14 ms·

How do you see it being anti-free-speech?

core-questions 6y ago
Virtually every technology that can be used to create a walled garden with moderation can be bent to limit people's ability to speak freely. How long until someone has a device which can go to Netflix, social networking, etc. but doesn't have a web browser on it that can load arbitrary pages, and it's impossible to jailbreak? Since we have no freedom of speech within FAANG properties, that would be a considerable restriction of speech... I do always find it wryly amusing when people who identify as being on the left see that the right are the only people who need defense using free speech laws, and then happily allow private industry to restrict speech since it doesn't impact them. The shoe could just as easily be on the other foot, and may well again be one day - principles matter.
- qayxc 6y ago
  > principles matter To whom, though? Everybody is praising Apple for their (admittedly quite excellent) M1 hardware and no one seems to take issue with that either. You cannot have truly open hardware as long as (software-) patents and IP exist, simple as that. Companies need to protect their investment, since the days of comparatively simple CPUs are over and a lot of "secret sauce" is actually software and licensed IP blocks. Since patent holders are free to select who their licensee is, they'll always target the ones with the biggest margins (see for example [1]) so mainly consumer products and thus those won't be free (as in speech) anytime soon. [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-20/nokia-seeks-to-block-lenovo-sales-in-germany-after-injunction https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-20/nokia-see...
  - core-questions 6y ago
    All of that hardware would be just fine if we had a Bill of Rights for the Internet that ensured free speech rights and ability to host content (of any sort that isn't strictly prohibited already) is enshrined in law. Pity all these laws end up spending most of their time enabling obscenity instead of political speech.
  - xg15 6y ago
    This is all probably true, but doesn't change the point that the consequences of those perfectly reasonable business descisions will have massive effects on personal freedom.
- fwip 6y ago
  I can't use my shoe to post on Hacker News. Why is it a free speech issue for a device to exist that can go to Twitter but doesn't host your blog for you?
  - core-questions 6y ago
    The issue is that the device may not be able to go to blogs hosted outside of the Trusted Ecosystem of Fact-Check Verified Not-Fake-News Websites, one day. Who knows?
- MaxBarraclough 6y ago
  > How long until someone has a device which can go to Netflix, social networking, etc. but doesn't have a web browser on it that can load arbitrary pages, and it's impossible to jailbreak? Such a locked-down device wouldn't really be anything new, we already have Roku, Chromecast, Chromebook, and games consoles. They don't threaten the 'ordinary' PC market.
  - core-questions 6y ago
    It's been an incremental war. For context, I've been posting about this for 20 years; during that time all the devices you say "we already have" were invented. This has eaten away at the average person's computing freedom, ironically while providing them a ton more computing power and capability. > They don't threaten the 'ordinary' PC market. Not directly, but think about this: * I know people who do not own a PC anymore, they just have tablet, phone, and TV. No need, apparently, but... * This results in a ton of kids growing up without early exposure to general purpose computing * This has been an increasing trend for quite some time now, and Pluton is just the next incarnation of Palladium, which tells us that Microsoft really does still see a completely captured market in their future. Linux plays a role, but in the embrace-and-extend sense; while WSL helps squeeze Linux out as a desktop OS down on the ground, Microsoft's ownership of Github cements it in the cloud. I know, I know, old man yells at cloud, I don't expect this train to stop, I just want people to stop and think once in a while about where it might be going. It's OK to dream up worst-case scenarios and then strategize for how you might fend off that eventuality even if it's unlikely.
    - MaxBarraclough 6y ago
      > ton of kids growing up without early exposure to general purpose computing I agree that's a problem. It's possible to learn to code on an iPad, [0] but the system is generally closed to exploration. [0] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/grasshopper-learn-to-code/id1354133284 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/grasshopper-learn-to-code/id13...

Virtually every technology that can be used to create a walled garden with moderation can be bent to limit people's ability to speak freely. How long until someone has a device which can go to Netflix, social networking, etc. but doesn't have a web browser on it that can load arbitrary pages, and it's impossible to jailbreak? Since we have no freedom of speech within FAANG properties, that would be a considerable restriction of speech... I do always find it wryly amusing when people who identify as being on the left see that the right are the only people who need defense using free speech laws, and then happily allow private industry to restrict speech since it doesn't impact them. The shoe could just as easily be on the other foot, and may well again be one day - principles matter.

qayxc 6y ago
> principles matter To whom, though? Everybody is praising Apple for their (admittedly quite excellent) M1 hardware and no one seems to take issue with that either. You cannot have truly open hardware as long as (software-) patents and IP exist, simple as that. Companies need to protect their investment, since the days of comparatively simple CPUs are over and a lot of "secret sauce" is actually software and licensed IP blocks. Since patent holders are free to select who their licensee is, they'll always target the ones with the biggest margins (see for example [1]) so mainly consumer products and thus those won't be free (as in speech) anytime soon. [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-20/nokia-seeks-to-block-lenovo-sales-in-germany-after-injunction https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-20/nokia-see...
- core-questions 6y ago
  All of that hardware would be just fine if we had a Bill of Rights for the Internet that ensured free speech rights and ability to host content (of any sort that isn't strictly prohibited already) is enshrined in law. Pity all these laws end up spending most of their time enabling obscenity instead of political speech.
- xg15 6y ago
  This is all probably true, but doesn't change the point that the consequences of those perfectly reasonable business descisions will have massive effects on personal freedom.
fwip 6y ago
I can't use my shoe to post on Hacker News. Why is it a free speech issue for a device to exist that can go to Twitter but doesn't host your blog for you?
- core-questions 6y ago
  The issue is that the device may not be able to go to blogs hosted outside of the Trusted Ecosystem of Fact-Check Verified Not-Fake-News Websites, one day. Who knows?
MaxBarraclough 6y ago
> How long until someone has a device which can go to Netflix, social networking, etc. but doesn't have a web browser on it that can load arbitrary pages, and it's impossible to jailbreak? Such a locked-down device wouldn't really be anything new, we already have Roku, Chromecast, Chromebook, and games consoles. They don't threaten the 'ordinary' PC market.
- core-questions 6y ago
  It's been an incremental war. For context, I've been posting about this for 20 years; during that time all the devices you say "we already have" were invented. This has eaten away at the average person's computing freedom, ironically while providing them a ton more computing power and capability. > They don't threaten the 'ordinary' PC market. Not directly, but think about this: * I know people who do not own a PC anymore, they just have tablet, phone, and TV. No need, apparently, but... * This results in a ton of kids growing up without early exposure to general purpose computing * This has been an increasing trend for quite some time now, and Pluton is just the next incarnation of Palladium, which tells us that Microsoft really does still see a completely captured market in their future. Linux plays a role, but in the embrace-and-extend sense; while WSL helps squeeze Linux out as a desktop OS down on the ground, Microsoft's ownership of Github cements it in the cloud. I know, I know, old man yells at cloud, I don't expect this train to stop, I just want people to stop and think once in a while about where it might be going. It's OK to dream up worst-case scenarios and then strategize for how you might fend off that eventuality even if it's unlikely.
  - MaxBarraclough 6y ago
    > ton of kids growing up without early exposure to general purpose computing I agree that's a problem. It's possible to learn to code on an iPad, [0] but the system is generally closed to exploration. [0] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/grasshopper-learn-to-code/id1354133284 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/grasshopper-learn-to-code/id13...