Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store • Hacker News Board

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

#571

Post by samatman » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 5:55 PM UTC

claudiawerner wrote: post #403

nine_k wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what in particular makes physical harms so special Such harms can be reliably detected, with stringent enough criteria. Mental harms, and the very notion of "normality", are much more nebulous.

>Such harms can be reliably detected, with stringent enough criteria. Mental harms, in many cases, can also be detected by competent professionals; besides that, it is entirely possible for physical harms to heal and for supporting evidence of their infliction be used to convict. Further, many physical harms depend at least partially on the victim's characteristics or situation; a concert pianist is arguably harmed m…

Here's where mental harms "detected by competent professionals" leads:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_abuse_of_psychiatry_...

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

#572

Post by lenkite » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 5:56 PM UTC

tzs wrote: post #432

IntelMiner wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

None of the reporting I saw on the wedding cake cases actually described the cakes. Are we talking normal wedding cakes, that you can buy from nearly any baker, with some ordinary decorations, that just have two men's names instead of one men's name and one woman's name after the "Congratulations", and have two mass-produced little plastic men on top instead of one little plastic man and one little plastic woman? Or…

Its custom designed cake. That baker has been sued yet again because he refused to bake a trans-themed birthday cake.

I don't believe he has a problem selling cakes to anyone, just that he refused to design cakes with themes.

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

#573

Post by luckylion » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 5:56 PM UTC

GoblinSlayer wrote: post #415

luckylion wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless there's a limitless supply of witches somewhere, the more witch-hunt-free towns there are, the more the witches will be distributed among those towns, because witches aren't a homogeneous group either. So in theory, voat & co should either shrink or get less radical the more reddit-alternatives there are. That is, unless reddit is turning normal people into witches that will then populate the new alternative p…

What do you think a normal person thinks when he sees a witch being burned?

Normal as in "average" or normal as in some kind of healthy & moral?

The average person puts their pitch fork back down and enjoys the bonding experience that a successful hunt brings to the community. The out-group isn't just persecuted because they are different, the whole process also helps confirm the unity of the in-group.

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

#574

Post by throwaway082920 » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 5:56 PM UTC

humanistbot wrote: post #47

The rationale they gave is that hate speech appears on these apps, because some of the microblogging sites that can be accessed via Fediverse have this kind of content. Based on this rationale, I look forward to Google Play removing Chrome, Firefox, and all other web browsers from the store as well.

It's pretty rich that Google claims to be removing these apps for hate speech when their own search engine returns results from sites like Kiwi Farms and Encyclopedia Dramatica on their victims so prominently.

(throwaway since the former name searches themselves to find new targets.)

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

#575

Post by tinyhouse » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 5:57 PM UTC

crocodiletears wrote: post #251

tinyhouse wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I found it eventually. Although the video doesn't show the first fatal shooting so we don't know how it all started.

Earlier footage indicates the first man shot was attempting to start a fight with the militiamen, but there's a gap in the timeline where nobody was filming before the fight broke out. The NYT has a very good article on the subject (and I'm a man who's very critical of the NYT) https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/27/us/kyle-rittenhouse-kenos...

OK I found a video showing the first fatal shooting [1]. It's not as clear as the video showing the mob chase (where it indeed looked like self defense) but from what I can tell the person who died got shot while running away from the shooter (it's hard to tell where the shooter is exactly during this time). Doesn't look like self defense to me. Hopefully there are better recordings of the whole incident.

Warning: the video is very graphic, esp in the end. [1] https://twitter.com/livesmattershow/status/12984844049189724...

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

#576

Post by dageshi » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 5:58 PM UTC

linuxftw wrote: post #472

dageshi wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really doubt google cares about federated applications at all. I suspect they're just trying to avoid a potential future shitstorm where they're accused of facilitating something nasty because they "approved" apps to be on the play store.

No, as others have said, you'd have to apply the same reasoning to a web browser. Google dominates the web search, so there's no need to prevent other browsers because it all drives Google's revenue anyway. Any app that allows you to break out of the garden is banned.

Viewed through the lens of "what will cause the most bad publicity" a browser is understood by 90% of the population. The "fediverse" isn't. It can be spun to cause damage in the way a browser cannot.

Google don't care about the federated stuff because it's not big enough to bother them, in fact it probably siphons all the crap they'd rather not index off to a place they no longer have to worry about.

They care about bad publicity and being seen to implicitly support "bad" things via their app store.

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

#577

Post by betterunix2 » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 6:01 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #494

simias wrote: post #488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your site has been overrun by ultra-far-right types for basically its entire existence and you do nothing to mitigate this then you're very clearly complicit. But you're right, most of the "no moderation, anything goes" online communities tend to be overrun by extremists but it's easy to see why: you only need a minority of very dedicated trolls posting outrageous content 24/7 to ruin a community. It takes time an…

>If your site has been overrun by ultra-far-right types for basically its entire existence and you do nothing to mitigate this then you're very clearly complicit. How do you mitigate without running counter to the original idea of "free speeech"?

By having more than a middle school understanding of what "free speech" is about. There is no "original idea" of free speech, there never has been, it is a concept that is used to refer to a wide variety of legal frameworks across different times and places. In Germany a person's free speech rights do not include holocaust denial. For most of the history of the United States free speech has been more limited than it is today; it was not all that long ago that we had the "equal time" rule that required media outlets to host both liberal and conservative commentary. You generally do not have a right to organize an insurrection against any government and whining about free speech will not convince anyone otherwise.

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

#578

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 6:03 PM UTC

john_moscow wrote: post #297

viro wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When your content is too cancerous for Reddit ...maybe the issue isn't Reddit.

Well, I can tell you what's bugging me personally about this. There's a growing divide in our society between the "equal opportunity" and "equal outcome" camps. And while the "equal opportunity" people mostly have the "just let me grill" attitude, "equal outcomers" are pushing increasingly harder, while doing their best to silence any opposing voices. It's now getting to a point where raising one's kids to be proud o…

[deleted]

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

#579

Post by josephcsible » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 6:03 PM UTC

Loughla wrote: post #427

mc32 wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, L.A.’s mayor has threatened as well as executed water service disruption to people hosting large parties. I get why one might want to do that, but I don’t think it’s the right precedent to set.

>but I don’t think it’s the right precedent to set. I've thought about this statement for about a half hour now. What does it mean? That punishing individuals for ignoring public health mandates is a precedent we don't want? Or is it just the 'utility' being used that is problematic for you? I don't get it.

The lack of due process?

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

#580

Post by benibela » Fri, Aug 28, 2020, 6:03 PM UTC

ziddoap wrote: post #313

kanox wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I'm not on Googles side here, but... As nice as your sentiment is, there are plenty of real problems which have to be addressed. Who defines, and what are the definitions of "Large" and "General Purpose" in this context? Am I allowed to moderate content as fits with my ToS at X number of users, but at X+1 users I become forced to publish all content which is "not otherwise illegal"? In regards to what is "not otherwi…

The courts decide what is a large platform. And they decide what is "not illegal"

In Germany, there were actually cases where courts have ruled that facebook is not allowed to delete non illegal posts:

https://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Oberlandesgericht-Me...

One big part of the argument of the judges was based on contracts. When a user makes a facebook account, it creates a contract between the user and facebook. The user agrees to share their data for ads and stuff, and facebook agrees to publish their posts. Thus they have to do that, they cannot just decide to not publish some posts, that would be a contract violation.

Just like when you order a pizza with 10 toppings, the pizza service cannot deliver a pizza with 8 toppings and still expect you to pay the full price

And as second part, the court has ruled that a clause "we choose which posts to publish" would be invalid in the contract, because a contract must be fair to all involved parties and not violate basic rights like freedom of speech.