Facebook's Ex Security Boss: Asking Big Tech To Police Hate Speech is 'a Dangerous Path' (technologyreview.com)

Like many people, Alex Stamos, former Facebook chief security officer, thinks tech platforms like Facebook and Google have too much power. But he doesn't agree with the calls to break them up. And he argues that the very people who say Facebook and Google are too powerful are giving them more power by insisting they do more to control hate speech and propaganda. From a report: "That's a dangerous path," he warns. If democratic countries make tech firms impose limits on free speech, so will autocratic ones. Before long, the technology will enable "machine-speed, real-time moderation of everything we say online." In attempting to rein in Big Tech, we risk creating Big Brother. So what's the solution? I spoke to Stamos at his Stanford office to find out.

Technology Review: So is the disinformation/propaganda problem mostly solved?
Stamos: In a free society, you will never eliminate that problem. I think the most important thing [in the US] is the advertising transparency. With or without any foreign interference, the parties, the campaigns, the PACs [political action committees] here in the US are divvying up the electorate into tiny little buckets, and that is a bad thing. Transparency is a good start. The next step we need is federal legislation to put a limit on ad targeting. There are thousands of companies in the internet advertising ecosystem. Facebook, Google, and Twitter are the only ones that have done anything, because they have gotten the most press coverage and the most pressure from politicians. So without legislation we're just going to push all of the attackers into the long tail of advertising, to companies that don't have dedicated teams looking for Russian disinformation groups.

Technology Review: Facebook has been criticized over Russian political interference both in the US and in other countries, the genocide in Myanmar, and a lot of other things. Do you feel Facebook has fully grasped the extent of its influence and its responsibility?
Stamos: I think the company certainly understands its impact. The hard part is solving it. Ninety percent of Facebook users live outside the United States. Well over half live in either non-free countries or democracies without protection for speech. One of the problems is coming up with solutions in these countries that don't immediately go to a very dark place [i.e., censorship]. Another is figuring out what issues to put engineering resources behind. No matter how big a company is, there are only a certain number of problems you [can tackle]. One of the problems that companies have had is that they're in a firefighting mode where they jump from emergency to emergency. So as they staff up that gets better, but we also need a more informed external discussion about the things we want the companies to focus on -- what are the problems that absolutely have to be solved, and what aren't. You mentioned a bunch of a problems that are actually very different, but people blur them all together.

Technology Review: How do you regulate in a world in which tech is advancing so fast while regulation moves so slowly? How should a society set sensible limits on what tech companies do?
Stamos: But right now, society is not asking for limits on what they do. It's asking that tech companies do more. And I think that's a dangerous path. In all of the problems you mentioned -- Russian disinformation, Myanmar -- what you're telling these companies is, "We want you to have more power to control what other people say and do." That's very dangerous, especially with the rise of machine learning. Five or ten years from now, there could be machine-learning systems that understand human languages as well as humans. We could end up with machine-speed, real-time moderation of everything we say online. So the powers we grant the tech companies right now are the powers those machines are going to have in five years.

Comments

Obligatory XKCD

[jargonburn]

the technology will enable "machine-speed, real-time moderation of everything we say online."

XKCD #2015

Take the bad with the good

[Anonymous Coward]

Like the internet you have to accept the bad stuff with the good if you want freedom. Yes, personal attacks should be addressed but only if the attacked request it. I don't think we need social networks policing for us because this makes a group of people in charge of deciding what should and should not be published. The Alex Jones example is paramount in silencing people just because we do not like their message. Also many examples of others being given a pass while a Jones gets systematically erased. If your going to create a social podium for people, you have to allow to good and bad to come out. It should be expected and the users should decide whether it has any value, or simply ignore it as noise.

Re:Take the bad with the good

[Falos]

>So is the disinformation/propaganda problem mostly solved?
Take the good with the bad. Those are evilbadwords that are bundled into free speech, tech or not. The only difference is the number of flyers.

Yes, we should continue to impose some restrictions near speech. Like endangering life. Precluding shouts of Fire in a theater.

Anyway, I think the whole point of the discussion is Do you actually want bigtech doing the solving? in the first place.

Re:Take the bad with the good

[Obfuscant]

Since when is deceptive advertising free speech?

Since "deceptive" has been defined as "anything that I disagree with."

Now now, I think most people would agree that there truly is "deceptive" that is not simply stuff you don't agree with. Things like the cell phone ad I saw last night and had to rewind on the DVR and pause to read the fine print. Big print: "Five lines for $25 each". Small print: "good until 1/1/2020. First line $60, second line $40, and $20/each for 3, 4, and 5 thereafter." That's deceptive when you consider the font size of the disclaimer (unreadable on regular NTSC TV.)

There are a lot of other companies that put out stuff that nobody would doubt is deceptive, because it's just patent nonsense. Part because it it truly devious. I fell for sales on a discount website twice when they were selling a "free" cell phone and internet service (which itself was a scam -- you had to pay in advance just in case you broke the quantity cap) where the wireless service was already planning to shut that service off in just a few months. Did anyone say anything about that? Of course not. Deceptive.

Regulation of advertising speech is done under truthiness rules, not speech rules. Yes, a company is free to claim that they can change the outcome of a sporting event based on a veggie snack platter they sell, but then when they are sued for lack of truthiness they lose.

Re:Take the bad with the good

[harrkev]

But the purge of media has gone much further than veggie snacks and advertising. It is censoring opinions. I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. Too bad nobody in the tech industry agrees with me. If you can somehow tag it (even wrongly) as "hate" or "racist" then you can censor speech without anything bothering what is left of your conscience.

Re:Take the bad with the good

[Xylantiel]

This is all BS. What facebook and google are doing should be illegal. They kickback ad revenue to content providers that get a lot of clicks -- then claim that their hands are clean when it turns out the provider was being fraudulent. If they are going to take money to place ads alongside the content or use that content to keep users where they can sell ads to them, then they bear responsibility for that content not being outright fraudulent. Is this messy and difficult? sure. I'm not allowed to lie to you to sell you a car, and I shouldn't be allowed to lie to you to get you to look at a commercial I'm being paid to get you to look at. What we have now is a system in which fraud-for-profit has been legalized.

Re:Take the bad with the good

[Anonymous Coward]

Because when Alex Jones bans you you've been flame warring or trolling, and have been banned probably by community staff.
When he gets banned its an expressly political decision -- made at the executive level.

And if you can't tell the difference between corporate policy decisions and web forum rules, there is no hope for you.

Re:Take the bad with the good

[farble1670]

The Alex Jones example is paramount in silencing people just because we do not like their message.

Yes, that's exactly what happened. Why would you think that a social media company would be obliged to carry content that hurts their bottom line? When it comes to private companies, there's no free speech.

AJ hasn't been silenced. He is free to take his idea to any platform that'll have him, or to create his own platform (at his own expense).

If your going to create a social podium for people

The podium is for advertisers, not the people.

Re:Take the bad with the good

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Since when is deceptive advertising free speech?

Advertising Is Protected by the First Amendment. ... However, advertising or "commercial speech" enjoys somewhat less First Amendment protection from governmental encroachment than other types of speech. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), for example, may regulate speech that is found to be "deceptive."

For commercial speech. That is not, however, other speech, and political speech is the most protected of all, even lying, lest the government become the arbiter of truth in politics.

Even commercial speech is butting agajnst the First Amendment, with cases being thrown out where government attempts to silence people who don't have a license in this or that industry, like the non-P.E. engineer commenting online about some crappy bridge or something, or someone giving vaguely medical advice in a discussion forum.

Sounds to me like...

[GerryGilmore]

...someone wanting to have it both ways. 1) We just can't regulate what's posted on our platform because "censorship". 2) If you post about n*ggers, kikes, etc. (like too many comments here on /.) you'll be banned. C'mon, guys - you can't have it both ways. FTR, I come down on the side of any commercial company being able to have their own standards of acceptable speech. Don't like it? TFB. Either adhere to the rules going in or use a different platform for stuff you know will get you kicked off.

Re:Sounds to me like...

[jimbolauski]

It's not just users that want it both ways, if companies censor posts, which is their right, then they should become responsible for the content in all posts, effectively they are condoning the message in posts they don't censor.

Well, that's a big nothing burger.

[hey!]

We shouldn't break them up no matter how big they get, but we shouldn't ask they do anything about misinformation that spreads through their vast information distribution monopolies.

Well, I can think of a way of fixing this: make them charge subscription fees.

Facebook has just over 2 billion users; it's important to realize users are not customers, they're the product being sold to advertisers. The net operating profit generated by selling those users is just under 16 billion. So conservatively, each subscribers is worth about $8/year in profit.

Suppose we say that social media companies have to charge users $1/month. Then each user is worth 50% more as a customer than he is as a product. Then, if you're not happy with the job Facebook does about keeping fake news down, even fake news delivered to your conspiracy nut uncle or SJW sister-in-law, you can vote with your pocketbook. This would require Facebook to figure out a way of managing information that was broadly acceptable to the majority of its users. No government monitoring of content would be required.

Re:Well, that's a big nothing burger.

[hey!]

It would weaken the incentive. The majority of its revenue would come from your wanting to have access to it, not how much time you spent on it.

It's simple

[PopeRatzo]

The problem is not that these sites should be policing hate speech. The problem is that they're a mass media platform where the people who use the platform are not the customers. As long as social media focuses on this business model, it will be a conduit for the worst people in society, because the only measure of success is clicks and eyeballs. Nobody is accountable for what is said. Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from responsibility or consequences.

You can fix this a couple of ways: First, you could actually charge the users of the platform instead of the advertisers. Second, you could require a real identity to participate. You'd be surprised how people all of a sudden start behaving like human beings when they know other people will be able to recognize them doing so. Finally, you could absolutely ban bots. All bots. You want to participate in this social media platform? Then prove you're human. This isn't because bots are responsible for hate speech, but because they amplify it, to the gratification of the person (or group) who originally posted.

Re: It's simple

[Anonymous Coward]

Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from responsibility or consequences.

Presumably, that includes a trip to the gulag.

If freedom of speech doesnâ(TM)t mean freedom from consequences, what the fuck does it mean?

Re:It's simple

[Arzaboa]

You nailed it. Accountability would be a great start.

It seems rather hysterical when all these folks are screaming about their freedom of thought, yet won't put their name on it. People are not being jailed for their political rants in the U.S. It appears the only thing they fear, is themselves and their words. By putting people's real names on it, one would hope that the conversation is tempered more towards reality instead of the ether of internet discussion boards.

--
A friend is someone that gives you total freedom to be yourself - Jim Morrison

Re:It's simple

[Obfuscant]

It seems rather hysterical when all these folks are screaming about their freedom of thought, yet won't put their name on it.

You cannot have true freedom of speech without anonymous speech. Otherwise you get Pope's "Bear Jew with a baseball bat" policing the speech by killing anyone he doesn't agree with.

Re:It's simple

[PopeRatzo]

You cannot have true freedom of speech without anonymous speech.

As long as you have access to anonymous speech elsewhere, there is no property of freedom that is infringed if you require real identity on a commercial website.

You can always print pamphlets in the basement and anonymously distribute them, you just don't get to be anonymous in the public square. That's always been the case.

Re:It's simple

[Visarga]

I don't think that's enough. Outside the online social networks there is the real world with its power struggles which generate torrents of fake news and disinformation. They would push this shit even without ads.

Re:It's simple

[Obfuscant]

As long as you have access to anonymous speech elsewhere, there is no property of freedom that is infringed if you require real identity on a commercial website.

The comment I replied to was not about a commercial website requiring names, it was insulting the people speaking who don't want to put their names on their speech. Typical nonsequitor.

Re:It's simple

[PopeRatzo]

I don't think that's enough. Outside the online social networks there is the real world with its power struggles which generate torrents of fake news and disinformation. They would push this shit even without ads.

So let them. This discussion pertains specifically to these social media sites. Let the dirtbags spread their misinformation and hate speech via mimeographed flyers printed in their basements. Who cares?

Re:It's simple

[PopeRatzo]

it was insulting the people speaking who don't want to put their names on their speech.

If you don't want to put your name on your speech, be my guest. There's just no requirement that a commercial social media site has to allow you to do so. Go scrawl your message in chalk on the sidewalk or whatever.

At the time the First Amendment was written, anonymous speech meant either a) word of mouth, in which case you still knew who was spreading the speech, or b) printing pamphlets. So go print your nazi propaganda on a pamphlet and tack them up to trees. It's your First Amendment right, after all.

Re:It's simple

[Obfuscant]

Wasting time arguing with me about something I didn't say. Just like always.

Re:It's simple

[PopeRatzo]

Wasting time arguing with me about something I didn't say. Just like always.

Now wait a minute. This is what you said, and I quote:

"You cannot have true freedom of speech without anonymous speech."

And my response is that if a social media site requires real identity, that does not affect your ability to have anonymous speech one bit.

This is your move, Obfuscant. You say something and then when someone challenges you, your response is always, "You're putting words in my mouth". The words you put in your own mouth are sufficient for this discussion. Find a new way to divert attention from your bullshit.

Re:It's simple

[Obfuscant]

And my response is that if a social media site requires real identity,

"True freedom of speech" has NOTHING to do with social media sites and their right to control their own hardware. You are arguing with me over something I DID NOT SAY, and your quote proves that. It was a response to the statement: "It seems rather hysterical when all these folks are screaming about their freedom of thought, yet won't put their name on it." That's an insult referring to the AUTHORS not wanting to put their names on what they say, and has nothing to do with what social media sites do or don't do. You pulled the quote out of context and then rant about how I object to you using it out of context. I expect nothing less.

You say something and then when someone challenges you, your response is always, "You're putting words in my mouth".

My response to YOU is that you are trying to put words in my mouth, because that's your normal method of operations. Like you are trying to do now when you argue with me about social media sites. It's an especially inane attempt, since I'm on record in this forum that social media sites are free to publish or not publish what they choose, because they own the hardware and it's not the government doing it. I am also on record as saying that calling such daily, normal operations as that "censorship" is stupid and wasteful, because it's like crying wolf.

The words you put in your own mouth are sufficient for this discussion.

For the discussion of the insult over people who are "hysterical" about having thoughts but not wanting to put their names on them, they are sufficient to dispel that insult. For the discussion you want to have, no, it has nothing to do with that, but you keep trying to pretend it does. Knock it off. You've been corrected on that misinterpretation at least twice now, so if you keep it up it will be exposed as deliberate.

I prefer #1357

[rsilvergun]

this one.

I don't think anyone is asking for the government to step in and police hate speech. Certainly nobody who has any pull. But for the same reason you don't see Alex Jones on Fox News you're not seeing him on Twitter and Facebook anymore: Advertisers.

Heck, guys doing silly videos about big chested anime girls are getting banned on Youtube left and right (eh hem... or so I've heard) because they're not advertiser friendly. Bloody Call of Duty streamers are having a tough time. A guy like Alex Jones isn't going to last. Especially with the veiled threats of violence (anyone remember the Pizza Gate shooter?).

If you want a free and open platform for video discourse there's an easy solution: National Public Access. Make a national Youtube. You'll have to pay for it though, and that means taxes. Otherwise the price you pay is your watered down, advertiser friendly content.

Re:I prefer #1357

[ShanghaiBill]

I don't think anyone is asking for the government to step in and police hate speech.

Plenty of people are asking for this. In fact, this is exactly what TFA is talking about.

If YouTube or any other private entity wants to set their own standards, or ban people at the request of advertisers, that is their right. But when the government steps in and sets the standards, that is dangerous, and is the direction we are headed.

Re:I prefer #1357

[Obfuscant]

I don't think anyone is asking for the government to step in and police hate speech.

Uhhh, government regulation is exactly that.

If you want a free and open platform for video discourse there's an easy solution: National Public Access. Make a national Youtube. You'll have to pay for it though, and that means taxes.

You want a government-censored "open" platform for discourse? You think a taxpayer-funded platform would be exempt from government regulation of content? What planet do you live on? Here on Earth you don't get freedom from government intervention by asking them to run the services.

Otherwise the price you pay is your watered down, advertiser friendly content.

Better an advertiser friendly pipeline than a government friendly one. It's easy to build a new pipeline with different advertisers, compared to building a new government.

Re:I prefer #1357

[Anonymous Coward]

Just by trying to institutionalize "hate speech" and "hate crimes", it's exactly what people are asking for. By putting such arbitrary concepts in to the legal framework, you're in effect calling for such acts. And it gets worse when anyone that's offended by something someone else says starts labeling it as "hate speech".

Re:I prefer #1357

[Anonymous Coward]

If YouTube or any other private entity wants to set their own standards, or ban people at the request of advertisers, that is their right.

I agree that that is their right. It is also our right to criticize YouTube and every other private entity for their actions.

Remember, free speech goes all ways. It is not a unidirectional I-can-say-things-but-if-you-say-things-back-you-are-violating-my-rights thing.

Re:I prefer #1357

[Applehu Akbar]

...getting banned on Youtube left and right.

Mostly right, apparently.

Re:I prefer #1357

[HeckRuler]

The German government has already stepped in and compelled facebook to police hate speech, and facebook is complying: https://www.cnet.com/news/facebook-weve-removed-hundreds-of-posts-under-german-hate-speech-law/

But you're probably focused on the USA. Facebook's CEO was recently on capital hill though, so we've got some scary quotes:

"Feinstein raised that threat explicitly after complaining about the industry's inability to thwart Russia's effort to influence the 2016 election, saying, “You bear this responsibility. You've created these platforms. And now they are being misused. And you have to be the ones to do something about it. Or we will.”" Of course that's voting interference and not hate speech. But once they're policing speech, hate/politics tomayto/tomawto.

I like Randall Munroe, he's a smart guy and pretty funny. But he misses the larger picture in that comic. He conflates free speech with the first amendment. Freedom of speech is a larger issue that's older than the US government. It was born out of the age of enlightenment and is a foundation of western civilization and liberalism. Free Speech is fundamental to a functional democracy, and many nations have laws giving people legal rights to that regard. But allowing others to use your severs as a platform for speech is a moral issue. You, as the owner, can choose to do whatever you want with your property. You can shut the server down, you can selectively purge, you can block people, whatever. Slashdot and Reddit are owned by companies and they can do so as they please. But I am free to simply abstain from them if they act like tyrannical fascist censoring jack-boot thugs. These are the modern-age public squares that so much of our laws are built around. It'd be nice we we could have some place where we could easily and quickly make public comment, but these are privately owned. Luckily the Internet makes dissent easy and if you don't like the level of censorship in a given forum, there are plenty out there to choose from. If these places start throwing people out the door based on ideological discrimination, (past a reasonable threshold, I mean, I'm not crazy) then I'll simply exit on my own. I feel no need to support immoral actions.

Re:I prefer #1357

[Crashmarik]

YouTube enjoys protections under the communications decency act, on the basis they are a neutral conveyance for others.

Well they sure as hell aren't. Same goes Facebook. If they want to keep their privileged status they should actually have to be neutral, only censoring illegal content.

Re:DMCA?

[Mr D from 63]

The dangerous path is the one where people form their opinions and ideals based almost entirely on Facebook or other social media.

Re:DMCA?

[Penguinisto]

It's a path they've been going down anyway for lots of reasons - revenue protection, corporate culture, the ideology(ies) of the majority of their moderators, engineers, etc. ... They'd just prefer to not have (the US) government pitch in and help tell them what to handle or reject.

Overall, the tech companies are correct in one regard, that being government not having a place in determining what should and should not be said on privately-owned platforms (no matter *what* is allowed within the bounds of current law in the company's country of residence.)

On the other hand, you'd think these companies would be used to it by now, considering their caving-in to demands of governments in China, India, various other EMEA nations, etc... each with their differing ideas of what free speech is or is not. I'm guessing they just don't want to the US government piling on? Dunno... they were more than eager to do it for other governments, if for no other reason than to boost growth/profits, so...

Re:Whoever owns the server, owns the speech

[ShanghaiBill]

If FaceBook has hate speech on it, then why not raid the offices where the servers are hosted?

Or we could keep the Constitution, and people could, you know, grow some thicker skin.

Your desire to be protected from offense does not trump the right of others to speak.

As a private entity, Facebook has a right to police hate speech as they see fit. The government has no right to force them to do so, by "raiding offices" or otherwise.

Re:Translation: we make $ off of h8

[Anonymous Coward]

Freedom is tolerating people (and groups of people) you don't like. If you don't believe in freedom for your most hated, ultimately you don't believe in freedom for yourself.

Psychopathy is Not A Right

[BrendaEM]

You have no right to prepare an assault on other people.

Re:Translation: we make $ off of h8

[Anonymous Coward]

That sounds like hate speech to me.. congratulations, by your logic you must now be censored.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[Obfuscant]

Second, people who are trying to stop nazis will never be as bad as the nazis. It's an immutable truth.

No, the immutable truth is that the ends do not justify the means.

If you are a "political group" that promotes genocide,

Last I knew, having an unpopular opinion was not quite as bad as someone killing a person who has an unpopular opinion. Maybe you live in a different universe than those of us in the US do.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[Anonymous Coward]

Lolwut? Not all nazis promote genocide, what about the moderate nazis?

Re:Nazi faggots will be brutally murdered

[rickb928]

Do you not get it?

Sure, when they come for your enemies, you cheer. Or just sit still and let them crush your enemies,

And then they come for you. Because they come for everyone, sooner or later.

No, no, no, in the US at least we do not want the government to either decide what is hate speech and shut down those who they claim spew it, nor do we want the government to charge corporations with the responsibility and authority to do so. We're stuck with corporations deciding what they will or will not publish or permit, but if they exercise that control they are, perhaps, taking responsibility, and we can expect them to be responsible. Perhaps.

Ads are not the issue. Content, speech is the issue. Whatever the Daily Stormer is, or Infowars, or the others, they are being censored. If that's OK with you, do let us know which of your favorite sources would similarly be no great loss to you if it were silenced. Sooner or later, one will, if you will not defend the right.

Re:DMCA?

[ShanghaiBill]

considering their caving-in to demands of governments in China, India, various other EMEA nations, etc... each with their differing ideas of what free speech is or is not.

So you are saying that since China, and Saudi Arabia force companies to censor content, then it is okay for America's government to do the same? If not, then what are you trying to say?

Companies are obligated to obey the law. This is not a debate about what companies should do, but about what governments should do. Governments have an extremely poor track record of benignly controlling what people hear and read.

Re: yeah because...

[Anonymous Coward]

If a crime is committed report it to the police. If not stfu and take the good wit the bad.

Disinformation isn't the problem

[DarkOx]

The fact is there are political movements on both sides the liberal / conservative aisle in American that actively target, and encourage low information voters.

Few things make me as angry as hearing people say how important it is to exercise your right to vote! No! that is not important and it might not even be desirable. Voter turnout for its own sake is stupid. That you have the right to vote is important; your exercise of it is only important if its important to you.

If an issue is on that ballot that affects you or people you care about; yes you should go vote. If you are interested in the political topics that are likely to be decided in part by a candidate in the next term of office enough to take the time to get facts from multiple sources with different perspectives or policy agenda and develop a considered opinion - by all means your input is valuable go vote.

Don't however vote because Dady allways said go vote for all the $PARTY candidates or because some teacher said blah blah are evil! or whatever. You don't have to vote in every election on a ballot either! Seriously if you are so uninformed that seeing a friggin MEME drives your opinion do us all and probably yourself in the long run a favor and stay home!

The problem is not that some foreigners run ads its that so many Americans put less thought into casting their ballot than they do in their breakfast order. Sorry not voting does not make you a good citizen; informed voting might.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[squiggleslash]

Now hold on. Who is proposing killing people with unpopular opinions?

Pope's right incidentally. You might not like it but "People advocating Genocide" are way worse, like, by a million orders of magnitude, than "People advocating privately owned public forums ban people who advocate genocide."

Re:Whoever owns the server, owns the speech

[ShanghaiBill]

The government absolutely has a right to raid or detain if probable cause of a crime is shown to a judge.

Speaking is not a crime.

Here is the 1st amendment of the United States Constitution: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Pay particular attention to the phrase "no law".

agree but ...

[originalGMC]

Not the big tech responsibility to police hate speech. More easy to flag it and display the address/phone numbers of haters, or better yet, just delete facebook source code. Last one probably the best / most humane option.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[lgw]

First, Joe, Facebook banning The Daily Stormer has absolutely nothing to do with the First Amendment. Not even in the most remote, tangential way. Nothing at all.

The SCOTUS has previously ruled that First Amendment protections apply to company property if access to that company property is needed to reach people. Company towns can't block access to people with a religious or political message to distribute.

Second, people who are trying to stop nazis will never be as bad as the nazis. It's an immutable truth.

The Communists killed 20x as many people as the Nazis. Objectively, Stalin was roughly 8 times as bad as the Nazis.

Also, there's something wrong with saying "We can do anything to $GROUP because nothing can be as bad as $GROUP". After all, that's exactly what Hitler said about the Jews.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[DarkOx]

people who are trying to stop nazis will never be as bad as the nazis

Are you sure - Stalinist Russia was at one point trying to stop the Nazi's those in power in that era did some pretty; dare I say equally awful things to groups like Roma, homosexuals, various Protestant sects, Polish people...

No I think its very possible to be anti-Nazi and no better than a Nazi..

logic miss

[hdyoung]

Autocratic regimes have been shaping conversation on the internet according to their whims for years. This guy can't argue that there's some sort of slippery slope here to slide down. The bad actors are already at the bottom. A better argument would be that we simply don't want to go there ourselves.

I'm a firm believer that there's a solution here. We can design something that allows individual free speech but shuts down the nation-state-sponsored tech-based misinformation campaigns eg Russia. Myanmar-type stuff could be shut down pretty selectively too, sovereign governments using Facebook to orchestrate mass murder and ethnic cleansing. Facebook knows about all this stuff. No doubt in my mind. I'm pretty sure that violates something in the TOS, meaning they can shut it down any minute they like. Their executives are sitting there, watching it happen in almost real time. They just don't want to deal with it. Bad for business doing anything that depresses revenue.

The problem is that the federal government is the only entity that can solve this. Business doesn't police itself. Companies don't make decisions based on morality. The only actor with the authority to reign this in is the government through policy, laws, rules and regulation. But nowadays most people have been convinced that any government regulation is the first step to a dystopia. Instead, we allow Facebook to pull a few extra percent of profits catering to places like Myanmar and Russia. Oh, well - at least my retirement account gets a slight boost.

Who?

[rsilvergun]

specifically who is asking the US Government to regulate speech on Facebook?

Now, there are Senators who want to regulate Disclosure, but that's not speech. If the Russians want to run pro-Trump adverts let them. But they need to register as foreign agents.

So by all means, show me somebody more credible than a /. poster who is asking the government to regulate speech on Facebook.

Re:Who?

[ShanghaiBill]

specifically who is asking the US Government to regulate speech on Facebook?

40% of Americans want more government regulation of speech.

But they need to register as foreign agents.

Here is the first amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Please note that it says "no law". It doesn't say "no law except for unregistered foreigners".

show me somebody more credible than a /. poster who is asking the government to regulate speech on Facebook.

You are moving the goalposts. Why does someone have to be "credible" to favor restrictions on speech? The vote of a non-credible person counts the same as yours.

Re:Who?

[AmiMoJo]

What was the justification used for laws regulating speech on radio and TV? Clearly they found some way around the 1st Amendment rule.

Re:Who?

[Gravis Zero]

Please note that it says "no law". It doesn't say "no law except for unregistered foreigners".

And yet one cannot make death threats to others. The reason is that it infringes upon my rights. The same can be said for unregistered foreign agents.

Re:Who?

[ShanghaiBill]

What was the justification used for laws regulating speech on radio and TV? Clearly they found some way around the 1st Amendment rule.

The justification was that the airwaves are a limited resource, owned by the government, and licensed to operators based on them providing a "public service". Since obscenity is not a public service, it was banned by regulation.

Many people believe that these regulations are unconstitutional, and the courts have repeatedly trimmed them back.

Re:Who?

[ShanghaiBill]

The same can be said for unregistered foreign agents.

How do the words of an unregistered foreigner infringe on your rights?

How would your rights be infringed differently if they were "registered"?

Why would the same words not infringe your rights if they were spoken by an American citizen?

Re:Who?

[Gravis Zero]

How do the words of an unregistered foreigner infringe on your rights?

I have the right to be protected from the subversive force of foreign governments. One of the central roles of government is to protect it's people.

How would your rights be infringed differently if they were "registered"?

There are multiple ways but just knowing someone is working on behalf of a foreign government is enough to make it worthwhile.

Why would the same words not infringe your rights if they were spoken by an American citizen?

If the words were their own then it would be their own motives at play, not those of a foreign government. It should be needless to say but foreign agents are not looking out for the good of the American people, so they are going to say different things or at least do so in different volumes. It's not like they act like just any ordinary US citizen either, they are here to do a job.

Re:Who?

[ShanghaiBill]

I have the right to be protected from the subversive force of foreign governments.

Perhaps you should learn to be a discerning listener. If what they say makes sense, and is supported by evidence, then perhaps you could learn something. If not, then you should learn to discount what they say regardless of their citizenship.

Hillary's collusion with the DNC to undermine Bernie's campaign was first disclosed by foreigners. The Iran-Contra scandal was also first disclosed by foreigners. Do you really believe that Americans should have been "protected" from those facts?

One of the central roles of government is to protect it's people.

One of the central tendencies of government is to concentrate, hoard, and abuse power. You should think carefully about giving them the power to "protect" you from listening to "bad people".

Re:Who?

[AmiMoJo]

Interesting. So how about regulations on the use of the phone network? It's privately owned by heavily regulated, e.g. universal service requirements and the Do Not Call list. That would seem to be more relevant to regulating platforms like Facebook.

Re: Who?

[c6gunner]

I have the right to be protected from the subversive force of foreign governments. One of the central roles of government is to protect it's people.

So you think that, say, Mao's little red book should be banned in the USA?

If you honestly believe that it is the role of government to protect you from the thoughts and opinions of people in other nations ... you may as well see if North Korea is accepting immigration applications.

Re:Who?

[Gravis Zero]

Perhaps you should learn to be a discerning listener. If what they say makes sense, and is supported by evidence

You misunderstand because it's to protect us all. That means protecting the discerning listeners from the fools who will believe anything. Facts don't worry me, it's the fools who swallow lies whole and then regurgitate them regularly that worry me.

One of the central tendencies of government is to concentrate, hoard, and abuse power. You should think carefully about giving them the power to "protect" you from listening to "bad people".

Absolutely, which is why we the who is very specific and encoded in law.

Re: Who?

[Gravis Zero]

So you think that, say, Mao's little red book should be banned in the USA?

No, why would it be?

If you honestly believe that it is the role of government to protect you from the thoughts and opinions of people in other nations

Not at all. You seem to misunderstand what a foreign agent is.

Re:Who?

[nasch]

There are plenty of restrictions on speech though. Incitement to violence, fraud, defamation, false advertising. Free speech has never been absolute in the US, despite the wording of the first amendment. You may disagree with it, but that's how it is.

Re:Translation: we make $ off of h8

[Anonymous Coward]

Classical naivete. If you give government the power to determine what is acceptable and unacceptable speech, then you're screwed as soon as the other side wins an election.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[PopeRatzo]

Last I knew, having an unpopular opinion was not quite as bad as someone killing a person who has an unpopular opinion.

Promoting genocide is a little more than an "unpopular opinion".

Society gets to defend itself from monsters. We have experience with this, you know. Ask your parents.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[PopeRatzo]

The SCOTUS has previously ruled that First Amendment protections apply to company property if access to that company property is needed to reach people.

Not if there are other alternatives. I cannot force Breitbart to publish my 4,000 word essay praising Fidel Castro.

Let me type this slowly for you, lgw: Facebook banning The Daily Stormer has absolutely nothing - at all - to do with the First Amendment

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[Obfuscant]

Now hold on. Who is proposing killing people with unpopular opinions?

Your biggest worry should be that the Bear Jew is going to bring his 36" Hank Greenberg model Louisville slugger into sudden contact with your head and that you will fill your briefs with shit.

You might not like it but "People advocating Genocide" are way worse, like, by a million orders of magnitude, than "People advocating privately owned public forums ban people who advocate genocide."

The statement made was not that "people advocating bans are never worse than nazis", it was "Second, people who are trying to stop nazis will never be as bad as the nazis. It's an immutable truth." "Never" and "immutable" are very strong words.

That is a statement that the ends justify the means. Pope's "Bear Jew" trying to kill someone who thinks Jews are bad is an example of exactly the opposite. Those means are not justified by the ends; to claim otherwise is to create a civilization of lynch mobs and murder, as we each justify our killing of our neighbor based on his personal beliefs.

Re:Translation: we make $ off of h8

[Anonymous Coward]

If you can't provide a solid rebuttal counterargument to the position of "pedos, nazis, or communists" without resorting to censorship, then maybe your position isn't as valid as you think it is. Fix that first.

If they censor, make them liable

[Anonymous Coward]

These organizations already censor, directly and indirectly, political speech. That, in itself, should be enough to make them liable for contributing to the hate crimes that they tacitly allow. Either censor all or censor nothing. Censoring your political opponents but not hate speech is an untenable position.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[Obfuscant]

Promoting genocide is a little more than an "unpopular opinion".

Being a nazi doesn't mean you take actions to do illegal things. It means you have a political belief system that is unpopular in today's world, in most places. "Stopping nazis" doesn't limit itself to stopping illegal actions, it talks about that political belief system.

Society gets to defend itself from monsters.

Not by having "Bear Jew" go out and kill anyone he doesn't like.

Ask your parents.

I understand why you might want to use that ad hominem at this point, since you probably do ask your parents about all kinds of things. It is, after all, as simple for you as yelling up the stairs. Some of us, however, are grown ups and know how what limits society are supposed to have. And some of have lost our parents already, so see the patent insult in your attitude.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[lgw]

Not if there are other alternatives.

Indeed, but Breitbart has a far smaller reach than Facebook. I'm not sure Facebook has a de-facto monopoly over its space, with Snapchat being popular with the kids these days, but it's pretty big. At some point, it becomes quite a bit like a company town. I'd say YouTube is already there for random people sharing videos. Anyway, I think you see my point: it's not entirely isolated from the First Amendment.

The people living in that company town did leave from time to time, after all, but the dominant way you'd reach them is through the company's property. That meant the company couldn't block protected speech, and had to allow use of it's property for speech it didn't agree with (in this case, it was a Jehova's Witness, so it was also speech that annoyed everyone exposed to it).

The government does get to regulate monopolies, after all.

Re: banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are p

[Newton IV]

Progressives are after the 1st and the 2nd amendments. They are quite open about it, they do not hide it.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[HornWumpus]

True, but we had to take the worse one (Stalin) on second.

The GP is right but doesn't take it far enough, it is possible to be anti-Nazi and be _worse_ than a Nazi.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[PopeRatzo]

Indeed, but Breitbart has a far smaller reach than Facebook.

Why should that matter? If your theory about commercial properties and the First Amendment are true, does it matter how big a "reach" the company has?

I'm not sure Facebook has a de-facto monopoly over its space

Ah, when you refer to Facebook's "space", you build a trap for yourself. What exactly is Facebook's space? Are there other alternatives for reaching this space? Of course there are. They might not all be as convenient, or as easy to use, but that's not Facebook's fault now, is it? If you want to put in sufficient effort, you can reach the same "space" Facebook serves using other means.

The people living in that company town did leave from time to time, after all, but the dominant way you'd reach them is through the company's property. That meant the company couldn't block protected speech, and had to allow use of it's property for speech it didn't agree with (in this case, it was a Jehova's Witness, so it was also speech that annoyed everyone exposed to it).

So, what if I want to reach specifically the MAGA chuds who only get their news from Breitbart? What alternatives do I have if I want them to read my 4,000 word essay on Trump's tiny mushroom dick?

Sorry, lgw. There's no way out of this one. And even your "company town" apocryphal story is way off-target. There are gated communities all over the United States, and if I demand access to be able to come and ring doorbells there so I can share the good news about how crystals can bring enlightenment, they're going to laugh in my face at the gate and point to the "No Solicitation" sign.

By the way, the case you're referring to, about company towns and free speech, is Marsh v Alabama, from 1946. It has been cited several times as precedent in subsequent First Amendment cases (some including online speech) and it's been laughed out of court every single time.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[PopeRatzo]

True, but we had to take the worse one (Stalin) on second.

Now wait a minute there. We had to take on the more immediate threat first. Stalin was bad, but he hadn't exactly embarked on an active program of world domination at the time of WWII. Stalin wasn't invading our allies in Western Europe. You've got to take them as they come, thus, Fascists first.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[HeckRuler]

Facebook banning The Daily Stormer has absolutely nothing to do with the First Amendment. Not even in the most remote, tangential way. Nothing at all.

Both are free speech issues. The first amendment legally protects you from the US government silencing you. (They can still silence you, but you can, in theory, sue them afterwards). The ideals of free speech are supposed to protect you from others silencing you. The ideals are a moral issue rather than a legal one, but the two are related.

people who are trying to stop nazis will never be as bad as the nazis.

uuuuuhhhhh.... Stalin and Mao? Like... did you just pull a brain-fart on all history past operation barbossa when Hitler attacked Russia in June 1941?

Regardless of history, that sort of blind hatred and unwillingness to consider alternatives puts you in the running for bigotry. Please, look at the definition and then look at your stance on Nazis.

Your biggest worry should be that the Bear Jew is going to bring his 36" Hank Greenberg model Louisville slugger into sudden contact with your head and that you will fill your briefs with shit.

That sounds like a death-threat. But a silly one because you're assuming by Joe_Dragon is a Nazi. Come on dude, Inglorious Bastards is a good movie because the bad guys are promoting a rampantly violent one-sided propaganda film. (the in-movie one with the sniper. The one Hitler is applauding when the bomb goes off.) And it casts negative moral judgement on them for that. They are bad guys doing bad things, and this is most certainly a bad thing. Now consider that Tarantino made a rampantly violent one-sided propaganda film where a group go assassinate Hitler. ...Do you see the parallels? Is this too deep for you? I thought this was going to be a great movie for promoting introspection, but no, too many people failed to see the satire and bought into the film's face-value. I think it's like the Starship Troopers movie. A disturbing number of people don't realize it's satire.

Want to cut propaganda AND Facebook's power? Easy.

[jbeach]

>And he argues that the very people who say Facebook and Google are too powerful are giving them more power by insisting they do more to control hate speech and propaganda

Great! There's a simple solution:
Facebook can stop *selling their user data to hate and propaganda groups*, and "stop accepting ads* from hate speech and propaganda groups.
This way:
1. Facebook is being a vector for less bullshit
2. Facebook is *lessening* it's power
3. Hate groups and propagandists can still spread their vile bullshit through their own shitty websites. Their free speech rights are still secure.

Handled.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is when those "trying to stop the nazis" start calling everyone they disagree with "nazis" in order to justify silencing and shaming them.

The problem really isn't the less than 1% of the population that espouses some nazi ideals. The problem is those that want to silence people. The vast majority will see the self proclaimed nazis as lunatics and not allow any atrocities to take place. The problem is in accepting self righteous mobs that want to use bully tactics to control the narrative of main stream ideas. Accepting some bad ideas to linger is the price for ensuring everyone has freedom. Progress only happens when unpopular ideas with merit are allowed to percolate and gain traction.

Re:Whoever owns the server, owns the speech

[BringsApples]

You have a good point. But what if, rather than facebook, let's use youtube instead. Why not raid the offices of youtube?

And you have misunderstood my point. I don't think that anyone's offices should be raided because of free speech, but I do find it odd that if you're a huge empire, you won't get raided, regardless of what your servers allow/disallow. And this is because the government is more or less allowing these empires to self-regulate free speech.

Too Narrow

[Crashmarik]

Hate is newspeak for "right wing opinions," and when people call for censorship of 'hate' they basically want all right wing opinions to be censored. By labelling it 'hate' they can claim to be doing good, when in actual fact these pro-censorship individuals are the most dangerous and evil people in society.

Hate speech is anything that someone with pull doesn't want other people to think about.

It's not just right wing opinions, it's incorrect opinions of any kind or actual history.

Remember when Russia with Putin was going to be our besty ? When Hillary proclaimed the reset, and Obama told Medvedev he would have more room after the elections ?

Boom now it's back to Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia

Not dangerous. Expensive

[DogDude]

Facebook isn't concerned about the "danger". They'll do whatever their advertisers want. They're an advertising platform.

What they're worried about is having to employ actual humans to read all of the shit that gets dumped onto their network. They can only make money if the whole thing is relatively automated. To accurately and effectively police the platform, they're going to need a LOT of humans to do the work, since AI can't and won't be able to do it for a very long time, more than likely. Paying humans is significantly more expensive than just running some dumb "AI" algorithms".

They don't want to get involved because it'll break their business model.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[lgw]

Justice Black explained it better than I do. The key reason the SCOTUS ruled that First Amendment protection extended to forcing a company to provide access (in Marsh v Alabama) was:

It is clear that, had the people of Chickasaw owned all the homes, and all the stores, and all the streets, and all the sidewalks, all those owners together could not have set up a municipal government with sufficient power to pass an ordinance completely barring the distribution of religious literature. Our question then narrows down to this: can those people who live in or come to Chickasaw be denied freedom of press and religion simply because a single company has legal title to all the town? For it is the State's contention that the mere fact that all the property interests in the town are held by a single company is enough to give that company power, enforceable by a state statute, to abridge these freedoms.

We do not agree that the corporation's property interests settle the question. ...

Ownership does not always mean absolute dominion. The more an owner, for his advantage, opens up his property for use by the public in general, the more do his rights become circumscribed by the statutory and constitutional rights of those who use it. ... thus, the owners of privately held bridges, ferries, turnpikes and railroads may not operate them as freely as a farmer does his farm. Since these facilities are built and operated primarily to benefit the public, and since their operation is essentially a public function, it is subject to state regulation. And, though the issue is not directly analogous to the one before us, we do want to point out by way of illustration that such regulation may not result in an operation of these facilities, even by privately owned companies, which unconstitutionally interferes with and discriminates against interstate commerce.

Do you see the point the Justice is making in his opinion? If your business profits from public use of your property, you lose some control of that property. There's tons of precedent for this.

Because Facebook makes its money through providing a platform for members of the public to communicate with one another, it's a very close analogy. That's different from e.g. Amazon, which primarily provides access to buy from Amazon (a shopping mall is not bound by this ruling, see Lloyd Corp. v. Tanner, because of this distinction)

Breitbart is fundamentally different because it's a publisher not a platform, that is, it's not a venue by which members of the public reach other members of the public, to a meaningful degree (it does have a comments section, but that's obviously not the primary use of the site).

If you build a bridge on your land, but allow the public to use it (perhaps for a toll), you can't ban people form the bridge for constitutionally-protected reasons, even though it's your bridge on your land.

The justice concluded:

When we balance the Constitutional rights of owners of property against those of the people to enjoy freedom of press and religion, as we must here, we remain mindful of the fact that the latter occupy a preferred position. As we have stated before, the right to exercise the liberties safeguarded by the First Amendment "lies at the foundation of free government by free men," and we must in all cases "weigh the circumstances and . . . appraise the . . . reasons . . . in support of the regulation . . . of the rights."

He gets it, he's just a troll

[rsilvergun]

And now his post gets seen. As the saying goes, don't feed the trolls.

Re:I don't want a survey

[ShanghaiBill]

I want names.

Stop the goalpost shifting. You said that NOBODY wanted speech regulated. I provided a survey with evidence that over A HUNDRED MILLION Americans think it should be. The specific names of those millions is irrelevant, and you know it.

Your own article says:

An overwhelming majority of Americans believe that “it would be hard to ban hate speech because people can’t agree what speech is hateful

Keep reading. They think it will be hard to do, but a sizable minority think it should be done anyway. 40% think the government should have the power to silence people saying "Men are better at math than women".

Show me somebody who matters that wants to regulate hate speech through the government.

More goalpost shifting. First it was "nobody", then it was "nobody credible", then it was "nobody that can't be specifically named", now it is "nobody that matters".

Preferably someone on the left.

Why does that matter? Some progressives want to ban "hate speech". Even more conservatives want to ban disrespect to the flag. It is an infringement on free speech either way.

Anyway, since you asked, here are a few specific people that have advocated government regulation of online speech:
1. Larry Kudlow, advisor to Donald Trump
2. Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce
3. Kevin Knight, former Facebook executive
4. Ro Khanna, California congressional representative

I now await your objection that these people "don't matter" or that I didn't list all 120 million.

The debate is wrong.

[SuricouRaven]

The nature of this debate misses the point.

Firstly, there is always going to be some level of censorship on social networks. Otherwise there are just too many trolls who would think it utterly hilarious to find pages for children's party entertainers and flood with with niche-fetish pornography, plus there are a few types of material which anger people so greatly that there is no option but to ban it - the exact list depending upon country, and usually enforced by law. So the debate is not about if censorship should be permitted, but about the extent and about who gets to decide.

Nor is all censorship equivalent. There are many parties, many ways and many reasons. In the case of social networks, commercial concerns are a big factor - they exist to make money, and some sorts of material are just not profitable. If your posts offend a group of people, insult a religion, contain too much profanity, contain anything relating to sex or advocate criminal acts then advertisers are not going to want their adverts appearing next to it, which means the network is going to want to discourage the production of this material. They may not ban it, but they have other means - they can rank it lower in searches, or demonetise as youtube does.

On the political side, there is what could be seen as a tidy symmetry - left and right both call for censorship, but of different material, and both then accuse the other of supporting censorship. The left might get horrified at hate speech, but they can't beat the right when it comes to sensitivity to 'indecency' - a category that goes far beyond just pornography.

Personally, if I were drafting legislation, I'd focus on accountability. Allow social network operators to censor as they see fit - but every time they decide to pull a post, make sure they have a duty to notify the poster specifying the reason for the action, and a reference number allowing them to review the audit records for the decision. If you have to have censorship, do it right.

Re: Shithole Country Loves Nazis

[Anonymous Coward]

America is based on the idea that you have the right to be stupid. People who have a problem with stupidity aren't welcome here. And by preserving the right to be stupid, we also preserve the right to be smart. OTOH if you infringe the right to be stupid, then you sometimes accidentally infringe the right to be smart. That's way worse than being stupid.

The internet is not a EU/China political project

[AHuxley]

Would US big tech please return to US 1st Amendment freedoms and stop trying to curate the internet to conform with the internal politics of EU and Communist China.

Return to allowing the US freedom to have an open press able to report and publish.
For people to be able to comment and link.
Let people online comment on political news as part of using their own social media account.
They are posting links they found interesting. Adding comments, art, cartoons. Its their own creativity and content. Something social media invited users to do as an open platform to connect users and sell ads.
The freedom to assembly online and petition government policy.
The freedom to speak and not be banned after speech due to political comments.
Its the users who are doing the publishing, its their own words, thoughts and political content. Users who spent years posting their ideas, creative art and comments.
Their comments on politics, bad movie scripts, history, art, culture, news, international events. Something people in the USA have the freedom to do.

When social media becomes a full time "publisher" then it can set its own domestic party political and internal publishing standards for its own staff.

Your users are not your workers, they not your staff. They do not have to follow the bands set domestic party political agenda.
They have a right to comment, link, create, post, question, be political on any topic they want. Users got invited onto open social media for their content.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[lgw]

It's not. People on Facebook are not "the public" who are just happening through. Each of them has had to register for an account and agree to Terms of Service, and every time they visit they must log in with credentials. It's much more of a private club (albeit a large one) than a public square.

Nah, that doesn't fly at all. Facebook could not ban black people from using its service. It's open to any member of the public who cares to sign up, even though there are some rule, no different from the toll bridge example from the case. "Private club" is very narrowly construed when it comes to protecting constitutional rights, as it should be.

Spam is not (generally) political or religious speech, which is a relevant here.

A key point in Cyber Promotions v. America Online was that AOL wasn't any sort of monopoly. The opinion pointed this out several times: that AOL does not by itself have enough control of "internet access" to deny it's users the ability to communicate with Cyber Promotions. I think it's a different story if we're talking about a modern ISP with a local monopoly.

That's why I think it matters whether Facebook is effectively a monopoly (and BTW I think it's borderline and unclear whether it is.)

Re:Nazi faggots will be brutally murdered

[rickb928]

Project Choke Point is the model. We do need for government to stop talking like this, and then to start talking to corporations like they also need to stop being so evil.

The reality is that while governments are monopolies of their own making, more or less, and we can vote and vote and maybe get what we want, but corporations serve their profits, and can be even more entrenched. Competition is the answer, maybe.

It's best to keep government out of this though, as they will change the rules and own this.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[PopeRatzo]

Nah, that doesn't fly at all. Facebook could not ban black people from using its service.

And neither could any private club. But a private club can require that everyone show ID and agree to a list of house rules. And, they can decide when you have violated their terms of service and kick you the fuck out.

So should we end the mod system on /.?

[rsilvergun]

Should ISP spam filters be banned?

If your complaint is government enforced censorship I don't know of anyone, left or right, advocating for that (maybe a few AC trolls on /.). So far it's the major players policing their own networks, almost completely for the sake of keeping them advertiser friendly (with a side order of "We're afraid one of these guys is going to incite violence and we'll get sued").

I keep saying this, but if we want a free platform nobody can get banned from the solution is easy: National Public Access. Have the government build a site anyone can post video to. Then if somebody gets banned for anything besides a crime then it really will be a first amendment issue.

Backdoor censorship

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

The big tech companies want to offer a place free of horrible stuff, while at the same time not developing a reputation for censorship.

I don't know if they can do both. Worse (and this is the problem with governmenr regulation) they have to try to avoid "regulation by raised eyebrow" where a regulator (driven by some in Congress) might look the other way, "too big corporation-wise", as long as they crush wild, nasty viewpoints.

This is a regular concern for radio and TV stations as they approach licensing renewals -- did they reign in some of their political shows?

Except you dont know what hate speeh is

[Anonymous Coward]

Its not "I don't like someone", its "Kill the president! Bomb the infidels! Praise be Allah!". etc.

Since you don't know what hate speech IS, your opinions on it are informed by what you want to be true, and what you want to be true is you to be able to say kill the president, etc.

Of course not YOUR party's president, only those evil ones for the other party.

Because you're a massive hypocrite.

Re: DMCA?

[c6gunner]

You're supposed to be a responsible, intelligent human being, who understands that every source will have some bias. You're supposed to be capable of, and interested in, checking multiple sources in order to try and get a balanced perspective which can better inform your opinion and lead to a more nuanced understanding of the subject.

That's not easy, though, so most people just end up isolating themselves in an ideological bubble which reinforces what they want to believe.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[lgw]

And neither could any private club.

I think we're talking about different things here. You seem to be talking about a nightclub, a "private club" as distinct from a "public house". That distinction isn't important in most states (I think there's a few where you can stills serve alcohol to 18-year-olds if it's a "private club".)

You can form a club that excludes any protected class you like. You can form a club open only to members of your own family, or just the 6 guys you went to high school with, or just your friends from church, or anything like that. That's the right of free association. But, as I said, it's construed very narrowly.

A private club can require that everyone show ID and agree to a list of house rules. And, they can decide when you have violated their terms of service and kick you the fuck out.

That applies to any club at all, not just a "private club". But, as the SCOTUS said, that right is not absolute. The more you're providing public access, the more your rights as an owner are trumped by the people's constitutional rights. If you want your house rules to include "no black people", you probably need to all know one another before forming the club. If you want your house rules to ban certain political speech, you can't be a common carrier.

There's a spectrum of "how public" vs "owner's rights", and the argument is about where the big social media companies fall on that spectrum. But you can't argue that "FB is private, so it can can have any rules it wants", as that's clearly false.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[squiggleslash]

Your biggest worry should be that the Bear Jew is going to bring his 36" Hank Greenberg model Louisville slugger into sudden contact with your head and that you will fill your briefs with shit.

Claiming it might happen is not the same as advocating it.

The statement made was not that "people advocating bans are never worse than nazis", it was "Second, people who are trying to stop nazis will never be as bad as the nazis. It's an immutable truth." "Never" and "immutable" are very strong words.

I was following on from your logic, but yes: genocidal people are worse than people who try to stop genocidal people. I think that's a 100% reasonable statement to make. Perhaps not on Slashdot where we seem to be overridden by people who feel that Nazis get a bad rap, and anyway we shouldn't call Hitler a Nazi because don't you know that's why he became a Nazi because liberals and jews called him one checkmate, but in the real world, where real people live, yes, people who stop genocidal maniacs (and are defined as such) are better than people who are genocidal maniacs.

. Pope's "Bear Jew" trying to kill someone who thinks Jews are bad is an example of exactly the opposite.

Pope's Bear Jew is a reference to a character in the Quentin Tarantino movie Inglorious Basterds, a character who literally kills genocidal Nazis. Is he a bad person? Maybe, maybe not. But is he worse than than the people he kills, whom he kills while they actively take part, at some level or other, in propping up and enabling the slaughter of millions of Jews while promoting one of the worst wars in recorded history?

I'd say he's not worse than them, no.

Most discussed on mobile version

[Zorpheus]

... and in the desktop version it does not even show up under "Most discussed".
And in the mobile version the whole discussion is invisible.
Looks like two major bugs in the webpage, or is just my account messed up?

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[JesseMcDonald]

It is clear that, had the people of Chickasaw owned all the homes, and all the stores, and all the streets, and all the sidewalks, all those owners together could not have set up a municipal government with sufficient power to pass an ordinance completely barring the distribution of religious literature.

If the owners of all the homes, stores, streets, and sidewalks were unanimous in their opposition to the distribution of religious literature, they could each ban the distribution of such literature on their own property, which the effect that such literature could not be distributed anywhere inside the town. Anyone who violated that rule would be trespassing on someone's private property. This talk of forming a government and passing ordinances is nothing but a distraction—a municipal government doesn't own all the property inside the city limits, and ordinances are not rules set by the property owner.

Our question then narrows down to this: can those people who live in or come to Chickasaw be denied freedom of press and religion simply because a single company has legal title to all the town?

But they are not being denied freedom of the press or religion. What is being denied is access to someone else's property. If they want to exercise their freedom of the press or religion they are welcome to do so on their own property. They knew about these rules and agreed to them as a condition of entering the town. Only their acceptance of the rules set by the property owner grants them the right to be there.

The more an owner, for his advantage, opens up his property for use by the public in general, the more do his rights become circumscribed by the statutory and constitutional rights of those who use it. ... thus, the owners of privately held bridges, ferries, turnpikes and railroads may not operate them as freely as a farmer does his farm.

This is nothing more or less than the taking of private property for public use without compensation. If the government doesn't care for the restrictions a property owner sets for the use of their own private property the government can very well buy the property from them on behalf of the public at a fair market price acceptable to both parties.

Re:banning The Daily Stormer is bad as they are po

[lgw]

If the owners of all the homes, stores, streets, and sidewalks were unanimous in their opposition to the distribution of religious literature, they could each ban the distribution of such literature on their own property, which the effect that such literature could not be distributed anywhere inside the town.

No: they couldn't ban it on the road (or sidewalk in most states), or public areas like in front of the post office. That's government land, in this example.

And that's the point: a street used just to get to your house, and your house alone, has different rules than a street used by the public, even if that "public" is just the neighborhood. You'll find quite a few laws treat the two differently.

If you build a road on your property, but it's open for people moving between two public roads (e.g., lots of toll roads), you're restricted just as if it were a government-owned road. You lose some of the ownership rights you might otherwise have had because you opened it to the public.

But they are not being denied freedom of the press or religion. What is being denied is access to someone else's property. If they want to exercise their freedom of the press or religion they are welcome to do so on their own property.

Well, it turns out that the protection for First Amendment rights trump ownership rights in some cases. Thank goodness. It is pretty narrow though: it doesn't apply to e.g. a shopping mall.

It's debatable where on this spectrum Facebook lies, but if you're arguing that the tradeoff between ownership rights and constitutionally-protected rights of the public doesn't exist, you're in fantasy land. You do have to serve black people in your privately-owned bar, and you do have to bake that gay wedding cake in the bakery that you own on your land, even though you may have other rules.

This is nothing more or less than the taking of private property for public use without compensation. If the government doesn't care for the restrictions a property owner sets for the use of their own private property the government can very well buy the property from them on behalf of the public at a fair market price acceptable to both parties.

Nice libertarian fantasy there, but it has little to do with the USA I live in.