Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship? • Hacker News Board

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#111

Post by SantalBlush » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 2:30 AM UTC

spfzero wrote: post #65

99_00 wrote: post #24

People shake their heads and wonder how the Catholic church could have been so backwards, dogmatic, and ignorant as to jail Copernicus. Yet, here we are. "At the time, it was scarier to be associated with Trump and to become a tool for racists, so people didn't want to publicly call for an investigation into lab origins." https://thehill.com/changing-america/well-being/prevention-c... Censoring commentary on scientif…

We seem to be moving to the idea that people can not think for themselves and so need to be told what to do by "experts", who cannot be questioned. Your ability to think critically about what you see and hear, is being marginalized and ignored, in favor of gaining your obedience. Holding out examples of people who make bad decisions, is used to gain acceptance for the idea that no one can make good decisions, except…

Except no one is actually policing your thoughts or forcing you to have certain thoughts. You are here on HN, freely expressing your dissenting opinion. The problem is that decision makers and possibly the majority of the public disagrees with you and are also free to express their opinion, and you think that makes you a victim. This post is absurdly dramatic.

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#112

Post by geofft » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 2:34 AM UTC

kyrra wrote: post #99

geofft wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reducing Section 230 protections is a giveaway to Big Tech. Remember that the thing Section 230 does is not that it permits you to moderate; the thing it does is that it permits you to moderate without taking liability for defamation posted by users (and other similar illegal content, but defamation was the motivating goal). One forum, CompuServe, didn't moderate anything, and wasn't held liable. Another forum, Prodi…

I agree that without Section 230 a company is effectively a publisher and takes responsibility for all content on the sites they host. I feel like that section should somehow be tailored to promote the First Amendment to let people say what they can that is legal. If you want protection from liability, you should allow people to post what they want as long as it's not illegal and then remove illegal content in a Good…

How do you envision HN working under such regulations? If I spam my startup on every post (which is clearly not in any of the exceptions to First Amendment protection), are they allowed to remove my comments or ban my account? What liability do they incur from doing so? Must they also remove anonymous posts complaining about employment at Amazon or whatever, because those defame Amazon?

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#113

Post by rebuilder » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 3:29 AM UTC

That was an odd summary of the issue at the end. Taibbi finishes by saying this is a problem because it potentially allows corporations to influence state institutions via regulatory capture, which in turn would result in dictating what can be said on sites like YouTube that use, e.g., CDC guidance to decide what is acceptable speech on their platform.

That seems tremendously convoluted to me. Regulatory capture is a problem, but it's a separate issue. Government agencies directing private censors would be a big problem. But private companies influencing other private companies' moderation guidelines indirectly like this, hoping the target company doesn't notice - really?

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#114

Post by mnouquet » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 4:01 AM UTC

dang wrote: post #98

mnouquet wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Civil discourse is long dead, and with an enemy knowing no boundary, it is only fair to respond with no boundary. Morality/ethics/rules of war will only get you dead. Creating a new HN account is cheap, this is my fourth or fifth one.

Would you please stop posting unsubstantive and/or flamebait comments to HN? You've been doing it a ton lately. It's not what this site is for. As you know, we ban accounts that do it. Of course, it's cheap to create a new account, because we want HN to be open to newcomers. But why abuse that, when you could contribute to not destroying the ecosystem instead? I'm sure you wouldn't drop lit matches in a dry forest, o…

[flagged]

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#115

Post by mdoms » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 4:14 AM UTC

99_00 wrote: post #24

People shake their heads and wonder how the Catholic church could have been so backwards, dogmatic, and ignorant as to jail Copernicus. Yet, here we are. "At the time, it was scarier to be associated with Trump and to become a tool for racists, so people didn't want to publicly call for an investigation into lab origins." https://thehill.com/changing-america/well-being/prevention-c... Censoring commentary on scientif…

Yeah Bret Weinstein is just like Copernicus.

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#116

Post by 99_00 » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 4:20 AM UTC

mdoms wrote: post #115

99_00 wrote: post #24

People shake their heads and wonder how the Catholic church could have been so backwards, dogmatic, and ignorant as to jail Copernicus. Yet, here we are. "At the time, it was scarier to be associated with Trump and to become a tool for racists, so people didn't want to publicly call for an investigation into lab origins." https://thehill.com/changing-america/well-being/prevention-c... Censoring commentary on scientif…

Yeah Bret Weinstein is just like Copernicus.

I strongly disagree.

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#117

Post by trompetenaccoun » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 6:09 AM UTC

throwaway6734 wrote: post #104

Covzire wrote: post #11

Facebook's censoring of #Revolution via their claims of moral superiority should frighten the shit out of every free person on earth. While we still have it reasonably good in America, their willingness to suppress speech in good times doesn't bode well for people who will be oppressed during bad times. The first amendment made it clear that not even the government had the authority to use their vast moral authority,…

Don't use facebook

Not an argument. Twitter heavily censors, as does Reddit. Even picture sites like Instagram "editorialize" user submissions. There isn't anywhere to go anymore, the internet has become unfree.

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#118

Post by inglor_cz » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 7:14 AM UTC

shkkmo wrote: post #64

inglor_cz wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the problem of such networks is permanency of something that we still treat as spoken word. If posts were ephemeral, they would present much less of an attack surface for various digital mobs. Maybe there should be an option for users to limit their comment lifetime to N minutes. With N starting somewhere around 5. Of course, you can do this manually, but a semiautomatic mechanism would work better.

Self-destructing messages only really work if you trust every person who reads them AND their devices. They can somewhat limit exposure (especially in obscurity) but also introduce the risk of establishing unwarranted perceptions of security.

Your perspective is a cryptographic one, where most flaws are fatal. My proposal was a softer one: reduction of the "I met someone I hate, let me dig in his ancient comment history to get him fired" risk. Self-destructive messages are far from perfect in this regard, but still useful.

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#119

Post by 6510 » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 7:31 AM UTC

Is it illegal for governments to start their own social network? I imagine it could be a lot of fun. Have a section for the block, the city, the region, and one for the country. Create contact lists, market places, business and personal pages for each? Use the same laws we already have for public space? Am I missing something? Are toll roads the future?

Re: Using government guidelines to police content: state censorship?

#120

Post by smaryjerry » Sun, Jul 04, 2021, 8:19 AM UTC

Covzire wrote: post #11

Facebook's censoring of #Revolution via their claims of moral superiority should frighten the shit out of every free person on earth. While we still have it reasonably good in America, their willingness to suppress speech in good times doesn't bode well for people who will be oppressed during bad times. The first amendment made it clear that not even the government had the authority to use their vast moral authority,…

If it was one site it wouldn’t be an issue, but these companies actually cooperate, work together, or hire the same third parties to coordinate bans that span not just one or two companies, but all of the major companies and sometimes including payment processors, all in the same strike. That is the easiest way for them to avoid blowback, when the person has lost all forms of communication at once.