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You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

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Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#261

Post by neltnerb »

roenxi wrote: post #97
conistonwater wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, so is the idea of those proposals that the federal government or the courts or the lawyers are going to be in charge of deciding what counts as aggressive moderation as opposed to regular moderation? Is that supposed to be better? Also, your comment is confusing because "limiting moderation to illegal content and viagra spam" was the legal limit before section 230, if I understood correctly, so it's not making…

Judges are the ones we all officially trust to make judgments. It isn't better as such to get them involved, but it might become necessary. I won't worry about technicalities, because I have no idea what they are. But it is becoming abundantly clear that the social media companies have political power and are willing to wield it if they think that it is appropriate, similar to newspapers and television. It is reasona…

So getting rid of it would let me sue Google for letting people forward conspiracy theories in emails? Huh.

Sorry, I think you actually do want a new law, not to modify this one. I have no idea how to define the websites that you want this to even apply to -- size? revenue? number of users? does twitter count? mastodon server instances? gab? reddit? texas instruments support forums? IRC servers?

This feels super arbitrary when almost every website to some extent republishes third party content.

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#262

Post by lostcolony »

edoceo wrote: post #251
tony101 wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that you would sue the person who originally posted the content. You can sue "John Doe" and subpoena the social media companies and internet service providers for information to identify the poster. https://revisionlegal.com/internet-law/defamation-attorney/i...

Seems reasonable, just costs a lot of money. The cost of harassment should out-weigh the cost of protection here tho. A) post video to YouTube for $0 b) contact lawyer to subpoena YT and then sue a jerk? $50,000

Which the removal or not of Section 230 doesn't change. No matter what the law says, no matter what culpability exists, if you can't afford a lawyer, you're not getting anything. An issue with the law in the US, but hardly relevant to the issue at hand.

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#263

Post by kemitchell »

Ugh.

I largely agree with the specific legal analysis in this guide. And it's nice to see a lawyer encouraging people who are not lawyers to read a law for themselves. But freely mixing legal analysis and political opinion, in a snarky format with debunker tone, isn't responsible. Law degrees don't turn our policy views into anointed fact.

The section on "big tech" isn't legal analysis. The fact that a law doesn't call out a specific group doesn't mean that such a group won't specifically benefit, or suffer, in practice. The fact that Section 230 doesn't have any language about company size or market share doesn't mean the law doesn't benefit them, benefit them more than smaller players, or benefit them in ways competitors in other industries don't enjoy. There are arguments both ways there. It's not all the lawyers on one side, and everybody who hasn't read the law on the other.

We know which side Mike's on. Reducing Section 230 claims to "a narrow set of frivolous lawsuits" was really cringey. Have a look at some of the cases that had folks reconsidering Section 230, back before Trump was even a candidate for president. The whole section where that jab appears is a straw man. I've not met anybody who thinks companies are totally immune from all laws.

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#264

Post by diebeforei485 »

codazoda wrote: post #200
colllectorof wrote: post #85

Dismissive article that misrepresents both why "normal" people out there are unhappy about section 230 and what the higher levels of conversation about changing it really look like right now[1]. Articles like this are read meat for Hacker News. You endlessly reassert your political bias while pretending you are "informing" some imaginary group of stupid people (who in reality isn't even here to be "informed"). [1] He…

> Today its primary effect is to give an impenetrable legal shield to giant tech corporations that engage in deliberate society-wide manipulation of information. I work at a small (compared to Google and Facebook) classifieds site. I don't think we could exist without section 230, because it would have been too expensive to start without immunity for what our users posted. So, it still does it's initial purpose. I wo…

I'm not sure this is true. Before Section 230 was a thing, companies were not liable for what users wrote on their platforms so long as they didn't moderate legal content [illegal content would be like housing ads with landlords specifying preferred race of tenants, or threats against the President].

A classifieds website could definitely exist post-230, and many did pre-230.

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#265

Post by snowwrestler »

Meekro wrote: post #18
awb wrote: post #4

> if you're in a real rush, just read Section (c)(1), which is only 26 words, and is the part that basically every single court decision (and there have been many) has relied on. > (c) Protection for “Good Samaritan” blocking and screening of offensive material (1) Treatment of publisher or speaker > No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information…

You're right, repealing section 230 would result in more censorship, not less. But I think "repeal section 230" has been shorthand slogan for a more detailed set of proposals (much like "defund the police" doesn't mean $0 budgets for all law enforcement). For example, see the DoJ's proposal to amend and clarify section 230 [1] [2]. Among other changes, they suggest limiting the extent to which a platform can moderate…

You can’t limit the extent to which a company moderates content, as the right to moderate is based in the First Amendment.

All you can do is adjust the shield from liability that 230 provides. If you decrease the size of that shield (as the DOJ proposal does), private companies will further restrict user activity (not expand it) until it fits under the shield again. That is true whether you are talking about a full repeal or only an incremental change.

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#266

Post by pdonis »

pessimizer wrote: post #189
mpoteat wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does this mean if a sports fan comes into my forum about programming and starts making sports threads, I cannot moderate that away, or else face legal action? Does it also mean HN could face legal action according to its current rule set?

This is the definitive question that has to be asked of anybody proposing a repeal of 230. I personally dislike 230, and have from the beginning, but anybody who doesn't have a direct and complete answer to this question isn't being serious. edit: I personally think that the answer is to standardize terms-of-service documents and to make them into real legal statements that both the website visitor and owner can make…

> I personally think that the answer is to standardize terms-of-service documents and to make them into real legal statements that both the website visitor and owner can make claims regarding, and that those statements be registered with a federal agency.

In other words, you want to create more regulations that websites have to abide by. All that does is favor the big players even more than they're favored now.

> Those requirements would either be too onerous to run the walled gardens of Web 2.0 at scale

No, they would be too onerous for any websites other than the huge walled gardens to meet. All you're doing is setting up another form of regulatory capture.

> or the big dogs would be forced to really bureaucratize or democratize

Or they'll just buy the regulations that favor them, the same way they do now.

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#267

Post by pdonis »

leereeves wrote: post #183
modmans2nd wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Section 230 doesn’t give social media any more power than they have under the first amendment. It is simply a shield from nuisance lawsuits.

It does though. For example, it gives them the power to refuse to remove false information without being held responsible for it, which the first amendment does not give to publishers like the NYT.

> the power to refuse to remove false information without being held responsible for it, which the first amendment does not give to publishers like the NYT

Yes, the First Amendment does protect speech that gives false information. We had a recent HN thread on just this topic:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25695190

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#268

Post by AmericanChopper »

dd36 wrote: post #135
AmericanChopper wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is simply wrong. It would mean platforms that don’t moderate have no liability. The law was created because a website that didn’t moderate was found to be not liable for the comments it’s users posted, and a website that did was found to be liable. This is even on the Wikipedia page for section 230. I guess the conclusion that repealing it would result in more censorship is based on the idea that platforms would…

It creates an incentive to improve moderation automation and reduce moderation costs. One way to do that is to verify users, which will help with our sock puppet and deliberate misinformation problems.

Automated moderation can’t possibly solve that problem. How do you automatically moderate libel?

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#269

Post by mrlala »

SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #229
root_axis wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we’re in a situation where even the speech of the POTUS is beholdent to corporate censors This is not true. The POTUS has the most prominent platform in the world, he could walk out to any random street corner and anything he says will be broadcast to every corner of the planet, he is not in any way beholden to "corporate censors".

That’s not true any more though. All of the media networks have shown examples of cutting away from the Presidents speeches when they detect he’s going to say something they don’t like. If you were Trump right now and want to directly address the nation, you know calling CNN and Fox and NBC are going to be a mixed bag at best. FAANG has given the indication right now that for two week no one should be giving the Pres…

>when they detect he’s going to say something they don’t like.

Give me a break. You act like they have been cutting out on him for years. It's only been recently this year when he literally lying and calling covid a hoax, telling people to do dangerous things like gather for his rallies during a pandemic / actively saying not to wear masks, and finally this election bullshit.

The networks have gone above and beyond his bs for years- there is a time to take a stand and the last few months have proven that.

Re: You've Been Referred Here Because You're Wrong About Section 230 of the CDA

#270

Post by cujo »

parsimo2010 wrote: post #241
cujo wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a perfectly sound hypothetical. Do you only allow discussion with people who have experienced a direct hardship? Is that your line for moderation? I'm being antagonistic, but that's part of your 230 fix right? You want judges to draw the magical cutoff line. So what do you do about companies who run a shoestring budget? They can't play in this game?

No, but the previous comment looks just specific enough that it seems like they are trying to make an example look like it was a real life example (which would give it a lot of weight) when in reality it was a hypothetical example (which gives it less weight). But to address the argument as a hypothetical, I don't think it's a fully developed argument. Fledgling companies with small user bases have very little liabil…

This last summer with the BLM protests the local town FB group got flooded with people behaving badly and eventually the moderators had to step in and effectively ban a bunch of people and prevent discussion on the topic for a time.

This wasn't a group that catered to Nazis. It was a group that asked about the best pizza in town and pointed out when the high school was putting on a play. To say it caught the mods off-guard would be an understatement.

Mods had to step in and save the day, but it basically requires someone to watch the service 24/7 during heated times as the threads blow up quickly. They don't take days or weeks to warm up. It just takes an active community and some catalyst event.

This was effectively just a forum. It happened in a FB group, but could have just as easily been some local dude hosting a phpbb forum. Same thing.

So this is the thing I keep coming back to: why would anyone ever dip their toes in user-created content if 230 is changed/repealed? It's all risk at that point, especially for folks who would aren't quitting their day job for it.

Or to put another way, with 230 as it is, Trump can't use twitter/fb/etc, but he can spin up his own phpbb and start his own community there. Why isn't that ok?

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