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Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

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Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#31

Post by noobermin »

twmb wrote: post #22

I caution against latching onto the title and making assumptions. The bulk of the content is analyzing where the current censorship position came from and the conclusion is for Google to be more open with their stance and also be more equal with applying it. As for the why: Why the shift toward censorship? - User Demands - before, In the absence of rules, bad behaviour thrived - now, Appease users, maintain platform…

I don't know where you got "left leaning" from unless you're bending over backwards to be fair, they are if anything centrists which makes sense since they're Google. For heaven's sake, the slide about conversations of free speech, I see establishment centrist media pieces on the same plot as Breitbart and WorldNetDaily. An equivalent would be listing the Young Turks or alternet.

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#32

Post by adventured »

The monopolists becoming ever more aggressive censors, is the strongest argument there can be for ending their monopolies. Once a company acquires a monopoly over a critical means of public information distribution (search, social, etc), their policies of restriction formally become censorship. They've become an impediment to functioning democracy.

Freedom of speech is too important to leave to the monopolies of Google and Facebook to decide what qualifies and what doesn't.

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#34

Post by zaroth »

eksemplar wrote: post #11
adamrezich wrote: post #2

The watermark makes it really annoying to read, but unless it gets refuted by Google, it has to be real, right? (That's how these things work these days...?)

Why would it be real when it was leaked by breitbart? Are the lizard people also real? Is the earth flat? Do vaccines cause autism?

You obviously don't read Breitbart.

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#35

Post by [deleted] »

noobermin wrote: post #28
stochastic_monk wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, assuming that it's real. (Which, considering Breitbart's history, could not be the case.)

Breitbart wouldn't benefit from faking it. If they did fake it, they would have made it look much more unbalanced whilst justifying more censorship.

[deleted]

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#36

Post by __initbrian__ »

Interesting Quote of Current President (Pg 48)

"""When it comes to users, all of this bad behaviour and mismanagement... Breads Conspiracy Theories

"Google's search engine was suppressing the bad news about Hillary Clinton" - Donald Trump, 2016"""

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#37

Post by twmb »

noobermin wrote: post #31
twmb wrote: post #22

I caution against latching onto the title and making assumptions. The bulk of the content is analyzing where the current censorship position came from and the conclusion is for Google to be more open with their stance and also be more equal with applying it. As for the why: Why the shift toward censorship? - User Demands - before, In the absence of rules, bad behaviour thrived - now, Appease users, maintain platform…

I don't know where you got "left leaning" from unless you're bending over backwards to be fair, they are if anything centrists which makes sense since they're Google. For heaven's sake, the slide about conversations of free speech, I see establishment centrist media pieces on the same plot as Breitbart and WorldNetDaily. An equivalent would be listing the Young Turks or alternet.

I think it is fair, but I can imagine a scenario where a person reads a line and thinks "this is obviously leftist".

Personally, I think company's have been bending over backwards to prove they aren't biasing against the right.

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#38

Post by chaosite »

This is a really good document, mostly describing current events and trends in censorship.

Most of the policy it advocates is basically being consistent and open about how Google is handling issues, and how censorship is being applied.

The title is click-baity, but that's not so bad.

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#39

Post by eksemplar »

evilturnip wrote: post #13

I'm actually glad to see the conclusion. Everybody wants to censor what they don't like. There are people who believe free speech is not the ultimate value, but rather to protect people from 'harm'. In this case 'harm' being ideas they don't agree with. The best stance is not to take a side, but to make sure both sides are civil in the expression of their beliefs.

What both sides though? The alt-right isn’t in opposition to anything mainstream, they are anti-democratic and should be treated the same way antifa, farc, isis and others are.

Every time democracy fails to shut down movements like the alt-right, things end badly for democracy itself. The most used throve is stuff like nazism and fascism, but history actually have a lot of better examples.

Because both Napoleon and Caesar effectively ended democracy with applause, unlike Hitler.

I think it’s extremely dangerous to treat anti-democratic forces as equal to democratic ones. I’m a conservative by the way, so it’s not like I’m not conserved about the liberal bias in the tech sector. But the debates we have these days, about forcing platforms to include outright anti-democratic values is crazy.

Re: Leaked Google briefing, admitting a “shift towards censorship”

#40

Post by spangry »

zaroth wrote: post #30

Underpinning the whole question of censorship; “Under section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, tech firms have legal immunity from the majority of the content posted on their platforms (unlike ‘traditional’ media publications). This protection has empowered YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Reddit to create spaces for free speech without the fear of legal action or its financial consequence.” Censoring content is…

What would be the practical consequences of losing this immunity?
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