4 ms·
The first amendment forbids the government from restricting speech, not Google
by woofyman 10y ago
The first amendment forbids the government from restricting speech, not Google
- yarou 10y agoSure, "Google" as a private entity can curtail freedom of speech on its platform. It becomes less clear when Facebook, Twitter, and Google are effectively public goods.
- lhc- 10y agoExcept they're pretty clearly private companies, not Public Goods. And as such, they can do basically whatever they want about speech on their platforms.
- majewsky 10y agoAt which point does a service offered by a private company become a public good? There was such a transitioning point for electric power, for telephone service, etc. Will it occur for social media? And if so, at which point?
- literallycancer 10y agoGoogle is a person, in the eyes of the law[1], and search results are it's speech (IIUC). 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood#Legislation_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood#Legislati...
- rconti 10y agoYou misread the parent. It was not arguing that the government can't restrict Google's speech. It was arguing that Google can restrict speech on its platform, which is true.
- literallycancer 10y agoI see.
- venomsnake 10y agoThe government I think could possibly use the commerce clause to impose obligation on a corporation certify its ranking algorithms which could lead to some extremely fun results. A law that prevents google algorithm to (not)take truthiness into account would probably be constitutional.