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FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

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Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#231

Post by DanBC »

supernova87a wrote: post #6

Might help to bring more popularity/attention to this story if "Section 230" could be explained in English in the title....

Watch "I am Jane Doe". https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6398054/?ref_=tt_urv

https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/4/13/17172762/fosta-sesta-b...

Women and children were kidnapped, drugged, and raped. Sex with these women and children was offered to paying men via ads in Backpage.

When some of these women escaped they noticed their images were still being used in these ads. They tried to i) get Backpage to stop using these images of them being raped (sometimes of them as children being raped) and ii) get Backpage to take more corporate responsibility about taking adverts from traffickers.

For some reason people seem to think this is about people who chose to sex work. It isn't. It's about people who were forced into it.

Backpage declined to take down the images, and declined to stop taking ads. They then made it easier for people to place those ads; they helped people evade law enforcement; they gave people advice about what language to use when placing those ads.

They got away with it because S230 means they're not responsible for what their users do, even though they're coaching their users about how to evade law enforcement.

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#232

Post by DanBC »

dexen wrote: post #56
akersten wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HackerNews could not exist in your proposed world. I doubt YC would hire a full-time staff of moderators to vet every single post. Since we remove things for being off-topic or overly mean, the only possible conclusion is that HN would shut down because they do not want to bear liability for the posts they leave up. The Internet as we know it would not exist without S230. Please read this[0] for a primer. [0]: https:…

>HackerNews could not exist in your proposed world Provably, definitively wrong. 1. HN relies on the "platform" choice to avoid responsibility for 3rd party posts. HN also relies on operators like dang moderating at the server side. 2. The proposed model would prevent operators moderating at the server side, when the "platform" model was selected. 3. Historically, Usenet had workflow, content, and userbase similar to…

> This was entirely sufficient for the purpose

Where "entirely sufficient" == put several newsadmins in jail; saw newsgroups collapse under huge amounts of spam; and left newsgroups vulnerable to obvious trolling.

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#233

Post by joshuamorton »

paulgb wrote: post #211
joshuamorton wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain how twitter is controlling the speech of a newspaper by blocking its article on their platform? Does twitter blocking the article suddenly unpublish it? Should conventional printing press owners be considered utilities because you might want to post a bunch of posters somewhere, and by refusing to print your posters they censor you?

It doesn't unpublish it, but in the long run it sets up Twitter and Facebook as de facto deciders of what type of content is created. To the extent that newspapers rely on social media for traffic, the editorial decisions of those platforms will silently shape the content of those newspapers. It's the “hidden” aspect of this control that worries me. The difference in the printing press analogy is that if a printing c…

Even if there's one poster printing company in town, they have first amendment rights.

You don't lose those for being too successful.

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#234

Post by joshuamorton »

guscost wrote: post #217
joshuamorton wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are you saying that a special immunity from prosecution, granted to particular businesses, is a civil liberty? I think that moderation is a consequence of the rights to speech and association. The ability to choose what content you host, and whose content you host, is a consequence of those rights. Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, whomever, cannot violate your civil liberties. Only the government can do that. And when t…

> I think that moderation is a consequence of the rights to speech and association. The ability to choose what content you host, and whose content you host, is a consequence of those rights. The right to speech does not mean that you are also immune from libel laws. That’s the controversial part, Facebook enjoys both the rights (plus consequences), and a special immunity under Section 230 that does not apply to any o…

> Do you think that being banned from Facebook does not also restrict an individual’s ability to associate and speak freely, in 2020?

It does not affect their civil liberties, no.

> One of those is clearly not like the others, and perhaps the law should favor “yours and mine”.

Section 230 does. And repealing it would harm them.

> The right to speech does not mean that you are also immune from libel laws.

Correct. And if we were discussing writing section 230, that would be valid. But we aren't. We're discussing changing established law. And if the reason to change the law is to restrict civil liberties that at protected by the first amendment, you encounter a constitutional problem.

Much as some laws are unconstitutional to enforce, I simply argue that some are unconstitutional to ignore.

If you want to imagine the negative impacts of such a change, a forum on baking could no longer remove content that was not related to baking without being liable for content posted by users.

As far as I know, the owner of a physical bulletin board isn't responsible if I post a libelous poster on it. Why should a virtual bulletin board be any different?

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#235

Post by verroq »

paulgb wrote: post #209
pnw_hazor wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Courts are well practiced at sorting these kinds of things out. They would review the content, presentation, targeting, etc. of the emails to determine if it is commercial speech or political speech.

The two problems with this approach: 1. Even if the courts always get it right, small sites are not going to want to want to hire a lawyer and go to court to defend someone else's speech. They will instead err on the side of caution (as many do now for DMCA violations), causing a chilling effect on speech. 2. In a system where whether a platform is liable for its content is ultimately decided by courts we cede a lot…

The government is forced to honour the Constitution unlike private corporations.

As courts set precedents, the process will become more streamlined. Ultimately becoming codified into law by congress.

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#236

Post by triceratops »

stale2002 wrote: post #204
triceratops wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who said ISPs and the phones are "unmoderated"? Try running a server with significant traffic from your home. Or using blue boxes (? I don't know, whatever Woz used) to get free long-distance calls. They absolutely perform moderation, only at the network layer, so most people never see it.

> Who said ISPs and the phones are "unmoderated"? ISPs have to follow common carrier laws. If social media platforms were subject to these same common carrier laws, then that is good enough for me. That is what I mean by unmoderated. I mean, that they are following things such as common carrier laws, which have very significant requirements.

> ISPs have to follow common carrier laws.

Firstly, you're wrong about that. This same FCC voted to remove ISPs from common carrier classification.

Also, what do you think common carrier means? It doesn't mean "completely unmoderated" as you appear to believe. As I already demonstrated, even common carriers perform network-layer moderation, since they provide the network layer. Social media provides the application layer, so why shouldn't they be allowed to perform moderation at the application layer?

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#237

Post by stale2002 »

triceratops wrote: post #236
stale2002 wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Who said ISPs and the phones are "unmoderated"? ISPs have to follow common carrier laws. If social media platforms were subject to these same common carrier laws, then that is good enough for me. That is what I mean by unmoderated. I mean, that they are following things such as common carrier laws, which have very significant requirements.

> ISPs have to follow common carrier laws. Firstly, you're wrong about that. This same FCC voted to remove ISPs from common carrier classification. Also, what do you think common carrier means? It doesn't mean "completely unmoderated" as you appear to believe. As I already demonstrated, even common carriers perform network-layer moderation, since they provide the network layer. Social media provides the application l…

> Also, what do you think common carrier means? It doesn't mean "completely unmoderated"

Systems such as the phone network are pretty darn unmoderated. It is mostly unmoderated, even if common carriers are allowed to do a small amount, of highly restricted moderation actions.

> as you appear to believe

I have just clarified. It means that there are very strong regulations, that ban many forms of moderation.

> so why shouldn't they be allowed to perform moderation at the application layer?

I am saying that I would be fine if they were banned from doing most moderation actions, as is the case for common carriers.

And I am saying that I would be OK with them engaging in the very small amount of highly regulated moderation, that common carriers are allowed to do.

Common carriers have large restrictions on the amount of moderation that they are allowed to do. I want those same restrictions to apply to other media platforms.

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#238

Post by sieabahlpark »

morpheuskafka wrote: post #229
75dvtwin wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has to be treated as criminal negligence when a platform applies its 'Terms of Use' or rule of conduct, selectively. I think that will solve the problem. Today, HN or Twitter can, selectively, diminish visibility of pro-conservative content and posts, while not applying the same scrutiny to the other side. They can sit there and claim neutrality, ask for 'evidence' and so on. But really, they are the ones that sho…

Sure they can. And "pro-conservative" users as well as anyone who likes to read their content can start their own forum for discussion online, or use one that their find more welcoming.

That would then imply that the previous provider is a publisher not a platform. The whole point of this discussion?

Of course you can build your own everything, you could build your own electrical grid with your own power generation too but instead we reasonably say that if you can afford it you have access to it.

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#239

Post by danaris »

Threeve303 wrote: post #141
eli wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t understand what outcome you are seeking here. Clearly social media companies can’t prescreen every piece of content so either you want them to all go out of business or you want to forbid them from moderating even to delete spam. There are already forums with “zero” moderation and there’s a reason all discussion hasn’t migrated there.

Gutting Section 230 is exactly designed to make these companies less profitable.

It is intended to do so.

It is not designed to do so.

Some politicians have become fixated on Section 230 as a remedy to what they feel is an injustice centered around these massive platforms, when what 230 mostly does is allow hundreds of thousands of small websites to operate without fear of legal liability for every single user comment, whether or not they do basic spam-filtering.

A solution exactly designed to make Facebook and Twitter less profitable would not touch the hundreds of thousands of other websites that gutting 230 would suddenly expose to liability. It would be much more tailored and specific to its purpose.

Re: FCC to move ahead with 'rulemaking' on Section 230

#240

Post by triceratops »

stale2002 wrote: post #237
triceratops wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ISPs have to follow common carrier laws. Firstly, you're wrong about that. This same FCC voted to remove ISPs from common carrier classification. Also, what do you think common carrier means? It doesn't mean "completely unmoderated" as you appear to believe. As I already demonstrated, even common carriers perform network-layer moderation, since they provide the network layer. Social media provides the application l…

> Also, what do you think common carrier means? It doesn't mean "completely unmoderated" Systems such as the phone network are pretty darn unmoderated. It is mostly unmoderated, even if common carriers are allowed to do a small amount, of highly restricted moderation actions. > as you appear to believe I have just clarified. It means that there are very strong regulations, that ban many forms of moderation. > so why…

> Common carriers have large restrictions on the amount of moderation that they are allowed to do

Yeah, I don't think you know what common carrier actually means.[1]

The moderation that telecoms and ISPs perform relates to traffic that can negatively affect other users of those systems. Social media platforms can easily argue that their moderation already follows similar principles. It just happens that they deal with content, not raw bits, so they have to moderate content.

You also didn't address my other point, which is that ISPs aren't common carriers at all and this same FCC voted to make it so. So this seems pretty hypocritical behavior on their part.

1. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/153

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