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Currently, platform immunity means the platform can't be sued or criminally charged because a user hosts something for which the user can be. The proposed chang

by Zak 6y ago

Currently, platform immunity means the platform can't be sued or criminally charged because a user hosts something for which the user can be. The proposed change would expose the operator of an editorial algorithm to liability for the algorithm recommending things that are already illegal. I don't think the concern with rolling back platform immunity is government restrictions on free speech, exactly. In the US, the first amendment provides the same protections it always has. Instead, concerns include that the risk of liability will hamper innovation, that only companies with a lot of resources will be able to take the risk, and that companies will overreact with their own proactive censorship to stay well clear of areas with potential liability. We've seen the latter with FOSTA/SESTA weakening platform immunity, which is arguably what its creators intended, but I suspect not what everyone in congress who voted for it expected.

joshuamorton 6y ago
Right, but the "platform immunity" thing applies equally to all platforms. You're instead proposing to extend immunity to some platforms and not others based on how they choose to recommend things. If you (like I do) believe that recommendation is a form of speech, this creates government favored classes of speech. To word it differently: "Platforms that recommend/aggregate speech in government sanctioned ways are protected from liability, while those that do not are not". That's, while not open and shut perhaps, certainly spooky.
- Zak 6y ago
  The law already does something like that. If I run the hypothetical blog host conspiracy-blogs.com, and I manually select ten posts I like to put on the front page every day, I can be prosecuted if I select a post for that saying something like: Tomorrow at 10 AM, join me on the steps of the capitol. Bring your gun and a sign that says "we will shoot you unless you vote no on bill 123.". The action described is a crime, soliciting others to participate in it is a crime, and my deliberate choice to show it to a larger audience is likely enough to subject me to accomplice liability that virtually any criminal lawyer would recommend against it. If violence actually occurred, there would be an ever lower bar for the victims to clear to sue me. Planning crimes is unambiguously not protected speech. The proposal described would subject any sufficiently editorial algorithm to similar liability.

by Zak 6y ago

joshuamorton 6y ago

Right, but the "platform immunity" thing applies equally to all platforms. You're instead proposing to extend immunity to some platforms and not others based on how they choose to recommend things. If you (like I do) believe that recommendation is a form of speech, this creates government favored classes of speech. To word it differently: "Platforms that recommend/aggregate speech in government sanctioned ways are protected from liability, while those that do not are not". That's, while not open and shut perhaps, certainly spooky.

Zak 6y ago
The law already does something like that. If I run the hypothetical blog host conspiracy-blogs.com, and I manually select ten posts I like to put on the front page every day, I can be prosecuted if I select a post for that saying something like: Tomorrow at 10 AM, join me on the steps of the capitol. Bring your gun and a sign that says "we will shoot you unless you vote no on bill 123.". The action described is a crime, soliciting others to participate in it is a crime, and my deliberate choice to show it to a larger audience is likely enough to subject me to accomplice liability that virtually any criminal lawyer would recommend against it. If violence actually occurred, there would be an ever lower bar for the victims to clear to sue me. Planning crimes is unambiguously not protected speech. The proposal described would subject any sufficiently editorial algorithm to similar liability.