141–150 of 151 posts
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The problem is Microsoft has leverage in other areas. I understand Sony's nervousness.
On the flip side, Microsoft might be nervous that Sony can leverage other areas, like their film division, to make a game they can’t compete with.
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Germany doesn't censor any mention of Nazism; they censor support for Nazism.
That is reassuringly sane. So who said anything about supporting? That was my whole original point, that if something is bad, it's if anything even more important not to censor information about it, not so thoroughly that it is actually removed from active and specific searches at least. That absolutely includes things that advocate, because those very statements are the bad thing that needs to be seen to be believed…
They do. You just can't deny the holocaust, spread anti-semitism, etc. [0]
My point, which I admittedly obscured, is that while there are things we censor and compel (which we mostly agree on), there are weirdly some things we don't censor that we also mostly agree on.
Anti-semitism is a good example. There's no value in talking about it. Anti-semitic hate groups use the shield of freedom of speech to spread their lies and recruit members. Proponents will spam forums, WhatsApp groups, social media, etc in what is effectively a DDoS on fact checkers. The thing that fixes anti-semitism isn't letting them say whatever they want wherever they want, it's a Wikipedia page on anti-semitism and a ban everywhere else.
It's also worth saying that while we're having a relatively academic debate, Jewish people, Black people, trans people, etc get to wade through a morass of hate on the internet which every so often leads to a mass murder. What's the value of that?
[0]: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/germanys-laws-ant...
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> that can regulate the flow of known bad information > prevent the spread of pro-genocide propaganda This is a Motte and Bailey. Your introduction advocates for: regulating the spread of known bad information. In your second to last paragraph you substitute it with: prevent the spread of pro-genocide propaganda I’ll engage with your second point only if you yield that the _only_ form of information that is acceptabl…
>This is a Motte and Bailey. No it isn't. The motte and bailey tactic is when you advocate for a very broad position, then retreat to something more defensible. I've stated that the broad statement (that all censorship is bad) is false, so as a result we need to have a more nuanced discussion about when it's appropriate to exercise this power and how we can de-fang potential abuses of it. Your position regarding all…
Holmes argued, "the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent."
It’s a great example of how governments abuse these powers to silence inconvenient speech.
From child pornography to robocalls, I’d suggest that you don’t need “speech” to be a crime - though it’d be convenient to many pro-censorship arguments if it were.
The production of pornography without consent is illegal and is not speech. The production and possession of child pornography is a crime. Transmission requires both, which are already crimes. Possession with intent to distribute and the distribution of this content are already crimes.
You don’t need a carve out for sending these over TCP/IP conflating it with speech any more than you need a carve out for sending the photos through the U.S. postal service. It was a crime before you sent the photos, still a crime after. Free speech doesn’t wash the crime away and you don’t need to ask us to give up free speech to charge them with a crime.
I don’t know this case or the site, I’m only commenting on this because, shouldn’t we be very concerned that anything can be silenced, globally, online? Where does it stop if we do it? Who gets the say? Who watches them? You see what I’m getting at? Google started self censoring “Russian propaganda” and everyone was so distracted with the war itself that nobody seemed to take notice of what gears that type of thing s…
You're just "waking up" now ? Tech clearly engaged in election interference on behalf of Trump's opponents in 2020. I don't like the man any more than anyone else, but that was a crime.
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>This is a Motte and Bailey. No it isn't. The motte and bailey tactic is when you advocate for a very broad position, then retreat to something more defensible. I've stated that the broad statement (that all censorship is bad) is false, so as a result we need to have a more nuanced discussion about when it's appropriate to exercise this power and how we can de-fang potential abuses of it. Your position regarding all…
The “fire in a crowded theater” is an oft cited example that highlights this point. The phrase is a paraphrasing of a dictum from an opinion in Schenck v. United States, which held that the defendant's speech in opposition to the draft during World War I was not protected by the First Amendment. Holmes argued, "the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present dan…
The very substance of your original argument is that the power to restrict these things is inherently dangerous, yet you don't seem to apply that standard in current cases where the acts of communication are criminalized.
Accordingly, your original argument falls flat based upon your own argument; the government can criminalize some speech and you don't seem to have an issue with it where it's obviously pro-social to do so.
So, again, work a little harder on refining the original position - the absolutist approach of complete governmental restriction doesn't exist in real life.
If you want to try redefining speech to only include vocal discussion between two people (which very much is not what freedom of speech entails), you'd still fall flat on almost all of the fraud related restrictions mentioned above in my previous post.
Anyways, that's all from me on the topic, the substance of the reply ignoring literally every area of nuance and actual productive conflict is just nauseating. It's like watching some tech guy tell a banker how bonds should work.
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"We need to wake up" Maybe stop relying on third party DNS 24/7. Most web users visit the same sites over and over, at a frequency of several times per month or even per week. Few of these sites are changing their IP addresses with the same frequency. Some (most, based on personal experience) will go years without a change in address. Yet people keep looking up the addresses every single day if not more frequently. G…
I run an authoritative server on the LAN that serves a custom root.zone. No need to use remote root servers. I get DNS data from a variety of sources, bulk recursive queries (pipelined over HTTPS/1.1) is only one of them. ICANN's DNS racket is as corrupt as any "cartel" of "large players". Why support it by renting "domain names".
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The “fire in a crowded theater” is an oft cited example that highlights this point. The phrase is a paraphrasing of a dictum from an opinion in Schenck v. United States, which held that the defendant's speech in opposition to the draft during World War I was not protected by the First Amendment. Holmes argued, "the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present dan…
Your rebuttal doesn't really address the substance of my point, but to put a fine point on it, "It's a crime, therefore it isn't speech" isn't a good argument - if anything it demolishes your own position that speech should never be restricted by government. The very substance of your original argument is that the power to restrict these things is inherently dangerous, yet you don't seem to apply that standard in cur…
I don’t think I believe this. You’ll need to explain a bit more why I do.
The best I can come up with is “photos are speech, no different than books or pamphlets. “Intellectual property” and pornography are already regulated and there’s no difference between that and other forms of speech. Taking a nude photo without the subject’s consent is speech and forcing someone to have their photo taken nude is speech. If you can’t take nude photographs of children, you don’t have free speech.” I’d have a problem with this argument but could agree with where it’s coming from.
I think what highlights the difference between “speech” and child pornography, for me, is best captured by loliporn and generative AI. I vehemently disagree with the depiction of minors in pornography. But, assuming the artist didn’t use actual child pornography as a reference (including in training the AI), I consider the content generated by those methods to be “speech.” I’d defend your right to produce and distribute it no matter how much I disagree with it. It was never about the “speech” part of the photo.
After reading your response, I’m left feeling like you missed the point of what I said. But maybe I originally missed yours?
I’m sorry for offending you. I assume your profession is law specializing in free speech. It must be exhausting having to engage with the general public on how they feel they feel they should be governed. You’re making me realize I treat my banker the same way, I try to understand (and I have opinions on) the financial instruments I put my savings into before I make the investment.
You must feel like an IT help desk clerk whose constantly burdened by users.
If you’d like me to withdraw from this conversation because I’m not worthy of having it with you, I’m okay with that.
I’ll leave with my general sentiment about your original Motte. I vehemently disagree with pro-genocide propaganda but I’ll defend an American’s right to post and read it.
I don’t understand why they go on DNS level . The web is hosted somewhere, the actual files are hosted somewhere (on a different site), yet they don’t go after either of these actual websites but after a DNS resolver? That’s just weird. On the other hand my country now DNS-blocks Russia Today so I guess it’s just the minimal viable block
The DNS provider has some German presence, and the site and its hosting don't. The serving of torrent magnet links alone is not illegal in most Europe.
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"We need to wake up" Maybe stop relying on third party DNS 24/7. Most web users visit the same sites over and over, at a frequency of several times per month or even per week. Few of these sites are changing their IP addresses with the same frequency. Some (most, based on personal experience) will go years without a change in address. Yet people keep looking up the addresses every single day if not more frequently. G…
For the self-hosters among us, here is a guide to setting up your own recursive DNS server, along with PiHole: https://martinkubecka.github.io/posts/general/recursive_dns/
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That is reassuringly sane. So who said anything about supporting? That was my whole original point, that if something is bad, it's if anything even more important not to censor information about it, not so thoroughly that it is actually removed from active and specific searches at least. That absolutely includes things that advocate, because those very statements are the bad thing that needs to be seen to be believed…
> You have to show the crowd-pleasing speeches and other pro-nazi propaganda They do. You just can't deny the holocaust, spread anti-semitism, etc. [0] My point, which I admittedly obscured, is that while there are things we censor and compel (which we mostly agree on), there are weirdly some things we don't censor that we also mostly agree on. Anti-semitism is a good example. There's no value in talking about it. An…
Is and entirely different thing than
"You can't see this thing"
I guess people are deciding that linking is saying rather than merely referencing.
Even if so, it just means that the need to be able to reference is more important than the need to hide a few of the unwanted things that manage to get said. Anything else is simply not sane, as in, not functional. Even if everyone agrees that some messages are offensive and some knowledge is undesired, that doesn't justify breaking the very concept of communication and knowledge.