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These Silicon Valley companies like to play both sides of the fence for sure. They don't want to be held liable for the things people post on the distribution i

These Silicon Valley companies like to play both sides of the fence for sure. They don't want to be held liable for the things people post on the distribution infrastructure they provide. Fine - I get that and it makes a lot of sense. However, even having that protection, they now want to control what is shown on their infrastructure. The whole reason they have this protection is so they CAN let anyone post without fear of litigation. I see it as a one-or-the-other kind of thing. Choose one of the 2 options: Censor absolutely nothing thats not patently unlawful OR censor things to keep yourself out of legal trouble because you ARE liable for the words distributed by your infrastructure. Choose one or have a choice made for you I say. More likely and what I personally believe happened; Hillary lost the 2016 election and the Democrats went nuts about Russian interference via social media. It HAD TO BE THE RUSSIANS as its simply impossible that our system of elections could produce a result where she didn't win. The social media elite realized "HOLY SH*T OUR PLATFORM CAN SWAY ELECTIONS??!!! COOL!!!". On that discovery they decided it was their moral obligation to sway our elections THE RIGHT WAY THIS TIME. Personally, I dont care who, I dont care why, I dont care if its "a very good reason". All forms of censorship have no place in a free society. Not by the government. Not by private enterprise. Sure as hell not by the unelected likes of Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg.

closeparen 6y ago
If someone feels that HN's moderation policy is such a social ill as to warrant YCombinator's destruction, do I still have to abide by it when replying to them? Put another way, why are you discussing this here and not on 4chan?
- SavageBeast 6y ago
  "If someone feels that HN's moderation policy is such a social ill as to warrant YCombinator's destruction, do I still have to abide by it when replying to them?" ^^ Your words - not mine. When HN takes action to remove unproductive or incorrect comments on posts its called "Moderation". When a media organization "Moderates" a US newspaper by locking their account over a political story its called "Censorship".
  - closeparen 6y ago
    HN moderation is an example of a tech company controlling what is shown on its infrastructure, and also depends on Section 230 protection. “Unproductive and incorrect” is not patently unlawful, so censoring it would open YC to liability for everything posted here, under your proposal.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> The whole reason they have this protection is so they CAN let anyone post without fear of litigation. No, the reason they have it is so that they can moderate without fear of litigation; before 230 unmoderated content generally did not expose companies to liability unless they knew of unlawful content (distributor model), but any attempt at moderation made them liable for everything on the site, whether or not they had specific knowledge (publisher model); 230 specifically was passed to negate liability as a publisher for user submitted content even if the platform engage in moderation.
- SavageBeast 6y ago
  Fair point and well said. I would call it a stretch to lock the account of a US newspaper until said newspaper removed a story it "printed". I know anyone can post a link from someplace supporting nearly any position but can we agree the Business Insider is at least not the national enquirer? https://www.businessinsider.com/jack-dorsey-ny-post-remains-locked-out-twitter-hunter-biden-2020-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/jack-dorsey-ny-post-remains-... Moderation is a long way from outright ban-hammering a US newspaper over their posting of a news story. What Twitter specifically did here more or less makes them an unofficial editor at NYPost. Thats not acceptable. Ask yourself this simple question - if the roles were reversed and Twitter was run by a Republican and they locked the Washington Post's account because it printed an unfavorable article about Donald Trump - what would you call that action?
  - judge2020 6y ago
    It’s certainly a call to action, but all too often each reply in a thread like this is just coming at it from the legal side when the parent was coming at it from the moral side (or vice versa). This is one of those situations - the comment you’re replying to is only explaining how it works currently.
    - free_rms 6y ago
      The thing about the moral side is that we already have a bunch of jurisprudence around the 1st amendment. Yes, companies aren't bound by it legally, but it'd be a great moral guide to follow if that's what they're after.
majormajor 6y ago
> I see it as a one-or-the-other kind of thing. Choose one of the 2 options: Censor absolutely nothing thats not patently unlawful OR censor things to keep yourself out of legal trouble because you ARE liable for the words distributed by your infrastructure. > Choose one or have a choice made for you I say. This is silliness. There's a ton of legitimate reason to have moderation standards, community guidelines, etc, for user generated content beyond "patently unlawful." To say that any forum that wants anything stricter as a moderation standard must be liable for any malicious actor's behavior is to doom so many online communities. You're so focused on your extreme "any censorship is bad" "principle" that you've lost sight of the nuance of the real world. A church, for instance: should they be able to have a discussion forum with standards around profanity without becoming liable for anything anyone in the world might post? It's not illegal to swear at everyone...
- WClayFerguson 6y ago
  If people need to be 'controlled', then why can't AT&T use voice recognition to do exactly what Twitter does, and if someone says something offensive in a phone call or text like "There are two sexes" or "All lives matter" then the person's phone can just be disconnected right? This is what Twitter does. Permanent ban for even the slightest offence. No, the solution is to make all censorship illegal on large platforms, because otherwise the unsolvable question of "whose standards" it is that determine "offensive" arises. Right now Twitter employees consider themselves this high court and they will ban you based on their own political leanings, which only 50% of the country agree with.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
root_axis 6y ago
Explicit partisan bias is protected speech; it's protected speech in newspapers, radio, tv, and also websites. I think it's interesting that people only want to rescind those protections for websites, and only a specific handful of popular websites...
sokoloff 6y ago
> All forms of censorship have no place in a free society. Not by the government. Not by private enterprise. People pay good money with good reason to have things curated for them. The New York Times decides what to publish and your local TV station decides what to air. That they choose to not print your article or letter to the editor or air your content is not out-of-bounds censorship. Why must Twitter or Facebook or YouTube be held to a looser standard? Or should the NYT print it all as well?
pjc50 6y ago
"Anything not explicitly illegal MUST be left up" is an immediately self-destructive moderation policy; your site fills with spam, goatse, snuff images, porn up to the borderline of legality, as well as the ridiculous lies about public figures that everyone wants to protect.

closeparen 6y ago

If someone feels that HN's moderation policy is such a social ill as to warrant YCombinator's destruction, do I still have to abide by it when replying to them? Put another way, why are you discussing this here and not on 4chan?

SavageBeast 6y ago
"If someone feels that HN's moderation policy is such a social ill as to warrant YCombinator's destruction, do I still have to abide by it when replying to them?" ^^ Your words - not mine. When HN takes action to remove unproductive or incorrect comments on posts its called "Moderation". When a media organization "Moderates" a US newspaper by locking their account over a political story its called "Censorship".
- closeparen 6y ago
  HN moderation is an example of a tech company controlling what is shown on its infrastructure, and also depends on Section 230 protection. “Unproductive and incorrect” is not patently unlawful, so censoring it would open YC to liability for everything posted here, under your proposal.

dragonwriter 6y ago

> The whole reason they have this protection is so they CAN let anyone post without fear of litigation. No, the reason they have it is so that they can moderate without fear of litigation; before 230 unmoderated content generally did not expose companies to liability unless they knew of unlawful content (distributor model), but any attempt at moderation made them liable for everything on the site, whether or not they had specific knowledge (publisher model); 230 specifically was passed to negate liability as a publisher for user submitted content even if the platform engage in moderation.

SavageBeast 6y ago
Fair point and well said. I would call it a stretch to lock the account of a US newspaper until said newspaper removed a story it "printed". I know anyone can post a link from someplace supporting nearly any position but can we agree the Business Insider is at least not the national enquirer? https://www.businessinsider.com/jack-dorsey-ny-post-remains-locked-out-twitter-hunter-biden-2020-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/jack-dorsey-ny-post-remains-... Moderation is a long way from outright ban-hammering a US newspaper over their posting of a news story. What Twitter specifically did here more or less makes them an unofficial editor at NYPost. Thats not acceptable. Ask yourself this simple question - if the roles were reversed and Twitter was run by a Republican and they locked the Washington Post's account because it printed an unfavorable article about Donald Trump - what would you call that action?
- judge2020 6y ago
  It’s certainly a call to action, but all too often each reply in a thread like this is just coming at it from the legal side when the parent was coming at it from the moral side (or vice versa). This is one of those situations - the comment you’re replying to is only explaining how it works currently.
  - free_rms 6y ago
    The thing about the moral side is that we already have a bunch of jurisprudence around the 1st amendment. Yes, companies aren't bound by it legally, but it'd be a great moral guide to follow if that's what they're after.

majormajor 6y ago

> I see it as a one-or-the-other kind of thing. Choose one of the 2 options: Censor absolutely nothing thats not patently unlawful OR censor things to keep yourself out of legal trouble because you ARE liable for the words distributed by your infrastructure. > Choose one or have a choice made for you I say. This is silliness. There's a ton of legitimate reason to have moderation standards, community guidelines, etc, for user generated content beyond "patently unlawful." To say that any forum that wants anything stricter as a moderation standard must be liable for any malicious actor's behavior is to doom so many online communities. You're so focused on your extreme "any censorship is bad" "principle" that you've lost sight of the nuance of the real world. A church, for instance: should they be able to have a discussion forum with standards around profanity without becoming liable for anything anyone in the world might post? It's not illegal to swear at everyone...

WClayFerguson 6y ago
If people need to be 'controlled', then why can't AT&T use voice recognition to do exactly what Twitter does, and if someone says something offensive in a phone call or text like "There are two sexes" or "All lives matter" then the person's phone can just be disconnected right? This is what Twitter does. Permanent ban for even the slightest offence. No, the solution is to make all censorship illegal on large platforms, because otherwise the unsolvable question of "whose standards" it is that determine "offensive" arises. Right now Twitter employees consider themselves this high court and they will ban you based on their own political leanings, which only 50% of the country agree with.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

root_axis 6y ago

Explicit partisan bias is protected speech; it's protected speech in newspapers, radio, tv, and also websites. I think it's interesting that people only want to rescind those protections for websites, and only a specific handful of popular websites...

sokoloff 6y ago

> All forms of censorship have no place in a free society. Not by the government. Not by private enterprise. People pay good money with good reason to have things curated for them. The New York Times decides what to publish and your local TV station decides what to air. That they choose to not print your article or letter to the editor or air your content is not out-of-bounds censorship. Why must Twitter or Facebook or YouTube be held to a looser standard? Or should the NYT print it all as well?

pjc50 6y ago

"Anything not explicitly illegal MUST be left up" is an immediately self-destructive moderation policy; your site fills with spam, goatse, snuff images, porn up to the borderline of legality, as well as the ridiculous lies about public figures that everyone wants to protect.