# The Elders of the Internet apologize for social media, offer the Trump Filter



## David Baxter PhD (Jul 17, 2018)

*‘Elders of the Internet’ apologise for social media, recommend Trump filters to fix it*
by Simon Sharwood, _The Register_
July 17, 2018

A new Internet Engineering Task Force draft proposes to apologise for social media.

Issued on Monday July 16th, the draft  titled “Social Media (An Apology)” is signed by “The Elders of the  Internet” and opens by noting “Recently, you may have noticed a dramatic  increase in the amount of opprobrium, outrage, hate speech and overall  bile on your favorite social media channel.”

“The Elders of the Internet apologize unreservedly for this disruption.”

The group say they’ve recently been focusing on  security standards and therefore “were caught unawares when the Internet  became the sink for every poorly-considered argument, paranoid thought  when you wake up in the dead of night, and shrieking nutjob you'd  usually cross the street to avoid.” They blame social media for  amplifying arguments, reducing productivity and even making it hard to  breathe.

And then they apologise for their lack of foresight  and not having done something to stop the current state of affairs, as  follows:

In retrospect, we should have known; USENET was a pretty clear warning. We will do better.

Happily, the draft proposes a fix. The Elders suggest  that adopting a meme-only diet could be useful, as memes are “a  time-proven way to express disdain, mocking and other sentiments while  maintaining an air of light humor. They can therefore be helpful in a  transition away from full-throated, deeply-felt outrage.”

“In other words, they’re the methadone of the internet.”

There’s also a call for net-users to adopt blocklists to avoid “undesirable content, and responsible social networks.”

“Recommending a specific blocklist is out of scope  for this document, but we suggest starting with "Trump" and working  outwards from there” the draft states.

The draft is, of course, all in good fun. “Elders of the Internet” was a term used by _The IT Crowd_ in the episode that famously packed the internet into a box (and claimed “The Hawk” – aka Stephen Hawking” as a member).



The Elders are clearly aware of that gag as the draft says a fond farewell to Hawking.

The Elders have, however, outed themselves as  reachable at either “the usual IPv6 address” or  internet-elders@hotmail.com if you’d like to apply for membership. ®


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## GaryQ (Jul 17, 2018)

A Trump filter would be good but then again we’d mever know what stupid brain fart he will come out with next.
just when you think he’s come up with the ultimate idiotic comment... he manages to unsurprisingly come up with something even dumber.

Was hilarious watching him and Poutin doing the press conference. After 30 seconds of Poutin talking you could tell “The Donald” was lost in space like a little kid probably thinking when’s this guy going to shut up so I can read my cue cards. Then the fun starts when he goes off script to answer questions.


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## David Baxter PhD (Jul 17, 2018)

David Baxter said:


> The Elders have, however, outed themselves as  reachable at either “the usual IPv6 address” or  internet-elders@hotmail.com if you’d like to apply for membership. ®



Did you apply for membership, @GaryQ?


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## GaryQ (Jul 17, 2018)

No did you David? Lol


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## David Baxter PhD (Jul 17, 2018)

Well I sent an email to the address in the email asking for information on how to join, yes. [emoji5]

I'll let you know if it bounces... or if they answer.

I mean, to quote Chris O'Dowd from _The IT Crowd_, "Well... if it’s  okay with The Hawk...” [emoji3]


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## GaryQ (Jul 17, 2018)

Yes, definitely let us know. I tried the inexistant IPv6 but my ISP doesn’t support IPv6 inexistant addressed (or even existing ones)


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## David Baxter PhD (Jul 17, 2018)




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