5 ms·

There are two things that can be true at the same time: - Amazon was within its legal and ethical rights to do this, and ought to win any court cases, etc. -

by gfodor 6y ago

There are two things that can be true at the same time: - Amazon was within its legal and ethical rights to do this, and ought to win any court cases, etc. - The aggregate situation of de-platforming of individuals and entire platforms from the Internet by a few unilateral decisions by corporations reveals a power structure we ought to not want (it has always been there, but now it's undeniably shown itself willing and able to exercise its power when needed) since it will inevitably be abused given incentives and the lack of checks and balances on it.

tshaddox 6y ago
Is there a feasible plan to obtain better power structures in the same time scales that these people are literally plotting to overthrow governments, murder political opponents, etc.?
- chmod600 6y ago
  Twitter and FB got a lot of credit for the Arab Spring.
  - noWeigh 6y ago
    Seems like a difference between between overthrowing fascist religious minority in power and preventing fascist religious minority from rising to power? Electoral college picks the President but two elections on and no popular vote wins for Trump. If we’re talking about suppression of speech, seems like Trump was keen on doing that as well, on the backs of a political minority.
- gfodor 6y ago
  There isn't a "deadline" to fixing these problems, they just need to be fixed. Unfortunately, like most things, fear will primarily guide our actions not sober analysis of the long-term unintended consequences of them.
res0nat0r 6y ago
The check and balance is working just fine in this case. Parler kept allowing people to post death threats, they didn't remove it because that's the entire reason their platform exists, and AWS enforced their TOS and stopped hosting them. They're free to go elsewhere.
_jal 6y ago
On your second point, there will always be power structures. You can't not have them, when considering realistic arrangements made of humans. So now what? Is the complaint really that the gatekeepers are different than they were 30 or 100 years ago? Or that there is no realistic alternative that could have acted, citing some authority you find more agreeable, in an effective timeframe?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- gfodor 6y ago
  I would have much preferred if this action occurred due to a legal order, not a few CEOs making unilateral decisions. If they were bound to go through a form of due process before nuking people off of the Internet based upon speech which is assumed to be illegal, my guess is it would be much less likely to be abused. It certainly seems like such a system would have worked just fine in this situation and could be made extremely efficient. I've argued for years having a few companies mediate all consequential human communication was going to be a big problem, so this happening to wake people up of the dangers isn't a surprise to me but just another stage of the process of people realizing it.
JamesBarney 6y ago
> - The aggregate situation of de-platforming of individuals and entire platforms from the Internet by a few unilateral decisions by corporations reveals a power structure we ought to not want (it has always been there, but now it's undeniably shown itself willing and able to exercise its power when needed) since it will inevitably be abused given incentives and the lack of checks and balances on it. When it's more than five separate organizations that all independently decide to deplatform is it still a unilateral decision? I also doubt these decisions were made unilaterally in the companies themselves. In this specific circumstance do we need to regulate these businesses to keep them from removing content related to organizing a violent insurrection? No one even removed this content until these groups literally stormed the capital chanting about hanging members of congress. I don't see the problem.
- gfodor 6y ago
  I'll admit the use of 'unilateral' here is probably poor, I don't know the proper one. These companies exert monopoly power in the markets they are in. Decisions made by companies which are monopolies are "unilateral-ist" because once a small number of them make a decision together (perhaps colluding) then it leaves no recourse for the person or group they are deciding against. Mentioned elsewhere, the process we should all wants is one where if a company wants to nuke an entire speech platform like this due to illegal speech, they can get a judge to affirm the legality of the content and the negligence of those who are hosting it. With that in hand, their actions would be immune from criticism. Without it, we find ourselves here, where we basically have to trust them to make the right decision and not abuse their power. It's not what we should want, for the same reason that we should have wanted anti-trust laws in place to reduce the power of monopolists, despite the fact that monopolists were operating entirely legally and often ethically.
  - JamesBarney 6y ago
    Banning content moderation unless you have a judge's order seems like it could be problematic. If this law existed could dang still ban people for people for being a-holes and not following site guidelines or would he need a court order?

by gfodor 6y ago

tshaddox 6y ago

Is there a feasible plan to obtain better power structures in the same time scales that these people are literally plotting to overthrow governments, murder political opponents, etc.?

chmod600 6y ago
Twitter and FB got a lot of credit for the Arab Spring.
- noWeigh 6y ago
  Seems like a difference between between overthrowing fascist religious minority in power and preventing fascist religious minority from rising to power? Electoral college picks the President but two elections on and no popular vote wins for Trump. If we’re talking about suppression of speech, seems like Trump was keen on doing that as well, on the backs of a political minority.
gfodor 6y ago
There isn't a "deadline" to fixing these problems, they just need to be fixed. Unfortunately, like most things, fear will primarily guide our actions not sober analysis of the long-term unintended consequences of them.

res0nat0r 6y ago

The check and balance is working just fine in this case. Parler kept allowing people to post death threats, they didn't remove it because that's the entire reason their platform exists, and AWS enforced their TOS and stopped hosting them. They're free to go elsewhere.

_jal 6y ago

On your second point, there will always be power structures. You can't not have them, when considering realistic arrangements made of humans. So now what? Is the complaint really that the gatekeepers are different than they were 30 or 100 years ago? Or that there is no realistic alternative that could have acted, citing some authority you find more agreeable, in an effective timeframe?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
gfodor 6y ago
I would have much preferred if this action occurred due to a legal order, not a few CEOs making unilateral decisions. If they were bound to go through a form of due process before nuking people off of the Internet based upon speech which is assumed to be illegal, my guess is it would be much less likely to be abused. It certainly seems like such a system would have worked just fine in this situation and could be made extremely efficient. I've argued for years having a few companies mediate all consequential human communication was going to be a big problem, so this happening to wake people up of the dangers isn't a surprise to me but just another stage of the process of people realizing it.

JamesBarney 6y ago

> - The aggregate situation of de-platforming of individuals and entire platforms from the Internet by a few unilateral decisions by corporations reveals a power structure we ought to not want (it has always been there, but now it's undeniably shown itself willing and able to exercise its power when needed) since it will inevitably be abused given incentives and the lack of checks and balances on it. When it's more than five separate organizations that all independently decide to deplatform is it still a unilateral decision? I also doubt these decisions were made unilaterally in the companies themselves. In this specific circumstance do we need to regulate these businesses to keep them from removing content related to organizing a violent insurrection? No one even removed this content until these groups literally stormed the capital chanting about hanging members of congress. I don't see the problem.

gfodor 6y ago
I'll admit the use of 'unilateral' here is probably poor, I don't know the proper one. These companies exert monopoly power in the markets they are in. Decisions made by companies which are monopolies are "unilateral-ist" because once a small number of them make a decision together (perhaps colluding) then it leaves no recourse for the person or group they are deciding against. Mentioned elsewhere, the process we should all wants is one where if a company wants to nuke an entire speech platform like this due to illegal speech, they can get a judge to affirm the legality of the content and the negligence of those who are hosting it. With that in hand, their actions would be immune from criticism. Without it, we find ourselves here, where we basically have to trust them to make the right decision and not abuse their power. It's not what we should want, for the same reason that we should have wanted anti-trust laws in place to reduce the power of monopolists, despite the fact that monopolists were operating entirely legally and often ethically.
- JamesBarney 6y ago
  Banning content moderation unless you have a judge's order seems like it could be problematic. If this law existed could dang still ban people for people for being a-holes and not following site guidelines or would he need a court order?