Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content” • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#951

Post by balozi » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:08 PM UTC

sgustard wrote: post #949

ibbibby wrote: post #748

"Misinformation" is just another word for "falsehood" or "untruth." Those of you claiming that "democracy" depends on authorities preventing the spread of misinformation are ipso facto saying that democracy requires the government, or megacorporate cartels with a monopoly on public speech most likely acting as proxies for the government (as Psaki made clear is happening), to define what counts as "truth" (a Ministry…

From the top of the post: "We need to curb abuses that threaten our ability to provide these services." Google has lawyers to minimize its legal liability. Turning some vapid terms of service clause into a slippery slope argument for the onrush of totalitarianism is taking things too far.

Google's lawyers #1 task should be fighting for their employer's own rights.

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#952

Post by intricatedetail » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:15 PM UTC

soheil wrote: post #659

tyingq wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this is really bizarre. I get this kind of policy for some kinds of platforms, but not Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Forms. Those are my documents, and I should be free to put whatever I want in them. What if I just like to collect and share old conspiracy theory stuff that I know is wrong? For whimsy, historical, whatever purposes...

This policy does not apply to private files. I just want to point out based on your comment that none of what you mentioned matters unless you share the document publicly.

> This policy does not apply to private files.

Yet. Once people get used to it, it will be extended to private files. Likely they will even build it into Android and create an API to report citizens storing questionable documents.

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#953

Post by johnklos » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:16 PM UTC

Another asshole move from Google. How, might you wonder, do you report abuse? Do they actually read anything sent to "abuse@google.com"? Hell no.

They expect you to visit phishing / spam links hosted by Google, then use a button on the page to report. Or they expect you to be logged in to Google.

They don't care a tiny bit about RFCs or about doing the right thing.

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#954

Post by intricatedetail » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:17 PM UTC

maxk42 wrote: post #521

irthomasthomas wrote: post #280

I just cancelled my drive subscription. I don't know how anyone could continue using it after this. I probably have dozens of docs and hundreds of research papers contradicting government health advice on diabetes and heart disease. These would fall under "Misleading content related to harmful health practices" since they promote a health theory which the government considers harmful. However I would have cancelled r…

Some commenter replied it will change nothing. I disagree (but didn't downvote) - it will change the number of people in the market for a competitor. There are competitors out there and the people who are cancelling their Drive subscriptions here are going to support them financially, building a viable rival to Drive with their dollars. More competition is one of the best possible outcomes and I fully support it. Ple…

If this comes from government, then every competitor will eventually have this. Google was probably asked to test idea and the impact.

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#955

Post by AHappyCamper » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:32 PM UTC

This is digital tyranny.

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#956

Post by crazygringo » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:33 PM UTC

logicchains wrote: post #685

crazygringo wrote: post #525

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's something fundamentally flawed There isn't really. You're adopting, I assume, J.S. Mill's view, that the cure for bad speech is more speech, which he famously published in 1859. However, since then it's been widely accepted that when speech reaches a certain level of harm then the greater good is to prevent/punish it. You can't incite violence under the guise of free speech. You can't advertise that somethi…

>However, since then it's been widely accepted It's not widely accepted at all, except maybe in the small circle of Silicon Valley elites whose ideas align with yours politically.

To the contrary, many Silicon Valley elites trend far more libertarian than the average population, so it's actually the opposite (depending on which elites you're talking about, they're not monolithic).

And it absolutely is widely accepted if you look at democratically produced law across the world. Restrictions on harmful speech exist literally everywhere in democracies. It's what people vote for. It's absolutely widely accepted.

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#957

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:44 PM UTC

qwertox wrote: post #395

temp8964 wrote: post #2

Related: @BreesAnna First time I’ve seen a cloud drive blocking a document... It was a very long document re vaccination headlines from around the world. https://twitter.com/BreesAnna/status/1384763150109716481

So I downloaded the PDF and took a look at it. Its 80 MB of screenshots and photos of newspaper articles of reports of people which died because of the vaccine (or at least shortly after having gotten it). I wouldn't consider it misinformation, but it is misleading. There can be several causes of serious side effects, most of which I believe to be either contamination, a pre-existing condition which got its last kick…

"It is 80 MB of screenshots and photos of newspaper articles of reports..."

Is there something wrong with VAERS data

https://vaers.hhs.gov/data/datasets.html?

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#958

Post by tisthetruth » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:45 PM UTC

I like to think there is no difference between what is labeled as misinformation and any commercial or advertising we all have been consuming since we could open our eyes.

The marketing industry regularly contributes to peoples decline in health on a regular basis among other things.

ex: All the sugar water or cigarettes we have been ingesting across generations because we have seen some commercial that told a good story, promised a certain association or feeling with the product in question. Let's face it, misinformation is what drives our economy.

Education on marketing tactics coming to a neighborhood high school near you soon.

Marketing is the drug and it's tactics are suddenly running out of control so now we want to jump on our pedestal and cry "bring on the reigns". What hypocrisy!

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#959

Post by overgard » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:45 PM UTC

samiran149 wrote: post #929

ibbibby wrote: post #748

"Misinformation" is just another word for "falsehood" or "untruth." Those of you claiming that "democracy" depends on authorities preventing the spread of misinformation are ipso facto saying that democracy requires the government, or megacorporate cartels with a monopoly on public speech most likely acting as proxies for the government (as Psaki made clear is happening), to define what counts as "truth" (a Ministry…

Agreed, its important to note that these modern day, illiberals couch a lot of their phraseology in sophomoric nuance. "XXXX statement is misinformation, because it lacks context" "XXXX statement is misinformation, because it is still up for debate" "XXXX statement is misinformation, because it is offensive to class YYYY" "XXXX statement is misinformation, because it is unfair to person ZZZZ" These are logical fallac…

It's amazing the way the political left has savegely gone against greenwald. We need more journalists like him not less. He has all the proper credentials (gay, liberal), he just happens to speak the truth so, apparently, fuck him. If we had more greenwalds the world would be a much better place

Re: Google Drive bans distribution of “misleading content”

#960

Post by overgard » Sat, Jul 17, 2021, 4:49 PM UTC

intended wrote: post #751

ibbibby wrote: post #748

"Misinformation" is just another word for "falsehood" or "untruth." Those of you claiming that "democracy" depends on authorities preventing the spread of misinformation are ipso facto saying that democracy requires the government, or megacorporate cartels with a monopoly on public speech most likely acting as proxies for the government (as Psaki made clear is happening), to define what counts as "truth" (a Ministry…

We aren’t talking about something as basic as truth and untruth. This is Integer and float vs malformed code. Misinformation is code. It’s designed to specifically take advantage of gaps in our society and spread in such a way that makes it harder to challenge it.

People can figure out the truth, and if they can't, we have bigger problems. I'd like to live in a world of common sense vs "elite" judgements

The amazing thing about these super political fights is like 90% of people are on the sidelines going "what's wrong with both of you?" The people that always end up looking like idiots are the idealogues