Mike Masnick
Mike Masnick | |
|---|---|
Masnick at an awards event hosted by Public Knowledge in 2012 | |
| Born | Michael Masnick December 8, 1974 |
| Occupation | Editor |
| Known for |
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Michael Masnick (born December 8, 1974)[1] is an American editor and entrepreneur. He is the CEO and founder of Techdirt, a weblog.[2]
He first used the term "Streisand effect" on the Techdirt blog in January 2005 and was interviewed about it three years later on National Public Radio's All Things Considered. In spite of the popularity of the term in the years since, Masnick himself has admitted the term has taken on a meaning of its own without his involvement after making it, and he receives little credit and no royalties for it (as revealed in a satirical article).[3][4]
In 2010-2012, Masnick played an important role in the SOPA-PIPA debates, "propell[ing] Techdirt into the single most important professional media site over the entire period, overshadowing the more established media."[5]
In a 2019 essay titled "Protocols, Not Platforms", Masnick observed that social media platforms were in a "crisis" of content moderation, being accused both of being too lenient on hate speech and misinformation, and of stifling free speech.[6][7] Masnick proposed that this could be addressed by developing protocols that allow individual users to filter content according to "their own tolerances for different types of speech."[6][7] The essay inspired Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to launch the Bluesky research initiative, which later became a social media startup of its own.[7] In August 2024, Masnick joined the board of Bluesky.[8]
References
- ^ Masnick, Mike (October 21, 2008). "The Uneasy Balance Between Wikipedia And Truth". Techdirt. Retrieved April 20, 2024.
- ^ Hill, Kashmir (July 29, 2023). "An Internet Veteran's Guide to Not Being Scared of Technology". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved April 20, 2024.
- ^ Robert Siegel (February 29, 2008). "The Streisand Effect' Snags Effort to Hide Documents". All Things Considered. National Public Radio.
The episode is the latest example of a phenomenon known as the "Streisand Effect." Robert Siegel talks with Mike Masnick, CEO of Techdirt Inc., who coined the term.
- ^ Mike Masnick (January 8, 2015). "For 10 Years Everyone's Been Using 'The Streisand Effect' Without Paying; Now I'm Going To Start Issuing Takedowns". Techdirt. Archived from the original on March 1, 2022. Retrieved February 2, 2026.
Obviously, this is necessary or else how would I have had the incentive to create the term in the first place? All these people benefiting off of my hard work, my labor, the sweat of my brow are freeloading off of my property. And it has to stop now.
- ^ Benkler, Yochai; Roberts, Hal; Faris, Robert; Solow-Niederman, Alicia; Etling, Bruce (2013). "Social Mobilization and the Networked Public Sphere: Mapping the SOPA-PIPA Debate". SSRN Electronic Journal. doi:10.2139/ssrn.2295953. ISSN 1556-5068.
- ^ a b Chayka, Kyle (April 7, 2025). "Bluesky's Quest to Build Nontoxic Social Media". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X. Retrieved September 27, 2025.
- ^ a b c Masnick, Mike (August 21, 2025). "Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech". Knight First Amendment Institute. Retrieved September 28, 2025.
- ^ Perez, Sarah (August 6, 2024). "Bluesky adds Techdirt founder Mike Masnick to its board". TechCrunch. Retrieved August 11, 2024.