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A violation of sales tax law can only be addressed by the government. The protections provided by Section 230 are from everyone who might not like something abo

by mreome 6y ago

A violation of sales tax law can only be addressed by the government. The protections provided by Section 230 are from everyone who might not like something about you, your site, or your users. It's the difference between the government having tanks and all your neighbors having tanks. Beyond that, I'm not saying online discourse won't survive, I'm saying that repealing Section 230 could lead to things being sorted out afterwards with the closure of the few remaining independent platforms and the cementing of the current centralized players who can afford to operate without the protections of Section 230. Arguably the complexity of inter-state sales tax has contributed (to a much smaller degree) to the centralization of online sales in the same way that a repeal of Section 230 would contribute to the centralization of online discourse. When was the last time you purchased anything from a truly independent store (meaning someone with their own independent site, not using Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Shopify, etc)?

adolph 6y ago
I've bought from standalone independent web stores within the last couple weeks for RC and bike stuff. Aside from that the services you mention (exception of Amazon) are aggregations of independent stores (some actual and some as individuals) and Amazon has an amazing variety of sellers within it. It is very rational for indy stores to behave as a virtual collective within those services, very similar to a shopping district of similar products or storefronts in a mall. It is also very rational for large retailers like Amazon and WalMart to include them since they act as a long tail that can carry NOS or custom goods or final stock at higher prices. Additionally I would challenge the concept of the "truly independent store" in that all organizations represent a particular collection of services and dependencies. It's turtles all the way down. The point about sales tax is that many said the sky would fall down if sales taxes were imposed on Internet sales. Things did change, but not for the worse on the whole. As you note, it is hard to tell if seller web front consolidation had to do with tax treatment change or other reasons. In the larger picture, the change increased fairness in tax treatment, something that especially hurt local independent stores, and missing revenue from states. The protections of Section 230 don't protect you, your site or your users. They protect large companies who are free to silence you to support their agendas and cannot be sued for the disagreeable content they don't silence. Section 230 is as much a farce now as sales tax was then. Post-Sect 230, will those same large companies and organizations silence indy outlets they disagree with? Yes, and they already do even with Sect 230. Even in the absence of Section 230 any plaintiff will have a hard row to how against the their unlimited pockets but there will at least be a sporting chance to advance the most important issues of the day.
- mreome 6y ago
  Putting the whole sales tax discussion aside, as it's really an entirely different issues, I'm not sure what you think Section 230 does exactly. Yes, it does explicitly protect me and my sites. Without Section 230 I'm potentially (and personally) liable for any libelous or illegal content a user posts to the small forums I operate. I can be sued for damages or charged even if I take the content down when I see it. I wouldn't have to worry about being shut-down by a large deep-pocketed company, as I'd get sued into oblivion by every litigious person who didn’t like what someone on my forum was saying about them, or charged with facilitation when some trolls decided to start spamming it will illegal content. The legal and financial risks would permanently shutter most open forums and smaller social media sites. Only those big deep-pocketed companies you're concerned about would be able to continue operating, as they have the financial means to defend themselves, and individuals in the company are protected from direct prosecution by the corporate structure. It also explicitly protects users, as without Section 230 a user forwarding or 'liking' content that turns out to be libelous can be construed to be a publisher of that content. I know this one sounds a bit insane, but it's already happened, see Barrett v. Rosenthal [1]. If you're worried about the "disagreeable content they don't silence" then you WANT Section 230. In Stratton Oakmont v. Prodigy [2] the judge ruled that since Prodigy did moderate it's message boards, that meant it would be liable for anything it left up. Section 230 overruled that judicial decision. It’s impossible for any public forum to be moderated perfectly, small ones due to limited funds/manpower and large ones due to scale. So, without Section 230, the only way for one to avoid liability is to NOT moderate at all and leave up all that "disagreeable" content unless ordered to remove it by a court. The whole issue of large companies who use the legal system to shut down small competitors and silence people is a huge problem, but is has little to do with Section 230 other than the fact that revoking Section 230 would just give those big companies yet another tool to do so. Imagine the simple case of a forum that is created as a place to discuss problems with some big company that actively does this kind of silencing. Without Section 230 the operator of the forum would either need to (a) not moderate and allow the site to be overrun by spam and fake posts from the company saying how it's all lies and the company is great, or (b) carefully fact-check every post someone made before allowing it, or get sued for libel the first (and every) time a post contains a false negative statement about the company. It's written a bit rudely for dramatic effect, but this is a great resource to really understand what Section 230 does and the implications of revoking it. It goes into more detail on the issues and court cases I mentioned: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrett_v._Rosenthal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrett_v._Rosenthal [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratton_Oakmont,_Inc._v._Prodigy_Services_Co https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratton_Oakmont,_Inc._v._Prod....

by mreome 6y ago

adolph 6y ago

I've bought from standalone independent web stores within the last couple weeks for RC and bike stuff. Aside from that the services you mention (exception of Amazon) are aggregations of independent stores (some actual and some as individuals) and Amazon has an amazing variety of sellers within it. It is very rational for indy stores to behave as a virtual collective within those services, very similar to a shopping district of similar products or storefronts in a mall. It is also very rational for large retailers like Amazon and WalMart to include them since they act as a long tail that can carry NOS or custom goods or final stock at higher prices. Additionally I would challenge the concept of the "truly independent store" in that all organizations represent a particular collection of services and dependencies. It's turtles all the way down. The point about sales tax is that many said the sky would fall down if sales taxes were imposed on Internet sales. Things did change, but not for the worse on the whole. As you note, it is hard to tell if seller web front consolidation had to do with tax treatment change or other reasons. In the larger picture, the change increased fairness in tax treatment, something that especially hurt local independent stores, and missing revenue from states. The protections of Section 230 don't protect you, your site or your users. They protect large companies who are free to silence you to support their agendas and cannot be sued for the disagreeable content they don't silence. Section 230 is as much a farce now as sales tax was then. Post-Sect 230, will those same large companies and organizations silence indy outlets they disagree with? Yes, and they already do even with Sect 230. Even in the absence of Section 230 any plaintiff will have a hard row to how against the their unlimited pockets but there will at least be a sporting chance to advance the most important issues of the day.

mreome 6y ago
Putting the whole sales tax discussion aside, as it's really an entirely different issues, I'm not sure what you think Section 230 does exactly. Yes, it does explicitly protect me and my sites. Without Section 230 I'm potentially (and personally) liable for any libelous or illegal content a user posts to the small forums I operate. I can be sued for damages or charged even if I take the content down when I see it. I wouldn't have to worry about being shut-down by a large deep-pocketed company, as I'd get sued into oblivion by every litigious person who didn’t like what someone on my forum was saying about them, or charged with facilitation when some trolls decided to start spamming it will illegal content. The legal and financial risks would permanently shutter most open forums and smaller social media sites. Only those big deep-pocketed companies you're concerned about would be able to continue operating, as they have the financial means to defend themselves, and individuals in the company are protected from direct prosecution by the corporate structure. It also explicitly protects users, as without Section 230 a user forwarding or 'liking' content that turns out to be libelous can be construed to be a publisher of that content. I know this one sounds a bit insane, but it's already happened, see Barrett v. Rosenthal [1]. If you're worried about the "disagreeable content they don't silence" then you WANT Section 230. In Stratton Oakmont v. Prodigy [2] the judge ruled that since Prodigy did moderate it's message boards, that meant it would be liable for anything it left up. Section 230 overruled that judicial decision. It’s impossible for any public forum to be moderated perfectly, small ones due to limited funds/manpower and large ones due to scale. So, without Section 230, the only way for one to avoid liability is to NOT moderate at all and leave up all that "disagreeable" content unless ordered to remove it by a court. The whole issue of large companies who use the legal system to shut down small competitors and silence people is a huge problem, but is has little to do with Section 230 other than the fact that revoking Section 230 would just give those big companies yet another tool to do so. Imagine the simple case of a forum that is created as a place to discuss problems with some big company that actively does this kind of silencing. Without Section 230 the operator of the forum would either need to (a) not moderate and allow the site to be overrun by spam and fake posts from the company saying how it's all lies and the company is great, or (b) carefully fact-check every post someone made before allowing it, or get sued for libel the first (and every) time a post contains a false negative statement about the company. It's written a bit rudely for dramatic effect, but this is a great resource to really understand what Section 230 does and the implications of revoking it. It goes into more detail on the issues and court cases I mentioned: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200531/23325444617/hello... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrett_v._Rosenthal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrett_v._Rosenthal [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratton_Oakmont,_Inc._v._Prodigy_Services_Co https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratton_Oakmont,_Inc._v._Prod....