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Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private

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Re: Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private

#171
It will be fun when the Internet mobilizes a mass exodus to a new or competing platform to fuck him over. He lives his online life with a foot three inches from his mouth, cocked and loaded, and waiting to scatter his brains to the wind. The first time it goes off after the takeover, Twitter will burn to the ground.

Because at its core, woke culture isn't righteous; it's petty and it's fueled by have nots fucking with haves because they can.

Re: Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private

#172
post #126

As somebody from the first world who has had the experience of moderating Internet forums… free speech in the sense of “the government generally shouldn’t control people’s speech, with limited exceptions” is good and necessary. Free speech in the sense of “everybody should be forced to platform every idea” is silly IMO. Left alone user content rapidly devolves into the most low-effort salient content - flame wars, po…

100% agree. Freedom of speech protects you _from_ government. The idea that government should compel commercial or private entities to give all voices a megaphone is misguided.

Re: Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private

#173

From observing various internet forums, including this one, I noticed that people from the "first world" countries don't know the value of free speech and often take it for granted. Sometimes even coming to such views as "free speech is dangerous" and that "we should limit free speech" (by blocking the views I don't like). Understand this: limits on free speech are far more dangerous to society than allowing fringe e…

Yes this is why there are very few actual limits on free speech. Twitter isn't going to throw you in jail for saying something wrong on the platform. Your country didn't slide into a fascist state because a private company started limiting which kinds of posts are allowed on the platform it made and owns.

Re: Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private

#174
post #126

As somebody from the first world who has had the experience of moderating Internet forums… free speech in the sense of “the government generally shouldn’t control people’s speech, with limited exceptions” is good and necessary. Free speech in the sense of “everybody should be forced to platform every idea” is silly IMO. Left alone user content rapidly devolves into the most low-effort salient content - flame wars, po…

Some private enterprises are treated like government services and regulated as such. Utilities, for example. I doubt there are many countries where the electricity company can fire a paying client. The key is not who manages or owns the business, but whether it's a commons platform - something needed to function in society.

So yeah, there's a pretty strong case to be made that certain internet companies are like that. Can you survive without social media? Sure, but you can also survive without sewer. It's just a lot harder to live a normal life.

Re: Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private

#176

From observing various internet forums, including this one, I noticed that people from the "first world" countries don't know the value of free speech and often take it for granted. Sometimes even coming to such views as "free speech is dangerous" and that "we should limit free speech" (by blocking the views I don't like). Understand this: limits on free speech are far more dangerous to society than allowing fringe e…

I'm not really sure what you mean by free speech here.

Do you mean that, if I say "this war is bad!" I may be "arrested" and "tried" and then put in a jail for 15 years (or just vanish, or be dropped from a helicopter over the ocean).

Or do you mean if I tweet "I'll 2nd amendment those Hajis!" my tweet won't be seen by 12 million people rather than "promoted" by some algorithm?

Freedom of speech, as denoted in the United States Constitution, is a set of limits around the government behaviors. U.S. Government behaviors.

The dose makes the medicine.

Re: Elon Musk makes $43B unsolicited bid to take Twitter private

#178
post #58

> Free speech absolutism is possible and is beneficial I don't think we have evidence to support this. Pursuant to the last major thread on the topic, I was thinking further about it, and realized that the vast majority of progress civilization has made has been under conditions much more regulated in terms of which ideas may propagate. We've never had a situation where fake news can and does spread the way it does t…

> Pursuant to the last major thread on the topic, I was thinking further about it, and realized that the vast majority of progress civilization has made has been under conditions much more regulated in terms of which ideas may propagate. We've never had a situation where fake news can and does spread the way it does today, where authorities are being undermined like this and casually dismissed by people with no knowledge of the respective fields, etc.

I don’t think you have evidence to support this either. Really hard to say when progress in a civilization happens, and how it would be different if norms were different.

Just because historically speech has been controlled doesn’t mean anything. Slavery also was well accepted and “progressed” civilization, but most people don’t want slavery in the modern world.

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