5 ms·

A public option for social media is exactly what I want. Townsquare.us, run by the government, where all speech except that which is literally illegal is allowe

A public option for social media is exactly what I want. Townsquare.us, run by the government, where all speech except that which is literally illegal is allowed. Supreme Court for challenges. No ads or tracking allowed. Post illegal content? Feds come knocking. Then, let FB/Twitter etc do whatever they want

philg_jr 5y ago
The only useful purpose of Facebook for me is using it as a somewhat modern phone book. It’s a great tool for tracking down old or new acquaintances and establishing a line of communication. It’s kind of what Facebook used to be before the newsfeed and like button. I wish there was an alternative to Facebook without the tracking and advertising, run by something not profit seeking. Maybe an organization like NPR or PBS?
lupire 5y ago
What's the point? We have plenty of options like that, but no one wants them. People want to go where other people are.
- websites420 5y ago
  The point is that it settles, once and for all, the role of government in policing social media. If social media really is the replication of the public town square, then one that has the same operating model is called for. Doesn't matter if people want to go there. The point is that it exists, and the model is governed by the taxpayers.
  - shkkmo 5y ago
    How would the existence of a crappy government run social media site that nobody uses have any impact on the issue at stake here?
    - websites420 5y ago
      The issue at stake: governments telling private businesses what they can and can't host on their servers. Impact of a government social media: If you get banned from Facebook, you have the option to post your non-illegal content on townsquare.us. Therefore, your free speech rights are not being impacted. The right to speak is not the right to be heard by the audience of your choice.
      - shkkmo 5y ago
        There are already tons of sites you can move to if you get banned from a platform, so there is no functional difference. I get that you don't share concerns about deplatforming, but presenting this as a solution to those concerns is not accurate.
        websites420 5y ago
        > There are already tons of sites you can move to if you get banned from a platform, so there is no functional difference. But none of those platforms draw a direct line between the constitutional guarantee of free speech and implementation of that speech. That’s the idea behind the public option: it’s the constitution with teeth, freedom in its purest form, while leaving corporations open to experiment with restrictions as the market demands.
      - username90 5y ago
        If social media is the public square then the government would just seize the servers just liked they seized all the public squares/roads/areas from private people.
Steko 5y ago
> where all speech except that which is literally illegal is allowed... No ads .. allowed. Another free speech utopia imploded within two sentences.
- websites420 5y ago
  To be clear, in my vision of this, people would be allowed to advertise however they want. Businesses could have accounts. But having a space for ads and then using behavioral ad targeting would be out.
  - Dracophoenix 5y ago
    In your vision of it, perhaps. Citizen's United, however, has already decreed that corporations have free speech rights like everybody else. By creating a distinction between commercial and personal speech, the government would be interfering in the 1st amendement rights of personal and commercial entities.
    - websites420 5y ago
      My vision doesn’t create a distinction between commercial and personal speech. In fact, it does the opposite, by not privileging commercial speech and giving it a special space on the page. If you want to advertise you wares, do so, but you don’t get to pay to get attention. Get people to follow you because they like what you have to say.
      - Dracophoenix 5y ago
        When you wrote "having a space for ads and then using behavioral ad targeting would be out", I understood it to mean that you did not want any space at all for ads and not just a lack of designated space for ads. With that being said, the only way I see this happening is if the government builds its own ISP and /or IXP, secures its own peering agreements (with the understanding that another ISP can refuse), hosts the website on its own servers, and accepts all potential spam that comes from all of its users. In addition, none of this will stop tracking by ads using tricks like the Facebook Pixel, obfuscated analytics, or fingerprinting scripts as code is also free speech. In fact, none of stops any tracking on server-side by government agents either. Any IP logs or information that's gleaned from user access of government services is understood to be self-incriminating and will be treated as such as in the case of a drug dealer in Massachusetts.[1] All in all, who is expected to pay for all this (and on what grounds) and how do you intend to stop ads or any tracking at all with these factors involved? [1]https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/05/how-the-usps-targeted-a-drug-dealer-via-his-ip-address/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/05/how-the-usps-tar...
spaced-out 5y ago
>where all speech except that which is literally illegal is allowed So I can post all the ads I want for my revolutionary penis enlargement pills?
- websites420 5y ago
  Sure! Your account is going to be linked your driver's license. It's your space. Go nuts!
  - bradlys 5y ago
    I wouldn’t be surprised if people got paid to spam ads on the website. People who don’t have any money (or care what Google indexes on them) would gladly send spam on behalf of their drivers license.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
ashtonkem 5y ago
It would be unusable. Porn is legal, gore is legal, hate speech is legal, as is any threat that’s not likely to cause “specific and imminent lawlessness”. The bar for the government being able to legally suppress speech is purposefully very, very high. This is good when it comes to keeping the power of the state out of matters it shouldn’t be involved in, but this is bad when you’re trying to make a social media platform usable by anyone but the absolute dregs of society. Content moderation is very, very hard, but people actually want it. There’s a reason why people stay on Twitter while whining on Twitter rather than going to 4chan or 8kun
- websites420 5y ago
  >It would be unusable. Porn is legal, gore is legal, hate speech is legal, as is any threat that’s not likely to cause “specific and imminent lawlessness”. Such is the nature of living in a free society. Certainly there are ways, in even the most basic social media platforms, of un-following / blocking certain posters. And if the content isn't targeted by algorithm, should be fairly easy to avoid content you don't want to see. Any if not, well, there's always Facebook and Twitter.
  - jfengel 5y ago
    I don't think Hacker News allows you to block people. Or follow them.

philg_jr 5y ago

The only useful purpose of Facebook for me is using it as a somewhat modern phone book. It’s a great tool for tracking down old or new acquaintances and establishing a line of communication. It’s kind of what Facebook used to be before the newsfeed and like button. I wish there was an alternative to Facebook without the tracking and advertising, run by something not profit seeking. Maybe an organization like NPR or PBS?

lupire 5y ago

What's the point? We have plenty of options like that, but no one wants them. People want to go where other people are.

websites420 5y ago
The point is that it settles, once and for all, the role of government in policing social media. If social media really is the replication of the public town square, then one that has the same operating model is called for. Doesn't matter if people want to go there. The point is that it exists, and the model is governed by the taxpayers.
- shkkmo 5y ago
  How would the existence of a crappy government run social media site that nobody uses have any impact on the issue at stake here?
  - websites420 5y ago
    The issue at stake: governments telling private businesses what they can and can't host on their servers. Impact of a government social media: If you get banned from Facebook, you have the option to post your non-illegal content on townsquare.us. Therefore, your free speech rights are not being impacted. The right to speak is not the right to be heard by the audience of your choice.
    - shkkmo 5y ago
      There are already tons of sites you can move to if you get banned from a platform, so there is no functional difference. I get that you don't share concerns about deplatforming, but presenting this as a solution to those concerns is not accurate.
      - websites420 5y ago
        > There are already tons of sites you can move to if you get banned from a platform, so there is no functional difference. But none of those platforms draw a direct line between the constitutional guarantee of free speech and implementation of that speech. That’s the idea behind the public option: it’s the constitution with teeth, freedom in its purest form, while leaving corporations open to experiment with restrictions as the market demands.
    - username90 5y ago
      If social media is the public square then the government would just seize the servers just liked they seized all the public squares/roads/areas from private people.

Steko 5y ago

> where all speech except that which is literally illegal is allowed... No ads .. allowed. Another free speech utopia imploded within two sentences.

websites420 5y ago
To be clear, in my vision of this, people would be allowed to advertise however they want. Businesses could have accounts. But having a space for ads and then using behavioral ad targeting would be out.
- Dracophoenix 5y ago
  In your vision of it, perhaps. Citizen's United, however, has already decreed that corporations have free speech rights like everybody else. By creating a distinction between commercial and personal speech, the government would be interfering in the 1st amendement rights of personal and commercial entities.
  - websites420 5y ago
    My vision doesn’t create a distinction between commercial and personal speech. In fact, it does the opposite, by not privileging commercial speech and giving it a special space on the page. If you want to advertise you wares, do so, but you don’t get to pay to get attention. Get people to follow you because they like what you have to say.
    - Dracophoenix 5y ago
      When you wrote "having a space for ads and then using behavioral ad targeting would be out", I understood it to mean that you did not want any space at all for ads and not just a lack of designated space for ads. With that being said, the only way I see this happening is if the government builds its own ISP and /or IXP, secures its own peering agreements (with the understanding that another ISP can refuse), hosts the website on its own servers, and accepts all potential spam that comes from all of its users. In addition, none of this will stop tracking by ads using tricks like the Facebook Pixel, obfuscated analytics, or fingerprinting scripts as code is also free speech. In fact, none of stops any tracking on server-side by government agents either. Any IP logs or information that's gleaned from user access of government services is understood to be self-incriminating and will be treated as such as in the case of a drug dealer in Massachusetts.[1] All in all, who is expected to pay for all this (and on what grounds) and how do you intend to stop ads or any tracking at all with these factors involved? [1]https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/05/how-the-usps-targeted-a-drug-dealer-via-his-ip-address/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/05/how-the-usps-tar...

spaced-out 5y ago

>where all speech except that which is literally illegal is allowed So I can post all the ads I want for my revolutionary penis enlargement pills?

websites420 5y ago
Sure! Your account is going to be linked your driver's license. It's your space. Go nuts!
- bradlys 5y ago
  I wouldn’t be surprised if people got paid to spam ads on the website. People who don’t have any money (or care what Google indexes on them) would gladly send spam on behalf of their drivers license.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

ashtonkem 5y ago

It would be unusable. Porn is legal, gore is legal, hate speech is legal, as is any threat that’s not likely to cause “specific and imminent lawlessness”. The bar for the government being able to legally suppress speech is purposefully very, very high. This is good when it comes to keeping the power of the state out of matters it shouldn’t be involved in, but this is bad when you’re trying to make a social media platform usable by anyone but the absolute dregs of society. Content moderation is very, very hard, but people actually want it. There’s a reason why people stay on Twitter while whining on Twitter rather than going to 4chan or 8kun

websites420 5y ago
>It would be unusable. Porn is legal, gore is legal, hate speech is legal, as is any threat that’s not likely to cause “specific and imminent lawlessness”. Such is the nature of living in a free society. Certainly there are ways, in even the most basic social media platforms, of un-following / blocking certain posters. And if the content isn't targeted by algorithm, should be fairly easy to avoid content you don't want to see. Any if not, well, there's always Facebook and Twitter.
- jfengel 5y ago
  I don't think Hacker News allows you to block people. Or follow them.