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Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

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Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#51

Post by joelrunyon »

GuiA wrote: post #46
Overtonwindow wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"when did all the platforms decide to start being the moral center of determining what's acceptable speech" When it became more profitable to do so, or they saw a PR angle. IMO businesses will cater to death cults that murder kittens if it makes money, but only until it becomes a PR problem. Real or imagined.

Or maybe they are private businesses run by people like you and me who like to have a say in what is published on their platform? For a community that is very pro-company founders, I have a hard time getting a lot of the kneejerk reactions here. Should physical stores not have a right to decide what they want and don't want to sell? Why should it be any different for Google's digital store? Even if their reason is "t…

I don't think that's the argument free speech advocates are making.

The argument is that facebook/twitter as well as some of these other platforms cloudflare/app stores, etc are a form of speech & they have a somewhat debateable stronghold on facilitating speech.

So, when they deny speech to a specific group of people, they're not just denying service, but denying speech.

The argument is debateable, but that is why people are upset, not that they don't think companies can act however they like towards their customers.

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#52

Post by cookiecaper »

jdoliner wrote: post #22

Little by little, Silicon Valley is supplanting the government. At this point it should be obvious that Silicon Valley companies feel no need to follow regulations imposed on them by the government. Some do, but those that don't aren't punished and generally wind up with faster growing businesses because of it. The government makes a symbolic effort to prevent hate speech, but where their efforts end Silicon Valley's…

Yes, conditions for the web as an open publication platform are rapidly deteriorating. This has major implications for everything that's changed during the PC revolution, not just political speech.

EDIT: Welp, this is the last comment from me for a while. HN's anti-thoughtcrime metering, which was activated on my account when I shared the illegal opinion that Kubernetes is not always a good thing to use for your production server infrastructure (n.b., HN is invested in Docker, and closely associated with Google), has kicked in to prevent me from sharing any more dangerous sentiments like "If you make a censorship-resistant network, don't let the people who have recently been censored know about it."

I look forward to the next five hours of watching every comment that isn't "Great! Delete everything I hate!" drop into the grey, and watching replies to my comments without being able to engage in the conversation. Very fishy stuff going on at HN recently. Source: user for 3315 days.

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#54

Post by dbnoch »

MichaelGG wrote: post #21

I find this odd. One person died at Charlottesville, potentially from an accident. Meanwhile there's been at least one intentional shooting with a higher death toll related to BLM, but there was no widespread "we need to shut this down" backlash there. But all of a sudden some random site writing mostly nonsense is some huge threat that we're gonna put aside neutrality and free speech for?

Can you please post your sources on what you are saying? I'm inclined to say that the opinion of this incident being "potentially from an accident" is extremely misguided.

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#55

Post by j2kun »

jdoliner wrote: post #22

Little by little, Silicon Valley is supplanting the government. At this point it should be obvious that Silicon Valley companies feel no need to follow regulations imposed on them by the government. Some do, but those that don't aren't punished and generally wind up with faster growing businesses because of it. The government makes a symbolic effort to prevent hate speech, but where their efforts end Silicon Valley's…

You act as if Google didn't just pay a multibillion dollar fine for violating a law based on censorship of certain shopping comparison websites.

SV is not beyond the power of governments, governments are just slow to catch up. For good reason.

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#56

Post by cyanexttuesday »

wisdomdata wrote: post #31

next dilemma for a startup - figuring out which bit of the splinternet you are going to target - the chinese, the confederate, the islamic or the general part.

I don't think there will be a general part once it gets splintered. It will probably be like China except every nation state will have their own version with their own censorship.

The open web started dying with the great firewall.

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#57

Post by CaptSpify »

GuiA wrote: post #46
Overtonwindow wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"when did all the platforms decide to start being the moral center of determining what's acceptable speech" When it became more profitable to do so, or they saw a PR angle. IMO businesses will cater to death cults that murder kittens if it makes money, but only until it becomes a PR problem. Real or imagined.

Or maybe they are private businesses run by people like you and me who like to have a say in what is published on their platform? For a community that is very pro-company founders, I have a hard time getting a lot of the kneejerk reactions here. Should physical stores not have a right to decide what they want and don't want to sell? Why should it be any different for Google's digital store? Even if their reason is "t…

Just because they legally are allowed censor speech doesn't mean that nobody is allowed to criticize them for it.

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#58

Post by ibn_ibid »

[deleted] wrote: post #38
joelrunyon wrote: post #10

Meanwhile twitter is being used to threaten assassinations - https://twitter.com/search?q=assassinate%20trump&src=tyah I get there's ugly stuff on the internet, but when did all the platforms decide to start being the moral center of determining what's acceptable speech. Hate speech is still protected speech (in the US anyways)[1] no matter how horrible it is. > A law that can be directed against speech found offensi…

[deleted]

"Stop picking sides"

as opposed to picking the side that aren't Nazis?

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#59

Post by Overtonwindow »

joelrunyon wrote: post #51
GuiA wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe they are private businesses run by people like you and me who like to have a say in what is published on their platform? For a community that is very pro-company founders, I have a hard time getting a lot of the kneejerk reactions here. Should physical stores not have a right to decide what they want and don't want to sell? Why should it be any different for Google's digital store? Even if their reason is "t…

I don't think that's the argument free speech advocates are making. The argument is that facebook/twitter as well as some of these other platforms cloudflare/app stores, etc are a form of speech & they have a somewhat debateable stronghold on facilitating speech. So, when they deny speech to a specific group of people, they're not just denying service, but denying speech. The argument is debateable, but that is why p…

To add to that argument, GAB, StormFront, and other websites and services like it have been around a LONG time. Since the internet began. Yet we are only now seeing a reaction from those platforms that host such content. Why? What made Gab and Stormfront ok two weeks ago, but not ok now? That's the hypocrisy that needs greater focus.

Re: Alt-social network Gab booted from Google Play Store for hate speech

#60

Post by drngdds »

Animats wrote: post #42

First they came for the Nazis, and I said nothing because I was not a Nazi. Then they came for the far-right, and I said nothing because I was not a far-righter...

...then they came for you, and you decided to sideload the app and go about your day?
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