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Apple has removed Infowars podcasts from iTunes

64 points by sahin-boydas 8y ago

graeme 8y ago
Indirectly related. Not sure how many people here know of Father Coughlin, an American Fascist radio priest of the 1930s. He reached millions of listeners. Was eventually shut down by Roosevelt and his local church parish: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Coughlin#Cancellation_of_radio_show https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Coughlin#Cancellation_...
gigatexal 8y ago
The anti-censorship thinking in me is not happy but when it comes to Alex Jones he’s one of the people on this planet that I wish I had omnipotence to remove his voice. He does much more harm than good. Perhaps a solution to his influence is educating people to think critically but alas I think for much of his “fans” (zealots maybe?) it might be too late.
- scarface74 8y ago
  He isn’t being “censored”. Anyone who knows the url to the podcast url can add it. A private company can legally decide who to do business with except for protected classes. The Supreme Court just said that someone didn’t have to offer service to someone if it went against thier beliefs.
  - gigatexal 8y ago
    it is harder for him to get new listeners unless the current ones spread the message. By delisting Apple is, in my mind, censoring him.
    - scarface74 8y ago
      There are millions of podcasts, apps, songs, web pages etc. available. It’s hard to get discovered organically on any platform unless you are featured. People are always complaining that Apple doesn’t allow you to side load apps and if Apple doesn’t approve your app, you can’t distribute it and it would be fine if Apple curated its own store as long as you could “side load”. Well here is an example where you can “side load” content by providing a URL and the content doesn’t get treated any differently. That tells me that even if you could side load apps, people would still be complaining about Apple’s “censorship”. In fact, between music, video, podcasts, apps, and books, the only two types of contents you can add to thier respective libraries directly from the phone, are podcasts and books.
  - Tomte 8y ago
    No it didn't (although I wish it did). SCOTUS said not a word about the material issue, but ruled on very narrow procedural grounds.
  - avar 8y ago
    If you're referring to the Masterpiece Cakeshop case they said no such thing, the ruling was so narrow (and nonsensical) that it's hard to conclude that it means much of anything, other than the court trying get out of deciding the more general question on a technicality. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masterpiece_Cakeshop_v._Colorado_Civil_Rights_Commission#Analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masterpiece_Cakeshop_v._Colora...
    - scarface74 8y ago
      I didn’t say it made sense. But conservatives have been fighting to allow for profit businesses to be run based on “religious beliefs” - not only the Cake case but also Hobby Lobby - it’s the other side of the coin.
  - jeffbax 8y ago
    Apple and others are within their right to not promote him, but it's definitely a form of censorship when the entities that are nearly 100% responsible for actually searching and easily adding the content remove the listing entirely. Fuck Alex Jones, but I want the tech companies to be totally impartial. As soon as Spotify led with removing music it immediately resulted with demands from political groups to remove more and more. It sets the stage for endless politicizing of everything someone doesn't like because the precedent of intervention is now made. It gives further power to the mob rule mentality of Twitter where everything you once said is on record, context-less, and used as a kludge to attack by the loudest people whether left or right. As someone who listens to podcasts like Reason magazine that are often pointed, if not controversial to some, this is highly concerning to me. Don't put Jones on anything but a direct search for all I care but as Sarah Jeong is now learning the pitchforks can come from the right too
    - scarface74 8y ago
      If you want to find the Alex Jones podcast, you can still go to Google (like the rest of the world) and the web page and the RSS feed comes up on the first page right below the news articles. http://rss.gcnlive.com/alexJones/ http://rss.gcnlive.com/alexJones/ You can add the link directly to the podcast app. I'm sure there are enough conservative outlets that will inform people how to go to the link. If enough sites link to it, it should appear higher up on Google.
      - jeffbax 8y ago
        The point is that these companies have immense control over the economy and speech. They should be as neutral as possible, otherwise it will be a tug of war to control them just like everything else in society is becoming. Also you realize that there's an entire "bring these giants to task over fake news" thing happening right now whereupon we will demand the likes of Google and Facebook take editorial control over content, when the majority of people will only get what comes out of those filters. This is inherently wildly dangerous and absolutely censorship. Delisted by Google = a company effectively does not exist, the same goes for most things online, and that is the natural next step once some of the giants start to take stricter control. People will only demand more and more things they don't like be removed.
te_chris 8y ago
As someone who is a big supporter and fan of public broadcasting - proper, popular public broadcasting like the BBC, I find it super ironic that both the American conservative and hard right, who seem to hate public broadcasting with equal force, are being denied platforms by private, capitalist enterprises who owe them no explanations or responsibility, and who have no true accountability to their audience.
- repolfx 8y ago
  What makes you think the BBC is any better?
  - te_chris 8y ago
    That's not my point. At all. My point is that a public broadcaster is accountable to the public, so they would have offical avenues of complaint.
    - repolfx 8y ago
      Yes, and what happens to BBC employees if they ignore such complaints? How exactly is the BBC accountable? Has the license fee ever been reduced in response to poor behaviour or problematic journalism by BBC staffers?
      - amaccuish 8y ago
        That's not how it works. There are investigations, public apologies are made, people are fired etc. It's quite clear from the Brexit debate that each side believed the BBC to be biased against them, which in my mind, at least for Brexit, meant the BBC were doing their job.
        repolfx 8y ago
        That's accountability for individuals possibly and very rarely. That's not accountability for the organisation. Consider what happens if someone is fired and someone who agrees with them on everything is immediately promoted into their place. Nothing changes. Markets create accountability for organisations, not just people. The BBC love to try and escape accountability by claiming "we found examples of people accusing of opposite biases, therefore we're neutral". However this doesn't logically follow.
amoshi 8y ago
I'm sure people will use the "it's their platform they can do what they want" argument, but with Spotify and now Apple removing a certain person's content, can we call this anything but censorship?
- pavlov 8y ago
  Not everyone can publish on iTunes or Spotify. Is it censorship when these companies choose which content they want to publish? If not, why is it censorship when they use the same judgment to remove something they had previously approved?
- tonyedgecombe 8y ago
  Corporations get to choose who they want as customers, suppliers and partners. The whole system would collapse if they didn't have this ability. It's a stretch calling it censorship as these people can host their podcast somewhere else or even host it themselves if they want to. Apple doesn't have a monopoly on podcast hosting.
  - repolfx 8y ago
    I find this argument increasingly tiresome. There has never been a time in history in which speech did not in some way depend on private support. Not so long ago that private support came from the owners of printing presses. It came from the landlords that allowed speakers on their property, and rented to unpopular people. It came from the telephone companies that served everyone even if they were saying "hateful" things down the phone. What we're seeing here seems like a relatively new phenomenon, of private companies that are taking it on themselves to systematically erase entire schools of thought from the modern communications platforms, at least as far as they can. And yes for any given instance you can say, well, you can host your content elsewhere. And that works right up until Google - for example - steals your domain name on moralistic grounds, or your last remaining ISP or hosting provider gets attacked or comes under pressure from activists and so on. Because the sort of people who are doing this don't simply want Alex Jones off iTunes. They want him gone completely, from everywhere, and they will not rest until that happens. Unfortunately Silicon Valley has long since lost any right to claim neutrality on political topics. That probably makes regulation inevitable. How long will conservatives sit back and watch as tech firms systematically attempt to erase their world view from the political conversation? How long will the wider population tolerate Twitter shadowbanning members of the government whilst doing nothing to an NYT journalist who (as noted above) says repeatedly she wants to kill all men, that she hates whites etc? This sort of extreme side-taking seems both new and very short-sighted. It cannot end well.
dumitrupetrov 8y ago
Of course "let's silence and remove everyone that disagrees with us!", i mean c'mon don't censor free speach, let the free market take care of itsef. You could remove someone who is promoting child abuse, threats, racism (man oh man, did twitter let that NYT editor board woman account stay despite her racist comments), killing and so on, but if you disagree with someone like alex jones, congrats! now move on! (not fan of him, but fan of free speach, i mean i know the price of it and it's not cheap)
- wavefunction 8y ago
  Free speech does not also guarantee a platform. It doesn't obligate anyone to promote your speech. Fans of his podcasts can get them elsewhere.
- pavlov 8y ago
  What about Apple's free speech? They're the publisher. Are they supposed to put their logo on content that they don't approve? That's not how a free market works.
  - joering2 8y ago
    No, more like "that's not how apple store works". You can find fart apps where you press a button and you hear a fart. I doubt by allowing this app in Apple store, everyone all of sudden believes farts = Apple. Or that Apple affiliates themselves with nasty behavior in public, etc.
    - pavlov 8y ago
      Apple manually approves every app and content item on their stores. They are legally the publisher.
  - nextlevelwizard 8y ago
    I now expect Apple to police all content that appears on their platform. If anything that breaks copyright appreas Apple should be held responsbile. They can not hold on to whatever "common carrier" status they enjoy now and still censor people they don't like.
mrweasel 8y ago
As long as they don't prevent iTunes from importing the Infowars podcast feed, I don't see it as a major problem. Apple isn't required to help you promote your content if they don't want to, but they are also not allowed to block your access to legal content, regardless of what they may think of it.
- ceejayoz 8y ago
  > they are also not allowed to block your access to legal content, regardless of what they may think of it What law forbids this?
  - akuji1993 8y ago
    Yeah not sure, what argument this stands on, because Apple is private provider of content on their own platform, they can do whatever the hell they want.
    - Wevah 8y ago
      I think mrweasel meant iTunes the app, not the service.
      - mrweasel 8y ago
        Exactly. It's perfectly fine to exclude content from the iTunes store. Apple have always banned porn in the iTunes/App store, and very few have complained about that.... Not that I would like a PornHub app for my AppleTV. What I wouldn't like is Apple parsing the podcast feeds I enter into iTunes and potentially block me from adding certain feeds. That should be non of their business.
  - mrweasel 8y ago
    I was just thinking morally. I'm not sure if a private company is allowed to block their customers from accessing content that the company, in this case Apple, simply dislike. That's may be perfectly legal. Would Apple be allowed to block users from accessing Google from an iPhone, if they wanted to? They can't if they do to promote their on alternative, but can they if they just feel like it and don't benefit?
thomasedwards 8y ago
Free speech means you can state and opinion and the government won’t put you in prison. That’s it, that’s all it is.
- firic 8y ago
  And companies that value free speech don't censor opinions regardless if them censoring is technically legal.
- tempodox 8y ago
  ... and commercial entities will not be proponents of free speech, as long and as far as that's legal.
- trosi 8y ago
  It's a bit more than that. Censorship violates freedom of speech, but it does not imply imprisonment
- humanrebar 8y ago
  No, that's the first amendment. Free speech is also a broader principle that the first amendment applies by restricting government power.
  - tgb 8y ago
    Thank you! I feel like everyone forgot their middle school civics lessons, the amount I hear that line trotted out these days.
bmarquez 8y ago
Well, so much for sunlight being the best disinfectant. You just know Alex will use the deplatforming to "prove" that the globalists are after him, or something like that. Might have been better to ignore him instead of Apple getting into the game of deciding what is and isn't hate speech. (Does NY Times hiring an openly racist editor make them subject to removal? Who knows...but somebody will start making that argument now that the door is open.)
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- rtpg 8y ago
  The BS crisis actor narrative and conspiracies pushed by Jones are not the null hypothesis , it's actively pushed by them. If you take away the mic, there's nothing left to disinfect. It's the formation of conspiracy believing, self-reinforcing cults that cause these narratives to begin with
- joshgel 8y ago
  Doesn't it mean that it's much harder for 'casual' listeners to find him? Like every show there are likely hardcore listeners (who will still find him) and a spectrum of less committed listeners (along that spectrum is a point where people will just stop listening)
- zaarn 8y ago
  Alex Jones is sadly closer to a religious cult than something desinfectable. There is a line somewhere in between, it's rather blurry but at some point sunlight no longer work and the best option is to nuke it. (I don't think this is generally true for everything the alt-right says, a lot of it can be desinfected with sunlight, so to speak)
- neotek 8y ago
  Yet again everyone rushes to the defence of fascists. If history has taught us anything it’s that giving fascists a platform is never, ever the solution, you can never reason with them, you can never argue them out of a position they didn’t reason themselves into, and they will always use your kindness as a weapon against you. There is no value in anyone giving people like Alex Jones a platform, all you are doing is giving him wider access to people who will be swayed by his idiotic ramblings. It shouldn’t even require saying; how do you think he has such a large following in the first place? Do you think he’s been unchallenged up to this point? Do you think the counter arguments have had any effect on his base? Do you think the sort of person who ends up falling for a dickhead like Jones is even capable of understanding the arguments against his position? Stop protecting fascists, open a history book.
DanielBMarkham 8y ago
And Facebook has permanently banned them. There used to be a joke on Slashdot. Whatever was happening in tech, somebody would say "And I for one welcome our new $X overlords" Now we have all the major internet companies deciding winners and losers. Doesn't seem like much of a joke anymore. All those years I watched my dear friends on the left march in the streets, claiming that the right was going to shut them down and prevent their message from being heard. Fooled me, guys. I guess it's true: we become what we fear from others.
- majewsky 8y ago
  I was going to add that that quote is a Simpsons reference, but it turns out the Simpsons actually referenced H. G. Wells: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-for-one-welcome-our-new-insect-overlords https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-for-one-welcome-our-new-ins...
  - JshWright 8y ago
    It's a pretty safe bet that any "Simpsons reference" it's actually a reference to something that is at least one level deeper (I consider this one of the great strengths of the show)
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- oliwarner 8y ago
  We have companies taking responsibility for what happens on their pitch. They aren't stopping him. He can still publish his brand of crazy elsewhere. This seems okay. If anything it's "our" fault for giving Facebook, Apple et al the unreserved omnipresence they have.
- tim333 8y ago
  I see your Simpsons reference and quote The Onion >First Amendment Experts Warn Facebook Banning InfoWars Could Set Completely Reasonable Precedent For Free Speech >... “If we allow giant media platforms to single out individual users for harassing the families of murdered kindergarteners, it could lead to a nightmare scenario of measured and well-thought-out public discourse,”...
i6mi6 8y ago
Can anyone explain why Infowars are bad? I keep hearing they are but no convincing arguments to support that claim. Edit: Do people giving me thumbs down care to explain themselves?
- holgerdanske 8y ago
  I can't speak for the American content, but the Scandinavian blog entries range from outright lies to gross missinformation. Would you really want that associated with your brand? I wouldn't.
  - i6mi6 8y ago
    What kind of lies do they tell?
    - shrikant 8y ago
      Read through a few of them here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/InfoWars#Controversies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/InfoWars#Controversies
      - i6mi6 8y ago
        1. Sexual harassment “filed complaints against Jones” filing and proving are different things. 2. What’s wrong with conspiracy theories? Who cares unless they are real? 3. Can I see examples of fake news posted by Infowars? Still haven’t seen any. 4. Same as conspiracy theories 5. I can think of many examples where mainstream media promotes violence and harassment against right wing. 6. Chobani never proved otherwise? 7. Not sure about copyright infringement but alright, could be it 8. Unexplained suspension
- mj921 8y ago
  This and the other thread have only the usual arguments about 1st amendment vs de-platforming and outrage mob stuff (I'm outraged because he said Sandy Hook was a FEMA drill), not one comment about what he presented as evidence/'evidence' to come to his conclusions. So here's a couple, big insurance policy taken out by Silverstein before 911, 'Decided to pull it' comment, people on the building there to 'document the event', BBC calling building 7 falling before it actually fell. Feel free to downvote its a throwaway account
swebs 8y ago
This is a great time to mention gpodder.net, a libre alternative to the iTunes podcast browser. Aside from not promoting censorship, it also integrates nicely with third party FOSS programs such as AntennaPod for Android or Armarok.
tgb 8y ago
I'm glad to see him go, but we're at the point where large tech companies essentially control what information we have access to and are beginning to engage with regulating the content for real, but we do not yet have legal or social norms about what they can or should do. I think that means we're in a dangerous position. Right now people get removed it banned based off how much pressure there is to remove them. We should instead have real institutions, either in the company or broader, where the rules are made, the cases are decided and appeals are possible. If this isn't regulated by the government, then we need to demand our information oligopoly helps us hold them accountable.
- orev 8y ago
  Freedom of Speech does not require large tech companies to carry, promote, and allow easy access to any and all speech. One’s rights extend only as far as one has the capability to express them using their own resources. If IW wants to setup their own app, App Store, and distribution channels, no one is stopping them, but Apple is not required to do so for them.
gigatexal 8y ago
Why was this flagged? People support this guy? Or hate the takedown so much?

64 points by sahin-boydas 8y ago

Indirectly related. Not sure how many people here know of Father Coughlin, an American Fascist radio priest of the 1930s. He reached millions of listeners. Was eventually shut down by Roosevelt and his local church parish: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Coughlin#Cancellation_of_radio_show https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Coughlin#Cancellation_...

gigatexal 8y ago

The anti-censorship thinking in me is not happy but when it comes to Alex Jones he’s one of the people on this planet that I wish I had omnipotence to remove his voice. He does much more harm than good. Perhaps a solution to his influence is educating people to think critically but alas I think for much of his “fans” (zealots maybe?) it might be too late.

scarface74 8y ago
He isn’t being “censored”. Anyone who knows the url to the podcast url can add it. A private company can legally decide who to do business with except for protected classes. The Supreme Court just said that someone didn’t have to offer service to someone if it went against thier beliefs.
- gigatexal 8y ago
  it is harder for him to get new listeners unless the current ones spread the message. By delisting Apple is, in my mind, censoring him.
  - scarface74 8y ago
    There are millions of podcasts, apps, songs, web pages etc. available. It’s hard to get discovered organically on any platform unless you are featured. People are always complaining that Apple doesn’t allow you to side load apps and if Apple doesn’t approve your app, you can’t distribute it and it would be fine if Apple curated its own store as long as you could “side load”. Well here is an example where you can “side load” content by providing a URL and the content doesn’t get treated any differently. That tells me that even if you could side load apps, people would still be complaining about Apple’s “censorship”. In fact, between music, video, podcasts, apps, and books, the only two types of contents you can add to thier respective libraries directly from the phone, are podcasts and books.
- Tomte 8y ago
  No it didn't (although I wish it did). SCOTUS said not a word about the material issue, but ruled on very narrow procedural grounds.
- avar 8y ago
  If you're referring to the Masterpiece Cakeshop case they said no such thing, the ruling was so narrow (and nonsensical) that it's hard to conclude that it means much of anything, other than the court trying get out of deciding the more general question on a technicality. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masterpiece_Cakeshop_v._Colorado_Civil_Rights_Commission#Analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masterpiece_Cakeshop_v._Colora...
  - scarface74 8y ago
    I didn’t say it made sense. But conservatives have been fighting to allow for profit businesses to be run based on “religious beliefs” - not only the Cake case but also Hobby Lobby - it’s the other side of the coin.
- jeffbax 8y ago
  Apple and others are within their right to not promote him, but it's definitely a form of censorship when the entities that are nearly 100% responsible for actually searching and easily adding the content remove the listing entirely. Fuck Alex Jones, but I want the tech companies to be totally impartial. As soon as Spotify led with removing music it immediately resulted with demands from political groups to remove more and more. It sets the stage for endless politicizing of everything someone doesn't like because the precedent of intervention is now made. It gives further power to the mob rule mentality of Twitter where everything you once said is on record, context-less, and used as a kludge to attack by the loudest people whether left or right. As someone who listens to podcasts like Reason magazine that are often pointed, if not controversial to some, this is highly concerning to me. Don't put Jones on anything but a direct search for all I care but as Sarah Jeong is now learning the pitchforks can come from the right too
  - scarface74 8y ago
    If you want to find the Alex Jones podcast, you can still go to Google (like the rest of the world) and the web page and the RSS feed comes up on the first page right below the news articles. http://rss.gcnlive.com/alexJones/ http://rss.gcnlive.com/alexJones/ You can add the link directly to the podcast app. I'm sure there are enough conservative outlets that will inform people how to go to the link. If enough sites link to it, it should appear higher up on Google.
    - jeffbax 8y ago
      The point is that these companies have immense control over the economy and speech. They should be as neutral as possible, otherwise it will be a tug of war to control them just like everything else in society is becoming. Also you realize that there's an entire "bring these giants to task over fake news" thing happening right now whereupon we will demand the likes of Google and Facebook take editorial control over content, when the majority of people will only get what comes out of those filters. This is inherently wildly dangerous and absolutely censorship. Delisted by Google = a company effectively does not exist, the same goes for most things online, and that is the natural next step once some of the giants start to take stricter control. People will only demand more and more things they don't like be removed.

te_chris 8y ago

As someone who is a big supporter and fan of public broadcasting - proper, popular public broadcasting like the BBC, I find it super ironic that both the American conservative and hard right, who seem to hate public broadcasting with equal force, are being denied platforms by private, capitalist enterprises who owe them no explanations or responsibility, and who have no true accountability to their audience.

repolfx 8y ago
What makes you think the BBC is any better?
- te_chris 8y ago
  That's not my point. At all. My point is that a public broadcaster is accountable to the public, so they would have offical avenues of complaint.
  - repolfx 8y ago
    Yes, and what happens to BBC employees if they ignore such complaints? How exactly is the BBC accountable? Has the license fee ever been reduced in response to poor behaviour or problematic journalism by BBC staffers?
    - amaccuish 8y ago
      That's not how it works. There are investigations, public apologies are made, people are fired etc. It's quite clear from the Brexit debate that each side believed the BBC to be biased against them, which in my mind, at least for Brexit, meant the BBC were doing their job.
      - repolfx 8y ago
        That's accountability for individuals possibly and very rarely. That's not accountability for the organisation. Consider what happens if someone is fired and someone who agrees with them on everything is immediately promoted into their place. Nothing changes. Markets create accountability for organisations, not just people. The BBC love to try and escape accountability by claiming "we found examples of people accusing of opposite biases, therefore we're neutral". However this doesn't logically follow.

amoshi 8y ago

I'm sure people will use the "it's their platform they can do what they want" argument, but with Spotify and now Apple removing a certain person's content, can we call this anything but censorship?

pavlov 8y ago
Not everyone can publish on iTunes or Spotify. Is it censorship when these companies choose which content they want to publish? If not, why is it censorship when they use the same judgment to remove something they had previously approved?
tonyedgecombe 8y ago
Corporations get to choose who they want as customers, suppliers and partners. The whole system would collapse if they didn't have this ability. It's a stretch calling it censorship as these people can host their podcast somewhere else or even host it themselves if they want to. Apple doesn't have a monopoly on podcast hosting.
- repolfx 8y ago
  I find this argument increasingly tiresome. There has never been a time in history in which speech did not in some way depend on private support. Not so long ago that private support came from the owners of printing presses. It came from the landlords that allowed speakers on their property, and rented to unpopular people. It came from the telephone companies that served everyone even if they were saying "hateful" things down the phone. What we're seeing here seems like a relatively new phenomenon, of private companies that are taking it on themselves to systematically erase entire schools of thought from the modern communications platforms, at least as far as they can. And yes for any given instance you can say, well, you can host your content elsewhere. And that works right up until Google - for example - steals your domain name on moralistic grounds, or your last remaining ISP or hosting provider gets attacked or comes under pressure from activists and so on. Because the sort of people who are doing this don't simply want Alex Jones off iTunes. They want him gone completely, from everywhere, and they will not rest until that happens. Unfortunately Silicon Valley has long since lost any right to claim neutrality on political topics. That probably makes regulation inevitable. How long will conservatives sit back and watch as tech firms systematically attempt to erase their world view from the political conversation? How long will the wider population tolerate Twitter shadowbanning members of the government whilst doing nothing to an NYT journalist who (as noted above) says repeatedly she wants to kill all men, that she hates whites etc? This sort of extreme side-taking seems both new and very short-sighted. It cannot end well.

dumitrupetrov 8y ago

Of course "let's silence and remove everyone that disagrees with us!", i mean c'mon don't censor free speach, let the free market take care of itsef. You could remove someone who is promoting child abuse, threats, racism (man oh man, did twitter let that NYT editor board woman account stay despite her racist comments), killing and so on, but if you disagree with someone like alex jones, congrats! now move on! (not fan of him, but fan of free speach, i mean i know the price of it and it's not cheap)

wavefunction 8y ago
Free speech does not also guarantee a platform. It doesn't obligate anyone to promote your speech. Fans of his podcasts can get them elsewhere.
pavlov 8y ago
What about Apple's free speech? They're the publisher. Are they supposed to put their logo on content that they don't approve? That's not how a free market works.
- joering2 8y ago
  No, more like "that's not how apple store works". You can find fart apps where you press a button and you hear a fart. I doubt by allowing this app in Apple store, everyone all of sudden believes farts = Apple. Or that Apple affiliates themselves with nasty behavior in public, etc.
  - pavlov 8y ago
    Apple manually approves every app and content item on their stores. They are legally the publisher.
- nextlevelwizard 8y ago
  I now expect Apple to police all content that appears on their platform. If anything that breaks copyright appreas Apple should be held responsbile. They can not hold on to whatever "common carrier" status they enjoy now and still censor people they don't like.

mrweasel 8y ago

As long as they don't prevent iTunes from importing the Infowars podcast feed, I don't see it as a major problem. Apple isn't required to help you promote your content if they don't want to, but they are also not allowed to block your access to legal content, regardless of what they may think of it.

ceejayoz 8y ago
> they are also not allowed to block your access to legal content, regardless of what they may think of it What law forbids this?
- akuji1993 8y ago
  Yeah not sure, what argument this stands on, because Apple is private provider of content on their own platform, they can do whatever the hell they want.
  - Wevah 8y ago
    I think mrweasel meant iTunes the app, not the service.
    - mrweasel 8y ago
      Exactly. It's perfectly fine to exclude content from the iTunes store. Apple have always banned porn in the iTunes/App store, and very few have complained about that.... Not that I would like a PornHub app for my AppleTV. What I wouldn't like is Apple parsing the podcast feeds I enter into iTunes and potentially block me from adding certain feeds. That should be non of their business.
- mrweasel 8y ago
  I was just thinking morally. I'm not sure if a private company is allowed to block their customers from accessing content that the company, in this case Apple, simply dislike. That's may be perfectly legal. Would Apple be allowed to block users from accessing Google from an iPhone, if they wanted to? They can't if they do to promote their on alternative, but can they if they just feel like it and don't benefit?

thomasedwards 8y ago

Free speech means you can state and opinion and the government won’t put you in prison. That’s it, that’s all it is.

firic 8y ago
And companies that value free speech don't censor opinions regardless if them censoring is technically legal.
tempodox 8y ago
... and commercial entities will not be proponents of free speech, as long and as far as that's legal.
trosi 8y ago
It's a bit more than that. Censorship violates freedom of speech, but it does not imply imprisonment
humanrebar 8y ago
No, that's the first amendment. Free speech is also a broader principle that the first amendment applies by restricting government power.
- tgb 8y ago
  Thank you! I feel like everyone forgot their middle school civics lessons, the amount I hear that line trotted out these days.

bmarquez 8y ago

Well, so much for sunlight being the best disinfectant. You just know Alex will use the deplatforming to "prove" that the globalists are after him, or something like that. Might have been better to ignore him instead of Apple getting into the game of deciding what is and isn't hate speech. (Does NY Times hiring an openly racist editor make them subject to removal? Who knows...but somebody will start making that argument now that the door is open.)

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rtpg 8y ago
The BS crisis actor narrative and conspiracies pushed by Jones are not the null hypothesis , it's actively pushed by them. If you take away the mic, there's nothing left to disinfect. It's the formation of conspiracy believing, self-reinforcing cults that cause these narratives to begin with
joshgel 8y ago
Doesn't it mean that it's much harder for 'casual' listeners to find him? Like every show there are likely hardcore listeners (who will still find him) and a spectrum of less committed listeners (along that spectrum is a point where people will just stop listening)
zaarn 8y ago
Alex Jones is sadly closer to a religious cult than something desinfectable. There is a line somewhere in between, it's rather blurry but at some point sunlight no longer work and the best option is to nuke it. (I don't think this is generally true for everything the alt-right says, a lot of it can be desinfected with sunlight, so to speak)
neotek 8y ago
Yet again everyone rushes to the defence of fascists. If history has taught us anything it’s that giving fascists a platform is never, ever the solution, you can never reason with them, you can never argue them out of a position they didn’t reason themselves into, and they will always use your kindness as a weapon against you. There is no value in anyone giving people like Alex Jones a platform, all you are doing is giving him wider access to people who will be swayed by his idiotic ramblings. It shouldn’t even require saying; how do you think he has such a large following in the first place? Do you think he’s been unchallenged up to this point? Do you think the counter arguments have had any effect on his base? Do you think the sort of person who ends up falling for a dickhead like Jones is even capable of understanding the arguments against his position? Stop protecting fascists, open a history book.

DanielBMarkham 8y ago

And Facebook has permanently banned them. There used to be a joke on Slashdot. Whatever was happening in tech, somebody would say "And I for one welcome our new $X overlords" Now we have all the major internet companies deciding winners and losers. Doesn't seem like much of a joke anymore. All those years I watched my dear friends on the left march in the streets, claiming that the right was going to shut them down and prevent their message from being heard. Fooled me, guys. I guess it's true: we become what we fear from others.

majewsky 8y ago
I was going to add that that quote is a Simpsons reference, but it turns out the Simpsons actually referenced H. G. Wells: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-for-one-welcome-our-new-insect-overlords https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-for-one-welcome-our-new-ins...
- JshWright 8y ago
  It's a pretty safe bet that any "Simpsons reference" it's actually a reference to something that is at least one level deeper (I consider this one of the great strengths of the show)
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oliwarner 8y ago
We have companies taking responsibility for what happens on their pitch. They aren't stopping him. He can still publish his brand of crazy elsewhere. This seems okay. If anything it's "our" fault for giving Facebook, Apple et al the unreserved omnipresence they have.
tim333 8y ago
I see your Simpsons reference and quote The Onion >First Amendment Experts Warn Facebook Banning InfoWars Could Set Completely Reasonable Precedent For Free Speech >... “If we allow giant media platforms to single out individual users for harassing the families of murdered kindergarteners, it could lead to a nightmare scenario of measured and well-thought-out public discourse,”...

i6mi6 8y ago

Can anyone explain why Infowars are bad? I keep hearing they are but no convincing arguments to support that claim. Edit: Do people giving me thumbs down care to explain themselves?

holgerdanske 8y ago
I can't speak for the American content, but the Scandinavian blog entries range from outright lies to gross missinformation. Would you really want that associated with your brand? I wouldn't.
- i6mi6 8y ago
  What kind of lies do they tell?
  - shrikant 8y ago
    Read through a few of them here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/InfoWars#Controversies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/InfoWars#Controversies
    - i6mi6 8y ago
      1. Sexual harassment “filed complaints against Jones” filing and proving are different things. 2. What’s wrong with conspiracy theories? Who cares unless they are real? 3. Can I see examples of fake news posted by Infowars? Still haven’t seen any. 4. Same as conspiracy theories 5. I can think of many examples where mainstream media promotes violence and harassment against right wing. 6. Chobani never proved otherwise? 7. Not sure about copyright infringement but alright, could be it 8. Unexplained suspension
mj921 8y ago
This and the other thread have only the usual arguments about 1st amendment vs de-platforming and outrage mob stuff (I'm outraged because he said Sandy Hook was a FEMA drill), not one comment about what he presented as evidence/'evidence' to come to his conclusions. So here's a couple, big insurance policy taken out by Silverstein before 911, 'Decided to pull it' comment, people on the building there to 'document the event', BBC calling building 7 falling before it actually fell. Feel free to downvote its a throwaway account

swebs 8y ago

This is a great time to mention gpodder.net, a libre alternative to the iTunes podcast browser. Aside from not promoting censorship, it also integrates nicely with third party FOSS programs such as AntennaPod for Android or Armarok.

tgb 8y ago

I'm glad to see him go, but we're at the point where large tech companies essentially control what information we have access to and are beginning to engage with regulating the content for real, but we do not yet have legal or social norms about what they can or should do. I think that means we're in a dangerous position. Right now people get removed it banned based off how much pressure there is to remove them. We should instead have real institutions, either in the company or broader, where the rules are made, the cases are decided and appeals are possible. If this isn't regulated by the government, then we need to demand our information oligopoly helps us hold them accountable.

orev 8y ago
Freedom of Speech does not require large tech companies to carry, promote, and allow easy access to any and all speech. One’s rights extend only as far as one has the capability to express them using their own resources. If IW wants to setup their own app, App Store, and distribution channels, no one is stopping them, but Apple is not required to do so for them.

gigatexal 8y ago

Why was this flagged? People support this guy? Or hate the takedown so much?