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Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

economictimes.indiatimes.com

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Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#21

Post by AndrewStephens »

Personally I think that social media companies should be at least in part liable for content posted by their users. There is a tendency to treat social media as a mere conduit, like the post office, that should not be responsible for content but the post office doesn't decide who sees what or profits from advertising inserted into mail.

I thought about this a few months ago and came up with this rantcompletely reasonable proposal[0] that tries to balance internet freedom with assigning limited responsibility for user content published by web sites.

Summary: under some conditions based on the number of views, whether any money changed hands, and whether the post was widely shared or mostly private, a publisher should be liable for some of the damages caused by a post.

[0] https://sheep.horse/2025/3/section_230_and_internet_freedom%...

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#22

Post by JumpCrisscross »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #5
defrost wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By that logic, the USA also wants to become like China. The current POTUS, Donald J. Trump declared his admiration for the strong chinese response to the Tiananmen Square protests. * https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-praised-china-tiananme... * https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/mar/11/donald-trump... ( and numerous other reports since his 1990 comments )

He's a bit of a tyrant himself, isn't he? It's alarming but I suppose it's not surprising. Haven't seen him defend censorship yet though.

> Haven't seen him defend censorship yet though

Literally kicked the Associated Press out of the White House because they wouldn't toe the line on calling the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America [1].

[1] https://www.ap.org/media-center/ap-in-the-news/2025/white-ho...

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#23

Post by FirmwareBurner »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #18
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why would social media companies only make money from what users do on their platform but be spared any accountability? Here's the thing that confuses me. In every country I know, TV and radio stations are liable for the content they broadcast. Both in terms of programs and also ads. I've seen several fines being issued for such breaches, and my country is very liberal and loosely regulated here. So then why do we l…

There is a legitimate argument social media can for being treated differently given their content is user generated. But that argument falls to pieces given algorithmic boosting, which is clearly an editorial slant.

>as its content is user generated

Content on TV stations is also mostly third party generated. Channel 5 didn't make The Punisher, they bought the rights to play it on air. Radio 2 didn't make In da Club, but 50 Cent did, they're just playing it on air. Newspapers also publish letters and content from readers, yet unlike social media they're the ones responsible for that content.

Because in many countries, content is age restricted per times of day, so the TV and radio statins need to edit the songs and movies they play to cut out various swear words, violence and sex scenes if they want to air to to general audiences, otherwise they get fined.

So why are social media companies allowed to wreak havok?

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#24

Post by BugheadTorpeda6 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #18
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why would social media companies only make money from what users do on their platform but be spared any accountability? Here's the thing that confuses me. In every country I know, TV and radio stations are liable for the content they broadcast. Both in terms of programs and also ads. I've seen several fines being issued for such breaches, and my country is very liberal and loosely regulated here. So then why do we l…

There is a legitimate argument social media can for being treated differently given their content is user generated. But that argument falls to pieces given algorithmic boosting, which is clearly an editorial slant.

Yep, just another reason they should be held liable the same as everybody else.

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#25

Post by mlinhares »

phantomathkg wrote: post #20
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why would social media companies only make money from what users do on their platform but be spared any accountability? Here's the thing that confuses me. In every country I know, TV and radio stations are liable for the content they broadcast. Both in terms of programs and also ads. I've seen several fines being issued for such breaches, and my country is very liberal and loosely regulated here. So then why do we l…

are you and GP are saying that all social media platform should perform policing to the point that everything outlaw in every countries should be banned?

yes, that's how the law works, social media platforms can't show nazi content in germany cos that's the law there. they're perfectly fine doing it.

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#26

Post by diggan »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #23
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a legitimate argument social media can for being treated differently given their content is user generated. But that argument falls to pieces given algorithmic boosting, which is clearly an editorial slant.

>as its content is user generated Content on TV stations is also mostly third party generated. Channel 5 didn't make The Punisher, they bought the rights to play it on air. Radio 2 didn't make In da Club, but 50 Cent did, they're just playing it on air. Newspapers also publish letters and content from readers, yet unlike social media they're the ones responsible for that content. Because in many countries, content is…

That's highlighting the difference, TV stations actively chose what to show, defaulting to rejecting. Social media is the opposite, kind of makes sense to have different rules.

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#27

Post by littlestymaar »

Finally! I've been yelling at the clouds for years now how it made zero sense to apply “hosting services” rules for social media when they haven't been doing mere content hosting for years: with their algorithmic feeds curating what everyone is viewing they are literally acting as content editors, and as such it made no sense to me that they didn't have the same obligations as any other other editors out there.

In fact, because of them the regulation on mere hosting services have increased sharply for no reasons, just because the regulators wanted to have more control on social medias.

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#28

Post by logicchains »

mlinhares wrote: post #25
phantomathkg wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

are you and GP are saying that all social media platform should perform policing to the point that everything outlaw in every countries should be banned?

yes, that's how the law works, social media platforms can't show nazi content in germany cos that's the law there. they're perfectly fine doing it.

Germany is a country without freedom of speech, where people can be fined for criticising politicians online. It's not something anyone should be aiming to emulate.

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#29

Post by FirmwareBurner »

diggan wrote: post #26
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>as its content is user generated Content on TV stations is also mostly third party generated. Channel 5 didn't make The Punisher, they bought the rights to play it on air. Radio 2 didn't make In da Club, but 50 Cent did, they're just playing it on air. Newspapers also publish letters and content from readers, yet unlike social media they're the ones responsible for that content. Because in many countries, content is…

That's highlighting the difference, TV stations actively chose what to show, defaulting to rejecting. Social media is the opposite, kind of makes sense to have different rules.

>Social media is the opposite

Disagree here, all social media platforms have "the algorithm" which chooses what to show and to who, in order o maximize engagement and ad revenue.

If they don't want to be responsible for what they show to users, maybe they should leave all that ad money on the table, but it seems like they have no moral issues cashing those cheques while outsourcing their externalities to society. It's not like Meta is scrambling for change between the couch cushions and can't invest in better human plus bot moderation and curation. But then Zuck will only be able to afford a gold trim on his yacht instead of the platinum one, and a smaller island. Oh no, how sad, how terrible.

So tell me again, why do we have double standards for super wealthy social media oligopolies compared to traditional mediums?

Re: Brazil's Supreme Court makes social media liable for user content

#30

Post by BugheadTorpeda6 »

phantomathkg wrote: post #20
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Why would social media companies only make money from what users do on their platform but be spared any accountability? Here's the thing that confuses me. In every country I know, TV and radio stations are liable for the content they broadcast. Both in terms of programs and also ads. I've seen several fines being issued for such breaches, and my country is very liberal and loosely regulated here. So then why do we l…

are you and GP are saying that all social media platform should perform policing to the point that everything outlaw in every countries should be banned?

Yes, I am saying that platforms should be policed to such an extent that they remove and ban all illegal content within a reasonable timeframe. And in the case of something like child porn, knowingly failing to do so quickly should lead to a lot of people going to jail (I think a lot of tech executives and employees belong in jail).

I don't find this to be too much to ask. Every other platform has to do this. The only reason you have a bunch of ridiculously wealthy anti-social people rampaging across the world "disrupting" whatever they see fit is because we decided the rules arbitrarily should't apply to them because of some wide eyed and ridiculous utopian bullshit how "the internet is for free love and knowledge mannnn, and it should be like, freeee brooo". I'm not even slightly sympathetic to that argument and I don't think the Internet has proven to be valuable enough either culturally or productivity wise to justify even the slightest loosening of the rules that apply elsewhere. The whole thing starts to look like a rent seeking scam that was used to destroy a lot of higher quality information resources and businesses if you squint at it for even a second.

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