Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms • Hacker News Board

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#511

Post by pinkfoot » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:16 PM UTC

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #192

throwanem wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should that be clear? Judging them by their actions rather than their words, it's quite plain that "free speech extremists" are no such thing, except inasmuch as it applies to them. They demand to be free to say whatever they like, and they demand everyone else be required to listen while they do it.

They ARE free to say whatever they like; their problem is that they then have to face the consequences. I mean I can say whatever I want on this platform as well, but if I cross a line my posts will be hidden and eventually my account blocked. And that is fair, it's what I agreed to, and not only that but it's morally just. The free speech extremists confuse freedom of speech with protection from consequences. Intere…

> They ARE free to say whatever they like; their problem is that they then have to face the consequences.

This is the definition of free speech that North Korea likes.

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#512

Post by mhucka » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:22 PM UTC

zarkov99 wrote: post #231

tuna-piano wrote: post #133

There's an unsolved conundrum I haven't heard mentioned yet. After the 2016 election, there was a thought that too much false information is spreading on social media. This happens in every country and across every form of communication - but social media platforms seem particularly worrysome (and is particularly bad with Whatsapp forwards in some Asian countries). So what should the social media companies do? Censor…

Its a big problem. On the one hand social media companies are utterly unsuitable for the role of arbitrers of truth. All they do is enforce the fashionable, safe truths, which might end up not being safe or true. On the other hand there is definitely disinformation out there, carefully crafted to achieve specific goals. We need a sort of peer review for social media, some sort of trust network that you can use to ass…

In the case of Facebook at least, there is evidence they knowingly allow their algorithms to promote divisive content: https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-knows-it-encourages-di...

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#513

Post by zarkov99 » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:25 PM UTC

mhucka wrote: post #512

zarkov99 wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a big problem. On the one hand social media companies are utterly unsuitable for the role of arbitrers of truth. All they do is enforce the fashionable, safe truths, which might end up not being safe or true. On the other hand there is definitely disinformation out there, carefully crafted to achieve specific goals. We need a sort of peer review for social media, some sort of trust network that you can use to ass…

In the case of Facebook at least, there is evidence they knowingly allow their algorithms to promote divisive content: https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-knows-it-encourages-di...

Of course they do, they are a for profit company not some enlightened beings we should delegate our sense making to. The whole social media revolution is a net negative and human culture has not caught up to this yet.

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#514

Post by techntoke » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:27 PM UTC

dathinab wrote: post #452

Finnucane wrote: post #391

It's pretty obvious that DT is not going to shut down the very platforms he relies on for his political survival. Even he's not that stupid. Nor does he have any real regulatory authority that could be employed that wouldn't also bite him back. So this is just him trying to bully the platforms into letting him say whatever without being exposed to any criticism or being called out for bullshit.

Sure, but such bullying is rather dangerous. Normally such threads come from people which are somewhat in the process or trying to de-mantel a democracy. So a US president saying something like that is quite worrying even if his intentions are not to undermine the US democracy.

That is exactly his intentions. He is an idiot for using Twitter in the first place. He should have been advocating for a decentralized Internet where his followers could live in a bubble catered to them.

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#515

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:28 PM UTC

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #247

jdhn wrote: post #124

Putting aside concerns about overreach government powers, would ending social media as we know it really be a bad thing?

I could do without Facebook and Twitter, but what counts as social media? Does Stack Exchange count? Hacker News? Email?

[deleted]

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#516

Post by brodouevencode » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:28 PM UTC

jjuel wrote: post #27

It is crazy to see how well he knows his base and how to get them to rally close to an election. Making them think everything is a liberal bias against them, and if they don't vote for his big government agenda they will receive a big government agenda. This is just one more way for him to get his base to believe everything he says versus people who actually prove what he says is a lie. He wants state run media and s…

Welcome to politics, where the rhetoric is made up and truth doesn't matter.

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#517

Post by yc-kraln » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:32 PM UTC

bilbo0s wrote: post #328

OliverJones wrote: post #104

A "conservative" government threatens to shut down private businesses. Wait, what? Maybe the billionaire hotel magnate from New York should arrange a leveraged buyout of the business he doesn't like, and shut it down when he owns it.

Just to distance myself from the current "conservative" establishment, I would argue that their views are not conservative so much as they are a relatively newer form of fascism. Typically with fascism there is nationalism that prioritizes the citizens of the nation above all else, but with this new "conservatism" in the US, the nationalism is a bit more race-based. But other than that it's much more close to fascism…

Ethnofascism or Ethnopluralism...

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#518

Post by brodouevencode » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:32 PM UTC

qubex wrote: post #22

I’m an outsider (not American, don’t live in America) so I’m almost not entitled to have an opinion on the matter, but it always strikes me as fairly odd when people of one persuasion or another rail against the ‘bias’ that they perceive against them in one circumstance or another (including media coverage). Of course people see bias against them. It’s classical confirmation bias: every time something goes their way,…

This is a great perspective.

Americans get too bogged down in the muck to look up to realize what's actually going on around them or be aware of just how hypocritical they are.

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#519

Post by jonny_eh » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:34 PM UTC

exabrial wrote: post #507

ojnabieoot wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Literally hundreds of people, including children, have died drinking bootleg alcohol being hawked as a COVID-19 cure. It is simply not the case that “any reasonable adult” knows your joke is a joke - that may be the case in developed countries where people have reliable access to actual doctors. But in developing countries this has been a serious problem. Misinformation kills innocent people. A harsh no-tolerance pol…

Completely disagree. My audience, my friends and family, are all educated reasonable adults.

There's no way for a moderator to know all that, and take it into account.

Re: Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

#520

Post by AnimalMuppet » Wed, May 27, 2020, 4:36 PM UTC

ianleeclark wrote: post #75

falcolas wrote: post #54

Free speech is not just an American constitutional right; many countries throughout the world consider free speech to be a human right. So, yeah, many of us get a bit worked up when people are kicked off platforms, because they are being silenced, sometimes to the point of being shut out of the modern internet entirely (when their rights to a DNS address are comprehensively removed). Hate speech and lies are terrible…

> So, yeah, many of us get a bit worked up when people are kicked off platforms, because they are being silenced, sometimes to the point of being shut out of the modern internet entirely (when their rights to a DNS address are comprehensively removed). Why is it bad that were refusing to let something like stormfront operate in polite society? Your free speech absolutism is dangerous. You can't debate an inherently b…

You debate an inherently bad-faith interlocutor, not to win the debate with them, but to win the audience. The thing is, something like stormfront is out there, whether twitter or whoever carries them or not. I'd like their drivel to be clearly exposed as drivel, and clearly understood to be drivel by everyone, so that when they get exposed to it in some unexpected way (they follow an innocent-looking link or whatever), then they take one look, think "Oh yeah, that garbage. Yeah, they make it sound good, but it's still trash." That happens when the stuff is publicly challenged and refuted, not when it's hidden away.