Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

331–340 of 1001 posts

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#331

Post by nitrogen »

Broken_Hippo wrote: post #186
kevinpet wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not in California. Political activity off the clock is legally protected. Because it isn't ever actually carrying a swastika flag. It's supporting the opposite side of a current contentious issue like abortion.

Making a hostile environment at work probably isn't protected, though, and that's what carrying a swastika flag on national television will make. As soon as I know a coworker is running about carrying a swastika flag, I can never feel safe around that coworker again.

But what someone does outside of work and not involving coworkers is, by definition, not a part of the workplace environment.

Treating everything about a person as within scope for personal concern is one of the things that really strongly turns people against each other. It shouldn't matter what someone believes or does on their own time, whether it's a right-leaning company with a gay employee, or a left-leaning company with a right-leaning employee.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#332

Post by CocaKoala »

BitwiseFool wrote: post #310
tw04 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How can we, as a society, claim to value free speech, yet allow social discourse platforms to censor and silence political enemies? Quite easily. Freedom of speech is freedom from government suppression of that speech - it's quite clear in the constitution. Freedom of speech doesn't mean I or anyone else has to give you a platform to speak from.

Who decided that Freedom of Speech only applies to government suppression? Does the prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment only apply to the government as well?

> Who decided that Freedom of Speech _only_ applies to government suppression

Which freedom of speech are you referring to? Because if you're thinking of the first amendment, then the people who decided that are the ones who wrote it, and it's pretty clear in the text.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#333

Post by andybak »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #328
ctdonath wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no bright line between Facebook and Bob’s Forum.

There's no bright line between a wheelbarrow and a bulk freighter but even Hellen Keller could tell you they're very different.

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

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#334

Post by coldpie »

Alupis wrote: post #259
Jonnax wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I find it hilarious that American conservatives who have for decades been advocates of silencing people for things like being against wars, sex/violence in music/film/video games, and homosexuality, are now campaigning on being victims of the "cancel culture" they themselves have advocated for.

I wonder if you're confusing public debate and a vocal minority with actual bans of things? I'm not aware of any actually banned video games in the US, for instance. We should talk about those things in public - and not everyone will agree. That's how it's supposed to be. It's brand new, however, to wield the power to literally cut off your political enemies from more than half of the population with a single click o…

> It's brand new, however, to wield the power to literally cut off your political enemies from more than half of the population with a single click of the mouse.

Indeed. The remedy here is to enforce anti-trust laws.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#335

Post by tw04 »

lordnacho wrote: post #277
tw04 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How can we, as a society, claim to value free speech, yet allow social discourse platforms to censor and silence political enemies? Quite easily. Freedom of speech is freedom from government suppression of that speech - it's quite clear in the constitution. Freedom of speech doesn't mean I or anyone else has to give you a platform to speak from.

I can agree with you, but still think there's a problem. The fact is nobody who wrote the constitution thought we'd get to a point where there was such a dominant private speech player. So yeah, it made sense at the time, since government was the big player historically, but we're looking at a different situation now.

>The fact is nobody who wrote the constitution thought we'd get to a point where there was such a dominant private speech player.

I'm quite certain that's not true. Papers in the 1700s had just as much dominance in speech as social media does today.

https://csac.history.wisc.edu/document-collections/themes-of...

I think HN has a gross overestimation of twitter's influence. There are 7.9 Billion people on the planet, and 185 million daily active twitter users. I can't say I've ever once gotten my news from twitter and don't plan on ever starting. In my social circle I've got exactly 2 people who use twitter daily.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#336

Post by reaperducer »

Alupis wrote: post #259
Jonnax wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I find it hilarious that American conservatives who have for decades been advocates of silencing people for things like being against wars, sex/violence in music/film/video games, and homosexuality, are now campaigning on being victims of the "cancel culture" they themselves have advocated for.

I wonder if you're confusing public debate and a vocal minority with actual bans of things? I'm not aware of any actually banned video games in the US, for instance. We should talk about those things in public - and not everyone will agree. That's how it's supposed to be. It's brand new, however, to wield the power to literally cut off your political enemies from more than half of the population with a single click o…

I'm not aware of any actually banned video games in the US, for instance.

There was an Atari 2600 game that involved rape which was banned in some community on Long Island. That's the only one i can think of.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#337

Post by ccn0p »

otterley wrote: post #324
dagw wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The significant difference is I (assume) no one depended on your forum for earning a significant part of their income. Once you set yourself as a place where you want people come and earn money, then banning them, and thus depriving them of something of real monetary value, takes on and entire different set of nuances.

Building your business on someone else's property subjects you to a material risk that the owner may someday kick you out. Being a responsible business owner means you recognize that risk and mitigate it as needed for business continuity, and have contingency plans in the event that it happens.

kind of agree with this statement in a free market sense, but the problem with these winner-take-most markets is there are often no reasonable alternatives.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#338

Post by shadowfox »

dagw wrote: post #276
newbie789 wrote: post #250

Coming from the perspective of someone that was an admin of a medium-large forum back in the vBulletin heyday of the early 2000s, I’m somewhat amused by people getting angry at moderation decisions. The rules were pretty clear: This is my website. I pay the bills and maintain it. Here are some clear rules that if you break them, you will be punished with a ban/suspension/shadow an/redirect to goatse upon login/etc. a…

The significant difference is I (assume) no one depended on your forum for earning a significant part of their income. Once you set yourself as a place where you want people come and earn money, then banning them, and thus depriving them of something of real monetary value, takes on and entire different set of nuances.

How different is that from at-will employment though? You can be fired at any time and for more or less any non-federally-protected reason (and can quit any time too). That seems pretty uncontroversial in the US at least.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#339

Post by TameAntelope »

kodah wrote: post #253

I had to type in this box more times than I'm willing to admit to produce something that didn't violate the guidelines. Let's examine why this is problematic: - This will absolutely be leveraged on anyone in a precarious position. It's their ultimate out. Minority groups, majority groups, it doesn't matter - you're in trouble and need a platform to tell your story? Not happening on Twitch. Expect more to sign on to t…

I think it's an interesting consequence of accountability, that the people being held accountable tend to vocally dislike being held accountable, but don't want to say so for some reason.

It'd honestly be pretty refreshing for a leader to come out and say, "I don't think my actions should be held against me like your actions should be held against you because I'm special/different." Insane, but refreshingly honest.

For what it's worth, I'm increasingly with you re: leaving the US, for what basically amount to the opposite reason. I'm tired of people not being responsible for themselves, their actions, and the outcomes that happen beyond the first order consequences.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#340

Post by kvia »

chrisco255 wrote: post #187
tw04 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How can we, as a society, claim to value free speech, yet allow social discourse platforms to censor and silence political enemies? Quite easily. Freedom of speech is freedom from government suppression of that speech - it's quite clear in the constitution. Freedom of speech doesn't mean I or anyone else has to give you a platform to speak from.

And antitrust laws are designed precisely to prevent corporations from monopolizing and abusing market position. Freedom of speech means I have the right to hear from people I choose to assemble with. Monopolies dominating the market for speech and then dictating the terms of speech is an antitrust situation. Not least of which because by the same mechanisms they can use to silence political opponents they can use to…

The notion that any entity can "dominate the market for speech" is absurd. Freedom of speech doesn't mean you have a right to free eyeballs at 's expense.

Freedom of speech and freedom of association mean that Twitter has the right to put or not put whatever it wants on its website.

Post reply on HN