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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

#51

Post by IAmEveryone »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #35
root_axis wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 fin…

> Section 230 only removes the financial incentive to remote bad content.

Please go read the actual law. It’s neither long nor complicated.

Section 230 corrected a problem in other law that made it dangerous to even attempt to moderate content. Before it became law, websites basically had to choose between not moderating at all, or assuming liability for all content.

Hell, I’ll just quote the relevant part in full:

(2) Civil liability

No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be held liable on account of—

(A) any action voluntarily taken in good faith to restrict access to or availability of material that the provider or user considers to be obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise objectionable, whether or not such material is constitutionally protected;

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

#52

Post by cortesoft »

doomrobo wrote: post #6
seemslegit wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's hardly helpful if I just don't want people who happen to have my number to know I'm using signal.

How would a messaging app work without contact discovery? You try a friend's number, and see if the message goes through? Well if that's what you want, then you can do this for all your phonebook numbers, and all the ones that go through are on Signal, and all the ones that error are not. Oops, you've reinvented contact discovery.

At least that requires the other person to have my contact saved, and actively try to reach me. I don't clear out my contact list frequently, so I don't want old contacts to be PROACTIVELY messaged about me joining Signal... if they are looking for me, fine.

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

#53

Post by ftvy »

akersten wrote: post #47
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…

> Section 230 is a failure because Section 230 removes any financial incentive for platforms to moderate responsibility. What in the world does "moderate responsibility" mean? It's their site, they get to decide what goes on it as long as it's legal. If it's not legal, it has to be removed anyway! > If I report harmful content on Twitter or Facebook or Google, we need a system that ensures I receive a non-automated,…

>If it's not legal, it has to be removed anyway!

Isn't that the original intent of section 230? Because these websites couldn't possibly moderate all possible user submissions for illegal content, that when illegal content is discovered that liability is held with the user and not the website hosting it?

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

#55

Post by cortesoft »

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #16
lotyrin wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I just don't value "contact discovery" as a feature? I just don't see it as a casual thing the way the target users of these apps apparently do. I want to explicitly control, per any form of communication, each person who is to be made to know that I operate that form of communication and whether or not that form of communication with me is open to them. I do not want to open up a new app and have a large pop…

That's great! Signal may not be for you then, which is okay.

or....make this an opt in feature?

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

#56

Post by novok »

IAmEveryone wrote: post #44
saferalt wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

You’re conveniently ignoring that the percentage-based fine structure in itself is almost literally “accounting for scale”. The minimum (of the maximum) set by the “whichever is higher” clause is needed to remain effective with non- and low-revenue entities. Something like Clearview (universal face recognition but startup with little revenue) would otherwise be free to ignore the law. If your small company does enoug…

> These fines also aren’t assessed arbitrarily: there’s a specific list of factors to take into account, and all decisions are subject to judicial review under the established principles of proportionality.

You hope bureaucrats do not act mechanistically and do not apply proportionality, but over and over again in recent history you see that exact behavior. Which is why no business trusts a statement of 'they'll be might be nice, but nothing is effectively stopping them from not being nice other than some platitudes'!

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

#57

Post by rapnie »

clarkevans wrote: post #13
AndyMcConachie wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is this downvoted?

Perhaps the parent is downvoted not because of the underlying content of the message, but because of the black/white framing. Every tool has a barrier to use, and even with a strong commitment to security/privacy, Signal seems to have decided that it's more beneficial for their users know which one of their friends are on Signal, than there is potential for abuse. Further, there may come a time where this calculus ch…

> Signal seems to have decided that it's more beneficial for their users know which one of their friends are on Signal

I feel the reason might be more as a way to promote more widespread use of Signal itself, rather than directly serving their users.

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

#58

Post by marcinzm »

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.

>the law generally accounts for scale.

Not in a useful way I've noticed because a small company can service hundreds of thousand easily thanks to the power of the internet. CCPA, for example, essentially sets the cutoff at 50000 users which you can get to pretty quickly with a consumer startup. The cutoff helps the local pizzeria I guess but not any actual competitor to incumbents.

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

#59

Post by leetcrew »

doomrobo wrote: post #6
seemslegit wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's hardly helpful if I just don't want people who happen to have my number to know I'm using signal.

How would a messaging app work without contact discovery? You try a friend's number, and see if the message goes through? Well if that's what you want, then you can do this for all your phonebook numbers, and all the ones that go through are on Signal, and all the ones that error are not. Oops, you've reinvented contact discovery.

personally, I have admitted defeat and accepted that most people will not use my favorite messaging app. so I just default to sms and ask people who I talk to often if they have (or would consider installing) my favorite app. at this point, it's only slightly less convenient to exchange usernames.

the contact prepopulation isn't even that useful. telegram in particular seems to drop notifications if you don't exclude it from power management on Android. if you don't know the user has notifications turned on and has jumped through the hoops to make them actually work, you may as well send messages into a black hole. this is part of why I never assume it's a good way to contact someone without explicitly asking.

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

#60

Post by hawkice »

Plenty of people have complex opinions about 230, but it's a law that says, if you see a comment that defames you, sue the person who made it, it's got nothing to do with e.g. whoever runs the skateboarding forum. Who opposes this? It's just codifying the common sense understanding of the internet.
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