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230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

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Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#31

Post by gknoy »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #29
ptudan wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can understand companies not being protected from profiting off of ads that come before viral lies (facebook, youtube), especially when the companies have a hand in spreading them with algorithms promoting addiction. But if they're not promoting the content, and aren't profiting from it in a different way than other content, we can't hold them responsible. These providers create platforms. Would you hold CVS respon…

"Would you hold CVS responsible for selling me the tape/sharpie/poster board to make a racist sign?" No, but I'd hold CVS responsible for displaying the sign in their stores. "But if they're not promoting the content, and aren't profiting from it in a different way than other content, we can't hold them responsible." That's the biggest issue Section 230 fails to account for: These companies are profiting off it . Whe…

> If I report harmful content on Twitter or Facebook or Google, we need a system that ensures I receive a non-automated, competent response

That seems extremely prone to being DOS-ed by bots or a brigade of complaint-heavy users.

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#32

Post by tigerstripe »

ori_b wrote: post #23
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #15

EARN IT is pretty disingenuous in how it is designed, of course, but I am all for making it harder and harder to retain Section 230 immunity: It's a mistake that we allow it in the first place. We should indeed continue to erode the eligibility for Section 230 to the point that either the limitations of remaining eligible for immunity makes it easy for competitors to produce better offerings without immunity, or that…

Do you think that any blog with a comments section should be legally responsible for spammers posting on it?

It would certainly change the face of the modern web. In the early 2000's, many blogs and news sites did not have comment sections.

Maybe a service like a third-party Disqus would come out that would split the user-generated content from the actual sites (and source the content via P2P networking).

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#33

Post by root_axis »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #24
ori_b wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think that any blog with a comments section should be legally responsible for spammers posting on it?

No, and they wouldn't be by any informed understanding of the law. That's not how the law has ever worked in any developed society. Generally, law has both the concept of intent and reasonableness. As such, a company that inadequately polices malicious and abusive content because that content is wildly profitable (hi Google and Facebook), we should have the legal ability to fine these companies into oblivion, because…

How would the law distinguish between reasonable moderation and unreasonable removal?

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#34

Post by ocdtrekkie »

gknoy wrote: post #31
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Would you hold CVS responsible for selling me the tape/sharpie/poster board to make a racist sign?" No, but I'd hold CVS responsible for displaying the sign in their stores. "But if they're not promoting the content, and aren't profiting from it in a different way than other content, we can't hold them responsible." That's the biggest issue Section 230 fails to account for: These companies are profiting off it . Whe…

> If I report harmful content on Twitter or Facebook or Google, we need a system that ensures I receive a non-automated, competent response That seems extremely prone to being DOS-ed by bots or a brigade of complaint-heavy users.

If a platform can't scale to handle content moderation requests, it shouldn't exist at scale. Presumably a company shouldn't be responsible to respond to bot submissions, and could potentially ban complainants who abuse the system. (Although doing so would potentially open them to legal recourse if they were banning someone for filing legitimate reports they just didn't want to deal with, for example.)

There are reasonable controls that can be put in place, but ultimately, Big Tech companies' responsibility needs to be seated in the legal system, and there needs to be a way to escalate to the legal system when these companies operate in a societally harmful fashion.

"We're just a platform, it's not our fault" should never be a conclusive answer to conversations about these companies' operations.

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#35

Post by ocdtrekkie »

root_axis wrote: post #33
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, and they wouldn't be by any informed understanding of the law. That's not how the law has ever worked in any developed society. Generally, law has both the concept of intent and reasonableness. As such, a company that inadequately polices malicious and abusive content because that content is wildly profitable (hi Google and Facebook), we should have the legal ability to fine these companies into oblivion, because…

How would the law distinguish between reasonable moderation and unreasonable removal?

"Unreasonable removal" isn't actually much of a concern here under our current legal doctrine: As these companies are private entities, they can decide that they simply don't want this or that on their platform, and that can be as unreasonable as they like.

Presumably, platforms which profit off user content have a financial incentive already to allow user content as much as they can, Section 230 only removes the financial incentive to remote bad content. Removing Section 230 will restore balance: Companies will still be motivated to keep as much non-abusive content as they can, but will face legal challenge if they fail to remove abusive content.

(There's an argument to be made that Facebook and Google represent "public spaces" in the modern Internet era, but we currently have no legal precedent for applying first amendment rights to privately owned properties. Either we'd need a huge legal shift to apply the first amendment to private spaces or we'd need to nationalize online platforms.)

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#36

Post by danShumway »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #24
ori_b wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think that any blog with a comments section should be legally responsible for spammers posting on it?

No, and they wouldn't be by any informed understanding of the law. That's not how the law has ever worked in any developed society. Generally, law has both the concept of intent and reasonableness. As such, a company that inadequately polices malicious and abusive content because that content is wildly profitable (hi Google and Facebook), we should have the legal ability to fine these companies into oblivion, because…

> No, and they wouldn't be by any informed understanding of the law.

You are misinformed about the history of 230. 230 was proposed exactly because the law was interpreted the way you're saying it wouldn't be.

From Wikipedia below, added emphasis mine:

> This concern was raised by legal challenges against CompuServe and Prodigy, early service providers at this time. CompuServe stated they would not attempt to regulate what users posted on their services, while Prodigy had employed a team of moderators to validate content. Both faced legal challenges related to content posted by their users. In Cubby, Inc. v. CompuServe Inc., CompuServe was found not be at fault as, by its stance as allowing all content to go unmoderated, it was a distributor and thus not liable for libelous content posted by users. However, Stratton Oakmont, Inc. v. Prodigy Services Co. found that as Prodigy had taken an editorial role with regard to customer content, it was a publisher and legally responsible for libel committed by customers.

> [...]

> United States Representative Christopher Cox (R-CA) had read an article about the two cases and felt the decisions were backwards. "It struck me that if that rule was going to take hold then the internet would become the Wild West and nobody would have any incentive to keep the internet civil", Cox stated.

---

It's become increasingly popular for people to say that Section 230 was a mistake. Usually they support that with claims that concerns about its repeal are purely theoretical fearmongering, despite the fact that we literally have case president on the books right now about what the Internet would look like without Section 230, and how the existing laws were being interpreted.

When people raise concerns that without Section 230 the Internet would be divided up into completely unmoderated platforms and aggressively curated gatekeepers, that's not fearmongering. It's history.

Ironically, the only websites that wouldn't be affected by a repeal of Section 230 are the completely unmoderated hellholes we want to discourage online, because they have Compuserve's precedent and the 1st Ammendment to hide behind.

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#37

Post by saferalt »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #25
marcinzm wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regulation of this sort generally just helps the incumbent players create a better moat around themselves. They can pay for the AI and humans to moderate things while newcomers can't. So it's question of trading of user benefit against giving even more power to Big Tech.

This is the standard scream of incumbent players when they want to discourage regulation. It both ignores the fact that what's "reasonable" for an incumbent monopoly and a small startup are different, and that the law generally accounts for scale.

Does it "generally account for scale"? Citation needed. The GDPR has a fine structure of up to 4% of world-wide turnover or €20 million. Whichever is HIGHER. That means for any company doing less than say, €20 million in revenue and found to be non-compliant, GDPR gives the legal authority to fine them out of existence. I only mention GDPR as a specific example because of the familiarity here, but the general pattern of non-scaling regulation that results in regulatory capture and monopolization is the norm, not the exception.

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#38

Post by kevingadd »

ori_b wrote: post #23
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #15

EARN IT is pretty disingenuous in how it is designed, of course, but I am all for making it harder and harder to retain Section 230 immunity: It's a mistake that we allow it in the first place. We should indeed continue to erode the eligibility for Section 230 to the point that either the limitations of remaining eligible for immunity makes it easy for competitors to produce better offerings without immunity, or that…

Do you think that any blog with a comments section should be legally responsible for spammers posting on it?

The fact that your proposed scenario is scary / unpleasant / difficult does not automatically make the alternatives better, as we have learned over the last two decades. We need to seriously consider that perhaps these things are not actually simple unless you ignore the consequences.

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#39

Post by dfee »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #25
marcinzm wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regulation of this sort generally just helps the incumbent players create a better moat around themselves. They can pay for the AI and humans to moderate things while newcomers can't. So it's question of trading of user benefit against giving even more power to Big Tech.

This is the standard scream of incumbent players when they want to discourage regulation. It both ignores the fact that what's "reasonable" for an incumbent monopoly and a small startup are different, and that the law generally accounts for scale.

this is an interesting counter-counter-argument i've not seen before. does discussion of this sort of derivative behavior exist elsewhere? i.e. is there an established narrative of incumbents pushing against regulatory capture, or examples of this behavior?

Re: 230, or not 230? That is the EARN IT question

#40

Post by ocdtrekkie »

danShumway wrote: post #36
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, and they wouldn't be by any informed understanding of the law. That's not how the law has ever worked in any developed society. Generally, law has both the concept of intent and reasonableness. As such, a company that inadequately polices malicious and abusive content because that content is wildly profitable (hi Google and Facebook), we should have the legal ability to fine these companies into oblivion, because…

> No, and they wouldn't be by any informed understanding of the law. You are misinformed about the history of 230. 230 was proposed exactly because the law was interpreted the way you're saying it wouldn't be. From Wikipedia below, added emphasis mine: > This concern was raised by legal challenges against CompuServe and Prodigy, early service providers at this time. CompuServe stated they would not attempt to regulat…

But in a world where we feel it was backwards that moderators were punished and unmoderated platforms weren't... Congress decided "let's just make everyone immune" was the right way to go?

And again, I think the examples here are missing the same concept that Section 230 fails to recognize: Profit, as I discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22816016 It seems like the author of Section 230 failed to recognize we're in a capitalist society when this regulation was drafted.

When platforms are taking a cut out of illegal activity, as Big Tech platforms do when they operate ad networks, courts would have to agree that any platform party, regardless of whether or not they currently moderate, should be held to some manner of responsibility.

Right now, when an old lady clicks a Google search result for "mapquest", clicks the top link for "Maps Quest"[0] because Google ads aren't distinguishable from real search results to the untrained eye, is pushed to install a browser extension (from the Chrome Web Store) that hijacks her browser's new tab and search, injects malicious ads, and scrapes her private info to relay to an attacker, Google makes money. And is wholly protected by Section 230 for that activity and unable to be held responsible for refusing to delist the malicious ad.

In what world is that the right legal position?

[0] (This is a very real world example, I've done a lot of senior citizen tech support, and this is how 90% of them get owned.)

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