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Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

reuters.com

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Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#201

Post by kube-system »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #148
marcinzm wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The moral principle in this case is that we don't think jail (or worse) should happen without being proven guilty. That does not mean we collectively believe all consequence requires proof of being guilty. Morals and punishment are not binary systems.

There's a point where this kind of ostracism becomes worse than jail. For many Twitch users, streaming is a substantial part of their social environment or even their full-time job. If I had to choose between a couple weeks in jail and a lifetime ban from working in my industry, or a couple weeks in jail and being banned from all my friend group chats, I'd take jail in a heartbeat.

On the other hand, one person's ostracism is another's right of association. It is just as wrong to force someone to work with a person they do not want to work with, as long as that reason is justifiable (i.e. not a protected class)

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#202

Post by Jonnax »

Alupis wrote: post #104
Judgmentality wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can think of fewer things less inline with classical American Constitutional ideals than to cheer on organizations that hunt down individuals and silence them for thoughts expressed on other platforms. The moderation team of twitch is pretty much universally hated by the internet. I don't think anybody is cheering them on.

Twitch is just the latest organization to jump onto the political silence bandwagon.

Personally I find it hilarious that American conservatives who have for decades been advocates of silencing people for things like being against wars, sex/violence in music/film/video games, and homosexuality, are now campaigning on being victims of the "cancel culture" they themselves have advocated for.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#203

Post by caturopath »

tw04 wrote: post #111
redm wrote: post #8

"The company said users will be able to report such behaviors but it may also investigate cases proactively, for instance if there is a verified news report that a user has been arrested." So we've arrived at "innocent until accused" instead of "innocent until proven guilty"? And if proven guilty, they will both be punished under the law, and again by companies like Twitch? If proven innocent will they be restored? W…

So you want the government to force private companies to continue doing business with someone they no longer wish to provide services to? We aren't talking protected class here, we're talking private companies picking and choosing who to do business with via non-discriminatory means. That's called a free market. Will they be restored if they're proven innocent? Maybe. Maybe not. Again, that's called a free market.

> So you want the government to force private companies to continue doing business with someone they no longer wish to provide services to?

I don't think OP actually said this.

But yes, like most people, I want this to happen sometimes. For example, I want a hotel to have to lodge Indian people, whether they actually want to or not.

In other cases, I don't want this to be legally required, but still will complain if I see something that indicates a lack of character. Not everything I think is shitty should be illegal.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#204

Post by MattGaiser »

teachtwolearn wrote: post #119
paxys wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was this magical era of free speech that people keep referring to?

Probably the eras when it was feasible to regularly communicate with small groups of people outside of a few highly-centralized platforms. At this point, there's a credible argument to be made that the Facebook empire is a sort of natural monopoly, like our public utilities. They need to be heavily regulated, split up into regional operators, and/or legislated out of existence.

You can communicate with small groups outside of a few central platforms. Stormfront remains alive. The incels have their own site as well.

You want the ability to communicate with everyone (tweeting is a message to the world) or if you aren't allowed to do that, for nobody to have that ability.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#205

Post by sneak »

Perhaps we should all stop donating free content to platforms operated by those that built an entire custom datacenter for the CIA to store its drone murder and torture videos in.

I'm not sure how continuing to donate content to enrich such an organization can in any way be worth it, even if they do give you free bandwidth.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#206

Post by AzzieElbab »

objclxt wrote: post #167
Alupis wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At a certain point, these platforms have such enormous, unprecedented influence and control over public discourse, that they aught to be thought of differently than, say a restaurant refusing service to a guy without a shirt or shoes on. We're clearly in uncharted territory, when it comes to the control and release of information. Just using Twitter and Facebook for example - they've silenced the second-most voted fo…

> they've silenced the second-most voted for President in American history, because he isn't their brand of politics 1. The second - and third, for that matter - most voted for President is Obama (69.5 and 65.9M votes). Trump is the fourth (62.9M votes)[1]. 2. He was not banned because he wasn’t ‘their brand of politics’, he was banned for inciting violence against the terms of those platforms. You can certainly argu…

"he was banned for inciting violence against the terms of those platforms" So technically Trump should be un-banned after claims of incitement were contested and disproved in congress, right?

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#207

Post by handoflixue »

Pfhreak wrote: post #135
Areibman wrote: post #66

It's strange to see a company that once prided itself on active engagement with its users to find product-market fit antagonize its content creators so much. And as a user, it gives me the perception that the platform is just plainly unfair. (Plus the platform is unusable without Adblock). Top streamers have been banned or lost partnerships for playing their own music[0], stating controversial political opinions[1][2…

To be clear, the controversial political opinions you believe should be platformed by Twitch are: "If that means white redneck militia dudes mowing down dipshit protesters that think they can torch buildings at 10 PM, at this point they have my fucking blessing." and "America Deserved 9/11"? Because those are the literal quotes from things that got people pulled from Twitch and you've labelled "controversial politica…

I'm old enough to remember when "gay people are all pedophiles" was the mainstream position given by the New York Times. It was utterly unacceptable to endorse such perverts.

I'm not so old to remember the arguments about how women are too emotional to be allowed to vote, or the ones about black people, but it was pretty unacceptable to come out in defense of either of those groups either.

Why in the world would I believe censorship is only going to squash the sort of stuff you list, when there's such a long history of it being used to oppress anyone who thinks they deserve the same rights as the rest of us?

Are we going to ban any pro-abortion discussions, because "suggesting we kill innocent people" is absolutely beyond the pale? Do you really think there aren't millions of people in the US drooling at that sort of censorship opportunity?

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#208

Post by ellyagg »

tw04 wrote: post #111
redm wrote: post #8

"The company said users will be able to report such behaviors but it may also investigate cases proactively, for instance if there is a verified news report that a user has been arrested." So we've arrived at "innocent until accused" instead of "innocent until proven guilty"? And if proven guilty, they will both be punished under the law, and again by companies like Twitch? If proven innocent will they be restored? W…

So you want the government to force private companies to continue doing business with someone they no longer wish to provide services to? We aren't talking protected class here, we're talking private companies picking and choosing who to do business with via non-discriminatory means. That's called a free market. Will they be restored if they're proven innocent? Maybe. Maybe not. Again, that's called a free market.

The "private" companies live in a heavily-scrutinized regulaory environment, where politians also routinely demand that they take action.

These are no longer private companies anymore.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#209

Post by Pfhreak »

aeturnum wrote: post #172
Pfhreak wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I also think we're within our rights to pressure them to adopt standards we would like. I think this is what's happening, it's just that the users of Twitch want something different than what you want. You might think they're the vocal minority or something, but Twitch is almost certainly making a data driven decision here.

I am sure there are many different groups here! But yah, there are definitely folks that will be happy. I was just trying to say that, beyond Twitch being within its rights, people can still yell at them and say they shouldn't (or should) do it. No need to leave it at "this is legal and in line with previous behavior."

Sure. I find it extremely tiring to read about how this is a slippery slope, and how this is somehow oppressive or unusual for American media.

I don't mind folks coming in and saying, "Hey, this is a change that I dislike." But a lot of the discourse here today is just outrage and finger pointing and yelling about free speech absolutism.

I think that HN's downvoting system actually makes it harder to have a reasoned discourse about topics like this, because if I disagree with the prevailing opinion in this community that Twitch is doing a bad thing, it's likely my comment gets strongly downvoted, rather than opening a line of discussion.

I don't know how to solve this. Maybe separate "I disagree" vs "Off-topic/poor quality comment" downvotes?

There's a reasonable discussion to be had about the decision Twitch made. I happen to think it's a good decision, and I'd love to be able to have that discourse in a calm way, but I don't know how to have it in something like HN where comments get swept up in voting and yelling and hostile replies.

Re: Twitch will ban users for 'severe misconduct' that occurs away from its site

#210

Post by alacombe »

paxys wrote: post #197
alacombe wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your 2nd source links to Hasan saying "America deserved 9/11". Maybe it did.

It's hilarious that in a thread full of people hating on companies for deplatforming people for their opinions, you are getting massively downvoted for voicing your own opinion. Goes to show that no one really wants "free speech".

> Goes to show that no one really wants "free speech".

Especially not on HN, where the SV/SJW group think prevail.

Argument I often get is "you are free to voice your opinions and we are free to massively downvote you", well, same happened with 9/11, the US elites have been cunts to the whole world (including to "The People" and still are), they are totally free to be, by then 9/11 came as a big slap in Wall Street America face, maybe they deserved it...

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