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EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

euractiv.com

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Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#251

Post by babesh »

dragonwriter wrote: post #250
alickz wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a private party can use their monopoly on the limiting of free speech to control the government how is that any different than those private parties _being_ the government, and by extension enjoying the monopoly on violence? If a handful of companies can influence the election of a government to such a degree then they would enjoy the best of both worlds: the freedom to censor as they please (because they aren't b…

> monopoly on the limiting of free speech No private party actually has such a monopoly, so it's not a real current issue.

They are if they act in concert. That is what is really scary.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#252

Post by alickz »

dragonwriter wrote: post #250
alickz wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a private party can use their monopoly on the limiting of free speech to control the government how is that any different than those private parties _being_ the government, and by extension enjoying the monopoly on violence? If a handful of companies can influence the election of a government to such a degree then they would enjoy the best of both worlds: the freedom to censor as they please (because they aren't b…

> monopoly on the limiting of free speech No private party actually has such a monopoly, so it's not a real current issue.

True, it might not be a monopoly, or even a duopoly, but I'm not sure it's much better. Do you think if a politician is banned from Facebook, Twitter, and Google they have even a small chance of being elected?

It wouldn't even take all 3. If Google decided to heavily promote pro-Trump articles in their SEO, and heavily downplay pro-Biden articles leading up to the election, do you think it would have gone the way it did? And if not, do you think that's OK?

Of course they can do what they like, it's their platform. And if Biden supporters didn't like it they could boycott and tell everyone to use Bing or DDG. But I'm not sure that's a realistic solution.

I'm not making any strong claims here, I certainly don't know the right answer or if this is as much of a problem as it seems to me. I'm just worried that a handful of companies control a significant amount of the discourse in not just their own countries, but internationally. It might not be a current issue, but I could see it being a future one.

Or I could be completely wrong, I'm just musing.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#253

Post by shripadk »

themacguffinman wrote: post #240
shripadk wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't care about American Free Speech. I'm not an American. I'm an Indian. Yes it is worse for America's image that a competitor censors another competitor. It puts a bad light on the US Government itself that it cannot regulate private companies and are at the mercy of private companies that even Government communications can be censored. This is far beyond what free speech is all about. And don't tell me US Gover…

I disagree, in fact it enhances my impression of the US government in the way that it exercises restraint on its immense natural power. It's quite easy for governments to flex their power and regulate anything and everything. This is common in third world countries and developing societies: edicts are the answer to everything. It is the language of dictators. The US government can absolutely force Twitter and Faceboo…

> exercises restraint on its immense natural power

I would have agreed with you provided it was the Government that had to do the banning first and took it's time and exercised restraint.

This is different. Big Tech cut off US Government communication lines from the rest of the World. Now we will never know what Trump is thinking except if he does a press conference. We will never know what the White House is doing. This causes major network effects across the World as people across the World want to know what is going on in the White House and what is on Trump's mind. Before internet and social media all communications were between the World leaders/bureaucrats and the rest of the World was pretty much oblivious to what was happening unless it became breaking news. Everything was opaque. That is not what I want to go back to. Trust me you don't want to wake up one day to learn your country is at War with another nation because everything was kept under wraps till the last minute. If you had known earlier you would have rallied the masses and built public pressure.

It is a public expectation to know what their leaders are upto. I want our leaders to be in the spotlight at all times. Trump is not just the President of USA, he is also a representative of USA to the rest of the World. Cutting off Trump's direct lines of communication cuts off feeds to the rest of the World about what is going on in his mind and the White House. This does not bode well for America as a responsible Democratic power. You do not cut off the lines to the Head of the Country with the World. No matter how much you disagree with him. This is irresponsible with Big Tech allowing it and US Congress keeping mum about it.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#254

Post by amai »

They should create state owned platforms for the public as a competition to the private ones. But instead they will just produce so many regulations that only the biggest companies can follow all these messy rules. This will in effect prevent any competition for the biggest companies by smaller companies making the situation worse for everyone.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#255

Post by themacguffinman »

scotty79 wrote: post #247
themacguffinman wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, in fact it enhances my impression of the US government in the way that it exercises restraint on its immense natural power. It's quite easy for governments to flex their power and regulate anything and everything. This is common in third world countries and developing societies: edicts are the answer to everything. It is the language of dictators. The US government can absolutely force Twitter and Faceboo…

Freedom is not something natural. In 100% freedom your stronger neighbour would have freedom to restrict your freedom and you would have freedom to resist, fail, and be sad about it. So your freedom is dependant of how much the strongest entity around is willing to limit freedom of your neighbors of restricting your freedom. US government showing restraint when major players on the market use their position to restri…

That's why the US government also sets limits on what private companies and their customers can do to restrict each other's freedoms. Under these democratically deliberated laws, Parler has as much freedom to use Twitter & Facebook as you have freedom to do use my lawn. The principle still holds even if every neighbor in your neighborhood hates you and denies you access to their lawn; The scope & scale of their lawn restriction is irrelevant because American society finds their freedom over their property to be more important than your freedom to use it.

There are things that the US government deems too important to restrict, but Facebook & Twitter is well outside that category. That's where American society has drawn the line, and it's a line that I agree with as well.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#256

Post by themacguffinman »

shripadk wrote: post #253
themacguffinman wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, in fact it enhances my impression of the US government in the way that it exercises restraint on its immense natural power. It's quite easy for governments to flex their power and regulate anything and everything. This is common in third world countries and developing societies: edicts are the answer to everything. It is the language of dictators. The US government can absolutely force Twitter and Faceboo…

> exercises restraint on its immense natural power I would have agreed with you provided it was the Government that had to do the banning first and took it's time and exercised restraint. This is different. Big Tech cut off US Government communication lines from the rest of the World. Now we will never know what Trump is thinking except if he does a press conference. We will never know what the White House is doing.…

It doesn't make sense to suggest that Big Tech is even capable of cutting off US government communication lines. Twitter & Facebook is not the US government's communication lines. The government can and regularly does publish communications on its own internet infrastructure it controls and regulates. The government also maintains continuous contact with a global free press that breathlessly and rapidly reports on anything the government and Trump himself wants to say.

Let's not misrepresent what this actually is: a private enterprise locking a political leader out of one of many communication platforms that the leader prefers. Twitter & Facebook are not and have never been critical requirements for the US government (or Trump) to communicate effectively.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#257

Post by turbinerneiter »

zajio1am wrote: post #82
turbinerneiter wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She was not elected by the voters. The voters were told that the winning party's candidate would be the commission president. Now von der Leyen is. She did not run in the election. This is a lot more similar to the electoral college making the losing candidate president than people want to admit. We elected the parliament under the impression that the MEPs would then elect the candidate of the party that got the most…

> She was not elected by the voters. The voters were told that the winning party's candidate would be the commission president. Now von der Leyen is. She did not run in the election. Well, this is true for prime minister posts in most parliamentary democracies. The winner is not the leader of plurality-winning party, but one who can get majority support in parliament. Usually it is the same person, but EP is too disi…

That's not the point.

They told us the candidate of the winning party will get the job.

He didn't.

They lied.

I voted for the other guy btw.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#258

Post by turbinerneiter »

jariel wrote: post #85
zajio1am wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She was not elected by the voters. The voters were told that the winning party's candidate would be the commission president. Now von der Leyen is. She did not run in the election. Well, this is true for prime minister posts in most parliamentary democracies. The winner is not the leader of plurality-winning party, but one who can get majority support in parliament. Usually it is the same person, but EP is too disi…

This argument doesn't work very well because even in Parliamentary systems there is good clarity as to what people are voting for. Your arguments is resting on technicalities, but not on the realities of awareness and participation of voters. Boris Johnson had a questionable first phase as PM due to his inherited position, a lack of confidence - so - there was an election. Not only did everyone in the UK know who the…

Exactly, von der Leyen could never have won a fair election, because she was involved in a scandal around illegal contracts for consultants - in any proper election, someone with a recent scandal like, particularly revolving around spending public money I'm a wrong way, would be toxic and no party would even run them as their candidate.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#259

Post by jokethrowaway »

taurath wrote: post #227
silexia wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, the worst possible party to limit your free speech is government. The government holds an exclusive monopoly on violence and killing. Almost every government that has obtained power over speech uses their violence monopoly to enforce it. The best party to limit speech that is considered bad is private individuals and companies in their own venues. If I own a comedy theater, I should be able to kick out obno…

A functioning democratic government is accountable to its people, while a private corporation is only accountable to its shareholders. Depending what you believe politically either, none or both could be true. Ultimately free markets can work against societal good just as much as an overly stringent and unaccountable government. Maximally accountable government and a moderately and fairly regulated market seems to be…

The difference between a government and a corporation is that people can stop buying at any time and you can have plenty of choices.

A democratic government is elected every X years and you have a very limited set of choices. It's plenty of time to forget about mistakes and that's too little choice to have accountable candidates.

Re: EU Commission: ‘No longer acceptable’ for platforms to take key decisions alone

#260

Post by jariel »

Karunamon wrote: post #180
jariel wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The power imbalance means companies can use all sorts of crazy leverage to do all sorts of things that wouldn't really be fair in a free market, and certainly not a free market of ideas etc.. I'll bet $100 that companies would love to wash their hands of a lot of this stuff, and just be able to 'comply' with some regulatory things so they can't be blamed or get into trouble one way or another.

I'd take that bet. Leaked conversations from Twitter and Google insiders show that the platform owners are well aware of the power their platforms give them. That's a power that can't be accurately measured in dollars, and speaking purely selfishly on their behalf, one that they'd be fools to give up.

Twitter tanked 10% on the Trump ban announcement.

Trump pushed very hard to dump legislation that favours them.

Angela Merkel, Macron and the EU Comission have spoken negatively about the ban.

i.e. the most powerful people in the world are speaking up, against you. Bad.

Parler - their 'evileenemy' was the #1 download (!) on App Store before the ban.

There is serious talk of breaking up those companies and issues of 'free speech' are top spot in the headlines.

Empathically - no - those companies do not want to be in that position.

I think you're misinterpreting those leaks.

It makes certain individuals feel powerful, gives them the influence to 'stop Trump' - but in the end, it's a massive distraction for their business.

They will be fighting these fires daily for some time.

From a business perspective - they just want to make money. They don't want to be fighting political wars because if they're taking on the US, the EU and other governments, they're going to lose somewhere.

They don't 'make more money' by being able to ban Trump and Bannon under their own guise - they risk it.

But if an independent board acting according to government regulation bans Trump, well, then it's 'not their fault'.

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