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This was a shockingly dumb move. Whether or not you think these actions were politically motivated or made in good faith, it just poured liquid oxygen on the "r

This was a shockingly dumb move. Whether or not you think these actions were politically motivated or made in good faith, it just poured liquid oxygen on the "reform section 230" fire you're seeing from both sides of the aisle - one using the censorship reason, the other using the disinformation reason. There's no way you don't block a newspaper, and the press secretary, and prevent anyone from even private messaging the link to each other, and blocking people who share screenshots, and not invite serious scrutiny or action. The legislative blowback is going to suck. Section 230 is an ordinary law, not a constitutional right or based on one, and that means it's exposed to all the usual political fighting.

fooey 6y ago
There won't be legislative blow back, the GOP is days away from being wholesale evicted from controlling anything at all in DC. As a legislative move, this is changing their bet to the horse that's about to win. The social media companies are clearly more afraid longterm of what happens if they let this kind of stunt spread than they are afraid of the lame duck.
- Karunamon 6y ago
  What makes you think that the Dems wouldn't like to make social media companies liable for misinfo? That's what I'm trying to say, here. Either way you slice it, 230 is in the crosshairs, it's just a matter of who's holding the gun and for what purpose. I also wouldn't bet a cent of my own money on the GOP being "wholesale evicted". I heard very similar, equally confident talk in 2016.
  - travmatt 6y ago
    Democrats haven’t been raising 230 regulation though, that’s been republicans disgruntled that their ads had been fact-checked (by partisan conservatives, it turns out). The proposed regulations coming out of the house have been more about competition and anti-monopoly. It’s hard to see this as anything more than an attempt to change their bet on a losing horse in this race, as the commenter you replied to pointed out. And I’m not sure if we’re remembering the same 2016 election. We’re both talking about the same election, that resulted in the largest win for an American political party in history, right? 2016 was absolutely horrendous for conservatives and their saving grace was the senate cycle was particularly bad for democrats. If there’s a similar performance this election there’s a good chance that they take both branches.
    - stale2002 6y ago
      > Democrats haven’t been raising 230 regulation though They may not be raising specifically 230 concerns. But democrats are absolutely bringing up anti-trust concerns regarding major tech company. Arguably, anti-trust breakup of major tech companies would be much more destructive to those tech companies, than merely removing some tech companies ability to moderate content.
      - travmatt 6y ago
        > They may not be raising specifically 230 concerns. But democrats are absolutely bringing up anti-trust concerns regarding major tech company. My comment that you replied to says that democrats in the house have been bringing up anti-trust concerns. Anti-trust and 230 regulation are two separate things done for different reasons. They are not equivalent actions nor do are they being pursued out of the same concerns. Trying to conflate them is wrong.
        stale2002 6y ago
        > Trying to conflate I think that from a higher level principle, they can be conflated. The way that they can be conflated is that many of these tech companies, just don't have many friends left. Even if the exact reason as for why they don't have many friends left may be different, the end result is still the same. The left and the right may be going after them from different angles, but that is still pretty bad, because nobody is there to defend them. People who may have stuck their neck out to defend them in the past, just aren't going to do so anymore.
        travmatt 6y ago
        Is it really your opinion that the richest and most powerful industry in the world has no ability to defend itself? And that we need to fight back and encourage monopoly and stifle competition? And sorry, they are still not conflatable - you’re still trying to create a false equivalence. They are not the same thing, the desire here to misrepresent facts to fit into a narrative is intellectually dishonest.
- deleted 6y ago
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- rayiner 6y ago
  Democrats’ victory will be built on purple House seats, COVID blowback, and suburban women and seniors getting cold on Trump. That’s not going to last forever. The “demographic destiny” thing is looking increasingly dubious as Trump continues to outperform expectations among Latinos, even after, well, four years of Trump and COVID and everything. Meanwhile, there is no bench of strong moderates behind Biden. Republicans will be back in office sooner than folks think.
  - ls612 6y ago
    Nonwhite Democrats are culturally far more conservative than white progressives on every issue except for racial issues. This will come to bite Democrats in a big way probably, as I’m almost sure the republicans will sooner or later nominate a nonwhite candidate (Nikki Haley??) and Democrats won’t get the ‘demographic’ vote they were hoping for.
    - rayiner 6y ago
      White progressives have become more liberal on race issues recently as well: https://www.vox.com/2019/3/22/18259865/great-awokening-white-liberals-race-polling-trump-2020 https://www.vox.com/2019/3/22/18259865/great-awokening-white... > In the past five years, white liberals have moved so far to the left on questions of race and racism that they are now, on these issues, to the left of even the typical black voter. Trump has plumbed the bottom of the non-white vote. The protests rankled many Latinos. In recent YouGov polling, a narrow majority of Latinos rated “the breakdown of law and order” as a “bigger problem” then “systemic racism.” Meanwhile, Millenial Black voters are twice as likely to have favorable or somewhat favorable views of Trump than older Black voters: https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/ucla-study-finds-younger-black-voters-have-been-trending-toward-trump https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/ucla-study... > The data collected from April 2-May 13 by the Democracy Fund + UCLA Nationscape project, an initiative that conducted weekly surveys of thousands of potential voters for nearly a year, found that 29% of percent of black voters ages 30-44 and 21% ages 18-29 have a "very favorable" or "somewhat favorable" view of President Trump. This compares to just 14% of black voters 45-64 and 9% of those 65 and older. It’s not going to be Mitt Romney’s Republican Party. But Democrats shouldn’t be popping champagne corks assuming that the opposing party will never be in power again.
jeremyjh 6y ago
I agree they blundered here. They don't want to be hijacked by another "leaks" story days before the election but now the suppression of this has become the entire story, and its convinced a lot of people the story is true and dangerous to Biden. Even if the email is true I don't see how its dangerous and if the only media carrying the story are the NY Post and Fox it doesn't hurt Biden.
- cm2187 6y ago
  Not sure why you are getting downvoted. Classic Barbara Streisand effect
  - jeremyjh 6y ago
    Maybe because I suggested Facebook and Twitter are concerned with the news hurting Biden. A better way to phrase would be - "is the story consequential to the election". I think it was not until they took this action, and it is a very strange hill to die on.
- Karunamon 6y ago
  That's an angle I hadn't even considered, but I'm surprised Twitter didn't. SV social media companies, of all the organizations in the world, should understand the implications of a Streisanding. If they had just left it alone, maybe attached the standard "this might be false" disclaimer, it would likely have passed as yet another partisan thing, but now they've gone and infused it with a bunch of power it didn't have prior.
  - deleted 6y ago
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  - AI_WAIFU 6y ago
    I think they got cocky with their grip on information and thought their algorithms would prevent the Streisand effect.
  - felipemnoa 6y ago
JumpCrisscross 6y ago
> it just poured liquid oxygen on the "reform section 230" fire you're seeing from both sides of the aisle - one using the censorship reason, the other using the disinformation reason The GOP is prioritizing § 230 reform. Given their likely fall from power and prioritization of the SCOTUS confirmation, as well as Democrat control of the House and its focus on stimulus bills, the short-term threat is minute. From an amoral government relations perspective, heavier moderation makes sense. A Biden spoof going viral during the election would attract the attention of incoming Democrat legislators. That creates a medium-term threat where there isn't one. That said, I'm surprised they chose to block the content over de-prioritise it algorithmically and flag it with a warning.
- sillysaurusx 6y ago
  It seems like the GOP might lose, but it’s hardly “likely”. It’s probably a good idea to consider what might happen if they don’t.
- dahfizz 6y ago
  I'm curious why you seem so confident in a widespread democratic victory when the republicans did so well in 2016? EDIT: for those unaware, not only did the republican party take control of the House, Senate, and Presidency in 2016. They also made big gains in state elections. In fact, the republican party had a 'trifecta' (house, senate, and executive) in 25/50 states. It was a very significant shift in power: https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_elections,_2016 https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_elections,_2016
  - toomuchtodo 6y ago
    Many polls are showing a Biden win is above 80% probability, the House is solidly Dem, and a possible sweep in the Senate. Make of that what you will. Its a fair point that polls missed in 2016. 2020 has kicked the hornet’s nest (rather, the last four years), voter turnout appears to be higher than previous years, and I’d bet an expensive bottle of bourbon current polls align close to what results will be (with modeling lessons learned from 2016). Tangentially, quite a few Trump voters have simply aged out over the last four years (roughly 1.8 million voters over the age of 55 die each year). Broadly speaking, much older voters skew conservative compared to younger cohorts (per Pew Research), hence the confidence in a shift towards the left across branches in government representation during this election cycle. GOP support is quite literally dying out. https://www.npr.org/2020/09/03/907433511/trumps-base-is-shrinking-as-whites-without-a-college-degree-continue-to-decline https://www.npr.org/2020/09/03/907433511/trumps-base-is-shri... https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2018/03/01/the-generation-gap-in-american-politics/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2018/03/01/the-generati... https://www.newsweek.com/democrats-chance-taking-senate-forecast-clean-sweep-1538599 https://www.newsweek.com/democrats-chance-taking-senate-fore... https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/ https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/ https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/12/biden-tops-270-politico-election-forecast-428837 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/12/biden-tops-270-poli...
afrojack123 6y ago
I agree. It was extremely dumb and obvious. TOO OBVIOUS. What are the politicians and social media tech companies trying to get out of section 230?
- sieabahlpark 6y ago
  Have it removed so no other company can get to their scale? We have to always have a way to defer liability to the user who posted the content. If a website is always responsible for whatever the users post you won't have much of a free internet anymore. However I think the issue with FB and Twitter is that they haven't had any repercussions for breaking the law in the first place.
afrojack123 6y ago
I have figured it out why this move was done despite being stupidly obvious. It is done to provide cover for the next thing Section 230 repealed. Section 230 provides immunity for website publishers from third party content. By repealing section 230, big social media tech gets an even larger monopoly but that's not the reason why this happened. There are lot of people on these social media platforms who are behind the scenes worker type of people. They know how things work and run their mouth freely. Somebody predicted Kamala Harris as VP 1 and 1/2 years out. The politicians can't risk losing control.
nimbius 6y ago
>There's no way you don't block a newspaper, and the press secretary, and prevent anyone from even private messaging the link to each other, and blocking people who share screenshots, and not invite serious scrutiny or action. If Biden becomes president, his 2018 quid-pro-quo admission to fire a Ukranian prosecutor is all the assurance social media companies need that Biden would likely ignore calls for reform to section 230. At worst, its a bold gamble social media companies appear to be taking in the face of the Trump administrations almost certain intent to reform.
- afrojack123 6y ago
  I doubt this. Seems far too obvious. Its typical mafia movie activity where they set up some bait or trap.
bduerst 6y ago
Eh, I don't think it's going to have the impact you think it will. The major criticism for S230 is that social media companies are rampant with fake news, and not doing enough to combat misinformation. If anything, it gives FB and Twitter a defense against an accusation of spreading political misinformation.
- MuffinFlavored 6y ago
  Was the NY Post article actually filled with disinformation? If the roles were reversed and a similar story came out about Trump and his son, would Twitter and Facebook have taken it down as part of a misinformation campaign?
  - deleted 6y ago
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  - res0nat0r 6y ago
    > Was the NY Post article actually filled with disinformation? Yes. Parroting Russian disinformation during an election campaign because your owners don't like the politics of said disinformation target should be removed. https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/14/biden-campaign-lashes-out-new-york-post-429486 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/14/biden-campaign-lash... https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/14/us/politics/hunter-biden-ukraine-facebook-twitter.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/14/us/politics/hunter-biden-... There needs to be more censorship on FB and YouTube which are in addition to Fox News doing WAY more damage to the United States than any foreign terrorists could ever dream.
    - remarkEon 6y ago
      Amusing you're citing the NYT. Their coverage in the lead up to the Iraq Invasion did more damage to this country, Her military, and the rest of the world than some mean tweets or made up BS about Russia. Should we ban the NYT, too?
    - aokiji 6y ago
      No, there does not need to be more censorship. You should realize by now the Russian boogeyman narrative has no power anymore. Not everything that favors Trump is a Russian initiative. Far from it.
rbecker 6y ago
I'm sure they've learned their lesson, and next time it won't be a ban, but a difficult-to-prove reduction in visibility.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  This is what Facebook already does. It turns out after a few years of this, it actually becomes pretty easy to recognize. For instance, many left news organizations that were critical of NATO have seen their posts substantially deprioritized on FB.
  - rbecker 6y ago
    Sounds interesting - I'd love a source on it.
AzzieElbab 6y ago
Given the scope of it, I have to assume some outside pressure was applied. WH speaker is banned off Twitter ffs
CyberRabbi 6y ago
Freedom of speech should be a civil right and I hope that’s the result of this. No entity should be allowed to censor speech.
- invalidusernam3 6y ago
  So hacker news shouldn't be allowed to remove spam comments?
  - CyberRabbi 6y ago
    hacker news shouldn’t be allowed to censor legitimate information or dissenting political opinions, which is what is covered by the 1st amendment. It doesn’t mean you can literally say whatever you want, e.g. flood sites with spam.
    - lozaning 6y ago
      Who gets to be the arbiter of "legitimate"?
      - CyberRabbi 6y ago
        Judges do when a lawsuit happens under a civil rights violation case.
        amanaplanacanal 6y ago
        Judges, who are government employees, would get to determine what speech is legitimate and what is not? No thanks, I’ll take the current system.
        CyberRabbi 6y ago
        That’s literally how all civil rights are enforced.
learnstats2 6y ago
>There's no way you don't block a newspaper This explains why individual billionaires bought all the newspapers.
iamsb 6y ago
I dont understand the shock.Just 4 years a staffer suspended Donald Trumps account and was considered a hero. So it is not at all surprising that twitter does this sort of policing.
heisenbit 6y ago
I would not characterize this story as speech but as carefully designed viral marketing content. If one is in the business of attracting people speaking with each other and selling that access to companies and political parties then dealing with viral content intended to undermine your sales is a continuous struggle. This one was deemed over the line and a case of potentially Russian disinformation laundering. When looking at the legalities keep in mind that these companies have been explicitly warned by the F.B.I. of such possibilities and have spent time combing through their own databases and have identified such events.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  > I would not characterize this story as speech but as carefully designed viral marketing content. God. I’m on the Left, but can you all not see the blatant paternalism behind stances like this? It’s a pretty explicit: “we know best, don’t worry your pretty little head about this misleading content, we will take care of it”
excerionsforte 6y ago
If you violate rules, you will be banned. They were found to be violating rules, but were treated leniently compared to lower profile users who distribute illegal materials. This is not new. You will be censored or banned on Hacker News for not following rules. You will not see the distribution of the NY Post's material on this site. I applaud them for enforcing rules, but not for being lenient with these actors. Free Speech has limits especially in someone elses' house, you should all know this. Furthermore Reform Section 230 is political crap going nowhere. Any invokation of that here is political nonsense.
ausjke 6y ago
the new media moves are building up for a possible civil war
DSingularity 6y ago
Companies which spend millions on counsel every year are not going to blunder. They either have anterior motives (boost the story through censorship) or they had no choice. I don’t know what to think anymore because I don’t understand how this censorship will have any effect other than causing the story to spread like fire.
- throwawaylolx 6y ago
  > other than causing the story to spread like fire. Does it really? I haven't seen anything on Reddit or the likes. Seems to me that the censorship has been rather successful so far.
  - raxxorrax 6y ago
    I am not even from the US and here almost everyone knows by now.
  - DSingularity 6y ago
    In your bubble. But in the bubble targeted by this story the censorship is going to accelerate everything.
  - deleted 6y ago
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- antifasux 6y ago
  It's a big story, Biden was caught in a quid pro quo almost exactly like the one Trump was impeached over -- but the one Trump was impeached for was for investigating Biden's corruption. The projection from the Democrats is unbelievable! To think they impeached a sitting President who was lawfully investigating the crime his predecessor committed and accused him of the very crime he was investigating. The only indictment that even stuck was obstruction... Of an investigation that did in fact turn out to have no merit. It was, in the end, a witch hunt like Trump said. And all anyone can think about is the election. Maybe this is proof to those of you who still only trust the legacy media that many of the things Trump has been accused of are in fact projection. The fact that BIDEN COLLUDED and Trump was impeached because of it is just the tip of the iceberg. Then there's Crossfire Hurricane and the interference with Trump's campaign by the Obama administration during the last election. Election interference and collision? Whoops that was the Democrats, not Trump. Quid pro quo with the Ukraine? Turns out that was Vice President Biden. Oops again! Impeached the wrong guy! Vote Trump; he's not the corrupt one. Can you believe it?
vonmoltke 6y ago
> and prevent anyone from even private messaging the link to each other I can't find this stated anywhere except HN posts. What is the original source for this?
- Karunamon 6y ago
  Various tweets from affected people, including screenshots, were all over last night. This isn't new, though. When Twitter blocks a URL, it applies even to DMs.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  I mean.. I just tried and it stopped me.
iovrthoughtthis 6y ago
Is there any potential benefit for fb in having Section 230 reformed?
raxxorrax 6y ago
Didn't Twitter and Google already stated they want regulation? They are one of the few companies that actually can facilitate any form of large scale content scanning. Such mechanisms take years to develop if you even get the critical data needed.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  Saying you want regulation is a classic of DC lobbying. Exxon wants “regulation” too. What it means in practice is that they want to be part of the conversation in choosing what regulations get passed, so actual serious regulations don’t make their way through.
  - raxxorrax 6y ago
    Hm, would make sense. Can't loose anything and they would always have an advantage to competitors.
- trident1000 6y ago
  Companies only want regulation when it boxes out competitors.

fooey 6y ago

There won't be legislative blow back, the GOP is days away from being wholesale evicted from controlling anything at all in DC. As a legislative move, this is changing their bet to the horse that's about to win. The social media companies are clearly more afraid longterm of what happens if they let this kind of stunt spread than they are afraid of the lame duck.

Karunamon 6y ago
What makes you think that the Dems wouldn't like to make social media companies liable for misinfo? That's what I'm trying to say, here. Either way you slice it, 230 is in the crosshairs, it's just a matter of who's holding the gun and for what purpose. I also wouldn't bet a cent of my own money on the GOP being "wholesale evicted". I heard very similar, equally confident talk in 2016.
- travmatt 6y ago
  Democrats haven’t been raising 230 regulation though, that’s been republicans disgruntled that their ads had been fact-checked (by partisan conservatives, it turns out). The proposed regulations coming out of the house have been more about competition and anti-monopoly. It’s hard to see this as anything more than an attempt to change their bet on a losing horse in this race, as the commenter you replied to pointed out. And I’m not sure if we’re remembering the same 2016 election. We’re both talking about the same election, that resulted in the largest win for an American political party in history, right? 2016 was absolutely horrendous for conservatives and their saving grace was the senate cycle was particularly bad for democrats. If there’s a similar performance this election there’s a good chance that they take both branches.
  - stale2002 6y ago
    > Democrats haven’t been raising 230 regulation though They may not be raising specifically 230 concerns. But democrats are absolutely bringing up anti-trust concerns regarding major tech company. Arguably, anti-trust breakup of major tech companies would be much more destructive to those tech companies, than merely removing some tech companies ability to moderate content.
    - travmatt 6y ago
      > They may not be raising specifically 230 concerns. But democrats are absolutely bringing up anti-trust concerns regarding major tech company. My comment that you replied to says that democrats in the house have been bringing up anti-trust concerns. Anti-trust and 230 regulation are two separate things done for different reasons. They are not equivalent actions nor do are they being pursued out of the same concerns. Trying to conflate them is wrong.
      - stale2002 6y ago
        > Trying to conflate I think that from a higher level principle, they can be conflated. The way that they can be conflated is that many of these tech companies, just don't have many friends left. Even if the exact reason as for why they don't have many friends left may be different, the end result is still the same. The left and the right may be going after them from different angles, but that is still pretty bad, because nobody is there to defend them. People who may have stuck their neck out to defend them in the past, just aren't going to do so anymore.
        travmatt 6y ago
        Is it really your opinion that the richest and most powerful industry in the world has no ability to defend itself? And that we need to fight back and encourage monopoly and stifle competition? And sorry, they are still not conflatable - you’re still trying to create a false equivalence. They are not the same thing, the desire here to misrepresent facts to fit into a narrative is intellectually dishonest.
deleted 6y ago
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rayiner 6y ago
Democrats’ victory will be built on purple House seats, COVID blowback, and suburban women and seniors getting cold on Trump. That’s not going to last forever. The “demographic destiny” thing is looking increasingly dubious as Trump continues to outperform expectations among Latinos, even after, well, four years of Trump and COVID and everything. Meanwhile, there is no bench of strong moderates behind Biden. Republicans will be back in office sooner than folks think.
- ls612 6y ago
  Nonwhite Democrats are culturally far more conservative than white progressives on every issue except for racial issues. This will come to bite Democrats in a big way probably, as I’m almost sure the republicans will sooner or later nominate a nonwhite candidate (Nikki Haley??) and Democrats won’t get the ‘demographic’ vote they were hoping for.
  - rayiner 6y ago
    White progressives have become more liberal on race issues recently as well: https://www.vox.com/2019/3/22/18259865/great-awokening-white-liberals-race-polling-trump-2020 https://www.vox.com/2019/3/22/18259865/great-awokening-white... > In the past five years, white liberals have moved so far to the left on questions of race and racism that they are now, on these issues, to the left of even the typical black voter. Trump has plumbed the bottom of the non-white vote. The protests rankled many Latinos. In recent YouGov polling, a narrow majority of Latinos rated “the breakdown of law and order” as a “bigger problem” then “systemic racism.” Meanwhile, Millenial Black voters are twice as likely to have favorable or somewhat favorable views of Trump than older Black voters: https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/ucla-study-finds-younger-black-voters-have-been-trending-toward-trump https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/ucla-study... > The data collected from April 2-May 13 by the Democracy Fund + UCLA Nationscape project, an initiative that conducted weekly surveys of thousands of potential voters for nearly a year, found that 29% of percent of black voters ages 30-44 and 21% ages 18-29 have a "very favorable" or "somewhat favorable" view of President Trump. This compares to just 14% of black voters 45-64 and 9% of those 65 and older. It’s not going to be Mitt Romney’s Republican Party. But Democrats shouldn’t be popping champagne corks assuming that the opposing party will never be in power again.

jeremyjh 6y ago

I agree they blundered here. They don't want to be hijacked by another "leaks" story days before the election but now the suppression of this has become the entire story, and its convinced a lot of people the story is true and dangerous to Biden. Even if the email is true I don't see how its dangerous and if the only media carrying the story are the NY Post and Fox it doesn't hurt Biden.

cm2187 6y ago
Not sure why you are getting downvoted. Classic Barbara Streisand effect
- jeremyjh 6y ago
  Maybe because I suggested Facebook and Twitter are concerned with the news hurting Biden. A better way to phrase would be - "is the story consequential to the election". I think it was not until they took this action, and it is a very strange hill to die on.
Karunamon 6y ago
That's an angle I hadn't even considered, but I'm surprised Twitter didn't. SV social media companies, of all the organizations in the world, should understand the implications of a Streisanding. If they had just left it alone, maybe attached the standard "this might be false" disclaimer, it would likely have passed as yet another partisan thing, but now they've gone and infused it with a bunch of power it didn't have prior.
- deleted 6y ago
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- AI_WAIFU 6y ago
  I think they got cocky with their grip on information and thought their algorithms would prevent the Streisand effect.
- felipemnoa 6y ago

JumpCrisscross 6y ago

> it just poured liquid oxygen on the "reform section 230" fire you're seeing from both sides of the aisle - one using the censorship reason, the other using the disinformation reason The GOP is prioritizing § 230 reform. Given their likely fall from power and prioritization of the SCOTUS confirmation, as well as Democrat control of the House and its focus on stimulus bills, the short-term threat is minute. From an amoral government relations perspective, heavier moderation makes sense. A Biden spoof going viral during the election would attract the attention of incoming Democrat legislators. That creates a medium-term threat where there isn't one. That said, I'm surprised they chose to block the content over de-prioritise it algorithmically and flag it with a warning.

sillysaurusx 6y ago
It seems like the GOP might lose, but it’s hardly “likely”. It’s probably a good idea to consider what might happen if they don’t.
dahfizz 6y ago
I'm curious why you seem so confident in a widespread democratic victory when the republicans did so well in 2016? EDIT: for those unaware, not only did the republican party take control of the House, Senate, and Presidency in 2016. They also made big gains in state elections. In fact, the republican party had a 'trifecta' (house, senate, and executive) in 25/50 states. It was a very significant shift in power: https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_elections,_2016 https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_elections,_2016
- toomuchtodo 6y ago
  Many polls are showing a Biden win is above 80% probability, the House is solidly Dem, and a possible sweep in the Senate. Make of that what you will. Its a fair point that polls missed in 2016. 2020 has kicked the hornet’s nest (rather, the last four years), voter turnout appears to be higher than previous years, and I’d bet an expensive bottle of bourbon current polls align close to what results will be (with modeling lessons learned from 2016). Tangentially, quite a few Trump voters have simply aged out over the last four years (roughly 1.8 million voters over the age of 55 die each year). Broadly speaking, much older voters skew conservative compared to younger cohorts (per Pew Research), hence the confidence in a shift towards the left across branches in government representation during this election cycle. GOP support is quite literally dying out. https://www.npr.org/2020/09/03/907433511/trumps-base-is-shrinking-as-whites-without-a-college-degree-continue-to-decline https://www.npr.org/2020/09/03/907433511/trumps-base-is-shri... https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2018/03/01/the-generation-gap-in-american-politics/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2018/03/01/the-generati... https://www.newsweek.com/democrats-chance-taking-senate-forecast-clean-sweep-1538599 https://www.newsweek.com/democrats-chance-taking-senate-fore... https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/ https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-election-forecast/ https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/12/biden-tops-270-politico-election-forecast-428837 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/12/biden-tops-270-poli...

afrojack123 6y ago

I agree. It was extremely dumb and obvious. TOO OBVIOUS. What are the politicians and social media tech companies trying to get out of section 230?

sieabahlpark 6y ago
Have it removed so no other company can get to their scale? We have to always have a way to defer liability to the user who posted the content. If a website is always responsible for whatever the users post you won't have much of a free internet anymore. However I think the issue with FB and Twitter is that they haven't had any repercussions for breaking the law in the first place.

afrojack123 6y ago

I have figured it out why this move was done despite being stupidly obvious. It is done to provide cover for the next thing Section 230 repealed. Section 230 provides immunity for website publishers from third party content. By repealing section 230, big social media tech gets an even larger monopoly but that's not the reason why this happened. There are lot of people on these social media platforms who are behind the scenes worker type of people. They know how things work and run their mouth freely. Somebody predicted Kamala Harris as VP 1 and 1/2 years out. The politicians can't risk losing control.

nimbius 6y ago

>There's no way you don't block a newspaper, and the press secretary, and prevent anyone from even private messaging the link to each other, and blocking people who share screenshots, and not invite serious scrutiny or action. If Biden becomes president, his 2018 quid-pro-quo admission to fire a Ukranian prosecutor is all the assurance social media companies need that Biden would likely ignore calls for reform to section 230. At worst, its a bold gamble social media companies appear to be taking in the face of the Trump administrations almost certain intent to reform.

afrojack123 6y ago
I doubt this. Seems far too obvious. Its typical mafia movie activity where they set up some bait or trap.

bduerst 6y ago

Eh, I don't think it's going to have the impact you think it will. The major criticism for S230 is that social media companies are rampant with fake news, and not doing enough to combat misinformation. If anything, it gives FB and Twitter a defense against an accusation of spreading political misinformation.

MuffinFlavored 6y ago
Was the NY Post article actually filled with disinformation? If the roles were reversed and a similar story came out about Trump and his son, would Twitter and Facebook have taken it down as part of a misinformation campaign?
- deleted 6y ago
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- res0nat0r 6y ago
  > Was the NY Post article actually filled with disinformation? Yes. Parroting Russian disinformation during an election campaign because your owners don't like the politics of said disinformation target should be removed. https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/14/biden-campaign-lashes-out-new-york-post-429486 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/14/biden-campaign-lash... https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/14/us/politics/hunter-biden-ukraine-facebook-twitter.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/14/us/politics/hunter-biden-... There needs to be more censorship on FB and YouTube which are in addition to Fox News doing WAY more damage to the United States than any foreign terrorists could ever dream.
  - remarkEon 6y ago
    Amusing you're citing the NYT. Their coverage in the lead up to the Iraq Invasion did more damage to this country, Her military, and the rest of the world than some mean tweets or made up BS about Russia. Should we ban the NYT, too?
  - aokiji 6y ago
    No, there does not need to be more censorship. You should realize by now the Russian boogeyman narrative has no power anymore. Not everything that favors Trump is a Russian initiative. Far from it.

rbecker 6y ago

I'm sure they've learned their lesson, and next time it won't be a ban, but a difficult-to-prove reduction in visibility.

whimsicalism 6y ago
This is what Facebook already does. It turns out after a few years of this, it actually becomes pretty easy to recognize. For instance, many left news organizations that were critical of NATO have seen their posts substantially deprioritized on FB.
- rbecker 6y ago
  Sounds interesting - I'd love a source on it.

AzzieElbab 6y ago

Given the scope of it, I have to assume some outside pressure was applied. WH speaker is banned off Twitter ffs

CyberRabbi 6y ago

Freedom of speech should be a civil right and I hope that’s the result of this. No entity should be allowed to censor speech.

invalidusernam3 6y ago
So hacker news shouldn't be allowed to remove spam comments?
- CyberRabbi 6y ago
  hacker news shouldn’t be allowed to censor legitimate information or dissenting political opinions, which is what is covered by the 1st amendment. It doesn’t mean you can literally say whatever you want, e.g. flood sites with spam.
  - lozaning 6y ago
    Who gets to be the arbiter of "legitimate"?
    - CyberRabbi 6y ago
      Judges do when a lawsuit happens under a civil rights violation case.
      - amanaplanacanal 6y ago
        Judges, who are government employees, would get to determine what speech is legitimate and what is not? No thanks, I’ll take the current system.
        CyberRabbi 6y ago
        That’s literally how all civil rights are enforced.

learnstats2 6y ago

>There's no way you don't block a newspaper This explains why individual billionaires bought all the newspapers.

iamsb 6y ago

I dont understand the shock.Just 4 years a staffer suspended Donald Trumps account and was considered a hero. So it is not at all surprising that twitter does this sort of policing.

heisenbit 6y ago

I would not characterize this story as speech but as carefully designed viral marketing content. If one is in the business of attracting people speaking with each other and selling that access to companies and political parties then dealing with viral content intended to undermine your sales is a continuous struggle. This one was deemed over the line and a case of potentially Russian disinformation laundering. When looking at the legalities keep in mind that these companies have been explicitly warned by the F.B.I. of such possibilities and have spent time combing through their own databases and have identified such events.

whimsicalism 6y ago
> I would not characterize this story as speech but as carefully designed viral marketing content. God. I’m on the Left, but can you all not see the blatant paternalism behind stances like this? It’s a pretty explicit: “we know best, don’t worry your pretty little head about this misleading content, we will take care of it”

excerionsforte 6y ago

If you violate rules, you will be banned. They were found to be violating rules, but were treated leniently compared to lower profile users who distribute illegal materials. This is not new. You will be censored or banned on Hacker News for not following rules. You will not see the distribution of the NY Post's material on this site. I applaud them for enforcing rules, but not for being lenient with these actors. Free Speech has limits especially in someone elses' house, you should all know this. Furthermore Reform Section 230 is political crap going nowhere. Any invokation of that here is political nonsense.

ausjke 6y ago

the new media moves are building up for a possible civil war

DSingularity 6y ago

Companies which spend millions on counsel every year are not going to blunder. They either have anterior motives (boost the story through censorship) or they had no choice. I don’t know what to think anymore because I don’t understand how this censorship will have any effect other than causing the story to spread like fire.

throwawaylolx 6y ago
> other than causing the story to spread like fire. Does it really? I haven't seen anything on Reddit or the likes. Seems to me that the censorship has been rather successful so far.
- raxxorrax 6y ago
  I am not even from the US and here almost everyone knows by now.
- DSingularity 6y ago
  In your bubble. But in the bubble targeted by this story the censorship is going to accelerate everything.
- deleted 6y ago
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antifasux 6y ago
It's a big story, Biden was caught in a quid pro quo almost exactly like the one Trump was impeached over -- but the one Trump was impeached for was for investigating Biden's corruption. The projection from the Democrats is unbelievable! To think they impeached a sitting President who was lawfully investigating the crime his predecessor committed and accused him of the very crime he was investigating. The only indictment that even stuck was obstruction... Of an investigation that did in fact turn out to have no merit. It was, in the end, a witch hunt like Trump said. And all anyone can think about is the election. Maybe this is proof to those of you who still only trust the legacy media that many of the things Trump has been accused of are in fact projection. The fact that BIDEN COLLUDED and Trump was impeached because of it is just the tip of the iceberg. Then there's Crossfire Hurricane and the interference with Trump's campaign by the Obama administration during the last election. Election interference and collision? Whoops that was the Democrats, not Trump. Quid pro quo with the Ukraine? Turns out that was Vice President Biden. Oops again! Impeached the wrong guy! Vote Trump; he's not the corrupt one. Can you believe it?

vonmoltke 6y ago

> and prevent anyone from even private messaging the link to each other I can't find this stated anywhere except HN posts. What is the original source for this?

Karunamon 6y ago
Various tweets from affected people, including screenshots, were all over last night. This isn't new, though. When Twitter blocks a URL, it applies even to DMs.
whimsicalism 6y ago
I mean.. I just tried and it stopped me.

iovrthoughtthis 6y ago

Is there any potential benefit for fb in having Section 230 reformed?

raxxorrax 6y ago

Didn't Twitter and Google already stated they want regulation? They are one of the few companies that actually can facilitate any form of large scale content scanning. Such mechanisms take years to develop if you even get the critical data needed.

whimsicalism 6y ago
Saying you want regulation is a classic of DC lobbying. Exxon wants “regulation” too. What it means in practice is that they want to be part of the conversation in choosing what regulations get passed, so actual serious regulations don’t make their way through.
- raxxorrax 6y ago
  Hm, would make sense. Can't loose anything and they would always have an advantage to competitors.
trident1000 6y ago
Companies only want regulation when it boxes out competitors.