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Donate to eff, and sign up. Electronic freedom is under attack everywhere including america and europe. Censorship under the guise of "fake news". Filters und

Donate to eff, and sign up. Electronic freedom is under attack everywhere including america and europe. Censorship under the guise of "fake news". Filters under the guise of protecting children.

wahern 10y ago
Really, you're putting fake news in scare quotes? There's like a 0% chance in the U.S. that the government will be able to censor any kind of news. As much as I dislike the Citizens United decision, the fact of the matter is that now both conservative and liberal jurists have committed the legal system to a radical notion of freedom of expression untouchable by legislative powers. That can't be walked back, at least not in our lifetimes short of a constitutional amendment. If you're bored and really want to be scared about government speech police, then your best bet would be worrying about mandatory filters and monitoring. Government regulation can still impose a chilling effect by that route, though I would think it would be significantly attenuated for topics beyond sex. In as much as restrictions around encryption are a free speech issue (think DMCA copy protection schemes, or chilling effect from being unable to secure your porn browsing habits), that's for sure the most likely area to be concerned with. It's too nerdy, though, for the frothing masses to understand. Few non-nerds, non-lawyers, regardless of political affiliation, believe requiring Apple to [have the capacity to] unlock a terrorist's iPhone is undesirable, even though it's by far the most legitimate liberty threat. I'm not optimistic on this front. Also, you might want to watch out for a re-emergence of libel civil suits. I'm not sure that would be a bad thing given that trolls have managed to carve out a lucrative industry for themselves. But if you're the kind of person who believes that "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me, or you, or do any kind of harm whatsoever", then it's definitely an avenue to be concerned about.
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  The problem is that while the government cannot censor free speech, corporations can (on their respective platforms). And when those platforms make up the vast majority of Internet communication, say, when Google, Facebook, and Twitter all agree to ban certain content, effectively, yes, censorship has occurred. Because it becomes impossible to reach the largest body of the population. And of course, while government cannot censor, they can certainly encourage corporations to.
  - wahern 10y ago
    Well, the same thing can be said about so-called fakes news--that it drowns out more objective, fact-based news, making constructive discussion difficult and ultimately damaging democracy. So then what? It sounds like quite a pickle to me, without any easy answers. Also, how can the government encourage censorship by corporations? Short of making laws regulating speech (which it cannot do directly, period, or even indirectly without strong justification based on a concrete need unrelated to the speech), it would need a carrot or stick. The carrot would be something like tax incentives. Are you seriously worried Congress will use a tax give-away as an incentive for Facebook to censor news in a partisan fashion? I suppose it's possible, but so is my winning the lottery. The stick would be using the threat of unfair regulatory scrutiny. Now this is far more plausible, but definitely not something keeping me up at night. And in any event, the solution would be to limit the ability to abuse discretion by rescinding regulations, removing discretionary authority, and/or making regulators more independent. That would be better overall. By the way, this is why net neutrality is such a dilemma. It's a government mandate that has the effect of limiting the ability of corporations to effectively censor other groups by imposing transit taxes. But the mandate does that by censoring corporations--they can't chose to throttle, block, or otherwise differentiate communications from hate groups, etc. Would you want to extend net neutrality principles to content publication platforms like Twitter or Facebook? What about your own bulletin board system? Mailing lists? How would you be able to block spam? If your position is that all censorship is bad, and any law or market dynamic which limits anyone's freedom to communicate or not communicate as they please is bad, then you're just building a tower of dilemmas and paradoxes. The only way out is to deconstruct "censorship" into finer, more concrete concepts. In other words, avoid generalizations and discuss issues well within their context. And don't spread Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt by making recourse to poor rhetorical devices like slippery slopes (e.g. OMG if government or other powerful agents does this than that parade of horribles will happen).
- rokosbasilisk 10y ago
  You obviously havent been reading the articles the eff has been putting out. Ive reiterated some of their core axioms. Their view and mine of censorship and implications of fake news seem very different then yours.

Donate to eff, and sign up. Electronic freedom is under attack everywhere including america and europe. Censorship under the guise of "fake news". Filters under the guise of protecting children.

wahern 10y ago

Really, you're putting fake news in scare quotes? There's like a 0% chance in the U.S. that the government will be able to censor any kind of news. As much as I dislike the Citizens United decision, the fact of the matter is that now both conservative and liberal jurists have committed the legal system to a radical notion of freedom of expression untouchable by legislative powers. That can't be walked back, at least not in our lifetimes short of a constitutional amendment. If you're bored and really want to be scared about government speech police, then your best bet would be worrying about mandatory filters and monitoring. Government regulation can still impose a chilling effect by that route, though I would think it would be significantly attenuated for topics beyond sex. In as much as restrictions around encryption are a free speech issue (think DMCA copy protection schemes, or chilling effect from being unable to secure your porn browsing habits), that's for sure the most likely area to be concerned with. It's too nerdy, though, for the frothing masses to understand. Few non-nerds, non-lawyers, regardless of political affiliation, believe requiring Apple to [have the capacity to] unlock a terrorist's iPhone is undesirable, even though it's by far the most legitimate liberty threat. I'm not optimistic on this front. Also, you might want to watch out for a re-emergence of libel civil suits. I'm not sure that would be a bad thing given that trolls have managed to carve out a lucrative industry for themselves. But if you're the kind of person who believes that "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me, or you, or do any kind of harm whatsoever", then it's definitely an avenue to be concerned about.

ocdtrekkie 10y ago
The problem is that while the government cannot censor free speech, corporations can (on their respective platforms). And when those platforms make up the vast majority of Internet communication, say, when Google, Facebook, and Twitter all agree to ban certain content, effectively, yes, censorship has occurred. Because it becomes impossible to reach the largest body of the population. And of course, while government cannot censor, they can certainly encourage corporations to.
- wahern 10y ago
  Well, the same thing can be said about so-called fakes news--that it drowns out more objective, fact-based news, making constructive discussion difficult and ultimately damaging democracy. So then what? It sounds like quite a pickle to me, without any easy answers. Also, how can the government encourage censorship by corporations? Short of making laws regulating speech (which it cannot do directly, period, or even indirectly without strong justification based on a concrete need unrelated to the speech), it would need a carrot or stick. The carrot would be something like tax incentives. Are you seriously worried Congress will use a tax give-away as an incentive for Facebook to censor news in a partisan fashion? I suppose it's possible, but so is my winning the lottery. The stick would be using the threat of unfair regulatory scrutiny. Now this is far more plausible, but definitely not something keeping me up at night. And in any event, the solution would be to limit the ability to abuse discretion by rescinding regulations, removing discretionary authority, and/or making regulators more independent. That would be better overall. By the way, this is why net neutrality is such a dilemma. It's a government mandate that has the effect of limiting the ability of corporations to effectively censor other groups by imposing transit taxes. But the mandate does that by censoring corporations--they can't chose to throttle, block, or otherwise differentiate communications from hate groups, etc. Would you want to extend net neutrality principles to content publication platforms like Twitter or Facebook? What about your own bulletin board system? Mailing lists? How would you be able to block spam? If your position is that all censorship is bad, and any law or market dynamic which limits anyone's freedom to communicate or not communicate as they please is bad, then you're just building a tower of dilemmas and paradoxes. The only way out is to deconstruct "censorship" into finer, more concrete concepts. In other words, avoid generalizations and discuss issues well within their context. And don't spread Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt by making recourse to poor rhetorical devices like slippery slopes (e.g. OMG if government or other powerful agents does this than that parade of horribles will happen).
rokosbasilisk 10y ago
You obviously havent been reading the articles the eff has been putting out. Ive reiterated some of their core axioms. Their view and mine of censorship and implications of fake news seem very different then yours.