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This would be more important and trustworthy if it had teeth and backing by multiple governments (say the USA, Canada, United Nations, EU), maybe each governmen
by gremlinsinc 6y ago
This would be more important and trustworthy if it had teeth and backing by multiple governments (say the USA, Canada, United Nations, EU), maybe each government could elect a member to sit on the board or maybe 3 members from the left, center, and right of their political spectrums.
Most importantly it needs to be more than "just facebook" but something that just governs social media in general.
Social media basically controls governments now, and may even have more power than government in many ways. So a coalition between the governments and social media may be the best way forward, but it needs to be as much content providers as possible.
- nickff 6y agoHow many members of the board are going to be from authoritarian regimes? I seems likely that this ends up more like the UN's committee on human rights (which frequently contains or is lead by representatives of horrific regimes) than NATO.
- codetrotter 6y agoIn the case of human rights though, those countries are the ones that need it the most. Even if it has as much as a tiny positive effect on the human rights of the people of those countries, that’s a win. What good would a committee on human rights be if they did not concern themselves with the ones that need it the most?
- ultrablack 6y agoI disagree. HR council is a lost opportunity. The countries on it are the worst offenders, only there to ensure nothing happens. Couldnt have been worse.
- dragonwriter 6y ago> The countries on it are the worst offenders The HRC is about 1/4 the size of the UN itself in seats, and countries are elected to by regional allocation in staggered 3-year terms for a maximum of two consecutive terms. “The worst offenders” is not a fair description of the current membership [0], or even a dominant faction of the membership, of the Council. There’ve been a couple times in history where the 15 or so countries elected in a single year have included several notably bad actors, and where people have mistaken that group for the whole council rather than about 1/3 of it, but that;s not reality. [0] https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/Pages/CurrentMembers.aspx https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/Pages/CurrentMembers.a...
- fakedang 6y agoSo you're saying that because China or Saudi Arabia needs human rights, they need to send a government lackey to represent them on the global stage, and that will result in even a tiny positive effect? I would be happy to do so if the representatives were Loujain al Hathloul and Rushan Abbas, not the jokers that these countries send to sit on the council. And I know we all will be dead before that ever happens.
- BurningFrog 6y agoChina is not going to nominate a dissident to such a panel. If a Chinese dissident is somehow nominated, they will be forced in line.
- astura 6y agoJesus, My idea of a dystopian future is a world where I would need permission from an intergovernmental panel (!) to kick disruptive people off my website. That would be absolute totalitarianism.
- TulliusCicero 6y agoSeriously. I get that the setup with Facebook/Twitter having so much social power is less than ideal, but the government telling you which trolls or assholes you're allowed to boot off your website, that sounds infinitely worse (and in the US, it's legally infeasible, it would never make it past the first amendment).