Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees • Hacker News Board

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#271

Post by JesusChrist2020 » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:30 AM UTC

lancesells wrote: post #248

legostormtroopr wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Social media is a not a public square where people can plant their soapbox Except there isn't really an alternative to Twitter - they have monopolised that "short catchy text stream" market. Other services, like Gab, exist - but when services like Cloudflare readily pull support for less mainstream alternatives, its hard to say that if you don't like Twitter you can go somewhere else. For better or worse, Facebook…

That's like saying television networks are required to give you a show for your free speech. Social networks are private companies built for profit. For better or worse they should be able to censor anything that's not good for their business. Hell, you can't even post a nipple on Facebook.

[dead]

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#272

Post by nscalf » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:32 AM UTC

legostormtroopr wrote: post #225

koboll wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. What about Paul Nehlen, a political candidate who (before he was permabanned) frequently railed on Twitter against the "Jewish media" and mused about the "JQ", which stands for Jewish Question? Who called Jewish critics "shekels-for-hire" and used the phrase "The goyim know!" as an imitation of their…

> Social media is a not a public square where people can plant their soapbox Except there isn't really an alternative to Twitter - they have monopolised that "short catchy text stream" market. Other services, like Gab, exist - but when services like Cloudflare readily pull support for less mainstream alternatives, its hard to say that if you don't like Twitter you can go somewhere else. For better or worse, Facebook…

Why does there have to be an alternative? They can give speeches, send letters and emails, go on television, post to other social media platforms, yell in a park, release an album, etc. You have the right to freedom of speech, not the right to freedom of mediums of speech.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#273

Post by klyrs » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:33 AM UTC

colejohnson66 wrote: post #230

Avicebron wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to work at FB so you might have some more insight than I do, if so please share. On the other side, I see new players arriving and proving to be competitive because FB will be forced to take a position, if people don't like that position they won't interact with the platform. Suddenly there's a market for a different platform.

> You seem to work at FB so you might have some more insight than I do, if so please share. Please don’t make accusations of astroturfing. It’s rude and against the HN guidelines. Why? Because the majority of the time, it’s not true. I don’t work at or have any connection to Microsoft, but a week ago, I was accused of astroturfing for them because I did not agree that them open sourcing stuff is EEE.

Before making that accusation maybe check out your GP's profile.

https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=pavlov

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#274

Post by darkerside » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:36 AM UTC

nscalf wrote: post #272

legostormtroopr wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Social media is a not a public square where people can plant their soapbox Except there isn't really an alternative to Twitter - they have monopolised that "short catchy text stream" market. Other services, like Gab, exist - but when services like Cloudflare readily pull support for less mainstream alternatives, its hard to say that if you don't like Twitter you can go somewhere else. For better or worse, Facebook…

Why does there have to be an alternative? They can give speeches, send letters and emails, go on television, post to other social media platforms, yell in a park, release an album, etc. You have the right to freedom of speech, not the right to freedom of mediums of speech.

They're also free to blog, set up their own Mastodon, etc

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#275

Post by cool_dude85 » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:36 AM UTC

gotoeleven wrote: post #259

dnadler wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was the real eye opener for me over the past 5 or 10 years. I used to be firmly in the "no censorship" camp, but it seems an alarming number Americans (I'm American and can't speak for any other nation) are not capable of using critical thinking when it comes to political issue that they've already made up their minds about. Close friends and family included. I don't know the answer to this problem, but it seems…

So people you know are thinking wrong, which shouldn't be allowed? You know this line of reasoning has a long and storied history.

So does not cracking down on hate speech and incitement to violence.

Imagine tut-tutting if the Rwandan government had cracked down on radio broadcasts calling Tutsi people cockroaches and encouraging Hutus to chop them down.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#276

Post by el_benhameen » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:39 AM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #265

gwbas1c wrote: post #263

"Free speech" is a very nuanced term. You can't shout "fire" in a crowd unless there's a fire; and you can't force me to distribute anything. Traditional media (TV, Newspapers, Radio, Publishers) always use discretion about what they print and broadcast. A TV station deciding not to broadcast something, or a publisher declining to publish something, is not censorship. IMO, Social Media is not like a generic web hosti…

I remember seeing that “yelling fire in a crowded theater” was technically untrue as it is usually presented. Anyone with more knowledge can elaborate?

https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/11/its-tim... and https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-ha... are illuminating.

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#277

Post by Alex3917 » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:41 AM UTC

koboll wrote: post #205

danielfoster wrote: post #2

So long as their speech remains legal, social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. It’s too easy to walk down a slippery slope where suddenly these sites have to regulate in accordance with whatever is the popular opinion of the day.

>social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. What about Paul Nehlen, a political candidate who (before he was permabanned) frequently railed on Twitter against the "Jewish media" and mused about the "JQ", which stands for Jewish Question? Who called Jewish critics "shekels-for-hire" and used the phrase "The goyim know!" as an imitation of their…

Better than the alternative. Consider the r/nyc subreddit, where criticism of anything Jewish-related, no matter how minor, is usually instantly deleted. Whereas posts referring to black people as thugs and animals are allowed to stand. E.g. Google "site:reddit.com/r/nyc thugs"

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#278

Post by derrick_jensen » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:44 AM UTC

lancesells wrote: post #248

legostormtroopr wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Social media is a not a public square where people can plant their soapbox Except there isn't really an alternative to Twitter - they have monopolised that "short catchy text stream" market. Other services, like Gab, exist - but when services like Cloudflare readily pull support for less mainstream alternatives, its hard to say that if you don't like Twitter you can go somewhere else. For better or worse, Facebook…

That's like saying television networks are required to give you a show for your free speech. Social networks are private companies built for profit. For better or worse they should be able to censor anything that's not good for their business. Hell, you can't even post a nipple on Facebook.

I agree with you in spirit, but the Fairness Doctrine in the United States was a variation of this, where the FCC required that approximately equal time and attention be paid to all sides of a major issue. Ronald Reagan removed this in the 80s, and helped popularize conservative talk radio. The justification was that the limited bandwidth of television made it in the public interest to regulate its influence. The internet is much higher bandwidth, so the same argument doesn't hold water.

EDIT: What qualified as "equal" and "all sides of a major issue" were up to the discretion of the FCC, so enforcement was fairly ad hoc

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#279

Post by brownra04 » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:44 AM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #265

gwbas1c wrote: post #263

"Free speech" is a very nuanced term. You can't shout "fire" in a crowd unless there's a fire; and you can't force me to distribute anything. Traditional media (TV, Newspapers, Radio, Publishers) always use discretion about what they print and broadcast. A TV station deciding not to broadcast something, or a publisher declining to publish something, is not censorship. IMO, Social Media is not like a generic web hosti…

I remember seeing that “yelling fire in a crowded theater” was technically untrue as it is usually presented. Anyone with more knowledge can elaborate?

Here's a good summary: [1]

Basically, the analogy of shouting "fire" in a theater was meant to illustrate the "clear and present danger" doctrine - if an act of speech could lead to clear and present danger which there were laws against, then the speech was not protected. What's false about this analogy is that the "clear and present danger" standard isn't the standard that speech is measured against today. Instead, speech is restricted according to the "imminent lawless action" doctrine, by which speech that could lead directly to people breaking the law is not protected. This was decided in Brandenburg v. Ohio[2], and the central tenet of the ruling is:

"Advocacy of force or criminal activity does not receive First Amendment protections if (1) the advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action, and (2) is likely to incite or produce such action."

Thus, standing on a street corner and praising the merits of rioting and damaging property might be protected speech if it was very unlikely for anyone to take those actions, but if you did it during a restless protest march the protections of free speech may not apply.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shouting_fire_in_a_crowded_the... [2]: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/395/444/

Re: Things from leaked audio of Mark Zuckerberg and his employees

#280

Post by philwelch » Thu, Jun 04, 2020, 1:45 AM UTC

koboll wrote: post #205

danielfoster wrote: post #2

So long as their speech remains legal, social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. It’s too easy to walk down a slippery slope where suddenly these sites have to regulate in accordance with whatever is the popular opinion of the day.

>social media sites should not be the business of censoring elected officials. That is the job of voters and Congress. What about Paul Nehlen, a political candidate who (before he was permabanned) frequently railed on Twitter against the "Jewish media" and mused about the "JQ", which stands for Jewish Question? Who called Jewish critics "shekels-for-hire" and used the phrase "The goyim know!" as an imitation of their…

> What about Paul Nehlen, a political candidate...

If that despicable moron somehow got elected, I think there would be a public interest in keeping his statements available to the public. If for no other reason than to maintain the public record of him making those statements as an elected official.

If President Trump told a journalist “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” and the journalist reported it, should social media censor that journalist? Of course not. Well in this case we don’t need the journalist because we can just see it ourselves. Social media can be, among many other things, a window into thoughts that public figures would not otherwise share without a significant filter in place. If elected officials actually want to live their private mental lives in that particular fishbowl, I sure as hell want to be able to keep an eye on them.

> Social media is a not a public square where people can plant their soapbox

Under California law there is an affirmative right to free speech even inside private shopping malls. So if your social media company is subject to California civil rights laws, the “private property” argument doesn’t hold up.