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That's even more ridiculous than 230. Facebook is obviously not a "knowing collaborator" with a terrorist organization. They have hundreds of millions of users,

That's even more ridiculous than 230. Facebook is obviously not a "knowing collaborator" with a terrorist organization. They have hundreds of millions of users, and some of those users are evil. Policing all of them on an individual basis is impossible. That's why 230 is in place. The spirit of this is to try to use a hastily written anti-terrorism bill to do a run-around on 230 for profit, and it's not going to work. Even if the lawsuit succeeds, congress will quickly fix the loophole in a mostly unanimous vote. The alternative would be a horrible tech recession as essentially all social networks and ISPs shut down due to unmaintainable legal risk.

dragonwriter 10y ago
> Facebook is obviously not a "knowing collaborator" with a terrorist organization. I don't doubt that's what the evidence would show at trial; OTOH, the legal system quite deliberately is designed not to operate based on prejudgements about what evidence will end up showing. > They have hundreds of millions of users, and some of those users are evil. Policing all of them on an individual basis is impossible. The plaintiffs' claim is that, based on Facebooks own statements in its Data Usage Policy and its own descriptions of how it selectively promotes content, that it does, in effect, actively police its users, and that the promotion of terrorist content is the result of that active policing. I'm inclined to think that this position is, in fact, incorrect, but I would be less quick to dismiss the complaint as failing to make a colorable legal claim. > The spirit of this is to try to use a hastily written anti-terrorism bill to do a run-around on 230 for profit, and it's not going to work. Perhaps, perhaps the intent of this is to use the Anti-Terrorism Act as a lever to get Facebook to change its business practices to reduce the utility of the platform as a vehicle for terrorists. > Even if the lawsuit succeeds, congress will quickly fix the loophole in a mostly unanimous vote. The alternative would be a horrible tech recession as essentially all social networks and ISPs shut down due to unmaintainable legal risk. I don't think there is near-unanimity in the US Congress that "social networks and ISPs" (even if both were at risk; the particular style of charge here is applicable to the former but not really the latter) are a more favored group than "Israeli victims of Islamist terror groups".

dragonwriter 10y ago

> Facebook is obviously not a "knowing collaborator" with a terrorist organization. I don't doubt that's what the evidence would show at trial; OTOH, the legal system quite deliberately is designed not to operate based on prejudgements about what evidence will end up showing. > They have hundreds of millions of users, and some of those users are evil. Policing all of them on an individual basis is impossible. The plaintiffs' claim is that, based on Facebooks own statements in its Data Usage Policy and its own descriptions of how it selectively promotes content, that it does, in effect, actively police its users, and that the promotion of terrorist content is the result of that active policing. I'm inclined to think that this position is, in fact, incorrect, but I would be less quick to dismiss the complaint as failing to make a colorable legal claim. > The spirit of this is to try to use a hastily written anti-terrorism bill to do a run-around on 230 for profit, and it's not going to work. Perhaps, perhaps the intent of this is to use the Anti-Terrorism Act as a lever to get Facebook to change its business practices to reduce the utility of the platform as a vehicle for terrorists. > Even if the lawsuit succeeds, congress will quickly fix the loophole in a mostly unanimous vote. The alternative would be a horrible tech recession as essentially all social networks and ISPs shut down due to unmaintainable legal risk. I don't think there is near-unanimity in the US Congress that "social networks and ISPs" (even if both were at risk; the particular style of charge here is applicable to the former but not really the latter) are a more favored group than "Israeli victims of Islamist terror groups".