5 ms·

It's hard not to see this as an authoritarian backlash to "speaking truth to power" when the President is arguing Twitter should lose 230 because they fact chec

by mcintyre1994 6y ago

It's hard not to see this as an authoritarian backlash to "speaking truth to power" when the President is arguing Twitter should lose 230 because they fact checked his tweet. Fact checking a President's tweet translates quite naturally to speaking truth to power.

chrisco255 6y ago
It's also editorializing Twitter...ergo Twitter is no longer a neutral platform and should be subject to all the same liabilities that Fox, CNN, etc are including libel and defamation.
- akersten 6y ago
  What? Not only does the legal concept of a "neutral platform" not exist, the examples you cite (Fox, CNN) are certainly not "neutral platforms." They aren't responsible for what their commenters post on their sites either (and it is certainly... eye-opening to check out their comment sections sometimes). Twitter already does have libel liabilities, just like Fox and CNN, if they were to themselves post something libelous - just like if Fox were to produce a segment themselves that is libelous.
  - chrisco255 6y ago
    No they don't. Twitter cannot be sued for something someone tweets that is false or defamatory about someone else. That individual tweeter is responsible. Unlike Fox or CNN who are responsible for what their reporters and commentators say. If Twitter ventures against the spirit of 230 protection, which was designed to protect neutral platforms like a utility, then they deserve to lose it. It's not about who produces a segment, Twitter is clearly the publisher and distributor. 230 was designed to protect free speech not to allow unlimited corporate intervention into speech.
    - vkou 6y ago
      Fox has been photoshopping a man with an assault rifle onto pictures of a peaceful protest for the last week. What legal consequences have they faced, or are they going to face for these blatant lies?
    - mcintyre1994 6y ago
      Here's section 230, it's very short: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230 Please can you explain how this was "designed to protect neutral platforms like a utility", given that the text contains none of the words "neutral", "platform" or "utility"? It also doesn't contain "editorialise" or any variant that I can see.
      - chrisco255 6y ago
        Here's the whole bill it was attached to, it's very long: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_19... Note the original TCA created the FCC. That entire bill was packed with legislation to regulate cable and phone companies as well as providers of internet services...ergo utility. Section 230 was developed in response to a pair of lawsuits against Internet service providers in the early 1990s that had different interpretations of whether the service providers should be treated as publishers or distributors of content created by its users. Note, it is my strong opinion that Twitter selectively fact checking and blocking tweets or shadowbanning particular users that do not violate any laws or TOS means they are venturing into the publisher role more and more. Section 230 was clearly designed to preserve free speech not to encourage its destruction by homogeneous corporations.
    - akersten 6y ago
      If Twitter themselves posted a tweet defaming someone, they'd have the exact same liabilities as those reporters at CNN, who are employed by CNN to create content for CNN. Twitter can't be sued for a libelous tweet that someone else posts. Just like Fox can't be sued for a libelous comment that someone else leaves on a story. Well, you can sue anyone for anything, the point is neither of these suits would be successful. I mean, this is just a common sense way of things working. In fact, the liability following-through to whoever actually did the bad thing was the entire motivation behind why S230 was created. > 230 protection, which was designed to protect neutral platforms like a utility, The text of section 230 has none of the words "neutral platform" nor "utility," nor are they legal concepts that exist in this context.
    - joshuamorton 6y ago
      In addition to the they other comments, we know from history that section 230 was written to encourage sites to moderate content. The historical revisionism around platform neutrality and section 230 is all made up.
- mcintyre1994 6y ago
  No of course they're not a neutral platform - I assume they ban spam and they have a terms of service and require adult content to be marked and all sorts of things. Isn't the point of 230 that they're allowed to moderate without taking on those liabilities because otherwise they obviously wouldn't exist?
  - akersten 6y ago
    Yes, that's the entire point of Section 230. Should those protections be removed, most of these sites would increase their moderation, and remove anything potentially libelous. A huge chilling effect on speech. There is an ongoing effort to upend those protections and bifurcate the internet into locked-down, heavily-moderated walled-garden sites, and sites that have no moderation at all. The motivations behind this movement range from malice (wanting the internet to become an unproductive wasteland) to political revenge (their favorite user got banned from Twitter and they want to lash out). I suppose "misunderstanding" of what S230 actually does is another motivation, but at this point if someone is still making an argument against it from that perspective, they're not arguing in good faith. The result of removing S230 protections is not "the internet becomes a wonderful place where all 'political opinions' can be expressed equally," the result is "all Internet sites become 4chan or Nickelodeon, pick one."
- jmole 6y ago
  why should twitter be responsible for user content? Certainly libel and defamation already apply to any material that twitter themselves post.
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    These arguments are always full of motivated reasoning; they start with the desired goal (Twitter shouldn’t be allowed to block people I like, usually), then they try to work backwards from the law to that outcome. This produces some fairly hilarious misinterpretations of how Section 230 works, along with the occasional misreference to State Action by the better read.
  - FpUser 6y ago
    Because they are supposedly active in moderating content (I am not talking about taking down illegal stuff here). Moderating content to fit their narrative arguably makes them a publisher with all the consequences. I guess what they are saying (entities that are meddling with 230) is either be totally neutral with the exception of taking down illegal stuff and spam or face the outcome.
    - sgift 6y ago
      > Moderating content to fit their narrative arguably makes them a publisher with all the consequences. The problem being that there is no proof that this happens. Despite all attempts to construct some kind of "one side gets moderated stronger than the other" narrative this stays a conspiracy theory.
      - ashtonkem 6y ago
        The other problem is that moderating content doesn’t make them the publisher. That is literally the point of section 230, giving platforms the ability to moderate without becoming responsible for the content.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  You’re free to make an argument that they should be liable, but they are not actually liable under the law as it exists today.
lliamander 6y ago
> they fact checked his tweet. They're now "fact checking" obvious satire. That's not merely moderation, but applying a false context that changes the meaning of the tweet.
- amanaplanacanal 6y ago
  I dunno. If readers can see that it is obviously satire, then Twitter just looks silly and no harm has been done. If readers can't tell though, then Twitter is providing a useful service here.
  - lliamander 6y ago
    If readers can't tell, then Twitter should label it "satire" not "manipulated content". EDIT: just speculation, but by mislabeling the tweet, I wonder if Twitter could be exposing itself to a libel lawsuit.
    - ashtonkem 6y ago
      No, they have not. Even without 230 this wouldn’t be libelous for a huge number of reasons. The bar for libel is not “someone is offended”, even if that someone is the president. The contortions that people keep going through to find a way to make Twitter liable is both getting old, and frankly it’s embarrassing.
      - lliamander 6y ago
        My point has nothing to do with being offended or with section 230. The point is: if Twitter is labeling something as "manipulated content" (implying an earnest attempt deceive) when the content is in fact satire, then Twitter is itself making misleading claims. It's like when Snopes was "fact-checking" the Babylon Bee (a satirical news website). They initially labeled some of their articles as false, but then re-labeled it more appropriately as satire after receiving push-back.[1] I'm not even saying Twitter should be sued here. But Twitter is now engaged in speech of their own, rather than just moderating a platform for other peoples' speech. [1]https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/georgia-lawmaker-go-back-claim/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/georgia-lawmaker-go-back-c...
arprocter 6y ago
It's a double standard if Joe Sixpack can sign up for an account and claim the moon is hollow and made of cheese without it getting flagged Maybe if Twitter decided all verified accounts will be subject to fact-checking?
- mcintyre1994 6y ago
  I guess that’s the truth to power bit - Joe Sixpack isn’t powerful and nor are most verified accounts imo, the President is.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  That’s a prudential argument against twitter fact checking, but it’s not a legal argument.
_-david-_ 6y ago
It is not because they fact checked his tweet. This was in the works for quite some time before the fact checking. This was a few days before: https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/23/21268433/president-trump-conservative-bias-social-media-twitter-facebook-google https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/23/21268433/president-trump-... And this was from last year: https://www.theverge.com/2019/5/15/18626785/white-house-trump-censorsip-tool-twitter-instagram-facebook-conservative-bias-social-media https://www.theverge.com/2019/5/15/18626785/white-house-trum...

chrisco255 6y ago

It's also editorializing Twitter...ergo Twitter is no longer a neutral platform and should be subject to all the same liabilities that Fox, CNN, etc are including libel and defamation.

akersten 6y ago
What? Not only does the legal concept of a "neutral platform" not exist, the examples you cite (Fox, CNN) are certainly not "neutral platforms." They aren't responsible for what their commenters post on their sites either (and it is certainly... eye-opening to check out their comment sections sometimes). Twitter already does have libel liabilities, just like Fox and CNN, if they were to themselves post something libelous - just like if Fox were to produce a segment themselves that is libelous.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  No they don't. Twitter cannot be sued for something someone tweets that is false or defamatory about someone else. That individual tweeter is responsible. Unlike Fox or CNN who are responsible for what their reporters and commentators say. If Twitter ventures against the spirit of 230 protection, which was designed to protect neutral platforms like a utility, then they deserve to lose it. It's not about who produces a segment, Twitter is clearly the publisher and distributor. 230 was designed to protect free speech not to allow unlimited corporate intervention into speech.
  - vkou 6y ago
    Fox has been photoshopping a man with an assault rifle onto pictures of a peaceful protest for the last week. What legal consequences have they faced, or are they going to face for these blatant lies?
  - mcintyre1994 6y ago
    Here's section 230, it's very short: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230 Please can you explain how this was "designed to protect neutral platforms like a utility", given that the text contains none of the words "neutral", "platform" or "utility"? It also doesn't contain "editorialise" or any variant that I can see.
    - chrisco255 6y ago
      Here's the whole bill it was attached to, it's very long: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_19... Note the original TCA created the FCC. That entire bill was packed with legislation to regulate cable and phone companies as well as providers of internet services...ergo utility. Section 230 was developed in response to a pair of lawsuits against Internet service providers in the early 1990s that had different interpretations of whether the service providers should be treated as publishers or distributors of content created by its users. Note, it is my strong opinion that Twitter selectively fact checking and blocking tweets or shadowbanning particular users that do not violate any laws or TOS means they are venturing into the publisher role more and more. Section 230 was clearly designed to preserve free speech not to encourage its destruction by homogeneous corporations.
  - akersten 6y ago
    If Twitter themselves posted a tweet defaming someone, they'd have the exact same liabilities as those reporters at CNN, who are employed by CNN to create content for CNN. Twitter can't be sued for a libelous tweet that someone else posts. Just like Fox can't be sued for a libelous comment that someone else leaves on a story. Well, you can sue anyone for anything, the point is neither of these suits would be successful. I mean, this is just a common sense way of things working. In fact, the liability following-through to whoever actually did the bad thing was the entire motivation behind why S230 was created. > 230 protection, which was designed to protect neutral platforms like a utility, The text of section 230 has none of the words "neutral platform" nor "utility," nor are they legal concepts that exist in this context.
  - joshuamorton 6y ago
    In addition to the they other comments, we know from history that section 230 was written to encourage sites to moderate content. The historical revisionism around platform neutrality and section 230 is all made up.
mcintyre1994 6y ago
No of course they're not a neutral platform - I assume they ban spam and they have a terms of service and require adult content to be marked and all sorts of things. Isn't the point of 230 that they're allowed to moderate without taking on those liabilities because otherwise they obviously wouldn't exist?
- akersten 6y ago
  Yes, that's the entire point of Section 230. Should those protections be removed, most of these sites would increase their moderation, and remove anything potentially libelous. A huge chilling effect on speech. There is an ongoing effort to upend those protections and bifurcate the internet into locked-down, heavily-moderated walled-garden sites, and sites that have no moderation at all. The motivations behind this movement range from malice (wanting the internet to become an unproductive wasteland) to political revenge (their favorite user got banned from Twitter and they want to lash out). I suppose "misunderstanding" of what S230 actually does is another motivation, but at this point if someone is still making an argument against it from that perspective, they're not arguing in good faith. The result of removing S230 protections is not "the internet becomes a wonderful place where all 'political opinions' can be expressed equally," the result is "all Internet sites become 4chan or Nickelodeon, pick one."
jmole 6y ago
why should twitter be responsible for user content? Certainly libel and defamation already apply to any material that twitter themselves post.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  These arguments are always full of motivated reasoning; they start with the desired goal (Twitter shouldn’t be allowed to block people I like, usually), then they try to work backwards from the law to that outcome. This produces some fairly hilarious misinterpretations of how Section 230 works, along with the occasional misreference to State Action by the better read.
- FpUser 6y ago
  Because they are supposedly active in moderating content (I am not talking about taking down illegal stuff here). Moderating content to fit their narrative arguably makes them a publisher with all the consequences. I guess what they are saying (entities that are meddling with 230) is either be totally neutral with the exception of taking down illegal stuff and spam or face the outcome.
  - sgift 6y ago
    > Moderating content to fit their narrative arguably makes them a publisher with all the consequences. The problem being that there is no proof that this happens. Despite all attempts to construct some kind of "one side gets moderated stronger than the other" narrative this stays a conspiracy theory.
    - ashtonkem 6y ago
      The other problem is that moderating content doesn’t make them the publisher. That is literally the point of section 230, giving platforms the ability to moderate without becoming responsible for the content.
ashtonkem 6y ago
You’re free to make an argument that they should be liable, but they are not actually liable under the law as it exists today.

lliamander 6y ago

> they fact checked his tweet. They're now "fact checking" obvious satire. That's not merely moderation, but applying a false context that changes the meaning of the tweet.

amanaplanacanal 6y ago
I dunno. If readers can see that it is obviously satire, then Twitter just looks silly and no harm has been done. If readers can't tell though, then Twitter is providing a useful service here.
- lliamander 6y ago
  If readers can't tell, then Twitter should label it "satire" not "manipulated content". EDIT: just speculation, but by mislabeling the tweet, I wonder if Twitter could be exposing itself to a libel lawsuit.
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    No, they have not. Even without 230 this wouldn’t be libelous for a huge number of reasons. The bar for libel is not “someone is offended”, even if that someone is the president. The contortions that people keep going through to find a way to make Twitter liable is both getting old, and frankly it’s embarrassing.
    - lliamander 6y ago
      My point has nothing to do with being offended or with section 230. The point is: if Twitter is labeling something as "manipulated content" (implying an earnest attempt deceive) when the content is in fact satire, then Twitter is itself making misleading claims. It's like when Snopes was "fact-checking" the Babylon Bee (a satirical news website). They initially labeled some of their articles as false, but then re-labeled it more appropriately as satire after receiving push-back.[1] I'm not even saying Twitter should be sued here. But Twitter is now engaged in speech of their own, rather than just moderating a platform for other peoples' speech. [1]https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/georgia-lawmaker-go-back-claim/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/georgia-lawmaker-go-back-c...

arprocter 6y ago

It's a double standard if Joe Sixpack can sign up for an account and claim the moon is hollow and made of cheese without it getting flagged Maybe if Twitter decided all verified accounts will be subject to fact-checking?

mcintyre1994 6y ago
I guess that’s the truth to power bit - Joe Sixpack isn’t powerful and nor are most verified accounts imo, the President is.
ashtonkem 6y ago
That’s a prudential argument against twitter fact checking, but it’s not a legal argument.

_-david-_ 6y ago

It is not because they fact checked his tweet. This was in the works for quite some time before the fact checking. This was a few days before: https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/23/21268433/president-trump-conservative-bias-social-media-twitter-facebook-google https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/23/21268433/president-trump-... And this was from last year: https://www.theverge.com/2019/5/15/18626785/white-house-trump-censorsip-tool-twitter-instagram-facebook-conservative-bias-social-media https://www.theverge.com/2019/5/15/18626785/white-house-trum...