Terminating Service for 8Chan • Hacker News Board

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#861

Post by joncrane » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:29 PM UTC

sytelus wrote: post #475

simula67 wrote: post #305

Free speech is a cultural value. It sometimes manifests itself in the form of codified laws like the first amendment to the US Constitution. However, free speech is not limited to the USA. The idea behind free speech is that people are allowed to put forward new ideas ( especially ideas about how to organize society, what is good and moral etc ) so that people can consider and accept or reject them. The idea is that…

Free speech is also a technological (or lack thereof) outcome. In 1700s, if you had a misguided evil thought, your chance of realizing full effect was still low because your thought must travel through multiple hops, each hop evaluating your idea and possibly terminating the propagation with some probability. So in societies without technological advancements, bad ideas and their damaging effects can stay contained i…

Good ideas were also suppressed under those conditions. Look at Galileo, Giordano Bruno, and Socrates.

Allowing all ideas a fertile ground to grow and gain followers is important.

Allowing individuals with a small social reach (e.g. live in a small, conservative, remote town) to access a wide range of ideas is important.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#862

Post by LargeWu » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:29 PM UTC

vgaldikas wrote: post #733

CM30 wrote: post #656

I don't like 8chan as a website, but I'm still not a fan of this move. Feels like no one online wants to just provide a 'dumb pipe', and always want to act like a pseudo publisher trying to dictate what's allowed and what isn't. Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provid…

These scums don't deserve water let alone internet access. I don't understand this free speach absolutism. If we can't agree that encouraging people to commit killings should not be allowed then what the fuck

Agreed. The sort of radicalization that's going on at 8chan and the like serve no legitimate public interest. Think I'm wrong? Then explain to me why this sort of online domestic terrorism academy is good for the public. Explain how any single person improves the world by participating in it.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#863

Post by Ajedi32 » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:30 PM UTC

cletus wrote: post #786

CM30 wrote: post #656

I don't like 8chan as a website, but I'm still not a fan of this move. Feels like no one online wants to just provide a 'dumb pipe', and always want to act like a pseudo publisher trying to dictate what's allowed and what isn't. Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provid…

> Imagine if real life utilities did this. You don't have to imagine it. Literally all of these things happen. Examples: - Utilities restricting or even cutting off crypto miners (eg [1]) - Your phone service has prohibited uses that will get your service disconnected (eg see Section 8, Use of the Service in [2]). - Getting water cut off is more difficult but not impossible, I imagine. Some places will cut you off fo…

Sure, but none of those have anything to do with the ideological beliefs of the person or organization they're providing service to. Those are all reasonable restrictions designed to prevent one customer from negatively impacting the quality of service the company provides to their other customers. What Cloudflare is doing here is a different thing entirely.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#864

Post by Traster » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:30 PM UTC

Ajedi32 wrote: post #837

bart_spoon wrote: post #814

I'm not sure I understand what those here rallying in defense of "free speech" are arguing. Free speech has not been violated. The government did not mandate this. As an individual citizen, I am allowed to say whatever I want under the protection of free speech. But I am not entitled to others providing me a platform for my speech. Other people/companies can't be coerced to provide me such a platform. And even if eve…

As has been explained in this thread multiple times now, Free Speech is a principle, not a law. If, for example, someone in North Korea spoke against their government and was executed for it, that'd be a violation of Free Speech. Arguing "but North Korea doesn't have a law protecting people who speak against the government" would be ridiculous. Similarly, if a person or organization in the United States is silenced b…

This is a very strange idea of what Free Speech is. The reason Free Speech is related to government is that government has a monopoly on violence. Government can turn up with guns at your house and stop you speaking in a way that no other body can. What is happening here is very different.

Cloudflare isn't preventing anyone from saying anything. All that is happening is Cloudflare is using it's freedom of association not to associate with this website. This has nothing to do with 8Chan's ability to publish what they want - only their ability to use Cloudflare's services to do so. As the article mentions - because the US has the principle of Free Speech enshrined in law, 8chan has the ability to go and use other services, or to develop the services that Cloudflare provided. This will not impact 8chan's ability to publish whatever they like.

Now there is a theoretical point of view, that if a company has a monopoly - it is effectively able to police speech, but that's absolutely not the case here, as is demonstrated in the past by companies going elsewhere to exercise their right.

What is being proposed as an understanding of Free Speech is not allowing private individuals from refusing to service to you. This would seem to be mandating someone to act - which is a principle quite far away from any law I've heard of.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#865

Post by saargrin » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:31 PM UTC

why not disconnect facebook too,they've been a platform for quite a number of these

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#866

Post by kobiguru » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:32 PM UTC

dwild wrote: post #853

zzzcpan wrote: post #835

So much hypocrisy. When war mongering governments like US, Russia use Cloudflare for war propaganda websites that enable their wars and killings of lots and lots of people it doesn't bother Matthew Prince. Or when websites behind Cloudflare promote and sell lethal weapons that are the actual reason behind mass shootings even being possible, still doesn't bother him. But no, a dissident free speech activist website is…

> When war mongering governments like US, Russia use Cloudflare for war propaganda websites that enable their wars and killings of lots and lots of people Do you have a source for that?

Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent and the website is the New York Times among others.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#867

Post by citruscomputing » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:35 PM UTC

joncrane wrote: post #861

sytelus wrote: post #475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free speech is also a technological (or lack thereof) outcome. In 1700s, if you had a misguided evil thought, your chance of realizing full effect was still low because your thought must travel through multiple hops, each hop evaluating your idea and possibly terminating the propagation with some probability. So in societies without technological advancements, bad ideas and their damaging effects can stay contained i…

Good ideas were also suppressed under those conditions. Look at Galileo, Giordano Bruno, and Socrates. Allowing all ideas a fertile ground to grow and gain followers is important. Allowing individuals with a small social reach (e.g. live in a small, conservative, remote town) to access a wide range of ideas is important.

Just wanting to clarify -- are you likening the shooter's manifesto to the works of Socrates?

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#868

Post by ausbah » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:35 PM UTC

INTPenis wrote: post #822

Same old story. Silence them instead of listening to them, speaking to them, learning from them. You can learn from a baby. Silencing people leads nowhere.

What could one possibly have to learn from these right wing extremism (and many other such groups)? The ideas, beliefs, and everything else they promote has been consistently been established as nothing but baseless drivel. Some ideas shouldn't be endlessly debated, they should be pushed out of the discussion and prevented from having their toxic ideas spread.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#869

Post by Ajedi32 » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:36 PM UTC

soneil wrote: post #849

CM30 wrote: post #656

I don't like 8chan as a website, but I'm still not a fan of this move. Feels like no one online wants to just provide a 'dumb pipe', and always want to act like a pseudo publisher trying to dictate what's allowed and what isn't. Imagine if real life utilities did this. If because someone used your property for offensive purposes, the water company cut off the water supply, or the electricity company refused to provid…

I always find the utility comparison an interesting one. If the water supply was poisoned, would you expect the utility company to cut your supply until it could be cleaned? If they could cut it off closer to the source of the poison so you weren't affected, would you prefer that? You don't expect 1000V from your electricity company. You don't expect arsenic from your water utility. You expect the fcc no-call list to…

I don't understand how any of that relates to what Cloudflare is doing here. 8Chan isn't poisoning the water supply or back-feeding 1000V into the electrical grid; they're just making normal use of Cloudflare's service just like any other customer.

Are you implying that ISPs are sending arsenic down my pipes when they service my request to load a web page from 8Chan? In that case, I'd argue that the websites I choose to visit are entirely my decision, and my ISP denying my request to connect to 8Chan would not improve their quality of service to me in any way.

Re: Terminating Service for 8Chan

#870

Post by bufferoverflow » Mon, Aug 05, 2019, 2:37 PM UTC

toyg wrote: post #768

bufferoverflow wrote: post #764

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a false equivocation. Squatters and offensive people are not the same.

The type of squatters that authorities take drastic action against, are typically of the "offensive" variety (far-right and far-left groups).

That's another false equivocation.