4 ms·

> I simply don’t get why we don’t hold the social media platforms accountable for the content that gets posted to them The scale of content being posted on so

> I simply don’t get why we don’t hold the social media platforms accountable for the content that gets posted to them The scale of content being posted on social media is such that this liability makes running a social media platform effectively impossible. All user generated content would have to be manually reviewed before being posted. This would be prohibitively expensive. As for the Trump ban, freedom of speech also means freedom from compelled speech. The government can't force a store to sell a particular newspaper, or force a newspaper to run a particular story. Same applies to internet websites. If you have a blog with a comments section, the government can't force you to host certain comments.

jwond 5y ago
> As for the Trump ban, freedom of speech also means freedom from compelled speech. The government can't force a store to sell a particular newspaper, or force a newspaper to run a particular story. Same applies to internet websites. If you have a blog with a comments section, the government can't force you to host certain comments. I personally don’t find this argument particularly compelling when the entity in question is a platform that arguably has more influence over public discourse than most (all?) governments. There is an enormous difference between someone’s blog and a web site that is used as a communication platform by politicians and world leaders, and which has a user base numbering in the millions or even billions.
InitialLastName 5y ago
> The scale of content being posted on social media is such that this liability makes running a social media platform effectively impossible. All user generated content would have to be manually reviewed before being posted. This would be prohibitively expensive. Since when is "operating responsibly would be too expensive" an excuse that we allow businesses to use to avoid any responsibility for the damage they cause? If your business model can't function at scale without incurring enormous externalities to your society, it doesn't have a right to exist.
- Manuel_D 5y ago
  It's not just a question if expenses but also responsibility. If I post a post-it note on my schools bulletin board making defamatory statements who is at fault? Me? Or the school, because it was their bulletin board?
  - InitialLastName 5y ago
    The first time, it's your responsibility. If you kept doing it but the school knew you were doing it and not only left it up, but put copies on bulletin boards across their entire global network, and never asked you to stop, maybe they have to take some responsibility.
    - Manuel_D 5y ago
      Right, the person who authored the defamatory content - not the platform - is responsible. That's how the law works. The school might not even know whether the content is defamatory. If someone posts an accusation of sexual assault and the accused denies it what happens? Does it have to immediately side with the accused?
moksly 5y ago
> The scale of content being posted on social media is such that this liability makes running a social media platform effectively impossible. I won’t miss social media, will you? And I say this as someone who uses Facebook, YouTube and Instagram quite a lot for Blood Bowl hobby purposes, so it’s not that I dislike their platforms as such, but it’s hard to deny that they aren’t healthy for society. At least not if we want to continue valuing experts and science and not popularity and populism.

jwond 5y ago

> As for the Trump ban, freedom of speech also means freedom from compelled speech. The government can't force a store to sell a particular newspaper, or force a newspaper to run a particular story. Same applies to internet websites. If you have a blog with a comments section, the government can't force you to host certain comments. I personally don’t find this argument particularly compelling when the entity in question is a platform that arguably has more influence over public discourse than most (all?) governments. There is an enormous difference between someone’s blog and a web site that is used as a communication platform by politicians and world leaders, and which has a user base numbering in the millions or even billions.

InitialLastName 5y ago

> The scale of content being posted on social media is such that this liability makes running a social media platform effectively impossible. All user generated content would have to be manually reviewed before being posted. This would be prohibitively expensive. Since when is "operating responsibly would be too expensive" an excuse that we allow businesses to use to avoid any responsibility for the damage they cause? If your business model can't function at scale without incurring enormous externalities to your society, it doesn't have a right to exist.

Manuel_D 5y ago
It's not just a question if expenses but also responsibility. If I post a post-it note on my schools bulletin board making defamatory statements who is at fault? Me? Or the school, because it was their bulletin board?
- InitialLastName 5y ago
  The first time, it's your responsibility. If you kept doing it but the school knew you were doing it and not only left it up, but put copies on bulletin boards across their entire global network, and never asked you to stop, maybe they have to take some responsibility.
  - Manuel_D 5y ago
    Right, the person who authored the defamatory content - not the platform - is responsible. That's how the law works. The school might not even know whether the content is defamatory. If someone posts an accusation of sexual assault and the accused denies it what happens? Does it have to immediately side with the accused?

moksly 5y ago

> The scale of content being posted on social media is such that this liability makes running a social media platform effectively impossible. I won’t miss social media, will you? And I say this as someone who uses Facebook, YouTube and Instagram quite a lot for Blood Bowl hobby purposes, so it’s not that I dislike their platforms as such, but it’s hard to deny that they aren’t healthy for society. At least not if we want to continue valuing experts and science and not popularity and populism.