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Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

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Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#91

Post by drivingmenuts »

cjhopman wrote: post #73
mychael wrote: post #16

I don't visit Gab, but I will definitely be closing my Joyent account. If you're not a courageous and principled defender of free speech, you should get out of the cloud business.

Usually when people make these statements, they don't actually mean it. If Gab were strictly a child porn site, would it be okay if Joyent stopped serving them? If yes, then your absolutist statement isn't actually what you mean and it's just a question of where to draw the line. If not (which has yet to have been the case when someone initially stated such a trivial statement), then I disagree with you and maybe the…

I would argue that restrictions on child pornography are more about consent and intent and the idea that anyone under the age of majority is not considered capable of giving consent to a sexual act.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#92

Post by pvg »

aldoushuxley001 wrote: post #87
pvg wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can easily find antisemitic tripe in Gab's official account. It's a site run by bigots for bigots that likes to pretend it's some neutral, principled free speech crusader. It's thoroughly, painfully obvious to any reasonable person that it's not - it's just a generic online septic tank.

I don't recall running into much antisemitic tripe when I was there. Calling Gab a white supremactist website just seems like a ridiculous over-the-top assertion without even a shred of evidence to back it up... I don't get how this isn't being called out as a blatant ad hominem attack.

Well, their own tweets seemed to convince one HN user they were, at best, Nazi-adjacent so I'm happy to try again. Take a look at

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18318536

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#93

Post by lgleason »

For all of the people saying that Joyent can do this because they are a private company that statement there is a catch to this. All service providers are exempt from being sued for content on their platform under safe harbor under the argument that they were neutral platforms. If they are going to start to curate content by kicking companies like Gab.com off then it is time that a few copyright, libel test cases against these companies make their way to the courts given that it is in violation of the spirit behind safe harbor as it is stated in section 230 of the communications decency act.. It also is going beyond the "good Samaritan" definition.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#94

Post by sbuttgereit »

walrus01 wrote: post #19

The irony of a bunch of Rand worshipping free market libertarians being outraged and indignant when another private business no longer wants to take their money.

I am find Rand an invaluable philosophical resource. While I wouldn't count myself an Objectivist, I certainly find more correct with Objectivism than not.

From this perspective, a few observations. Joyent should be able to do business with whomever they want, period. So long as they don't commit fraud or infringe on the rights of others in so doing, then they are within their rights AND within their moral prerogative to not do business with Gab. Note also that there is no moral obligation of Joyent to give Gab a platform and they're not doing so is not censorship: Gab's right to free speech cannot rightfully compromise Joyent's right to speech or association. The only way Joyent would be in the wrong here is if they represented to Gab that their business was acceptable/welcome and they did so with fore-knowledge of that business; and even then they'd only be in the wrong due to the short notice of termination given and the resulting damage to Gab's business, not because of the change of heart. To suggest that those that think like me might think otherwise is to speak without the requisite education to comment or is simple intellectual dishonesty.

Regardless the degree to which you hate Rand and those that think like me, the ridiculous and ill-informed hyperbole that your message contains is unwarranted and leads to the very state of affairs in which we find ourselves. It doesn't matter toward which "team" you express unmitigated hate, it only matters that you and those that shout disparagements (regardless of which side they sit) advocate acting on raw emotion rather than reason... indulging in hate over disagreement and debate. The facts, the truth, and the legitimate back-and-forth of competing ideas tested by reason seems to matter not once that's done. It may play well to the home team, but it does nothing to advance the discussion in the more general sense.

Very sad.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#95

Post by legostormtroopr »

daxterspeed wrote: post #80
lgleason wrote: post #66

Irregardless of what you think of Gab etc.. Unless the platform is being used for illegal activity and or it is engaging in something that breaks the law these service providers can and should be treated like the phone company. In other words the phone company does not turn off your phone because you are a nazi, racist etc.. Also, and this is an important distinction, there has been no established link between the sh…

Setting up your own hosting provider (read: servers) might be a bit of a hassle, but it's nothing compared to setting up your own telephone network. Gab is free to purchase their own servers and provide the necessary facilities.

Sure, you don't need shared hosting, just setup your own servers. Until someone kicks you out of there server space...

Sure, you don't need shared server space, just setup your own co-location facility. Until someone decides not to give you backhaul...

Or until someone decides they won't provide you with DNS. Or DDoS protection. Or Payment gateway. Or... or... or...

The reality we are facing is that some political opinions (even relatively benign ones) aren't allowed access to the same resources as others.

Gab is benign, they started based on people getting kicked off Twitter - because you don't need Twitter, just start your own. So they did. And now they find themselves being booted around, because of virtue signalling tech companies.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#96

Post by duskwuff »

lgleason wrote: post #93

For all of the people saying that Joyent can do this because they are a private company that statement there is a catch to this. All service providers are exempt from being sued for content on their platform under safe harbor under the argument that they were neutral platforms. If they are going to start to curate content by kicking companies like Gab.com off then it is time that a few copyright, libel test cases aga…

This is incorrect on multiple levels.

The term "safe harbor" is typically used to refer to the provisions of the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act (OCILLA), not the Communications Decency Act you're discussing. OCILLA protects hosting and network providers from liability for copyright infringements committed by their customers, so long as they aren't aware of the infringement and don't directly benefit from it, and so long as they comply with the DMCA takedown process. This is, obviously, completely irrelevant to this situation.

The CDA actually does the exact opposite of what you are claiming here. It explicitly indemnifies service providers for blocking content, regardless of whether that content is constitutionally protected or not -- it reads in part:

> (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: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#97

Post by charlesism »

partiallypro wrote: post #58

There is a lot of strawmanning when it comes to free speech. Virtually no one claims the 1st Amendment guarantees people a platform or that it applies to corporations. Yet, I see people clarifying that constantly...when no one is saying otherwise. Free speech as an American ideal, that's all people are really saying. Anyhow, Joyent has every right to shut down their hosting services to anyone they feel...and no one r…

    > Gab might rightfully deserve being kicked off, but 
    > Free speech as an American ideal, that's 
    > all people are really saying.
It's not the only American ideal.

https://youtu.be/D4EjRzzRQLI

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#98

Post by otriv »

krschultz wrote: post #34
mychael wrote: post #16

I don't visit Gab, but I will definitely be closing my Joyent account. If you're not a courageous and principled defender of free speech, you should get out of the cloud business.

Gab is in the same category as The Daily Stormer. It's not courageous to hide behind free speech absolutism to protect content that invites others to violence. That's being too weak to engage in making the hard choices of what you will support with your efforts. It's the exact opposite of being principled.

Except that The Daily Stormer is creating their own content while Gab is just hosting others. I'm sure I could find YouTube comments equally as bad as comments on Gab.

Re: Gab.com Booted from Hosting Provider Due to User Account

#99

Post by jakelazaroff »

otriv wrote: post #98
krschultz wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gab is in the same category as The Daily Stormer. It's not courageous to hide behind free speech absolutism to protect content that invites others to violence. That's being too weak to engage in making the hard choices of what you will support with your efforts. It's the exact opposite of being principled.

Except that The Daily Stormer is creating their own content while Gab is just hosting others. I'm sure I could find YouTube comments equally as bad as comments on Gab.

Gab actively cultivates a neo-Nazi userbase; see https://twitter.com/ClenchedFisk/status/1027690034718224384?...
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