Not even O. Henry could have conceived of a story with this much irony.
The New York Times published an error-riddled opinion article on Oct. 31 attacking Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for refusing to censor error-riddled political content posted by any of the social media website’s estimated one billion active users. In other words, the New York Times failed to fact-check an op-ed complaining about Facebook’s supposed failure to fact-check the world.
At the heart of the op-ed’s complaint is Zuckerberg’s assertion that Facebook is not in the business of censoring its users. In fact, the Facebook founder alleged recently to do so would be a violation of the principles of the First Amendment. The author of the New York Times op-ed, none other than The Social Network screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, disagrees. The screenwriter believes that now is the perfect time for massive tech conglomerates headed by people he dislikes personally to start policing online speech.
If only Sorkin had not made so many factual errors in the piece.
His op-ed claimed originally that his Academy Award-winning portrayal of Facebook’s founding was released in 2011. It was not, as a lengthy New York Times editor’s note now clarifies. Sorkin’s movie was released in 2010.
I am not sure how the guy who won an Academy Award for The Social Network screwed that one up, but OK.
The op-ed, titled “Aaron Sorkin: An Open Letter to Mark Zuckerberg,” claimed also, “The law hasn’t been written yet — yet — that holds carriers of user-generated internet content responsible for the user-generated content they carry, just like movie studios, television networks and book, magazine and newspaper publishers.”
Sorkin added, “Ask Peter Thiel, who funded a defamation suit against Gawker that bankrupted the site and forced it to close down. (You should have Mr. Thiel’s number in your phone because he was an early investor in Facebook.)”
This latter part also is not true. The lawsuit that bankrupted Gawker was an “invasion of privacy lawsuit, not a defamation suit,” as the New York Times now notes in its correction of the anti-Zuckerberg op-ed.
Sorkin’s commentary also claimed originally that half of all Americans say their main source of news is Facebook. This is false, according to the New York Times. That number is more like 40%, and those people say only that they get news from Facebook, not that it is their main source.
Lastly, because it is funny, the West Wing creator ends his op-ed with these self-indulgent paragraphs — because he really does not know any other way:
Now you tell me. If I’d known you felt that way, I’d have had the Winklevoss twins invent Facebook.
Zuckerberg himself responded Thursday with the following quote from Sorkin’s astonishingly bad 1995 drama The American President:
That is going to leave a mark, on both The Social Network screenwriter and the New York Times.
At least we can say now that The Newsroom is no longer the worst thing that Sorkin has inflicted on the American press.
