PDA

View Full Version : Does anyone here use GIYUS?

LastChild
15th February 2008, 02:19 PM
Does anyone here use GIYUS and the Megaphone tool?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megaphone_desktop_tool

On what kind of issues? For instance does it lean towards a particular US presidential candidate in polls it thinks will favor Israel somehow? Or am I mistaken about how it works?

Does GIYUS stand for something?
Undesired Walrus
15th February 2008, 02:36 PM
LastChild has discovered the Politics forum.
webfusion
19th February 2008, 11:59 PM
This is Hebrew for "drafted" (or "inducted") in the military sense (IDF). It refers to being sent a call-up notice for the Army.

On the website, it uses the acronym "Give Israel Your United Support" -- and it's obviously a play on the original Hebrew usage of the word.
gtc
20th February 2008, 01:30 AM
You also see it used as an insult used on websites such as The Guardian's Comment is Free. The suggestion is that someone is parroting talking points or is a paid shill for the Jews Israelis.
ddt
20th February 2008, 07:17 PM
The suggestion is that someone is parroting talking points or is a paid shill for the Israelis.
That is the whole point of the tool, isn't it? From the wiki entry from the OP:
Computing website The Register has described use of the software as "highly organised mass manipulation of technologies which are supposed to be democratising" and claimed Megaphone is "effectively a high-tech exercise in ballot-stuffing.
One correction though: the intent of the tool is that its users be unpaid shills for the Israelis.
webfusion
20th February 2008, 07:24 PM
Went rummaging through my personal files, and came across an image of my actual IDF "GIYUS" notice.

Just thought you all might find it fascinating. Or not.

http://home.comcast.net/~advent99/tzav.jpg
gtc
21st February 2008, 03:05 AM
That is the whole point of the tool, isn't it? From the wiki entry from the OP:

One correction though: the intent of the tool is that its users be unpaid shills for the Israelis.

Can you define shill as you understand it?

We may be talking at cross purposes here because shill has negative connotations in my experience and GIYUS doesn't seem to have negative connotations.
gtc
21st February 2008, 03:11 AM
Interesting image. Thanks.
ddt
21st February 2008, 04:31 AM
That is the whole point of the tool, isn't it? From the wiki entry from the OP:

One correction though: the intent of the tool is that its users be unpaid shills for the Israelis.
Can you define shill as you understand it?

We may be talking at cross purposes here because shill has negative connotations in my experience and GIYUS doesn't seem to have negative connotations.
I understand "shill" indeed negative: as an unquestioning supporter. That's not exactly what wiktionary.org has to say:
Verb

1. To promote as a fan or customer.
2. To put under cover; to sheal.

[edit] Noun

1. A person paid to endorse a product favourably, while pretending to be impartial.
2. An accomplice at a confidence trick during an auction or gambling game.

which gives the impression that an "unpaid shill" does not exist :).

Anyway, I agree with you about the negative connotation. I was only referring to the Megaphone tool, not GIYUS as a whole. And as the Megaphone tool does not allow the user to decide how to cast his vote (see the wiki page mentioned, read the article from the Register linked there for your daily dose of sarcasm), thus turning its users into unquestioning sheeple supporters, in my book that counts as a negative.