Slashdot Mirror
Twitter, Facebook and Google Sued For Facilitating Paris Attacks (thenextweb.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Reynaldo Gonzalez is suing Twitter, Facebook and Google for facilitating the spread of "extremist propaganda" after alleging the three companies "knowingly permitted" ISIS to recruit, raise money and spread its message across each of the respective platforms. His daughter, Nohemi, was among the 130 killed when religious extremists attacked Paris last year. In the court documents, Gonzalez goes on to say that religious extremists would not have the infrastructure to get their message to the masses without the three companies and their social networks. While each company does have moderators that review content, The Next Web notes that it's a statistical impossibility to maintain that any company of such a size can review, or even find, all instances of offensive content. Google is also being faced with a lawsuit from the Space Data Corporation of Chandler, Arizona, which claims the tech giant stole the idea behind its Wi-Fi-emitting balloon network, Project Loon.
No it isn't impossible. The companies just don't want to INVEST their money to moderate or curate their content. You can be damned sure they do curate some of their content. These companies have hundreds of billions of dollars in CASH. They could do it if they wanted to, but they don't want to. They could hire 100,000 people to do it. They don't want to spend their money. But it isn't impossible, they just need to change the way they do business.
With over 100 billion dollars in the bank, they cannot hire a hundred thousand people and have them look through the newly posted information?
ABC's mediawatch noted that facebooks advertising platform is so good, it can literally sell a specific ad to a specific human because we have posted our lives there.
If we can advertise that well, cant we find a single video of a american islamist pointing out that the gun laws make it trivial for a person to perform brainless slaughter like we've witnessed a few days ago.
Lazy psychopaths.
They'd throw an AI at it at best, and then have to hire a significantly smaller staff of people to look over complaints. Wouldn't be surprised if the AI twitter bots can be re-purposed for this.
Here is the thing though. Even if they could, would they want to? If they are shown to specifically filter certain content, wouldn't they make themselves more liable for the things that slip by? It'd be better to just ask users to report content that violates their terms of service, than to search it out themselves with fervor.
What this person wants, or will get if these companies getting stuck with responsibility will be the death of organized (as in a single place) free speech. It will fall to smaller groups and likely be a return to something like it was pre-MySpace, where people had their own sites catered to their own community. Much harder to track those down. Groups like these exist for things, such as drug trades or illegal porn, more specifically on the dark net.
For an example of what has been done in the past, think of the KKK or the Neo-Nazis. They aren't repressed by the governments like many would like, because if they are, then they'd be harder to track and likely act out a lot more. They calm their national terrorist groups by allowing them to speak publicly.
To one of the greatest quotes in history, "The more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."
You _are_ free to speak limited only by the laws of your country. But what you are talking about is forcing private entities to allow your speech to be broadcast - which is bullshit.
How about copy machine manufactures since they there is still paper propaganda?
How about sue video camera manufacturers?
How about Adobe for building Premier?
How far does "facilitating" go?
The reason that only "social media" is being sued is because "social media" is currently the in thing.
Don't forget them. How about the city? They provided the roads used by the terrorists!
May as well sue the French government. The roads that the attackers used sure as shit facilitated their attack as well.
I would actually give up my freedom of speech if it meant the corporations had to as well. Because my speech isn't doing much to help and theirs is doing plenty to fuck things up.
Blaming a small handful of online (and rich) entities for any kind of terror attack is absurd. In general, no single company facilitates a terrorist attack. As far as I'm aware, no one sued Boeing for 9/11. As far as I'm aware, no one has sued Toyota for the rise of ISIS. Taking it a step further, no one has sued clothing manufacturers for allowing terrorists to blend in with the rest of society. No one has sued the doctors that might have treated terrorists. No one has sued local construction companies for building the roads/subways that the terrorists have used. And on and on and on.
I think it's deplorable that people are trying to make a quick buck in the courts on the backs of innocent victims.
The lawsuit is an interesting example of the differences between the Middle East and the West. In the Middle East, when innocent people are killed en masse, terrorists are born. In the West, when innocent people are killed en masse, frivolous platitudes and lawsuits are born. I don't know how you defeat an enemy that grows after every attack you make on them. But, looking at the direction our society is going, it's pretty obvious that people have figured out how to defeat us. Just instill enough fear that we voluntarily devolve our society.
no fan of these companies, but freedom of speech should be absolute on principle.
as long as a person does not engage in actual violence, or a legal crime. he/she should be able to do whatever they want(including violent speech).
but these companies have already given up on freedom of speech. they have set up and use, censors and moderators, against those who are not actually violent and are not criminals .
in this case also, they seem to defend by pointing out impracticality of monitoring their platforms, rather than standing by principle of not monitoring at all.
Actually I see it being easier than that. You don't monitor every site, you monitor the site they sell your post/data to, Flurry.com (Google) being one.
www.rovio.com/ (Angry Birds) used to have a TOS that explained just how this worked (value in your personal data). It was a pretty good read, none of this broad "we sell your info", but what and to who.
If you've ever played Angry Birds you were quite the asset to rovio.com, and they are in no way unique in this practice.
no fan of these companies, but freedom of speech should be absolute on principle.
as long as a person does not engage in actual violence, or a legal crime. he/she should be able to do whatever they want(including violent speech).
I hope you realize that you're not thinking things through here. You're basically going all-in on freedom, just because, and not realizing that there are consequences to that. Well, you do, but then a sentence later, you back out.
If freedom of speech is absolute, then you're only going to be ignoring the consequences of speech. Fortunately, you aren't quite lost in the notion, since you identify that violence is wrong, and recognize that crimes can be established.
That means you can recognize that some behavior is wrong. Does that mean you think lies and deception should be stopped, or can we do nothing about them?
Does someone who calls for another to be harmed, get blood on their hands when another person does it?
Are you prepared to deal with the results of your absolute position?
but these companies have already given up on freedom of speech. they have set up and use, censors and moderators, against those who are not actually violent and are not criminals .
Or they've rejected the false notion of inaction in the face of harm being caused to others. They see things as wrong, and stop it.
Or more likely, they see it as costing them money as others don't want to be around that kind of bullshit.
in this case also, they seem to defend by pointing out impracticality of monitoring their platforms, rather than standing by principle of not monitoring at all.
In which case, the question becomes, are their actions sufficient to show their responsibility was appropriate?
That's a tougher question.
Let's take classified ads in the paper. Should a paper consider who it sells space to? What if they deal with criminals? What if they become a haven for prostitution? What should they do? Hands off, or some awareness?
So it's not terrorism when anti-abortion activists assassinate doctors or firebomb clinics. Really?
Or when a bunch of armed militants occupy a federal facility and threaten the lives of local and federal law enforcement officers. None of those involved had any terrorism related charges brought against them. They face weapons charges, felony conspiracy, and destroying government property. No terrorism charges at all.
What if the armed occupiers had been Muslims or radical environmentalist or native American militants, or anybody who wasn't a right wing Christian? It would be called terrorism from the first report and there would have been no kid gloves. Nobody would be wandering into town for a hot meal and a warm bed in a motel, which happened during the first week or so. The siege would not have lasted over a month. The authorities would have come in with guns blazing and there would have been many fatalities. And anyone who wasn't killed on the spot would have been charged with terrorism and murder for any deaths that occurred. (When criminals commit violent felonies and one of them dies at the hand of the police, the remaining perps can be charged with murder. Why did these perps avoid that charge?)
So who is getting a free pass because of their religion? Someone who is a lot like you.
Why is Snark Required?
. What radicalizes Muslims in the west is the behavior of the west.
Then explain why there are so few radical Muslims in the US (whose sins in the middle east need no repeating), and so many in places like Belgium?