8 ms·

I just made an argument about that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18765494 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18765494, and here: https://news.yco

I just made an argument about that here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18765494 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18765494, and here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18765509 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18765509. > The difference is that the internet has discontinuously more scalable network effects, so technology companies often find themselves in a winner-takes-all dynamic. If some publisher, newspaper, or literary magazine refused to publish Walt Whitman, he could always try and find another publisher. But if Twitter bans Titania McGrath, there is no other Twitter for her to join because the next best alternative has 1/10000th the number of users. > This effect is new. These platforms are private entities, but effectively they operate as public commons. So culturally we must treat them similar to public commons where it isn't acceptable to kick out quirky characters because some of us don't like what they have to say.

bunderbunder 8y ago
The fact that Twitter is way more popular than Mastodon doesn't really change anything. It's freedom of speech, not freedom of venue.
- kristofferR 8y ago
  If you are only allowed to speak freely when noone can hear you - are you then allowed freedom of speech?
  - SolaceQuantum 8y ago
    I believe the answer is yes, in that no one is forced to read spam or flyers.
    - icebraining 8y ago
      kristofferR wrote "can hear you" not "wants to hear you".
      - SolaceQuantum 8y ago
        Yes, and by being limited to local flyers, the vast majority of America cannot hear your speech.
  - toofy 8y ago
    > If you are only allowed to speak freely when no one can hear you - are you then allowed freedom of speech? Yes. Of course you are being allowed freedom of speech.
  - Udik 8y ago
    Sure. For example, you can say what you want, after you've been exiled by the government to some desert island. An alternative would be a special muzzle to be fitted on the mouth of someone, so that he can say what he wants but emit no sound. /s
  - root_axis 8y ago
    This is a misleading characterization of the situation. Being banned from an arbitrary website doesn't mean that nobody can hear you. Twitter is not the internet, you are free to post whatever content you want on a platform that is friendlier to the message or on your own personal platform. Nobody owes you a platform.
    - coffeemug 8y ago
      Nobody owes you not selling your data either. But social networks got so big and powerful that we're developing specialized norms for this sort of stuff because on balance it's better to live in a society where our data doesn't get sold. The same is true for speech and platforms -- nobody owes you one, but these companies accrue the astronomical benefits of massive network effects and are changing the ecology of our society. It's reasonable to impose free speech norms in exchange because on balance it will result in a better world than the counterfactual.
      - joe_the_user 8y ago
        It's reasonable to impose free speech norms in exchange because on balance it will result in a better world than the counterfactual. Why exactly? The New York Times and the wire services were once the primary venue for most newspaper publication. There was never a requirement that anyone be able to write articles for them. The thing is allowing garbage views into "record of note" publications seriously empowers them. As an earlier article points out, youtube's algorithm is weight towards feeding people polarized extremist rants because these get responses (just the other day, my suggested "next videos" included a client change denier and Jordan Peterson for zero reason). We're looking at the result of extreme ideological polarization and these don't look pretty. A good portion of what could be called "hate speech" is pseudo-science presenting itself as science and this to someone who's (probably foolishly) expecting a bit of vetting on a large website, this pseudo-science sell is especially effective. Moreover, a large portion of those who uses a social network know that the "open web" exists and are quite capable of cruising it. Again, by letting into a venue the naive person imagines is vetted, you have increased its momentum considerably. The average person isn't necessary super competent at sorting modern issues. A good portion of heinous content leverages this by appearing respectable and being the web site of
  - fao_ 8y ago
    You need to rephrase this to: "If you are only able to speak freely when no one is forced to listen to you - are you then allowed freedom of speech?" This isn't some guy shouting in the street or some other public place (who, funnily enough, everyone usually agrees with their removal), but someone shouting on what is effectively private property.
    - kristofferR 8y ago
      Shouting is a horrible analogy since shouting is forcing itself on others wether they want to listen or not. "Being available to be spoken/listened to" is more accurate. You also need to remember that the places we're talking about are de facto public spaces due to their practical monopolies on speech. They are private spaces legally and the companies who own them can be as discriminatory as they want in regards to who they allow to speak from a legal standpoint, but they shouldn't abuse their power to do so. If they do discriminate too much, they should be regulated to be neutral places for speech, considering their excessive clout. A future where a select group of companies control what people hear, discuss and think is scary.
      - Fjolsvith 8y ago
        Such regulation will be swatted down, I'm sure. The private spaces have legal protections guaranteed by the constitution. Just like the christian baker who was protected from being forced to decorate cakes with messages he found offensive, these companies will be protected from being forced to publish speech they find offensive. The analogy is appropriate in the sense that its not the "shouting" that is offensive, but rather that the message is considered offensive in the private place where it is expressed against the wishes of the owner of that private place.
    - tapland 8y ago
      I fail to recognize the 'forced to listen' part. I very rarely see political opinions at all on twitter or youtube, because I don't follow those topics. Also isn't filter bubbles a thing?
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
  - bunderbunder 8y ago
    > If you are only allowed to speak freely when noone can hear you No one? Hyperbole like this only serves to muddy the waters. Furthermore, I'm curious if those who believe that having access to social media needs to be considered a fundamental right really have the courage of their convictions: If this is the case, then we've got bigger problems than whether or not Milo Yiannopoulos can use it to act like a tool in public. There are whole classes of people who don't have easy access to the hardware and constant Internet connections required to take part, and their freedom of speech has clearly been curtailed. Perhaps there's a need to set up a social fund to ensure that their basic human rights are being preserved by buying them smartphones with data plans, and forcing the nation's cellular providers to extend coverage to every nook and cranny of the country.
    - kristofferR 8y ago
      I'm not sure if you're joking or not, since the LifeLine program (nicknamed ObamaPhone by the right) has provided deeply government subsidized phone access since 1985 and cellular providers already are required to provide coverage to unprofitable, but inhabited areas.
- ng12 8y ago
  Ah, yes. The "free speech zone" approach.
  - mindslight 8y ago
    I still remember those fucking cages they built for the DNC. I think back to our feelings of extreme powerlessness during the Bush II years and can't help but feel that the present grassroots support for censorship is being fueled by some naive desire for comeuppance. Alas it's not left xor right wing ideas that get censored, but really the anti-authoritarian ideas and attitude. Don't you know that all those radio stations were just nobly deciding to not broadcast Imagine? Plus ça change.
- Wistar 8y ago
  Or, freedom of speech, not freedom of reach.
- mcherm 8y ago
  > The fact that Twitter is way more popular than Mastodon doesn't really change anything. We're not discussing what IS, we are discussing what SHOULD BE. The fact that twitter is way more popular than Mastodon absolutely DOES change something... it changes the number of people who can hear the message. One might argue that this SHOULD not make a person's right to be heard on Twitter any different than their right to be heard in a small-town newspaper; another might argue that it SHOULD alter those rights. Any sensible discussion needs to be rooted in the question of what our values are. I cannot lay out your values for you, but at least I can explain my own. For me, freedom of speech is an important value primarily because it protects those with correct but controversial or unpopular opinions from being silenced. Also to some extent "freedom of speech" is a terminal value for me: people being allowed to express themselves is a thing I value for its own sake. So how do I run this analysis? Well, the claim is that there are incredibly strong network effects on a system like Twitter, Facebook, and their ilk. In other words, the existence of Twitter nearly guarantees that Mastodon cannot grow very large. And this is different from what happened with newspapers. It is closer to what happened with the telephone system. Although not 100% true, I think there is a great deal of truth to this claim. So what do we do? One possibility is to say that the network effects shouldn't make any difference, and that we should regulate Twitter (and Facebook, and other similarly situated platforms) like we do newspapers (give them free rein to control what appears on their platforms). This is the position that our legal system is taking at the moment. Another possibility is to consider this to be closer to the telephone system. Remember that for years there was a single phone system throughout the US, run by a single company (AT&T, "Ma Bell"). Until automated switching systems became fully capable the phone company even had operators who connected calls and were capable of listening in. But they never put in place a policy of kicking people off of the phone system if they talked about topics that AT&T didn't like. If AT&T had used such a policy it could have drastically altered the history of things like the civil rights movement. Would AT&T have chosen to ban those who supported the KKK and lynchings, or would they have chosen to ban the Black Panthers and those who violated the law in their quest to push for change? I'm not sure which side they would have been on, and I wouldn't want the outcome of the civil rights struggle to have been decided by executives at one company rather than through the collective struggles of the citizens of the country. So historically, we regulated publishers of newspapers and books one way and the telephone company another way, and looking back at history I am confident that we made the right choice both times. I am not so sure about the way we regulate Twitter and Facebook. Their network effects are less strong than were those of the telephone system, but are still massive. I find this a difficult call to make. Patreon, on the other hand, seems more clear. There are other payment systems and the network effects are less powerful. If Patreon wants to restrict who can get paid through their platform then other platforms can arise and so long as Patreon isn't leveraging their market dominance to crush these upstarts, that should be fine by me.
- Consultant32452 8y ago
  One important component of free speech is the right, not to be heard, but the right to hear. That is what is being taken away from me and I find it terrifying, even though I'd never heard of any of these people before they got unpersoned. The idea that by handling some financial transactions Patreon or PayPal is somehow supporting some kind of speech is a disastrous one. Starbucks doesn't get to ask you your views before selling you coffee, nor should any of these other companies.
b_tterc_p 8y ago
I don’t use twitter but this seems purposefully naive. Human attention does not scale like technology. You’re not going to reach the entire user base of twitter with your annoying quirky content. You probably won’t even reach 1/10000th of it. Also, we probably would kick people out of public commons for yelling vile opinions on the grounds of disturbing the peace. if you simply must shout such things, you can apply to do a formal protest- a thing anyone on the web can effectively accomplish by making their own web page.

bunderbunder 8y ago

The fact that Twitter is way more popular than Mastodon doesn't really change anything. It's freedom of speech, not freedom of venue.

kristofferR 8y ago
If you are only allowed to speak freely when noone can hear you - are you then allowed freedom of speech?
- SolaceQuantum 8y ago
  I believe the answer is yes, in that no one is forced to read spam or flyers.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    kristofferR wrote "can hear you" not "wants to hear you".
    - SolaceQuantum 8y ago
      Yes, and by being limited to local flyers, the vast majority of America cannot hear your speech.
- toofy 8y ago
  > If you are only allowed to speak freely when no one can hear you - are you then allowed freedom of speech? Yes. Of course you are being allowed freedom of speech.
- Udik 8y ago
  Sure. For example, you can say what you want, after you've been exiled by the government to some desert island. An alternative would be a special muzzle to be fitted on the mouth of someone, so that he can say what he wants but emit no sound. /s
- root_axis 8y ago
  This is a misleading characterization of the situation. Being banned from an arbitrary website doesn't mean that nobody can hear you. Twitter is not the internet, you are free to post whatever content you want on a platform that is friendlier to the message or on your own personal platform. Nobody owes you a platform.
  - coffeemug 8y ago
    Nobody owes you not selling your data either. But social networks got so big and powerful that we're developing specialized norms for this sort of stuff because on balance it's better to live in a society where our data doesn't get sold. The same is true for speech and platforms -- nobody owes you one, but these companies accrue the astronomical benefits of massive network effects and are changing the ecology of our society. It's reasonable to impose free speech norms in exchange because on balance it will result in a better world than the counterfactual.
    - joe_the_user 8y ago
      It's reasonable to impose free speech norms in exchange because on balance it will result in a better world than the counterfactual. Why exactly? The New York Times and the wire services were once the primary venue for most newspaper publication. There was never a requirement that anyone be able to write articles for them. The thing is allowing garbage views into "record of note" publications seriously empowers them. As an earlier article points out, youtube's algorithm is weight towards feeding people polarized extremist rants because these get responses (just the other day, my suggested "next videos" included a client change denier and Jordan Peterson for zero reason). We're looking at the result of extreme ideological polarization and these don't look pretty. A good portion of what could be called "hate speech" is pseudo-science presenting itself as science and this to someone who's (probably foolishly) expecting a bit of vetting on a large website, this pseudo-science sell is especially effective. Moreover, a large portion of those who uses a social network know that the "open web" exists and are quite capable of cruising it. Again, by letting into a venue the naive person imagines is vetted, you have increased its momentum considerably. The average person isn't necessary super competent at sorting modern issues. A good portion of heinous content leverages this by appearing respectable and being the web site of
- fao_ 8y ago
  You need to rephrase this to: "If you are only able to speak freely when no one is forced to listen to you - are you then allowed freedom of speech?" This isn't some guy shouting in the street or some other public place (who, funnily enough, everyone usually agrees with their removal), but someone shouting on what is effectively private property.
  - kristofferR 8y ago
    Shouting is a horrible analogy since shouting is forcing itself on others wether they want to listen or not. "Being available to be spoken/listened to" is more accurate. You also need to remember that the places we're talking about are de facto public spaces due to their practical monopolies on speech. They are private spaces legally and the companies who own them can be as discriminatory as they want in regards to who they allow to speak from a legal standpoint, but they shouldn't abuse their power to do so. If they do discriminate too much, they should be regulated to be neutral places for speech, considering their excessive clout. A future where a select group of companies control what people hear, discuss and think is scary.
    - Fjolsvith 8y ago
      Such regulation will be swatted down, I'm sure. The private spaces have legal protections guaranteed by the constitution. Just like the christian baker who was protected from being forced to decorate cakes with messages he found offensive, these companies will be protected from being forced to publish speech they find offensive. The analogy is appropriate in the sense that its not the "shouting" that is offensive, but rather that the message is considered offensive in the private place where it is expressed against the wishes of the owner of that private place.
  - tapland 8y ago
    I fail to recognize the 'forced to listen' part. I very rarely see political opinions at all on twitter or youtube, because I don't follow those topics. Also isn't filter bubbles a thing?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
- bunderbunder 8y ago
  > If you are only allowed to speak freely when noone can hear you No one? Hyperbole like this only serves to muddy the waters. Furthermore, I'm curious if those who believe that having access to social media needs to be considered a fundamental right really have the courage of their convictions: If this is the case, then we've got bigger problems than whether or not Milo Yiannopoulos can use it to act like a tool in public. There are whole classes of people who don't have easy access to the hardware and constant Internet connections required to take part, and their freedom of speech has clearly been curtailed. Perhaps there's a need to set up a social fund to ensure that their basic human rights are being preserved by buying them smartphones with data plans, and forcing the nation's cellular providers to extend coverage to every nook and cranny of the country.
  - kristofferR 8y ago
    I'm not sure if you're joking or not, since the LifeLine program (nicknamed ObamaPhone by the right) has provided deeply government subsidized phone access since 1985 and cellular providers already are required to provide coverage to unprofitable, but inhabited areas.
ng12 8y ago
Ah, yes. The "free speech zone" approach.
- mindslight 8y ago
  I still remember those fucking cages they built for the DNC. I think back to our feelings of extreme powerlessness during the Bush II years and can't help but feel that the present grassroots support for censorship is being fueled by some naive desire for comeuppance. Alas it's not left xor right wing ideas that get censored, but really the anti-authoritarian ideas and attitude. Don't you know that all those radio stations were just nobly deciding to not broadcast Imagine? Plus ça change.
Wistar 8y ago
Or, freedom of speech, not freedom of reach.
mcherm 8y ago
> The fact that Twitter is way more popular than Mastodon doesn't really change anything. We're not discussing what IS, we are discussing what SHOULD BE. The fact that twitter is way more popular than Mastodon absolutely DOES change something... it changes the number of people who can hear the message. One might argue that this SHOULD not make a person's right to be heard on Twitter any different than their right to be heard in a small-town newspaper; another might argue that it SHOULD alter those rights. Any sensible discussion needs to be rooted in the question of what our values are. I cannot lay out your values for you, but at least I can explain my own. For me, freedom of speech is an important value primarily because it protects those with correct but controversial or unpopular opinions from being silenced. Also to some extent "freedom of speech" is a terminal value for me: people being allowed to express themselves is a thing I value for its own sake. So how do I run this analysis? Well, the claim is that there are incredibly strong network effects on a system like Twitter, Facebook, and their ilk. In other words, the existence of Twitter nearly guarantees that Mastodon cannot grow very large. And this is different from what happened with newspapers. It is closer to what happened with the telephone system. Although not 100% true, I think there is a great deal of truth to this claim. So what do we do? One possibility is to say that the network effects shouldn't make any difference, and that we should regulate Twitter (and Facebook, and other similarly situated platforms) like we do newspapers (give them free rein to control what appears on their platforms). This is the position that our legal system is taking at the moment. Another possibility is to consider this to be closer to the telephone system. Remember that for years there was a single phone system throughout the US, run by a single company (AT&T, "Ma Bell"). Until automated switching systems became fully capable the phone company even had operators who connected calls and were capable of listening in. But they never put in place a policy of kicking people off of the phone system if they talked about topics that AT&T didn't like. If AT&T had used such a policy it could have drastically altered the history of things like the civil rights movement. Would AT&T have chosen to ban those who supported the KKK and lynchings, or would they have chosen to ban the Black Panthers and those who violated the law in their quest to push for change? I'm not sure which side they would have been on, and I wouldn't want the outcome of the civil rights struggle to have been decided by executives at one company rather than through the collective struggles of the citizens of the country. So historically, we regulated publishers of newspapers and books one way and the telephone company another way, and looking back at history I am confident that we made the right choice both times. I am not so sure about the way we regulate Twitter and Facebook. Their network effects are less strong than were those of the telephone system, but are still massive. I find this a difficult call to make. Patreon, on the other hand, seems more clear. There are other payment systems and the network effects are less powerful. If Patreon wants to restrict who can get paid through their platform then other platforms can arise and so long as Patreon isn't leveraging their market dominance to crush these upstarts, that should be fine by me.
Consultant32452 8y ago
One important component of free speech is the right, not to be heard, but the right to hear. That is what is being taken away from me and I find it terrifying, even though I'd never heard of any of these people before they got unpersoned. The idea that by handling some financial transactions Patreon or PayPal is somehow supporting some kind of speech is a disastrous one. Starbucks doesn't get to ask you your views before selling you coffee, nor should any of these other companies.

b_tterc_p 8y ago

I don’t use twitter but this seems purposefully naive. Human attention does not scale like technology. You’re not going to reach the entire user base of twitter with your annoying quirky content. You probably won’t even reach 1/10000th of it. Also, we probably would kick people out of public commons for yelling vile opinions on the grounds of disturbing the peace. if you simply must shout such things, you can apply to do a formal protest- a thing anyone on the web can effectively accomplish by making their own web page.