Big news in the social media sphere as Trump has signed an Executive Order on Preventing Online Censorship to review how Section 230(c) of the of the Communications Decency Act functions. This comes after Twitter but a "misinformation" tag on a Trump post.
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Plenty of people have been censored in the past 2 years for expressing views that social media big tech giants don't agree with. Teams of so-called "fact checkers" popped up to become the "authorities" to validate what is or isn't true. Only "authoritative" sources from the mainstream media or academia was to be considered "true".
The censorship grew as Twitter was shadow-banning or outright banning conservatives on their platform. Facebook did similar, as did YouTube.
With COVID-19, the censorship increased. Anything that wasn't supported by the WHO, was open for removal by YouTube is they found it or if it was reported to them by their hallway-monitor users. Facebook is doing similar. And Twitter as well.
Twitter poked the wrong bear, as Trump has power to create "laws" out of nowhere. And so he did when he felt the censorship himself. It didn't matter much before it happened to him. He was content to let it keep happening to others. I guess that just shows things often have to get personal before people get involved in doing something about it.
Trump's EO says that social media big tech giants are "tantamount to a monopoly". They act like a public square where people can speak their voices. At least that's how it started. They allow information to shape discussions on a national and global scale.
The problem is when they censor information. This is when they stop being a public town square to allow people to voice their opinions. Even tagging something as "misinformation" shows how they are acting as editors of the information people are voicing. This makes them "an editor with a viewpoint".
"What they chose to promote or ignore is nothing short of political activism."
"This censorship is a threat to freedom itself - imagine if your phone company edited your text messages or blocked your phone calls."
Attorney General Barr said that Section 203 "was stretched way beyond its original intention...its purpose was to allow websites that were acting virtually as bulletin boards were not responsible for third-party information." The EO calls for a review and getting "back to the original interpretation" of Section 230.
"Currently social media platforms like twitter enjoy a liability shield because they are a 'neutral platform' - which they are not...social media companies who engage in editing or censorship will be stripped of this shield, while companies will be punished should they engage in any "deceptive" acts. Federal agencies will also be barred from buying advertising on these platforms - a direct attack on their bottom line."
Social media companies grew into tech giants because of the public forum model. Now they they have grown, they are betraying that model. They are using their power to enforce or restrict certain views they don't agree with. It's no longer a public forum, but a regulated forum where they control the flow of information.
Whent he EO draft was leaked, the markets didn't respond well, as the stocks fell for both Facebook and Twitter.
Do you agree or disagree with this anti-censorship move?
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This is messy. On the one hand, private companies should be free to establish and enforce policies they find suitable. On the other hand, these social media giants are incorporated under government law and deeply intertwined with political interests, pulling themselves way out of the orbit of the market economy.
Censoring dissenters does nothing to disprove the dissenting opinions or dissuade people from considering unapproved ideas, it just drives discourse underground. This is part of why stupidity like white supremacy thrives in the darker corners of the web, maintaining echo chambers of self-reinforcing stupidity.
I think I would be OK with sites adding an icon beside posts deemed controversial or doubtful, but hiding them is just not cool.
I generally agree with what you have said here. However, the reality is (as you have stated), that these so-called 'private' companies would have never had the exposure or the market share they do today, without large sums of seed funding and manipulation that benefited them as a start-up, from both political influence and private hands with deep seeded government and intelligence contacts. They always thrive from cronyism.
The problem with saying it's ok to allow them to label a comment, is that it will be subjective and manipulated by the person or 'persons' doing the moderating, just like we have now. Not only do these 'fact-checkers' deliberately deceive the public as fact checking operations, but It's not difficult to then steer something into a completely different direction, after setting the initial policy.
Yes, they are private companies, but also received government funds at some point as I recall. They acted like open public squares at first, then when they grew in wealth and power they decided to control the openness of the platforms more, betraying the original purpose.
This is mostly what I think as well. Private companies should be able to censor as they fit. The issue is when they become publishers/editors by saying what is true and what isn't. They shouldn't be allowed to have their cake and eat it too. Either they are a platform where they can moderate posts or they are a publisher who can get sued for what they publish or edit.
Sites always walk a fine line on some kinds of content. Gore, pornography, and anything else that falls under "NSFW" drives away a lot of potential users. Truly criminal things like child pornography and identity theft need to be curtailed somehow. Steemit/Hive rely on tags, reputation scores, and downvotes to organically moderate a lot, but the recent Steemit censorship campaign focusing on dissenters instead of spammers and plagiarists gaming the system revealed a huge flaw in central control even on our system here.
DPoS = plutocracy, rule by money masters. Who has the money does what they want.
Facebook, Youtube, and Twitter deserve this retaliation measure. They have not even been apologetic about the misdeeds they have done to individuals picked on directly or arbitrarily. Elites being invited on television to explain common ethics of what will and won't be tolerated from the uncivilized sheep is dividing society into a caste system that does not belong in America in this age.
I don't mind so much the banning of users at the discretion of the business that hosts the accounts. Profane, hateful, or explicit content is justifiable grounds for ban or age verification settings to view.
I do mind when people's words are selectively changed or hidden without a fair process to dispute the censorship actions. Every user deserves the liberty to use their own words, and not have this altered. Otherwise people are characterized wrongly with false statements they never said. When the meaning of a person's communication is altered, it is impossible for anyone to hear truth.
Indeed, the caste system seems to be developing as the elites and controlling interests decide what happens with this non-crisis.
Suppose he tried to do this when it was only Alex Jones. He would have lost some conservatives' support IMO. Now anyone who supports him, supports these measures. From a political point of view, I think it was good timing.
Yes, times well because it happened to him lol
I’ll take that as a win lol anything is better than what we’ve got. These types of things may not have much teeth but are symbolic I think. It may signal he’s got a little bit more clout than some think.
Yeah we'll see what happens ;)
About time, these companies are all enacting their political agenda and the Twitter "fact checker" is a political hack.
Yeah the fact checking thing is bullshit. You're not allowed to think for yourself, we're going to tell you whats true or not.
Twitter is just trying to be like Facebook. I mean they're the ones that introduced the fake news overlay on links.
I trust them. They are their to protect me :P
I may quite agree with the anti-censorship move because we have different opinions and we can not all agree on the same thing. So, why censor and remove my post because I didn't agree with yours?
It's debatable, anyways
Yeah, people should be allowed to access info and think for themselves.
All this means is blockchain DAPPS are going to skyrocket! :)
Maybe... it's not like there aren't censorship problems. Blockchain is only censorship resistant, not proof.
there is certainly a path towards proof though wouldn't you say?
When they get a taste of their own medicine, they work for Freedom again :)
Good.
They work for freedom again? Nah...
Indirectly yes:
Ok, they not really work for Freedom... what i was trying to say is:
They (governments and big tech.) start "eating up each other"...
Wasn't they working "close together" until now?
At least something we can agree with him on