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President Trump Says It is 'Very Dangerous' When Companies Like Twitter Regulate Own Content (reuters.com)

Posted by msmash on from the Mr.-President-speaks dept.

In an interview with Reuters on Monday, the U.S. President Donald Trump said that it is "very dangerous" for social media companies like Twitter and Facebook to regulate the content on their own platforms. Trump's remarks come on the backdrop of technology giants Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Spotify, and YouTube ridding select kind of content of their platforms in the recent weeks. On Saturday, Trump argued that social media companies are "closing down the opinions" of conservatives. He tweeted, "They are closing down the opinions of many people on the RIGHT, while at the same time doing nothing to others. Speaking loudly and clearly for the Trump Administration, we won't let that happen."

Further reading: Twitter Is 'Rethinking' Its Service, and Suspending 1M Accounts Each Day.

32 of 692 comments (clear)

  1. Re:You all agree with him you know by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Your Comcast analogy is highly flawed. But then, you knew that.

  2. Both are dangerous by SuperKendall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The moment any platform that allows public user comments starts meddling in who can speak, and who can say what - that is dangerous. Even more so when multiple companies collide to prevent one person from speaking as is the case with Alex Jones.

    But that should, if anything, be a legal matter; someone I read somewhere said that Alex Jones may well be able to make a restraint to trade lawsuit happen against a variety of companies.

    HOWEVER what is even more dangerous is letting the government have direct sway over what actions companies like Facebook or Twitter can or cannot have over users. You have to be able to let them run platforms as they see fit, then let the market of users and financial consequences dictate what actions are appropriate for a company to take.

    Even though Twitter banned Alex Jones, you also see people like Will Wheaton self banning - so it's not like there is a balance naturally occurring anyway, even as things are.

    For myself, I continue to use Twitter but the way to enjoy it is instantly mute anyone who goes political. Technical Twitter seems OK still.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Both are dangerous by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Alex Jones pushed violent attacks on innocent individuals named from his conspiracy theories with no bases in truth. To defend him makes you a nutter, regardless of what the individual reasons platforms game for giving him das boot.

      Kendall happily defends traitors and dangerous people, so long as ideologically they agree with him. Otherwise he's for the opposite.

    2. Re:Both are dangerous by PraiseBob · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I think the courts have been pretty consistent that inciting panic (shouting "fire") and inciting violence do not qualify as free speech, and aren't under the same level of protections. Media companies are reacting in a somewhat reasonable manner in trying to curb and remove the calls for violence that Alex Jones keeps issuing on their platforms. It just so happens that most of the requests for violence are coming from right-wing talking heads. I'd HOPE for the same kind of response if left-wing talking heads kept calling for violence towards their political opponents.

      I'm sure there are plenty of counterexamples, but pro-gun groups & people are much more consistent about using guns as their solution when compared to the anti-gun crowd for instance.

    3. Re:Both are dangerous by HornWumpus · · Score: 3, Insightful

      No common carrier status. They are all now liable for the contents of all posts.

      --
      John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
    4. Re:Both are dangerous by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I assume you mean "colluded"... But really Jones has been trying to get himself banned for a long time and given that he posts the same content on all platforms it's hardly surprising that they all banned him around the same time.

      Getting banned helps him by fuelling his conspiracy theories.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    5. Re:Both are dangerous by cdsparrow · · Score: 5, Insightful

      "These platforms are as critical as other utilities like Electricity or Gas"

      How is twitter or facebook as important as power or gas? Many people (myself included) don't use these sites and are probably better off for it. Power and water and gas and the like are important to staying alive - facebook, not so much.

    6. Re:Both are dangerous by WhiplashII · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Exactly - you cannot have both common carrier status and political censoring.

      --
      while (sig==sig) sig=!sig;
    7. Re:Both are dangerous by Darinbob · · Score: 3, Insightful

      By removing Alex Jones, they are not "pushing" an agenda. Alex Jones is the biggest creator of fake news out there. His followers have been harassing parents of murdered children and sending death threats. No company should be required to host his putrid content. If a baker can't be compelled to bake a gay wedding cake then a company can't be required to be the voice of an idiotic conspiracy theorist.

      The "media" is in no way the same thing, the media has not been pushing conspiracy theories that cause people who show up armed at a pizza parlor. To equate Alex Jones with the media is amazingly stupid.

      The first amendment places a limit on the government only. It does not restrict or compel individuals or companies.

    8. Re:Both are dangerous by PeeAitchPee · · Score: 3, Informative

      No one on Twitter has 1A protection -- NO ONE. Twitter is a private corp, not part of the gov't, and "free speech" as defined by the 1A *only* affects the gov't ability to block said speech.

    9. Re:Both are dangerous by Luckyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Are you seriously suggesting that serious news organisations do not live to expose people to total garbage?

      Your political affiliation should be utterly irrelevant here. Every serious news organisation exposes people to total garbage on daily basis. It's the core of their business.

      If you do not comprehend this, you're beyond gullible.

  3. New services are not stopped by this by damn_registrars · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Twitter is doing exactly nothing to stop people from starting their own service. If they don't like the terms at Twitter they are free to go start a new service where they can set the terms. Twitter is not obligated to bend to the whims of Trump or anyone else if they fear it would be bad for their bottom line. After all at the end of the day they exist to make money, not to be the mouthpiece of any one man.

    --
    Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
    1. Re:New services are not stopped by this by Tablizer · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If they don't like the terms at Twitter they are free to go start a new service where they can set the terms.

      Rupert Murdoch's company, of which Fox News was part of, purchased MySpace in part for that reason. But it flopped.

      GOP are hypocrites: They did away with the Fairness Doctrine when radio was booming with conservative pundits. Now they want something like it back for Big Digital Media, which is centrist or left-leaning.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    2. Re:New services are not stopped by this by drinkypoo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Would you accept the top-3 mobile companies banning you from their services because they didn't like what you were saying? Right before the midterm elections?

      No, but I also don't try to incite violence.

      The people to be really mad at are the telecoms, who have collected billions of dollars in tax money which was supposed to be used to improve our internet access but which went into the pockets of telecommunications executives. If not for them, then it would be a lot easier to host your own content. The internet we deserve, even if for no reason other than that we paid for it, would let Alex Jones continue to spout his hatred even without the cooperation of Google. P.S. #netneutrality

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  4. But not dangerous for bakers to regulate cakes? by JoeyRox · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As in who they decide is allowed to buy one? Either you allow all private companies to select who can use their service or you allow none of them to do so.

    1. Re:But not dangerous for bakers to regulate cakes? by jensend · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That's baloney, and I think you know better and are just trying to be provocative (flamebait).

      The bakers were perfectly happy to sell those people standard bakery items. They were unwilling to expend their creative and artistic effort to make a custom cake to support an event they have moral objections to. Similarly, one might expect a Jewish bakery to sell rolls and muffins to neo-Nazis but one ought not expect them to create custom cakes for a neo-Nazi rally.

  5. Re:You all agree with him you know by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    OK, so can the crazy. On the actual, non-conspiracy hand, it is Trump who decries the "lying media" and "fake news" whenever he does something stupid, outlandish, against current cultural norms, etc. They aren't lying; he is. But HE would like to regulate what they can say like in China. Who is dangerous here? Facebook for taking a raging nutbag like Alex Jones off for telling people to get their guns ready? Or Trump who would like to stop the press from being mean to him?

  6. Trolls and moderation. by RyanFenton · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Trolls do tend to say that whenever moderation starts removing abuse dominating a conversation channel.

    The other top response is saying that they wouldn't be trolling of only the other side would stop being so wrong.

    But to never moderate those things would mean that everything becomes rhetoric - all noise and no signal. It defeats the purpose of having having a channel of communication... which is kind of the point of this modern form of trolling, isn't it?

    Ryan Fenton

  7. Re:You all agree with him you know by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You can compare websites to ISPs when I have more than one viable option for my ISP

  8. But not when the Govenment does it. by SeaFox · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm sure he's perfectly fine with the government regulating social media, and the press for that matter.
    Things will be full of the correct facts then... just like in China and North Korea.

  9. He means Alex Jones by rsilvergun · · Score: 3, Insightful

    And Jones was fine for years until he started doing borderline incitement to violence. It doesn't help that he caters to an extreme right wing base that's been shown to act on the kind of crazy conspiracy theories he specializes in.

    BTW, does anyone else think in the "two minutes of hate" from 1984 when watching Jones rant? Serious, that creeped me out more than anything he's done (yes, more than the references to blood libel whenever he criticized someone Jewish).

    --
    Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
  10. Re:You all agree with him you know by Dan667 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    your comment is so wrong, you don't have an understanding at all. You don't like twitter don't use it. You don't like the internet, well tough there is only one.

  11. Re: You all agree with him you know by nasch · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hillary also did not have an agenda, all she did was attack Trump.

    Maybe she didn't publicize it well enough, but she definitely had an agenda. https://www.hillaryclinton.com...

    Trump on the other hand HAD an AGENDA "Make America Great Again"

    That's a slogan, not an agenda.

    The only people who voted for her were airheads who thought having a vagina was a requirement for the white house.

    Now you're just being stupid.

    The Economy woke up and got in gear the day after the election

    Citation needed.

  12. Re:You all agree with him you know by Desler · · Score: 5, Informative

    No, what I do agree with is Alex Jones' Terms of Service of InfoWars:

    If you violate these rules, your posts and/or user name will be deleted.
    Remember: you are a guest here. It is not censorship if you violate the rules and your post is deleted. All civilizations have rules and if you violate them you can expect to be ostracized from the tribe.

    Funny how Alex Jones is being a huge hypocrite when he gets banned from other websites and then claims he's being censorwd.

  13. Re:He is right for the wrong reasons :) by nasch · · Score: 5, Informative

    risk changing their legal status from an open platform to a curated one and hence liable for their content

    They're protected from liability for the speech of their users by the Communications Decency Act. The CDA explicitly states that moderating their platforms does not remove that protection.

  14. Re:You all agree with him you know by sheph · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The thing with Alex Jones is that it's fairly obvious that he's off his nut. Do we really need Facebook to protect us from him? Are you incapable of listening to people and coming to the determination as to whether or not they're full of crap? And if not, who would the appropriate party be? Facebook? The government? Some agency? All have potential for abuse. I'd rather hear and see everything and make up my own mind.

    --
    I don't believe in karma, I just call it like I see it.
  15. How Free Speech Works by hduff · · Score: 4, Informative

    The 1st Amendment of the US Constitution just keeps the government from censoring your speech. Since social media is not the government, they can do whatever they want: allowing you to speak unfettered, closing your account, censoring what you say. There's NOTHING illegal or wrong about that; it's only a problem when the government starts censoring your speech.

    --
    "I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
  16. Re:"Conservative speech" by fuqck_slashdot · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Seriously, goolag search "anti white racism on twitter".
    The legal definition doesn't exist in this country, so you must be referencing a definition de facto vulgaris.
    In which case there's a negative qualification: white people.
    Did you miss that whole Sara Jeong thing?

  17. Re:The RIGHT puts out more obvious lies. by Man+On+Pink+Corner · · Score: 4, Informative

    How about 2,300 examples and counting?

    http://projects.thestar.com/donald-trump-fact-check/

  18. Re: You all agree with him you know by DaHat · · Score: 4, Insightful

    but Trump did not legitimately win (electoral college).

    He didn't legitimately win by... winning in the only way that matters per the system we have today?

    How does that work again?

    --
    Help Brendan pay off his student loans
  19. Re: You all agree with him you know by c6gunner · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The electoral college is itself illegitimate, an arcane abomination that was imposed centuries ago, when it ostensibly served some purpose (but never did) and which still fools people into thinking it protects smaller states or some other bullshit.

    That's hilarious. I would argue that, given recent history, it's more important now than it's ever been before. Any system which keeps a handful of cities from dictating terms to the rest of the nation is a valuable one.

  20. Re:The RIGHT puts out more obvious lies. by Man+On+Pink+Corner · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Yeah, I don't doubt that you could compile a huge list of lies for just about any politician, from Obama ("You can keep your doctor") all the way back to that time when George Washington promised his troops that there would be cake on the other side of the Delaware.

    But the thing about Trump is, he lies by default. He lies reflexively. He lies about shit that doesn't matter. "Biggest inaugural crowd in history," that kind of thing. Trump would literally piss on your shoes and tell you it's raining.

    That part is new and disturbing. It suggests that he's not only a typical lying politician, but some sort of psychopath.