5 ms·

More important than the 0% commission is how open this platform will actually be, or will it also engage in politics and police certain speech as they see fit?

PaulRobinson 8y ago
It is the law in France - as it is with most countries - that some forms of speech and expression are not tolerated and companies must not provide a platform for them. Extremism on both the left and the right isn't tolerated. Nazism, Antisemitism, etc. all fall into the same bucket. France - where Liberapay is based - notoriously has the "Burka Ban", preventing women from covering their faces in public. In the UK "incitement to violence" is illegal, as are certain forms of protest and speech, and it is infamously severe when it comes to libel/slander law. Germany has outlawed many forms of right-wing nationalism in fear of fuelling neo-Nazis. Policing speech is inherently European. In some ways, it's why the United States exists, and one of the key differences in creed between European and American attitudes. Typically European attitudes around this veer towards "tragedy of the commons" arguments relating to violence, incitement to violence and discrimination. Attitudes are much, much more liberal in relation to showing and exhibiting nudity and it does not automatically equate that seeing breasts/genitals means content is sexual as it often does in the US. TL;DR: they're going to police speech, probably differently to others, but it will be policed. Nudity/(consenting adult) sexual content is more likely to get a pass more so than US companies would allow, but discrimination and non-centrist politics less likely.
- icebraining 8y ago
  > Nudity/(consenting adult) sexual content is more likely to get a pass more so than US companies would allow Unfortunately, Liberapay is beholden to its payment processors, which tend to ban sexual content; they're currently using Stripe, which bans quite a bit of stuff: https://stripe.com/us/restricted-businesses https://stripe.com/us/restricted-businesses
Forbo 8y ago
Their platform their rules. Don't like it, then use hatreon or a direct payment method like cryptocurrency donations.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
gilrain 8y ago
Hopefully they will police hate speech and other forms of speech which are rightly illegal due to their inherent intention to infringe on other people’s rights, yes. You can use a hateful platform like Hatreon if you wish to spread those views. Because your freedom of speech isn’t being trampled on, it’s just that civilized people don’t want you junking up their property.
- vgoh1 8y ago
  Companies need to leave the policing to the police. Also, hate speech is not illegal in USA, nor should it be. It is a complicated issue - everything that is wrong should not be illegal or banned.
  - q3k 8y ago
    It is, thankfully, illegal in France, and as such Liberapay does have to police it. Again, if you want to spread hate speech, you'll have to use another platform.
    - gadders 8y ago
      Given that Jean-Marie Le Pen was able to campaign for years, I find it hard to believe it is illegal.
      - fwn 8y ago
        In practice, actual hate speech (the respective local legal norm, not the battle cry) doesn't govern what you can say but how you can say it. Jean-Marie Le Pen managed to formulate many of his statements in compliance with local hate speech regulations. Far from all of them, though. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Marie_Le_Pen#Issues_and_policy_positions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Marie_Le_Pen#Issues_and_p...
    - fwn 8y ago
      Most of the time no one actually "wants to spread hate speech". It's a category used to gain power by evoking government backed oppression of ideological enemies. ...and in some rare cases there is also actual hate speech in the sense of a countries respective laws. (Those laws are pretty diverse and far from universal.) In functioning legal systems this latter, tiny set of cases is determined by judges. In other systems it's chosen through other means like corporations, priests, some mob or something. With platforms as the rising way of public discourse courts are unprepared and just hand it off to somebody else. ...that doesn't mean it's the responsible thing to do. People will probably still think that's great until the integrated corporations decide to switch sides and start to promote non-mainstream positions.
mattbk1 8y ago
From https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.com/issues/1383 https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.com/issues/1383: > Liberapay cannot protect anyone from the decisions of underlying payment processors, not even itself (https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/liberapay-is-in-trouble-b58b40714d82 https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/liberapay-is-in-trouble-b5...).

PaulRobinson 8y ago

It is the law in France - as it is with most countries - that some forms of speech and expression are not tolerated and companies must not provide a platform for them. Extremism on both the left and the right isn't tolerated. Nazism, Antisemitism, etc. all fall into the same bucket. France - where Liberapay is based - notoriously has the "Burka Ban", preventing women from covering their faces in public. In the UK "incitement to violence" is illegal, as are certain forms of protest and speech, and it is infamously severe when it comes to libel/slander law. Germany has outlawed many forms of right-wing nationalism in fear of fuelling neo-Nazis. Policing speech is inherently European. In some ways, it's why the United States exists, and one of the key differences in creed between European and American attitudes. Typically European attitudes around this veer towards "tragedy of the commons" arguments relating to violence, incitement to violence and discrimination. Attitudes are much, much more liberal in relation to showing and exhibiting nudity and it does not automatically equate that seeing breasts/genitals means content is sexual as it often does in the US. TL;DR: they're going to police speech, probably differently to others, but it will be policed. Nudity/(consenting adult) sexual content is more likely to get a pass more so than US companies would allow, but discrimination and non-centrist politics less likely.

icebraining 8y ago
> Nudity/(consenting adult) sexual content is more likely to get a pass more so than US companies would allow Unfortunately, Liberapay is beholden to its payment processors, which tend to ban sexual content; they're currently using Stripe, which bans quite a bit of stuff: https://stripe.com/us/restricted-businesses https://stripe.com/us/restricted-businesses

Forbo 8y ago

Their platform their rules. Don't like it, then use hatreon or a direct payment method like cryptocurrency donations.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

gilrain 8y ago

Hopefully they will police hate speech and other forms of speech which are rightly illegal due to their inherent intention to infringe on other people’s rights, yes. You can use a hateful platform like Hatreon if you wish to spread those views. Because your freedom of speech isn’t being trampled on, it’s just that civilized people don’t want you junking up their property.

vgoh1 8y ago
Companies need to leave the policing to the police. Also, hate speech is not illegal in USA, nor should it be. It is a complicated issue - everything that is wrong should not be illegal or banned.
- q3k 8y ago
  It is, thankfully, illegal in France, and as such Liberapay does have to police it. Again, if you want to spread hate speech, you'll have to use another platform.
  - gadders 8y ago
    Given that Jean-Marie Le Pen was able to campaign for years, I find it hard to believe it is illegal.
    - fwn 8y ago
      In practice, actual hate speech (the respective local legal norm, not the battle cry) doesn't govern what you can say but how you can say it. Jean-Marie Le Pen managed to formulate many of his statements in compliance with local hate speech regulations. Far from all of them, though. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Marie_Le_Pen#Issues_and_policy_positions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Marie_Le_Pen#Issues_and_p...
  - fwn 8y ago
    Most of the time no one actually "wants to spread hate speech". It's a category used to gain power by evoking government backed oppression of ideological enemies. ...and in some rare cases there is also actual hate speech in the sense of a countries respective laws. (Those laws are pretty diverse and far from universal.) In functioning legal systems this latter, tiny set of cases is determined by judges. In other systems it's chosen through other means like corporations, priests, some mob or something. With platforms as the rising way of public discourse courts are unprepared and just hand it off to somebody else. ...that doesn't mean it's the responsible thing to do. People will probably still think that's great until the integrated corporations decide to switch sides and start to promote non-mainstream positions.

mattbk1 8y ago

From https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.com/issues/1383 https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.com/issues/1383: > Liberapay cannot protect anyone from the decisions of underlying payment processors, not even itself (https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/liberapay-is-in-trouble-b58b40714d82 https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/liberapay-is-in-trouble-b5...).