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Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

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Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#111

Post by TechBro8615 »

wbronitsky wrote: post #103
TechBro8615 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an entirely unsurprising result of eliminating reasonable discussion and rendering it professionally untenable to support the president. Welcome to the life of a conservative in tech. I'm pretty sure there are a lot of us, but I have no way of knowing for sure, because it's clear that speaking about our political beliefs can lead to negative repercussions in our career. Good luck getting a job or investment a…

I do not think we should make people who spread hate feel comfortable spreading that hate. The president is unequivocally spreading hate and inciting violence. He should not be able to do that when doing that is against the TOS of the site he is doing it on. Said another way, why does he get to incite violence on twitter, yet I do not? There is a distinct difference between expressing a political view, such as that w…

> I feel like this is a misreading of the situation.

I was referring to the quote from the article "that people who agreed with [Zuckerberg's decision] were afraid to speak out for fear of appearing insensitive," so I don't think it's a misreading of the situation. On the contrary, I'm expressing my lack of surprise, given my personal experience as a conservative in tech with a 98% liberal peer group. I am unable to talk freely about my political beliefs in the same way that, say, Biden or Bernie supporters are. I would be labeled a racist simply for agreeing with any republican point of view. Whereas I routinely see friends on Facebook getting hundreds of likes on statuses that call republican politicians "vile" or "scum."

As an aside, what's particularly frustrating is how many people assume or expect that I hold the same views as them when in casual conversation. Someone will bring up Trump as if it's a foregone conclusion that he's a racist sociopath and anyone who supports him is one too, and I just have to nod along and laugh with them, or find a way to change the subject, lest I be "outed" as some sort of violent extremist for supporting the president.

> The president is unequivocally spreading hate and inciting violence

Unequivocally? I think you could find a lot of people who disagree with this assessment of his words. Who's to decide what is "unequivocally" an incitement of violence?

> There is a distinct difference between expressing a political view, such as that we should have the government spend less money, and inciting random citizens to commit violent acts against a perceived enemy.

This is a strawman, because I haven't seen Trump "inciting random citizens to commit violent acts." Regardless, of course there is a difference between political speech and inciting violence. But who is to be the arbiter of it? Because from what I've seen, certain people on the left can twist almost anything outside of their agenda to fit their definition of "violence." As a contrived example, some on the left would be "offended" by the suggestion that "a country is not a country without a strong border," equating it to "locking kids in cages." Is it violence to advocate for strong borders and criminal consequences for illegal immigration? Or is it political speech? What about when the president says it?

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#112

Post by karatestomp »

supercanuck wrote: post #6
danielfoster wrote: post #2

So long as their speech remains legal, social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. It’s too easy to walk down a slippery slope where suddenly these sites have to regulate in accordance with whatever is the popular opinion of the day.

You know what would help. More alternatives. What if Instagram, WhatsApp, Youtube, etc were all still independent or there was interopability between Google Circles, Facebook and whatever else? Watch how fast Facebook would adapt and be monitoring news and trying to conform to the public opinion if they felt they needed to compete. The only reason we're in this position is because a reduction in real competition in t…

This is the real answer. Removing the incentives that discourage interoperability and common standards would help. This probably means regulating spying-centric advertising and related mass-data-gathering out of existence.

Twitter should be a protocol with many providers and many clients, not a restrictive service from a single provider. Ditto most of the rest.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#113

Post by philjohn »

danielfoster wrote: post #2

So long as their speech remains legal, social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. It’s too easy to walk down a slippery slope where suddenly these sites have to regulate in accordance with whatever is the popular opinion of the day.

Maybe platforms shouldn't allow politicians on there full stop.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#114

Post by wbronitsky »

TechBro8615 wrote: post #111
wbronitsky wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not think we should make people who spread hate feel comfortable spreading that hate. The president is unequivocally spreading hate and inciting violence. He should not be able to do that when doing that is against the TOS of the site he is doing it on. Said another way, why does he get to incite violence on twitter, yet I do not? There is a distinct difference between expressing a political view, such as that w…

> I feel like this is a misreading of the situation. I was referring to the quote from the article "that people who agreed with [Zuckerberg's decision] were afraid to speak out for fear of appearing insensitive," so I don't think it's a misreading of the situation. On the contrary, I'm expressing my lack of surprise, given my personal experience as a conservative in tech with a 98% liberal peer group. I am unable to…

> Trump as if it's a foregone conclusion that he's a racist sociopath

You are totally correct. I do think this. I have ample evidence that backs up my case as well. I think the quote "when they start looting, we start shooting" which was hidden by Twitter for inciting violence, is enough for me.

> This is a strawman, because I haven't seen Trump "inciting random citizens to commit violent acts."

I don't think we can have a real conversation because we disagree about the basic facts on the ground.

Trump, from my position, is clearly, repeatedly and blatantly pushing people to violence using Twitter. In fact, even Twitter thinks so.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#115

Post by s_y_n_t_a_x »

Traster wrote: post #80
lanevorockz wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry but you are incorrect. Platforms have protections while they act as a free and open forum. This protection ceases to exist the time you start fiddling with the content. Obviously, Terms of Service are there to filter the garbage out but any double standard can end up with your Platform credentials revoked and your business down the drain.

Your comment doesn't even slightly reflect the law. I don't know why people keep spreading this. Section 230(c): > No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider. Furthermore section 230 (c)(2) states: > any action voluntarily taken in good faith to restrict access to or availability of material th…

Yes, and the debate is whether or not the companies are acting in bad faith and abusing this 1996 law by selectively altering their users posts and presenting their information thus acting like a publisher.

Yes this is the current state, but the question is whether it's morally right and should we update it to reflect the current situation of the social media behemoths, this law was designed for small bulletin boards at the time.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#116

Post by bpyne »

TechBro8615 wrote: post #91
babesh wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no reason to give elected officials a free pass. It biases elections by giving them an even bigger microphone than the other people running. Apply the same standards to all.

A free pass on what exactly? This has gotten so crazy, I can’t believe people are protesting Facebook for not censoring a politician. Here’s an idea... if you don’t like what somebody writes online, don’t read it. Do people really think that censoring, or even annotating, the President’s words will change how people feel about them? Like someone is going to read Trump’s message, think “oh right, mail-in ballots could…

I think it's a good thing to hold public figures accountable. Politicians, in particular, need to be held accountable due to the large amount of influence they have on our society. When Twitter, for example, places a warning on a Tweet to warn readers that it contains provably false statements, it holds the Tweeter accountable and that is enough reason to do it regardless of the changing minds argument.

As far as changing minds goes, I think there's a swath of voters who sit in the political middle and they don't fact check. The swath is large enough that they can influence elections. It's critical to make sure they don't get influenced by politicians who make up facts on the spot.

A friend of mine and I commiserated last week about the difficulty of debating with people on political issues. We noticed that people can make up "facts" quicker than we can fact check. You would think that the onus would be on the person making an argument to provide proof. But that standard of argument is long gone. The proof seems to always be on the person who says, "No, I don't think that's right."

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#117

Post by tarkin2 »

kec wrote: post #50
danielfoster wrote: post #2

So long as their speech remains legal, social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. It’s too easy to walk down a slippery slope where suddenly these sites have to regulate in accordance with whatever is the popular opinion of the day.

The US president is the single most powerful person in the world. If he says "Hey $literally_any_media_outlet, I'd like to make a statement, want to swing by the rose garden in 20?" The media will fall over themselves to do so. I don't think you could come up with an example of someone who would be less harmed by being banned from social media than the potus. Even if for some reason you don't buy that, social media c…

Both facebook and twitter give the president something more than traditional media: retweets, engagement, reaction, analysis etc.

The whole 'the only good democrat is a dead democrat' and glorifying violence would have been much harder to do with traditional potus press statements.

Twitter and Facebook allow him to use these new tools, despite his tendency to incite violence. They help to enable him. And it's their choice. And they thus make his words much more effective.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#118

Post by specialist »

danielfoster wrote: post #2

So long as their speech remains legal, social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. It’s too easy to walk down a slippery slope where suddenly these sites have to regulate in accordance with whatever is the popular opinion of the day.

Facebook's defense is that they're just the pipes, like a telco, and can't be held liable for the content.

What is the free speech argument for automatic algorithmic recommenders?

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#119

Post by tarkin2 »

danielfoster wrote: post #2

So long as their speech remains legal, social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. It’s too easy to walk down a slippery slope where suddenly these sites have to regulate in accordance with whatever is the popular opinion of the day.

> So long as their speech remains legal

He incites violence.

Facebook and Twitter's tools give him a fuller engagement with the population.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#120

Post by Avicebron »

s_y_n_t_a_x wrote: post #115
Traster wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment doesn't even slightly reflect the law. I don't know why people keep spreading this. Section 230(c): > No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider. Furthermore section 230 (c)(2) states: > any action voluntarily taken in good faith to restrict access to or availability of material th…

Yes, and the debate is whether or not the companies are acting in bad faith and abusing this 1996 law by selectively altering their users posts and presenting their information thus acting like a publisher. Yes this is the current state, but the question is whether it's morally right and should we update it to reflect the current situation of the social media behemoths, this law was designed for small bulletin boards…

Yeah, at best it's an outdated law. At worst it's an excuse for companies with immense wealth and power to enforce their political will on millions if not billions of people. I would be fine if there was some remote form of competition at scale with these platforms, but no one can make an honest argument that these are not dominant players who are quickly pulling up the ladder behind them. We need to update our laws to reflect modern reality
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