Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf] • Hacker News Board

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#41

Post by ampdepolymerase » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 6:46 PM UTC

uniqueuid wrote: post #37

klyrs wrote: post #22

My biggest technical issue with this "common carrier" movement is spam. The author mentions it, but seems to suggest that users can simply block or ignore spammers. As somebody who witnessed the commercialization of the internet, I find this extremely naive. We generally think of email as a "common carrier," but even there, spam is blocked. Blocking spam is censorship. Failure to automatically detect 1% of spam will…

Well, the common carrier approach would not necessarily mean that every user can publish what they want. Common carrier treatment arises when you control a unique piece of infrastructure, or, more loosely defined, a dominant one. As a result you need to provide non-discriminating access for competitors. In my interpretation, this requirement would also be satisfied by Facebook allowing publishers and companies to cre…

Simple, outsource the moderation. Provide a common access API for third parties to provide moderation. Whether their home feed content resemble 4chan or the New Yorker is entirely up to the user.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#42

Post by amadeuspagel » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 6:46 PM UTC

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #27

I'm not seeing what problem is being solved here. If, as he points out early in the paper, common carrier status in the US would only apply to hosting, but not recommendation engines and the like, what is the gain? Anybody can already find hosting somewhere. It's the discoverability that the platforms provide that's the secret sauce.

> If, as he points out early in the paper, common carrier status in the US would only apply to hosting, but not recommendation engines and the like, what is the gain?

There's something between hosting and recommendations, which the paper suggests common carrier status could also be applied to, and that's subscriptions. So youtube wouldn't have to recommend Alex Jones' videos, but if people subscribe to his channel, it would have to show his videos to them.

> Anybody can already find hosting somewhere.

Even if that's the case, taking away their current hosting disrupts people's speech.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#43

Post by tedunangst » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 6:50 PM UTC

klyrs wrote: post #22

My biggest technical issue with this "common carrier" movement is spam. The author mentions it, but seems to suggest that users can simply block or ignore spammers. As somebody who witnessed the commercialization of the internet, I find this extremely naive. We generally think of email as a "common carrier," but even there, spam is blocked. Blocking spam is censorship. Failure to automatically detect 1% of spam will…

I think this is a common failing for legal analysis of tech problems. Some years ago Lessig made the argument that radio bandwidth should be unregulated and belong to all, instead of licensed to cellphone carriers. The technical basis for the argument was that's how Ethernet hubs work, and they work great. Of course, nobody uses a hub today.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#44

Post by Majromax » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 6:51 PM UTC

To me, the question is how a common carrier status can coexist with content curation and promotion.

Looking at the ur-example of the phone company, AT&T doesn't try to preemptively place calls that a household "might be interested in based on analytics."

The modern social media landscape, however, is dominated by "the algorithm." Youtube lives on its recommendations; Twitter wants you to keep refreshing its feed; even Hacker News tries to sort the front page by a combination of novelty and interest. In my opinion, this is a continuous, editorial judgment by the outlet, and it is very different from the idea of a "neutral public square" that exists as an objective point in space.

The fight isn't really about whether an individual person should have a right to send messages to other individual people on social media platforms; it's about whether the media platform has a responsibility to actively promote views without regard for their content. It's not about forcing the "shopping mall" to allow protesters (PruneYard, from the article), but instead it's about forcing the "shopping mall" to advertise that it's hosting protesters and include them on its maps and business lists.

(Edit to add:)

The article discusses this point somewhat in its section E, related to compelled recommendations, but I think the topic deserves much broader analysis. A "legally viewpoint-neutral Twitter" would be a Pyrrhic victory for proponents if Twitter could still restrict user's visibility to direct subscribers/replies only, denying the public part of its platform.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#45

Post by amadeuspagel » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 6:52 PM UTC

jasode wrote: post #12

uniqueuid wrote: post #2

For context: This paper argues that online platforms constitute a sort of "infrastructure" similar to utilities, and that they should be regulated to guarantee equal access. This idea is not new - it has been discussed under different terms, e.g. with relation to "must carry"-rules for cable providers. To simplify a bit, the argument boils down to the question of liability and responsibility for content curation. Pla…

>, and that they should be regulated to guarantee equal access. You mentioned the UK BBC in another comment. Here are some examples of BBC censorship: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_the_United_Kingd... If the government-run BBC sometimes censors certain topics, I'm confused as to how that same government becomes a watchdog & enforcer over private corporations designated as "common carrier" and not censor…

> The "common carrier" designation is easy to implement when communication is point-to-point with paid subscriptions (e.g. telephones) -- instead of broadcast funded with ads or government taxes (e.g. Facebook/Twitter, BBC). There is no government in the world that allows broadcast of any topic without interference.

The paper deals with the supposed distinction between point-to-point and broadcast. In brief, it's not very clear. Consider the postal service: If millions of people subscribe to a magazine, is that point-to-point communication or broadcasting? How is it different from millions of people subscribing to a youtube channel? Or following someone on twitter?

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#46

Post by singlow » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 6:53 PM UTC

Buttons840 wrote: post #18

If social media becomes a common carrier, but ISPs do not, can Facebook just host their service on their own ISP and block unwanted users at the ISP level? "It's not Facebook blocking the user, it's the ISP, which happens to be the only ISP we host Facebook on." All just poking holes in the idea that social media can be a common carrier while the ISPs are not. Somehow the literal carrier avoided becoming the common c…

That's not how laws work.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#47

Post by labcomputer » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 7:00 PM UTC

amadeuspagel wrote: post #39

klyrs wrote: post #22

My biggest technical issue with this "common carrier" movement is spam. The author mentions it, but seems to suggest that users can simply block or ignore spammers. As somebody who witnessed the commercialization of the internet, I find this extremely naive. We generally think of email as a "common carrier," but even there, spam is blocked. Blocking spam is censorship. Failure to automatically detect 1% of spam will…

Phone companies are regulated as common carriers, but there's an exception allowing them "to block by default illegal or unwanted calls based on reasonable call analytics before the calls reach consumers."[1] [1]: https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/stop-unwanted-robocalls...

But that puts us back where we started:

FB, et. al., will argue that they are blocking unwanted messages based on reasonable analytics. So we will continue to see exactly the same type of feed curation as today.

The only difference (maybe) is that a platform (probably) can't just wholesale ban a particular person... but I bet that even the phone company is allowed to ban a person is deemed to be sufficiently abusive or harassing.

The fundamental problem is that there is a vocal minority who really, really don't want to believe that they are the vocal minority who everyone else wants to ignore. There isn't some magic set of laws and regulations you can create to force the silent majority to listen to you when they think you're dumb and annoying.

The first amendment grants you the right to speak and the right for people (who wish to) to listen, but it doesn't grant you the right to an audience for your speech.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#48

Post by Buttons840 » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 7:06 PM UTC

singlow wrote: post #46

Buttons840 wrote: post #18

If social media becomes a common carrier, but ISPs do not, can Facebook just host their service on their own ISP and block unwanted users at the ISP level? "It's not Facebook blocking the user, it's the ISP, which happens to be the only ISP we host Facebook on." All just poking holes in the idea that social media can be a common carrier while the ISPs are not. Somehow the literal carrier avoided becoming the common c…

That's not how laws work.

Your right, this legal "hack" would probably be frowned upon by a judge, but it does demonstrate how silly it is that the literal carrier is not the one considered the "common carrier".

It would be illegal for Facebook to arbitrarily prevent someone from accessing Facebook, and legal for Comcast to arbitrarily prevent someone from accessing Facebook. And back to my original proposal, if Facebook and Comcast came to some sort of deal, perhaps Comcast could block unwanted user on behalf of Facebook.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#49

Post by amadeuspagel » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 7:08 PM UTC

Majromax wrote: post #44

To me, the question is how a common carrier status can coexist with content curation and promotion. Looking at the ur-example of the phone company, AT&T doesn't try to preemptively place calls that a household "might be interested in based on analytics." The modern social media landscape, however, is dominated by "the algorithm." Youtube lives on its recommendations; Twitter wants you to keep refreshing its feed; eve…

> A "legally viewpoint-neutral Twitter" would be a Pyrrhic victory for proponents if Twitter could still restrict user's visibility to direct subscribers/replies only, denying the public part of its platform.

I don't agree. I think that would be a huge victory. It would certainly not be pyrrhic in the sense that we would lose anything.

Re: Social Media Platforms as Common Carriers? [pdf]

#50

Post by Anon1096 » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 7:12 PM UTC

klyrs wrote: post #22

My biggest technical issue with this "common carrier" movement is spam. The author mentions it, but seems to suggest that users can simply block or ignore spammers. As somebody who witnessed the commercialization of the internet, I find this extremely naive. We generally think of email as a "common carrier," but even there, spam is blocked. Blocking spam is censorship. Failure to automatically detect 1% of spam will…

Couldn't a social media site implement support for custom blocklists or moderators, and have users opt into them? Facebook can have their own Official TM Facebook Moderation Blocklist, which users can subscribe to and filter out all spam and hate according to Facebook's algorithm. Or users can choose not to and subscribe to someone else's or no blocklist at all. Therefore, there wouldn't be any issue with common carrier status since users can post without being hindered, but other users can tailor their feeds to only see posts they care about.