What also gets glossed over is the privacy tradeoff: to "protect minors," you end up collecting more sensitive data about everyone, including adults downloading trivial apps
in some people's eyes, that's a feature, not a bug.
Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
161–170 of 263 posts
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
Historically liquor store checks were purely visual. These days they are often digital, meaning claims about privacy might (or might not) be outdated. The general principle still applies though. The physical infrastructure already exists, the ID checks do not necessarily need to be digitized or recorded, and even if they are the issued tokens don't need to be tied to the check. Grocery stores already sell age restric…
I don't trust that the information about my identity would not be recorded while selling me my "free speech token". So the chilling effect on free speech would be exactly the same.
That would largely depend on the implementation details I think. Both those of the ID check itself as well as the precise nature of the tokens.
Consider a somewhat extreme example. A preprinted paper ticket with nothing more than a serial number on it. The clerk only visually inspects the ID document then enters the serial number into a web portal and hands it to you. When you go to "redeem" it the service relays the number back to the government server rather than your local device doing so directly. That would be far more privacy preserving than the vast majority of present day clearnet activity.
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
Law is a strange and possibly the only aspect in human societies where people are by default assumed to know, understand and follow it to the letter when everybody acknowledges that law is open to interpretation. You cannot in most cases claim ignorance as it can be abused by criminals. But there is whole industry of education, profession, journals, blogs, podcasts and videos trying to teach, interpret and explain th…
In the end, we are at the mercy of those with power. Laws are just a way to make their decisions appear fair and appease the masses. If you piss off enough the wrong person with power, it doesn't matter what the laws say, you'll get screwed.
It’s not the ideal of the system. We shouldn’t have two tiered justice, the top should be being held accountable.
Adams and Jefferson wrestled with another question. J said generations shouldn’t be tied to the decisions of their ancestors. Adams said but surely laws are necessary to maintain stability and order and preserve their fragile democracy for future generations.
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
As a UK subject, with a government that has begun implementing the online safety act, prosecuting people for tweets that clearly weren't inciting violence and getting rid of jury trials for cases with fewer than five years sentences, I look on with envy at your constitutional protections of the individual.
The problem interpreting the intent of that tweet is that Lucy Connolly herself admitted to authorities she was inciting violence so becomes hard to build a defence at that point. Incitement isn’t first amendment protected in the US either https://codes.findlaw.com/us/title-18-crimes-and-criminal-pr...
I should be clearer and provide references etc, I was refering to this:
https://freespeechunion.org/labour-reported-me-for-racial-ha...
The major part of this case is that without a jury trial he'd probably have had zero chance of being cleared. Countless others were persuaded to plead guilty to avoid a long time in prison and then were given long sentences. h he was strong enough not to give in.
You are right, freedom of expression in the US doesn't cover inciting violence, but it has an high bar, imminent lawless action:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandenburg_v._Ohio
Yes in Lucy Connolly's case she admitted to inciting violence, though I'm not certain what she did justifies a 31 month sentence.
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the end, we are at the mercy of those with power. Laws are just a way to make their decisions appear fair and appease the masses. If you piss off enough the wrong person with power, it doesn't matter what the laws say, you'll get screwed.
It’s not the ideal of the system. We shouldn’t have two tiered justice, the top should be being held accountable. Adams and Jefferson wrestled with another question. J said generations shouldn’t be tied to the decisions of their ancestors. Adams said but surely laws are necessary to maintain stability and order and preserve their fragile democracy for future generations.
Ideal and reality are rarely in alignment, and reality is what we need to be concerned with.
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
I got years of their spam without signing up. Only after several years did they add a way to opt out an email address without making an account.
If they don't provide an easy opt-out link then why not just block the sender and move on? Unlike the less legal operations I wouldn't expect a legitimate business to rotate domains or otherwise attempt to evade blocks.
Why block when you can report to Spamhaus?
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#167Earlier quoted context omitted.
> "would require every bookstore to verify the age of every customer at the door and, for minors..." It's a dumb law, but, devil's advocate - isn't that how porn shops work? And porn shops also sell some non-porn items, too.
This is the difference between standing on a street corner shouting "shit" and taking a shit on a street corner. The court is generally pretty adept at navigating the difference between "a bookstore that has some spicy books" and "a sex shop that has some non-spicy books".
Most modern social media is the latter, but for trash and propaganda, rather than sex. So why doesn't the court apply the same rule that it's okay to check IDs on entry?
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is the second amendment excepted? Nothing in the text says anything different from the others with regards to age. And don't say "because it's insane for kids to buy deadly weapons" because that doesn't seem to figure into any other part of second amendment interpretation.
Because that's the way our courts have ruled on it. Nothing more complicated than that. The courts are empowered by the Constitution to interpret the Constitution, and their interpretation says kids can have their rights limited.
IIRC didn't the courts empower themselves to interpret the constitution? Nothing in the constitution says they can. Of course, since they interpret the constitution, they can just insert an interpretation that says they interpret the constitution...
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't trust that the information about my identity would not be recorded while selling me my "free speech token". So the chilling effect on free speech would be exactly the same.
That would largely depend on the implementation details I think. Both those of the ID check itself as well as the precise nature of the tokens. Consider a somewhat extreme example. A preprinted paper ticket with nothing more than a serial number on it. The clerk only visually inspects the ID document then enters the serial number into a web portal and hands it to you. When you go to "redeem" it the service relays the…
How would I know the Clerk wasn't instructed to record the name from my ID? Also this runs into the same problems as voter ID laws, not everyone has an ID that they can show at a liquor store.
Re: Texas app store age verification law blocked by federal judge
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the end, we are at the mercy of those with power. Laws are just a way to make their decisions appear fair and appease the masses. If you piss off enough the wrong person with power, it doesn't matter what the laws say, you'll get screwed.
Not quite that simple. Laws legitimise and stabilise those in power. If enough people stop believing in the law, it really threatens those in power. There are other means to gaining power, of course.
> Laws legitimise and stabilise those in power. If enough people stop believing in the law, it really threatens those in power.
Not quite that simple.
If enough people stop believing in the law, the society breaks apart, and you have people shooting each other in the streets trying to loot supermarkets and extend their lives for a week or two, before inevitably dying of starvation.
This is serious stuff. Society and civilization are purely abstract, intersubjective constructs. They exist only as long as enough people believe in them -- but then, it's still not that simple. Actually, they exist if enough people believe that enough other people believe in them.
Money, laws, employment, contracts, corporations, even marriages - are mutually recursive beliefs achieving stability as independent abstractions. But they're not independent - they're vulnerable to breaking if large group of people suddenly start to doubt in them.