7 ms·

I watched the piece. Here are the basic points it made (which I agree with): - Pre-internet, generally speaking the only entities capable of widely spreading f

I watched the piece. Here are the basic points it made (which I agree with): - Pre-internet, generally speaking the only entities capable of widely spreading facts about private individuals were things you could sue for defamation or libel: newpapers, tv stations etc. - Now Twitter, Facebook and YouTube can spread defamatory information about anyone without paying a similar price. - It's true that the services will eventually accede to taking the content down (although in one case, that of a woman murdered on camera, it seemed to have proved difficult/impossible to fully do so given all the reposts). - But they let it be put it up there in the first place! Once its up, all the damage to someone's life can be done in a day.

majormajor 6y ago
For all that "don't read the comments" seems to be common knowledge in the tech community, we have a collective blind spot about the product design choices we make that amplify annonymous, un-vetted, un-sourced claims. Almost all our tech media products default to treating things as "this is good enough to broadcast to the world until someone proves we should take it down" instead of defaulting to "this is probably low-value dreck that's not worth much distribution." This is certainly easier from a product design perspective... but does it really make sense?
- giantg2 6y ago
  What would a sensible alternative be?
  - postmeta 6y ago
    No recommendations or notifications without liability.
    - giantg2 6y ago
      I don't think think this really solves the issue of content quality like the original comment was addressing. However, I do think it's a step in the right direction and makes sense. After all, if your platform is promoting specific content by your own actions/volition, then it's no longer just content posted by some user, but it's now being used or reposted/linked by the company that owns the platform for monetary gain (I would guess ToS would solidify this with some boilerplate statement saying they can use your content to make money and to promote the platform etc).
  - okennedy 6y ago
    Decouple discovery (e.g., suggesting posts from new users or paid ads) from the protections afforded to dumb carriers/hosting services (i.e., posts received from users you follow or are engaged in a discussion with).
    - giantg2 6y ago
      Are you basically saying to remove protections from platforms that take an active role in the content propagation, Like Facebook ranking algorithms? If so, I agree that this would be a step in the right direction. But what paradigm replaces the original comment's statement that platforms treat all content as good instead of vetting it for quality? I'm skeptical of how we could have a system that vets for quality without introducing more/other issues. That's what I wanted to learn more about.
anfilt 6y ago
You can still sue the poster. Section 230 just means you cant sue the service provider for defamation and slander. Do you think phone service providers should be sued for conversations their subscribers have? Similar thing. Also without it you could sue companies like cloud flare, aws or anyone providing hosting infrastructure.
- postmeta 6y ago
  While I agree you shouldn't be able to sue service providers, I think it is different because Twitter and Facebook recommend things for you to read and amplify the message. The recommendation/amplification aspect is what needs liability.
  - roywiggins 6y ago
    What about bookstores? They make recommendations too. Imagine if every used bookstore had to send every book they resold to a lawyer to make sure it didn't defame anyone.
    - nitrogen 6y ago
      If a bookstore promoted a libelous book to millions of people, then yeah, I'd expect them to be as liable as the publisher and author.
      - roywiggins 6y ago
        They absolutely aren't treated the same as publishers: "Thus, newspapers, magazines, and broadcasters are liable for republication of libel or slander because they have editorial control over their communications. On the other hand, bookstores, libraries, and other distributors of material are liable for republication only if they know, or had reason to know, that the statement is defamatory." https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/law/law/libel-and-slander https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/law/law... In other words: they aren't expected to have actually read every word of every book they sell. Publishers, newspapers, etc, are. But if a book defames me on page 154, the law doesn't hold the bookstore responsible unless it knew. Once it does know, you could probably sue. But that's not the same as treating it like a publisher- it's a different standard.
dylan604 6y ago
>- Now Twitter, Facebook and YouTube can spread defamatory information about anyone without paying a similar price. Is that necessarily true though? If someone spews libelous content on Twitter, are they not individually susceptible to being sued for libel?
- anfilt 6y ago
  you can sue the individual. Look at what happened to elon musk for just saying “pedo guy”.
  - baud147258 6y ago
    And Musk was found not guilty. And you can't 'just say' that another person is a pedophile, that's a serious accusation
    - anfilt 6y ago
      The US has a high bar for defamation/slander because the 1st amendment. Also musk could higher decent lawyers. Even then he still was sued, the case was not tossed for lack of standing or merit. The judge still thought there was a case worth arguing.
giantg2 6y ago
It would be interesting to see the statistics of the number and percent successful of defamation and libel suits based on source of the info. I don't think those cases are very common since they can be hard to prove.
roywiggins 6y ago
That's not true, though. Pre-internet bookstores could sell libelous books without being liable for their contents. You can't sue Barnes and Noble for selling books that defame you, you have to sue the author. Section 230 extends that regime to websites that host other people's content.
- dasil003 6y ago
  You could sue the publisher, which is analogous to suing social media companies. Suing B&N is like suing an ISP.
  - roywiggins 6y ago
    B&N makes way more moderation decisions than an ISP, they promote books, they recommend books, they lay out a store so you can browse the different books on offer. They aren't a dumb pipe like a good ISP. Specialty bookstores are even less like an ISP, they might restrict themselves to one or a handful of genres. Leftist bookstores have an ideological filter. And so on. None of them are like ISPs at all. It would be weird to make Medium treated like a publisher for hosting a defamatory blog post while a bookstore selling a bound copy of the same content would not be. That's why section 230 is a thing!
- projektfu 6y ago
  You can sue them to have known libel removed from their shelves, but their exposure is not the same as the publisher unless for some reason they do not actually remove it.
mc32 6y ago
I think my main gripe with these platforms is that an anonymous random person can accuse a specific person of anything without any corroborating evidence and destroy that person’s life with impunity —especially when responsibility gets diluted via retweets, mob mentality, etc.
Vrondi 6y ago
Twitter, Facebook and YouTube are not the ones spreading the disinformation. Individuals are. What has changed is that individual people have the sort of voice that once only newspapers and institutions had. By your logic, the phone companies would be legally liable for everything that users say or plan on phone calls.
robomartin 6y ago
Completely agree with you. FB and Twitter can (and have) destroyed peoples lives in more ways than one. Knowing about history can be important when evaluating and thinking about some of these ideas. Most people I have seen posting comments to your comment are rehashing arguments that were at the core of the Cubby v. CompuServe some thirty years ago. FB and Twitter MODERATE and control everything on their systems. This places them in a position of responsibility. While IANAL, I think I can say this is a case of legal precedent. Are there cases that reverse or modify Cubby v. CompuServe? For all their AI prowess they sure as heck seem to just suck at it when it comes to moderating for quality. These platforms are oceans, no, galaxies, of lies, misinformation and manipulation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubby,_Inc._v._CompuServe_Inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubby,_Inc._v._CompuServe_Inc.
- marstall 6y ago
  > platforms are oceans, no, galaxies, of lies, misinformation and manipulation. well said! depressing. i was so hopeful in 2006.
cm277 6y ago
I am literally old enough to remember the arguments for Section 230 when it was voted into law. And they basically boiled down to "this internet thing is too new, let's protect these tiny new companies now that they are starting up by removing liability". Totally made sense at the time. A quarter of a century later, these are now the largest companies in the history of humanity. We should at least be able to discuss what kind of liability we should be able to put on them.

majormajor 6y ago

For all that "don't read the comments" seems to be common knowledge in the tech community, we have a collective blind spot about the product design choices we make that amplify annonymous, un-vetted, un-sourced claims. Almost all our tech media products default to treating things as "this is good enough to broadcast to the world until someone proves we should take it down" instead of defaulting to "this is probably low-value dreck that's not worth much distribution." This is certainly easier from a product design perspective... but does it really make sense?

giantg2 6y ago
What would a sensible alternative be?
- postmeta 6y ago
  No recommendations or notifications without liability.
  - giantg2 6y ago
    I don't think think this really solves the issue of content quality like the original comment was addressing. However, I do think it's a step in the right direction and makes sense. After all, if your platform is promoting specific content by your own actions/volition, then it's no longer just content posted by some user, but it's now being used or reposted/linked by the company that owns the platform for monetary gain (I would guess ToS would solidify this with some boilerplate statement saying they can use your content to make money and to promote the platform etc).
- okennedy 6y ago
  Decouple discovery (e.g., suggesting posts from new users or paid ads) from the protections afforded to dumb carriers/hosting services (i.e., posts received from users you follow or are engaged in a discussion with).
  - giantg2 6y ago
    Are you basically saying to remove protections from platforms that take an active role in the content propagation, Like Facebook ranking algorithms? If so, I agree that this would be a step in the right direction. But what paradigm replaces the original comment's statement that platforms treat all content as good instead of vetting it for quality? I'm skeptical of how we could have a system that vets for quality without introducing more/other issues. That's what I wanted to learn more about.

anfilt 6y ago

You can still sue the poster. Section 230 just means you cant sue the service provider for defamation and slander. Do you think phone service providers should be sued for conversations their subscribers have? Similar thing. Also without it you could sue companies like cloud flare, aws or anyone providing hosting infrastructure.

postmeta 6y ago
While I agree you shouldn't be able to sue service providers, I think it is different because Twitter and Facebook recommend things for you to read and amplify the message. The recommendation/amplification aspect is what needs liability.
- roywiggins 6y ago
  What about bookstores? They make recommendations too. Imagine if every used bookstore had to send every book they resold to a lawyer to make sure it didn't defame anyone.
  - nitrogen 6y ago
    If a bookstore promoted a libelous book to millions of people, then yeah, I'd expect them to be as liable as the publisher and author.
    - roywiggins 6y ago
      They absolutely aren't treated the same as publishers: "Thus, newspapers, magazines, and broadcasters are liable for republication of libel or slander because they have editorial control over their communications. On the other hand, bookstores, libraries, and other distributors of material are liable for republication only if they know, or had reason to know, that the statement is defamatory." https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/law/law/libel-and-slander https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/law/law... In other words: they aren't expected to have actually read every word of every book they sell. Publishers, newspapers, etc, are. But if a book defames me on page 154, the law doesn't hold the bookstore responsible unless it knew. Once it does know, you could probably sue. But that's not the same as treating it like a publisher- it's a different standard.

dylan604 6y ago

>- Now Twitter, Facebook and YouTube can spread defamatory information about anyone without paying a similar price. Is that necessarily true though? If someone spews libelous content on Twitter, are they not individually susceptible to being sued for libel?

anfilt 6y ago
you can sue the individual. Look at what happened to elon musk for just saying “pedo guy”.
- baud147258 6y ago
  And Musk was found not guilty. And you can't 'just say' that another person is a pedophile, that's a serious accusation
  - anfilt 6y ago
    The US has a high bar for defamation/slander because the 1st amendment. Also musk could higher decent lawyers. Even then he still was sued, the case was not tossed for lack of standing or merit. The judge still thought there was a case worth arguing.

giantg2 6y ago

It would be interesting to see the statistics of the number and percent successful of defamation and libel suits based on source of the info. I don't think those cases are very common since they can be hard to prove.

roywiggins 6y ago

That's not true, though. Pre-internet bookstores could sell libelous books without being liable for their contents. You can't sue Barnes and Noble for selling books that defame you, you have to sue the author. Section 230 extends that regime to websites that host other people's content.

dasil003 6y ago
You could sue the publisher, which is analogous to suing social media companies. Suing B&N is like suing an ISP.
- roywiggins 6y ago
  B&N makes way more moderation decisions than an ISP, they promote books, they recommend books, they lay out a store so you can browse the different books on offer. They aren't a dumb pipe like a good ISP. Specialty bookstores are even less like an ISP, they might restrict themselves to one or a handful of genres. Leftist bookstores have an ideological filter. And so on. None of them are like ISPs at all. It would be weird to make Medium treated like a publisher for hosting a defamatory blog post while a bookstore selling a bound copy of the same content would not be. That's why section 230 is a thing!
projektfu 6y ago
You can sue them to have known libel removed from their shelves, but their exposure is not the same as the publisher unless for some reason they do not actually remove it.

mc32 6y ago

I think my main gripe with these platforms is that an anonymous random person can accuse a specific person of anything without any corroborating evidence and destroy that person’s life with impunity —especially when responsibility gets diluted via retweets, mob mentality, etc.

Vrondi 6y ago

Twitter, Facebook and YouTube are not the ones spreading the disinformation. Individuals are. What has changed is that individual people have the sort of voice that once only newspapers and institutions had. By your logic, the phone companies would be legally liable for everything that users say or plan on phone calls.

robomartin 6y ago

Completely agree with you. FB and Twitter can (and have) destroyed peoples lives in more ways than one. Knowing about history can be important when evaluating and thinking about some of these ideas. Most people I have seen posting comments to your comment are rehashing arguments that were at the core of the Cubby v. CompuServe some thirty years ago. FB and Twitter MODERATE and control everything on their systems. This places them in a position of responsibility. While IANAL, I think I can say this is a case of legal precedent. Are there cases that reverse or modify Cubby v. CompuServe? For all their AI prowess they sure as heck seem to just suck at it when it comes to moderating for quality. These platforms are oceans, no, galaxies, of lies, misinformation and manipulation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubby,_Inc._v._CompuServe_Inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubby,_Inc._v._CompuServe_Inc.

marstall 6y ago
> platforms are oceans, no, galaxies, of lies, misinformation and manipulation. well said! depressing. i was so hopeful in 2006.

cm277 6y ago

I am literally old enough to remember the arguments for Section 230 when it was voted into law. And they basically boiled down to "this internet thing is too new, let's protect these tiny new companies now that they are starting up by removing liability". Totally made sense at the time. A quarter of a century later, these are now the largest companies in the history of humanity. We should at least be able to discuss what kind of liability we should be able to put on them.