the law. Moderation policies wouldn’t necessarily remove porn presumed to be legal, either, so moderation is still a crapshoot.
Still, that sucks.
Bluesky had better take care that they not act like other cowardly tech media
If they don’t it is only because they are waiting to obtain a higher share of the social media market.
Jumping ship from one corporate owned social media to another corporate owned social media isn’t a smart move. There is nothing about Bluesky that will prevent it from becoming X in the future. People joining now are only adding to the network effect that will make leaving more difficult in a decade or two.
The problem of social media won’t be solved by choosing which dictator’s rule you want to live under. You don’t have the freedom to speak and express yourself if you give someone veto power over what you write.
Bluesky is BS
WTF bluesky.
More trash
Put it on Facebook! Ol’ Zuck decided all the guardrails pretty much needed to go so. Post and do whatever. Plus, the people who should see it most are those still hanging around on Facebook 🤣
I don’t want to watch this video please
I guess I get it. They would not like to set precedent to allow non-consensual AI generated porn on the platform. Seems reasonable. That said, fuck Donny. The video is hilarious. It’s fine if Bluesky doesn’t host it though.
Holy shit. A reasonable take from someone who clearly leaves the house.
Well, looks like they put it back up. I think I agree with you though. It might be better for them to restrict this. Frankly republican incels excel at generating this kind of content and this sets the precedent that Bluesky will welcome such AI garbage. I’m not arguing that this stuff shouldn’t be made in good spirit, but for a serious platform to not moderate it out I think invites chaos.
There’s plenty of legal precedent for newsworthiness to supersede some rules in the name of the freedom of the Press. It makes sense that I’m not allowed (at least where I live) to post a non-consensual pictures of someone off the street. But it would not make sense if I was forbidden from posting a picture of the Prime Minister visiting a school for example. That’s newsworthy and therefore the public interest outweighs his right to privacy.
The AI video of Trump/Musk made a bunch of headlines because it was hacked onto a government building. On top of that it’s satire of public figures and – I can’t believe that needs saying – is clearly not meant to provide sexual gratification.
Corpos and bureaucracies would have you believe nuance doesn’t belong in moderation decisions, but that’s a fallacy and an flimsy shield to hide behind to justify making absolutely terrible braindead decisions at best, and political instrumentation of rules at worst. We should celebrate any time when moderators are given latitude to not stick to dumb rules (as long as this latitude is not being used for evil), and shame any company that censors legitimate satire of the elites based on bullshit rules meant to protect the little people.
That’s a really thin line. I have a hard time imagining anyone sticking to this same argument if the satire were directed towards someone they admired in a similar position of power. The prime minister visiting a school is a world away from AI generated content of something that never actually happened. Leaving nuance out of these policies isn’t some corporation pulling wool over our eyes, it’s just really hard to do nuance at scale without bias and commotion.
Exactly.
Content featuring public figures should be given extra lenience, because if we can’t openly criticize our leaders, we aren’t free. So as long as it’s either factually correct or clearly parody/satire/etc, it should be allowed. Defamation and libel rules should have a very high bar for conviction when it comes to public figures.
This was obviously satire, and well done at that. Good on BlueSky for restoring it, I hope they fix whatever process got it pulled.
Only because I find these specific videos to be quite funny, maybe there can be a “satire/criticism of a public figure” exception that could exist
I’ll just explain why that is a horrible idea with three simple letters:
A. O. C.
Fuck. Good point. Guess I’ll just have to come to peace with me being a hypocrite when it comes to what I find acceptable.
Satire is already legal and right wingers have already called for her to be shot or worse and gotten away with it. Pandora’s box isn’t closed, it’s long been open.
I don’t like AOC, but any threat of of call for violence is unacceptable regardless of the target. I don’t care if it’s despicable people like Trump, violence against an individual isn’t the answer. Violence against ideas, however, is fine.
There are politicians that I kind of like, and they should also not be above reproach. Bring all their bad takes into the light and let’s talk about them.
There’s already multiple LoRA of her on civitai.
That’s a pretty big loophole. I mean, imagine the same exact video with Kamala Harris and Nancy Pelosi. It takes a significantly different subtext when the subjects are women. But the subtext doesn’t really matter to the morality of the act.
Either involuntary AI generated pornography is wrong or it isn’t. I think it’s wrong. Do Trump and Musk deserve it? Sure, but it’s still wrong. Do I feel bad for them? No, because they deserve it. But it’s still not something I would do, or suggest anyone else do, and if the creator is prosecuted, I’m not going to defend them.
It’s satire, and yeah, I think satire of Harris skipping the primary process through “backroom deals” could be criticized with a similar video.
As long as there’s a point to the video, it’s speech. Make it clear that it’s AI gen satire and I think it’s fine, just don’t make more explicit than necessary to get the point across.
Except you know that sexual exploitation has a different effect on women than men. Trump revels in his playboy reputation. Harris was accused of using sex to get ahead in politics. And you know that conservatives would believe that the video was real while they jerk off to it. Those dipshits still think Michelle Obama was a man.
Trump rapes women. He’s not entitled to the same level of respect as almost anyone. He is entitled to the same laws, on that we agree.
And you know that conservatives would believe that the video was real while they jerk off to it
It doesn’t matter what they believe, what matters is that it’s explicitly parody or satire. Idiots will be idiots despite your best efforts to prevent it.
Either involuntary AI generated pornography is wrong or it isn’t.
Agree. Laws have to be applied evenly, or else they are not Laws.
Good thing you put a permissive license on that so the whole of humanity can benefit.
These uh… aren’t laws. They’re community guidelines. I think one does not have to get so anal about preserving the rights of vulnerable people while also maintaining an “even application” because they’re two different situations.
Not even the law is black and white, it’s still tweaked and interpreted by judges and lawyers. It’s obvious that AI-generated pornography of women in political office is completely different from a video of a fascist dictator making out with the feet of another fascist. Get your head checked.
It’s not porn tho…not even a little bit.
It is if you are into feet, lmao
So if I’m into words, are libraries considered porn?
Your analogy doesn’t hold. Words aren’t human body parts.
Is this considered porn? I am certainly, along with at least hundreds of millions of people, into shirtless Ryan Gosling. Specifically his pecs and abs.
Look, I am taking the piss, but not everything that might turn someone on for one reason or another is porn. The AI video of Trump is clearly satire and meant to disgust. What’s next, we can’t make satirical drawings of him grovelling at Putin’s feet because some people have a humiliation fetish?
I’ll admit defeat when I’m defeated.
At least you haven’t been defeeted.
Tarantino nods in agreement
Are we about to delve into the legal status of squat cobbler
fwiw they restored the post and blamed it on a moderator being too strict in applying a policy regarding non consensual ai porn. It’s objectively good they have policies banning such things but it was completely obvious from context that this was not meant to be pornographic at all
As such, one could easily read it with cynicism as responding to backlash as they only reviewed said moderators actions after this article came out and the associated clamor
Poor moderator probably had a foot fetish
Or more likely a Trump fetish.
Simple solution to all this crap:
MASTODON.
I do not understand why people use BlueSky We already had the alternative!!! It was here first and many had already created accounts… Then just went back to Twitter
because there is zero marketing for mastodon. zero sex-appeal to mastodon.
bluesky was a better car salesman selling the same old car twitter had.
It was far faster and easier to build up a feed of enjoyable content on BlueSky. My Mastodon feed has sat almost completely empty, and I’ve only been able to find a few news-reposters there.
And I’m tech-savvy. Imagine how it is for other social media users.
Love mastodon but Bluesky has a lot of cool features like starter packs and lists and feeds + the ability to do your own moderation. It’s really customizable that way + there a lot of users… In the end people will go where people are. Besides, mastodon is cool because its still underground and is filled with nerds like the early internet. Do we really want all the normies to join?
- Bluesky is more easily usable
- More people they want to follow are on Bluesky
Instead of complaining we need to work on making Masto more welcoming to new users and amplifying the advantages it has over Bluesky
Honestly, that ship has sailed, I think. When Musk first took over Twitter and everyone was bailing, if Mastodon was a viable alternative it could have taken off.
Now that Bluesky has overtaken them, and is seen as the alternative to Twitter, I think the opportunity has been lost.
That’s quite a good point. Here’s a little thought experiment, though: If we woke up tomorrow and Mastodon looked just like Bluesky (but with a different color scheme) and featured 100% two-way integration with Bluesky…
Essentially, if Mastodon became hands down the most user-friendly and engaging option—would that be enough to make a meaningful difference in its adoption curve?
Possibly, although anyone who already has an account on Bluesky would likely stay there, and Bluesky has the upper hand in name recognition, and there is the uphill battle of explaining the concept of federation to people who have little interest in technology.
And that’s if, hypothetically speaking, Mastodon was as easy to use.
It’s not happening. Also, if it’s anything like here, the non stop Linuxposting would probably annoy people.
Same discussion in every single post on either Mastodon or Bluesky.
Re-upload it 100 times over…fuck em
Throw it on peertube/other platforms. haha
First part yes, upload it anywhere and everywhere. Second part no, they’re not required to leave it up and accept any legal liability, so just keep putting up new copies expecting they’ll get removed.
Hopefully this amplifies the videos exposure. Is it because it is considered explicit that it’s not tolerated like other forms of parody?
yeah it’s basically deepfake porn.
Yeah. I think it was hilarious to “hack” government displays to show this in protest.
I am REALLY uncomfortable with sharing it on a wider basis. Because, at the risk of sounding like DNC leadership, it is opening a huge can of worms. Imagine if instead this was musk posting a deepfake of him and AOC similar to how he offered to rape taylor swift a while back?
If it’s actual satire, it should be allowed, but to be satire, it needs to criticize something instead of just being offensive. Satire is free speech, the latter is defamation or libel (not a lawyer, so not sure which it is).
oh it WILL happen on both sides. it’s just going to be part of our lives now, and social media is fully justified in removing it from their platforms.
It’s probably not AI, and could be considered revenge porn.
Explicit? Hardly. Just two good pals suckin’ toe.
just a lil evolution of the brojob
That’s because Aaron Rodericks is Jesse Singal loving garbage.
I’d expect a little more enthusiasm from our Commander in Chief…
He’s old and tired.
