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Censorship and bias of information seem to be the major concerns I have with tech companies. Treating them as common carriers so they are not allowed to discri

Censorship and bias of information seem to be the major concerns I have with tech companies. Treating them as common carriers so they are not allowed to discriminate seems like something that is needed. Outside of that, I think they are doing a decent job and question whether more regulation will do more harm than good.

ucaetano 9y ago
> Treating them as common carriers so they are not allowed to discriminate seems like something that is needed Common carriers for what? Google and Facebook are by definition discriminators. You access Google so it can discriminate for you, and give you discriminated results that match what you're looking for, and not the entire internet. You don't sign up for an ISP for discrimination, you sign up for access, so you want it to not discriminate at all. ISPs provide access, social media and search provide aggregation. Trying to regulate both in the same is pointless.
- bcheung 9y ago
  Yes, this could use some clarification. Aggregation is fine, by discrimination I meant censoring and blocking certain individuals because you don't like them. Unless it is something illegal tech companies should respect freedom of speech. By analogy, package (mail) is to packet (internet) is to post (social media). That's the common carrier connection I was trying to get at. ISPs and the postal service is not allowed to use discrimination to deny service to individuals because they don't like what they have to say.
  - ucaetano 9y ago
    > Unless it is something illegal tech companies should respect freedom of speech. Why would they, when no other company has to? Freedom of speech has nothing to do with others having to allow you to use their services for your speech. > By analogy, package (mail) is to packet (internet) is to post (social media). Sure, and email providers are free to block your emails. Or rank them. I'm not getting your point, are you saying that internet companies should promote all posts equally?

ucaetano 9y ago

> Treating them as common carriers so they are not allowed to discriminate seems like something that is needed Common carriers for what? Google and Facebook are by definition discriminators. You access Google so it can discriminate for you, and give you discriminated results that match what you're looking for, and not the entire internet. You don't sign up for an ISP for discrimination, you sign up for access, so you want it to not discriminate at all. ISPs provide access, social media and search provide aggregation. Trying to regulate both in the same is pointless.

bcheung 9y ago
Yes, this could use some clarification. Aggregation is fine, by discrimination I meant censoring and blocking certain individuals because you don't like them. Unless it is something illegal tech companies should respect freedom of speech. By analogy, package (mail) is to packet (internet) is to post (social media). That's the common carrier connection I was trying to get at. ISPs and the postal service is not allowed to use discrimination to deny service to individuals because they don't like what they have to say.
- ucaetano 9y ago
  > Unless it is something illegal tech companies should respect freedom of speech. Why would they, when no other company has to? Freedom of speech has nothing to do with others having to allow you to use their services for your speech. > By analogy, package (mail) is to packet (internet) is to post (social media). Sure, and email providers are free to block your emails. Or rank them. I'm not getting your point, are you saying that internet companies should promote all posts equally?