Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media • Hacker News Board

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#31

Post by kodablah » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:45 PM UTC

clarkevans wrote: post #20

jewelthief91 wrote: post #6

I doubt this would help. Judging by my Facebook feed Americans are perfectly capable of vicious, polarized discourse without foreign influence. In fact this may backfire as it would allow the hateful in society to have more of a right to preach on these platforms as no one would be able to accuse them of being foreign trolls. Its probable that this level of discourse is here to stay and that the previous elevated, co…

Is there something that can be done about our polarized discourse without trampling over our civil rights? I think this is necessary dialogue.

> Is there something that can be done about our polarized discourse without trampling over our civil rights?

Actively and without consequence? No. Simply maintain self control and realize that the more dialog is open, instant, and global, the more it is subject to the loudest and most manipulative. Not necessarily ideal, but better than alternatives.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#32

Post by Kenji » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:47 PM UTC

Teknoman117 wrote: post #16

I think we have to be careful about making companies liable for everything their users upload. While companies like Google and Facebook have the computational capacity to scan everything that they consume, what about startups? It shouldn't mean companies aren't liable for failing to remove content deemed illegal, but having it be illegal for any single thing to slip between the cracks seems harsh.

Don't you get it? That's precisely the plan. Facebook and Google want this to be the law because then simple people cannot even host a forum anymore.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#33

Post by wesleytodd » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:47 PM UTC

I think the faster we make companies liable for the content on their servers the better. Why? Because I want distributed/federated data to become an actual priority to these companies. I want it to hit their bottom line when they get sued for content uploaded to their servers so they consider keeping the data owned by the user who generated it.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#34

Post by cirgue » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:54 PM UTC

slg wrote: post #18

At this point it seems clear that individual companies have disincentives that prevent them from acting against these issue. Most people in the tech community are generally opposed to the government getting involved since the government is often slow to understand and react to technological changes. I would generally agree with them. However we have to stop sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that things th…

They will only have a disincentive to act when people are willing to leave toxic platforms, and people will only leave toxic platforms when there are viable alternatives.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#35

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:55 PM UTC

clarkevans wrote: post #20

jewelthief91 wrote: post #6

I doubt this would help. Judging by my Facebook feed Americans are perfectly capable of vicious, polarized discourse without foreign influence. In fact this may backfire as it would allow the hateful in society to have more of a right to preach on these platforms as no one would be able to accuse them of being foreign trolls. Its probable that this level of discourse is here to stay and that the previous elevated, co…

Is there something that can be done about our polarized discourse without trampling over our civil rights? I think this is necessary dialogue.

[deleted]

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#36

Post by nybble41 » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:57 PM UTC

User23 wrote: post #10

1996 wrote: post #7

What about freedom of speech, or freedom of press? The government shall make no law? I guess the convenient exception made by the FCC for regulating content shown on TV (OMG nudity!! censor this!!) will prove useful as a precedent. Sad.

Obscenity isn’t protected by the first amendment. Obviously there is disagreement over what is and isn’t obscene.

> Obscenity isn’t protected by the first amendment.

Right, I must've missed the "except for obscenity" clause. Oh wait, there isn't one... that's just something the courts made up out of thin air.

The freedom of speech includes all speech, even obscene speech. It is never appropriate to respond to speech with force.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#37

Post by kodablah » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:58 PM UTC

wesleytodd wrote: post #33

I think the faster we make companies liable for the content on their servers the better. Why? Because I want distributed/federated data to become an actual priority to these companies. I want it to hit their bottom line when they get sued for content uploaded to their servers so they consider keeping the data owned by the user who generated it.

Surely you realize that making data a liability reduces the ability for you and I to host it, not increases it. I understand you are against centralization of data, but you can't magically commoditize and distribute it via punishments. You'll only strengthen those that can take a hit. While it seems mathematically logical to say "well, if we make it less financially beneficial to have data, they won't have it" what happens in practice is "well, if we make it less financially beneficial to have data, nobody will have it". There are alternatives to decentralization that have less effect on smaller orgs.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#38

Post by shawn » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:59 PM UTC

wesleytodd wrote: post #33

I think the faster we make companies liable for the content on their servers the better. Why? Because I want distributed/federated data to become an actual priority to these companies. I want it to hit their bottom line when they get sued for content uploaded to their servers so they consider keeping the data owned by the user who generated it.

I’ve been working on that. It’s a hard problem, but emule works quite well. I propose something based on that: when you start a program, you advertise all the sha256’s of all the files you share. Whenever you need a resource, you send a request to the dht for its sha256. Anyone who has the file will opportunistically try to send it to you.

Since it’s a dht, there’s nothing to take down. And since it operates on sha256s of data, it’s implicitly secure. And it uses tor for the rendezvous, so it’s not possible to track who is requesting what, except by unique ID (which can just be a bitcoin wallet address you control).

The hard part is, what do you do about abuse? What if someone spams the network with bots that try to fulfill every request with bad data?

If anyone has research refs in this direction, I’d be grateful to read them. I’d also like to avoid a blockchain if possible, since it seems unnecessary for simple federated distributed data.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#39

Post by Kalium » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 9:59 PM UTC

clarkevans wrote: post #20

jewelthief91 wrote: post #6

I doubt this would help. Judging by my Facebook feed Americans are perfectly capable of vicious, polarized discourse without foreign influence. In fact this may backfire as it would allow the hateful in society to have more of a right to preach on these platforms as no one would be able to accuse them of being foreign trolls. Its probable that this level of discourse is here to stay and that the previous elevated, co…

Is there something that can be done about our polarized discourse without trampling over our civil rights? I think this is necessary dialogue.

Absolutely!

Is there something Congress should be doing? Perhaps it's not the thing for them to be involved in.

Re: Leaked white paper proposes U.S. Congressional regulation of social media

#40

Post by Kalium » Tue, Aug 07, 2018, 10:00 PM UTC

kodablah wrote: post #37

wesleytodd wrote: post #33

I think the faster we make companies liable for the content on their servers the better. Why? Because I want distributed/federated data to become an actual priority to these companies. I want it to hit their bottom line when they get sued for content uploaded to their servers so they consider keeping the data owned by the user who generated it.

Surely you realize that making data a liability reduces the ability for you and I to host it, not increases it. I understand you are against centralization of data, but you can't magically commoditize and distribute it via punishments. You'll only strengthen those that can take a hit. While it seems mathematically logical to say "well, if we make it less financially beneficial to have data, they won't have it" what h…

If anything, I think liability would be a forcing function that would strongly encourage centralization. Only those with deep pockets could afford it.