Earlier quoted context omitted.
Which groups?
Does that matter? If op is lying, he or she is lying. But are some groups ok to threaten? Are some people ok to threaten?
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Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
771–780 of 996 posts
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#772Earlier quoted context omitted.
A century ago in the United States the phrase "shouting fire in a crowded theater" was used in a Supreme Court ruling upholding the censorship of anti-draft activists during World War I, and within living memory the United States had various laws censoring pornographic photos and videos. There was even a time when it was illegal to have the Post Office carry written information about contraception: https://en.wikiped…
>In case anyone tries to claim that the founders intended for the most expansive possible understanding of freedom of speech, the fact is that one of the earliest laws passed in the United States was a law that censored criticisms of the Federal government (in an attempt to crack down on foreign misinformation campaigns): I'm not sure whether that proves your point. The wikipedia article says that it was controversia…
The fact that the law was passed by the same men who ratified the constitution says a lot about their concept of freedom of speech, even if it was controversial and short lived. If the founders really meant for free speech to be as expansive as it is today it is hard to see how such a law could have been passed in the first place.
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#773Earlier quoted context omitted.
They also banned all images from the Netflix film "Cuties" https://www.newsweek.com/4chan-bans-images-netflix-film-cuti...
4chan already bans anime/cartoon style deciptions of underage content, so it's not really surprising that they ban this too
No they don't.
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#774Earlier quoted context omitted.
>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 That only ever applied to broadcast media (and maybe only to prime-time TV). Publishers of the written word have never been required by the US government to grant equal time. >For most of the history of the United States free speech has been more limited than it is today I don't…
A century ago in the United States the phrase "shouting fire in a crowded theater" was used in a Supreme Court ruling upholding the censorship of anti-draft activists during World War I, and within living memory the United States had various laws censoring pornographic photos and videos. There was even a time when it was illegal to have the Post Office carry written information about contraception: https://en.wikiped…
OK, but the topic is hate speech in particular, and there has never been a time when hate speech modulo calls to violent action (and possibly calls on landlords or employers to discriminate) has been unlawful in the US.
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#775Earlier quoted context omitted.
A reminder that Gab is not a gray area edgecase, but a purpose-built platform for conspiracies and hate speech.
Okay come on. This sequence of comments is funny, you have to admit. "Google is censoring apps" "It's because those apps can access hate speech" "You can use this other app store" "They ban this app, though" "But that's because it's for hate speech" Come on, this is peak comedy.
> those apps can access hate speech
> it's for hate speech
There's a big difference here and you seem to know it
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#776> 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…
Then Google should be held liable for the content they choose to publish, including under libel and slanderous laws.
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#777Earlier quoted context omitted.
>but a ban on specific implementations that make it easy to join specific communities which encourage hatred and real-world violence. As you state, one can access these specific communities in a number of ways, including Google Chrome. If the community is the issue, go after the community, not an ActivityPub app that can access content from these and other communities. Should Google also ban RSS reader apps that don'…
Oh, please don't suggest banning RSS apps - Apple is already doing that, they removed Pocket Casts and Castro because they allow access to Podcasts that offend Chinese censorship, while Apple's own podcast app remains because it blocks those particular podcasts: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/jun/12/apple-rem...
> Apple is already doing that, they removed Pocket Casts and Castro
In china. That is an important note that you left out to make Apple seem worse.
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#778It 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.
> People agree to very sensible things. Like hate speech is bad and it’s not censorship if it’s not mandated by the government. I'm paraphrasing what was here a few days ago: Our banking partner is uncomfortable that the realistic sex toys modeled after magical creatures have the colors that strongly represent human organs. You will either have to change the colors or we will not be able to continue providing you wit…
To be fair, they didn't claim that people don't also agree to very stupid and malicious things, and in fact rather implied that that's the likely result of supposedly sensible starting points.
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#779The is the first I (as well as others here, apparently) had ever heard of the "fediverse". Wikipedia [1] helps me out with what it is technically... but can anyone who knows describe what its content is actually like? In terms of hate speech or illegal content... does that make up the vast majority of fediverse content, in the way that pirated media makes up the vast majority of torrents? (Even though torrents can al…
I use Mastodon to get away from the negativity and hate speech on Twitter and Reddit.
In my experience, there has been a very minimal amount of hate speech on my timeline.
The nature of the decentralized, federated system does allow hate groups to easily gain a platform. However it's just as easy, if not easier to prevent their instance from communicating with yours.
It's very much NOT like the torrent analogy you made and a lot more in line with your Reddit analogy.
I would encourage you to go to https://mastodon.online and check it out!
Re: Google is apparently taking down all/most Fediverse apps from the Play Store
#780> 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…
Constitutions are squishy things, ultimately. They evolve over the years. I take your point about legality. But, I'd make the point that we don't have a clear moral or legal concept of free speech that relates to the current world. "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." At s…
So for some of my volunteer moderation work, this was a question I tried to answer, so that we could have a justification for censorship, instead of "We need to do this, or the forum will continue to be a dumpster fire of hate".
The argument was a closer look at the "market place of ideas" analogy.
There are actors in the market selling bad content. Content designed to addict, poison or over turn the fair functioning of the market place.
Earlier things were far slower, so this was not as pertinent a threat.
With social media, and virality, this is a clear and present danger for the functioning of the digital meeting places we enjoy.
Therefore, there is a need for action to prevent these market perverting actions.
Nathan Mattias at Cornell is someone who wrote/writes about it, while also working to help citizen run experiments to figure out what works for content moderation.
He had an interesting article which makes a better argument: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/apr/18/a-toxic-w...
Other interesting articles: https://citizensandtech.org/2020/02/can-public-infrastructur...