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> Due to the monopoly of control on social media right now, companies like Facebook, Twitter, et. al. are the new public spaces. Just because you want them to

by danem 7y ago

> Due to the monopoly of control on social media right now, companies like Facebook, Twitter, et. al. are the new public spaces. Just because you want them to be considered "public spaces" doesn't make them so. These are private companies using private funding, nothing public about them. Go to the countless other forums to post your opinions. Make your own Twitter alternative. Nothing is stopping you. The ideas being promoted on 8chan and the like have lost in the "marketplace of ideas". The only free speech issue here is that you seem to want government intervention to promote hugely unpopular ideas, and force private companies to use their resources to broadcast content against their wishes, clearly violating the first amendment. > If the WSJ was one of 2 or 3 news publications in the entire world that people got their information from, them choosing to not a run a story or firing a particular journalist would be a big deal. How many major publications do you see running white supremacist content? How many major publications do you see running anti-vax conspiracy theories? What you describe has been happening for the entirety of media's existence. Ideas largely fall out of favor and people no longer wish to pay the cost of broadcasting them.

zaroth 7y ago
Actually there is quite a bit of merit in discussing the limits that are placed, or could/should be placed, on the mega-platforms in terms of what content they are allowed to censor. This is not a definitively answered question, and is something that the courts are indeed struggling with. It is actually not as simple as having a ToS which says “we can deny service to anyone for any reason”. Twitter, for example, advertised itself as a neutral platform. Therefore it would be an unfair and deceptive business practice (per the FTC) for it to institute politically motivated account terminations. Similarly, Google certainly has the capability to influence both election turnout and perhaps even voting itself through the type of content it surfaces, and Congress has held many hearings and even heard testimony from Pichai on this exact topic.

by danem 7y ago

zaroth 7y ago

Actually there is quite a bit of merit in discussing the limits that are placed, or could/should be placed, on the mega-platforms in terms of what content they are allowed to censor. This is not a definitively answered question, and is something that the courts are indeed struggling with. It is actually not as simple as having a ToS which says “we can deny service to anyone for any reason”. Twitter, for example, advertised itself as a neutral platform. Therefore it would be an unfair and deceptive business practice (per the FTC) for it to institute politically motivated account terminations. Similarly, Google certainly has the capability to influence both election turnout and perhaps even voting itself through the type of content it surfaces, and Congress has held many hearings and even heard testimony from Pichai on this exact topic.