Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store

Post by bumbledraven » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 3:47 PM UTC

kanox wrote: post #249

thomascgalvin wrote: post #169

> Like hate speech is bad and it’s not censorship if it’s not mandated by the government. To be fully accurate, this is absolutely censorship , but it's not a violation of anyone's First Amendment rights. People often conflate the two. We can argue about whether or not Google should ban certain opinions on their platform, or where the line should be drawn, but it is arguable that hey have the legal right to do so. An…

This definition of censorship is bad and must be changed. Large general-purpose platforms should be forced do distribute all content which is not otherwise illegal, and only perform removal based through the standard legal system.

Post by kanox » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 3:48 PM UTC

tenebrisalietum wrote: post #250

mc32 wrote: post #95

It always starts like that. People agree to very sensible things. Like hate speech is bad and it’s not censorship if it’s not mandated by the government. Eventually the definition of hate or whatever it is that’s offensive is very removed from the original meaning, and now we all bear the brunt of the sensible people who with best intentions wanted to make things better.

Kindly take this as a devils advocate post before you reflexively downvote. It looks like letting people say anything they want on major social media platforms is only having one major positive effect: a few advertising companies are becoming very rich. The negative effects include: - incited violence (gang-oriented gun crime in Chicago is often fanned by social media posts for example) - bad medical decisions (vacci…

Post by Aerroon » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 3:49 PM UTC

IntelMiner wrote: post #256

croes wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a clever trick. Make the medium you want to censor a private property than it's legal.

And yet. There's a certain "side" that wants to have that both ways Private companies can't censor "bad opinions" But private companies can also arbitrarily refuse service for say, making a "gay wedding cake" How is this disconnect rationalized?

Post by jakelazaroff » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 3:49 PM UTC

thelean12 wrote: post #258

jakelazaroff wrote: post #53

> Holy crap, google is apparently taking down all/most fediverse apps from google play on the grounds that that some servers in the fediverse engage in hate speech. Good thing you can't find any hate speech on Play Store–promoted corporate behemoths Twitter and Facebook!

This is a bad faith argument. Twitter and Facebook do a lot to take down hate speech from their platforms (with exceptions made for "public interest" cases like high level politicians). Some servers on the fediverse specifically allow unfettered hate speech.

Post by yjftsjthsd-h » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 3:50 PM UTC

jakelazaroff wrote: post #193

quotemstr wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The danger here is viewpoint based discrimination . It should be illegal for a big platform to shut down certain points of view when these points of view are legal and expressed in a normal manner. You can shut down spam without harming the principle of free expression because you can express any idea in a way that isn't spam. The law gives you a legitimate and stable line that you can draw between allowed and disall…

Why should e.g. hate speech be allowed but not spam? Spam is perfectly legal. You’re not actually against lines being drawn through legal speech — you just don’t like where they fall.