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Are you suggesting that the laws should be changed to limit the political freedom of some companies? If so, what would be your criteria for determining which co

Are you suggesting that the laws should be changed to limit the political freedom of some companies? If so, what would be your criteria for determining which companies this would apply to?

CamperBob2 7y ago
When they get too big.
- root_axis 7y ago
  I appreciate the snark, but I'll just say anyway that I'm actually asking what are the factors that determine when a company is "too big"?
  - CamperBob2 7y ago
    In all honesty, the only way a company like Facebook gets this big is through the support of the larger society that sustains them. The Internet itself is a product of that society. Everyone with a stake in that society is at least entitled to an opinion, if not an outright vote, regarding how the company operates. This is a reflection of a larger point, which is that any sufficiently-dominant corporation is indistinguishable from a government. Especially with the introduction of Libra, that's starting to sound less like a cliche and more like an axiom. This also (should) give the rest of us more input in how the company does business.
    - root_axis 7y ago
      I don't disagree with much of anything you've written there, but corporate dominance has been an issue for a long time and the impact of social media companies is trivial compared to the impact of companies that e.g. kill citizens with addictive drugs for profit, withhold life saving drugs and medical treatment for profit, hoard and reserve huge swaths of residential property for rent seeking, contaminate the water table and arable land for natural gas etc and the political proclivities of these companies is never scrutinized outside of partisan politics. I'm not saying that Facebook isn't also a problem, but it seems very much like bikeshedding to tie ourselves into knots writing new laws so that people have the right to share low-effort memes on Facebook's servers when there are so many real problems that could be solved with new laws.
semiotagonal 7y ago
When they're so big that no competition can challenge them. My personal opinion is that Facebook should be broken up, but social media remain unregulated, since a ban on lies only rewards the most skilled liars, whose statements can fool the evaluators.
- root_axis 7y ago
  > When they're so big that no competition can challenge them. This is pretty vague though. It also raises questions about why we don't limit the political proclivities of other types of companies that also deal in political speech (cable news, broadcast news, talk radio, public radio). I also disagree with the idea that access to Facebook and similar platforms is fundamentally important; it's well known by now that these systems are engineered to be addictive and that heavy use of social media is associated with poor mental health, if anything we should make ad based social media platforms illegal altogether. > My personal opinion is that Facebook should be broken up Why? I am not opposed to the idea but I just don't see how it would improve the situation at all.
- chroma 7y ago
  > When they're so big that no competition can challenge them. That's what people said about MySpace before Facebook. It's also what people said about IBM, Microsoft, AOL, Nokia, and Kodak. Big companies have a hard time changing direction. They also tend to be more risk averse, causing them to coast on their brand and network effects. Eventually they're usurped by smaller companies that take more risks and innovate better.
buboard 7y ago
the self-preservation instict of states would dictate that they will limit them when they threaten the power of the government.

Are you suggesting that the laws should be changed to limit the political freedom of some companies? If so, what would be your criteria for determining which companies this would apply to?

CamperBob2 7y ago

When they get too big.

root_axis 7y ago
I appreciate the snark, but I'll just say anyway that I'm actually asking what are the factors that determine when a company is "too big"?
- CamperBob2 7y ago
  In all honesty, the only way a company like Facebook gets this big is through the support of the larger society that sustains them. The Internet itself is a product of that society. Everyone with a stake in that society is at least entitled to an opinion, if not an outright vote, regarding how the company operates. This is a reflection of a larger point, which is that any sufficiently-dominant corporation is indistinguishable from a government. Especially with the introduction of Libra, that's starting to sound less like a cliche and more like an axiom. This also (should) give the rest of us more input in how the company does business.
  - root_axis 7y ago
    I don't disagree with much of anything you've written there, but corporate dominance has been an issue for a long time and the impact of social media companies is trivial compared to the impact of companies that e.g. kill citizens with addictive drugs for profit, withhold life saving drugs and medical treatment for profit, hoard and reserve huge swaths of residential property for rent seeking, contaminate the water table and arable land for natural gas etc and the political proclivities of these companies is never scrutinized outside of partisan politics. I'm not saying that Facebook isn't also a problem, but it seems very much like bikeshedding to tie ourselves into knots writing new laws so that people have the right to share low-effort memes on Facebook's servers when there are so many real problems that could be solved with new laws.

semiotagonal 7y ago

When they're so big that no competition can challenge them. My personal opinion is that Facebook should be broken up, but social media remain unregulated, since a ban on lies only rewards the most skilled liars, whose statements can fool the evaluators.

root_axis 7y ago
> When they're so big that no competition can challenge them. This is pretty vague though. It also raises questions about why we don't limit the political proclivities of other types of companies that also deal in political speech (cable news, broadcast news, talk radio, public radio). I also disagree with the idea that access to Facebook and similar platforms is fundamentally important; it's well known by now that these systems are engineered to be addictive and that heavy use of social media is associated with poor mental health, if anything we should make ad based social media platforms illegal altogether. > My personal opinion is that Facebook should be broken up Why? I am not opposed to the idea but I just don't see how it would improve the situation at all.
chroma 7y ago
> When they're so big that no competition can challenge them. That's what people said about MySpace before Facebook. It's also what people said about IBM, Microsoft, AOL, Nokia, and Kodak. Big companies have a hard time changing direction. They also tend to be more risk averse, causing them to coast on their brand and network effects. Eventually they're usurped by smaller companies that take more risks and innovate better.

buboard 7y ago

the self-preservation instict of states would dictate that they will limit them when they threaten the power of the government.