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If the people want a free-speech-respecting public square, they should petition their state to create one that is compelling enough to become the choice of the

If the people want a free-speech-respecting public square, they should petition their state to create one that is compelling enough to become the choice of the majority, not let private citizens do the hard work of creating an effective square, and then use force to commandeer it.

4h53n 5y ago
Why? We could let the free market come up with competing solutions and regulate where necessary.
- CryptoPunk 5y ago
  1. Because it's a violation of other people's rights to control their own private property. It's predicated on using the threat of imprisonment against people acting peacefully, which infringes upon human rights. 2. Because it's lazy and lacking credibility: it's a claim to being privy to 'the correct path for society', without showing the ability to create something of value. The state could still tap market forces to bring about public squares that abide with its guidelines, by providing subsidies to private parties developing such platforms, in exchange for the parties entering into an irrevocable covenant that requires them to follow the state's rules.
  - oefnak 5y ago
    1. A company is not a person. Also, the company did not have to go to jail, it got a fine.
    - raxxorrax 5y ago
      "Punks" arguing for corporate rights to ban content in the name of human rights. I think I will take a stroll through the forest, maybe I meat a bear that plays guitar and sells refreshing lemonade. I am prepared for anything.
      - CryptoPunk 5y ago
        Punks don't rely on the state to force private citizens to let people use their platforms.
    - CryptoPunk 5y ago
      A company belongs to its shareholders. Commandeering it violates the shareholders' rights to their property. All legal injunctions are predicated on the threat of imprisonment, even fines: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/06/enforcing-the-law-is-inherently-violent/488828/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/06/enforci...
      - marcel-garus 5y ago
        In Germany, near the top of our most fundamental lawbook, the Grundgesetz, it says: > §14.2 GG: Eigentum verpflichtet. Sein Gebrauch soll zugleich dem Wohle der Allgemeinheit dienen. [0] Which roughly translates to: > §14.2 GG: Property obliges. Its use should also serve the public good. [0]: https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/gg/art_14.html https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/gg/art_14.html
        CryptoPunk 5y ago
        Any state control over private citizens can be rationalized in this way. Private property is a private creation, and the use of public resources by the individuals that create it should not be used as an excuse to deny its creators their rights over it, any more than the use of public resources by individuals should not be used to invalidate their right to free speech.
      - josefx 5y ago
        > A company belongs to its shareholders. A company is generally its own legal entity, intentionally separated from its shareholders to protect them from any fallout should the company ever go bankrupt or get sued into oblivion. You can get into serious trouble if you founded a company and failed to correctly distinguish between your own and the companies property, because as far as the government is concerned you explicitly told it to make this distinction.
        CryptoPunk 5y ago
        It's its own legal entity, that is owned by other people. And there is very little privilege that incorporation grants corporations that is not entirely contractual. Limited liability for shareholders for tort is the only one I can think of, and that, in my opinion, should be repealed. Limited liability for debt can be entirely contractual in its basis, and established by shareholders/companies operating outside of the corporate structure too, simply by stipulating that condition in any loan agreememt the business enter into with another party.
linspace 5y ago
The clause only affects when the platform is big enough. It's a concentration of power in the hands of a few, certainly not the shareholders as you say in other comment. That such a concentration of power will be abused is almost a law of nature and so laws are put into place, the same way there are laws to prevent monopolies, to the detriment of shareholders also. You may think that this practicalities don't align with your ideology which is fine but as someone living in a country with multiple nation wide and regional state owned television channels I think they are terrible idea because they are extremely inefficient compared with private ones and also degenerate into propaganda machines for the political party in power, and the longer the same party is in power the worse.
- CryptoPunk 5y ago
  It's not an abuse of power if a) it's contractual and b) it's private property. One doesn't automatically become a victim, incapable of provide genuine consent to the terms offered, by virtue of the party offering the terms having a service that they badly want or need. If you believe otherwise, then I challenge you to convince a court of that. Courts, under common law, will invalidate any contract where the parties to it did not provide informed and genuine consent to the terms contained in it. Resorting to legislative intervention suggests lacking the confidence in the validity of the allegations that premise it to use the judicial free market track. >>as someone living in a country with multiple nation wide and regional state owned television channels I think they are terrible idea because they are extremely inefficient compared with private ones and also degenerate into propaganda machines for the political party in power, and the longer the same party is in power the worse. Two points: a) you think the polity is incapable of managing large organizatons competently enough to compete with shareholder-run private enterprises, yet you think this same polity can craft effective cookie-cutter rules that will affect millions of interactions a day. It's not a coherent model of the world. b) the state is not limited to organizations under its direct management to support its policies. As I explained in a response to a sibling comment of yours, the state could still tap market forces to bring about public squares that abide with its guidelines, by providing subsidies to private parties developing such platforms, in exchange for the parties entering into an irrevocable covenant that requires them to follow the state's rules. Yet another option would be the state funding decentralized open-source protocols that are capable of entirely replacing centralized parties in many markets. The state, being publicly funded, is the only entity capable of cost-effectively funding non-profit initiatives like this that produce public goods. My larger point is that the state should not be monopolizing industries. It should provide alternatives to the private options. If it fails, the public still has the private options. If it succeeds, it did so by providing an option superior to those provided by the private sector. This imposes accountability on the state, by leaving it with competitors to act as a yardstick, while ensuring its interventions only impact the market to the extent that they improve it.
codeflow2202 5y ago
Put limitations to what a private entity can do on national soil is completely in the hands of local governments. If you want to make money here, you follow our rules. Completely free capitalism brings the kind of aberrations that we can already see destroying the livelihood of millions of people in the USA
- CryptoPunk 5y ago
  That is abuse of the monopolistic control the state exerts over the land within its jurisdiction. It would be equally abusive if the state used it to prohibit homosexual intercourse, marijuana usage or atheism-promoting speech. >>Completely free capitalism brings the kind of aberrations that we can already see destroying the livelihood of millions of people in the USA The idea that the US has "completely free capitalism" is the Big Lie promoted by the state's unionized activist bureaucracy. The US, along with the rest of advanced nations, has rapidly moved away from being a free society with economic liberty, toward one that has a significant amount of centralized control over the private actions of its citizens: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/social-spending-oecd-longrun https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/social-spending-oecd-long...
stickyricky 5y ago
Is it really a mainstream position of modern libertarians that state-owned corporations competing against private interest is better than passing a law against some externality? This reads like a Chinese Communist Party press-release and not a non-aggression-pact, individualist libertarian.
- CryptoPunk 5y ago
  I can't speak for the mainstream libertarian position, only my own beliefs on what is consistent with human rights and what ruleset would likely be conducive to economic evolution towards greater functionality. There is nothing wrong with state-owned corporations in principle. They need not violate any one's rights. How they are funded, and what laws are created to assist them, can of course be problematic, as can the general inefficiency of the state sector. But if the funding sources for the state subsidies are not based on violating private property or contracting rights, there are no laws enacted to give the state-sponsored enterprise a monopoly over a market, and the subsidies address an externality to produce significant positive economic returns, then it would be fine. This approach to government intervention is less risky, as failure of government administration will only waste the resources expended on the state-sponsored enterprise, while leaving private citizens with the private sector alternatives. Regimenting an entire sector with top-down rules risks destroying that entire sector if the government chooses the wrong set of rules.

4h53n 5y ago

Why? We could let the free market come up with competing solutions and regulate where necessary.

CryptoPunk 5y ago
1. Because it's a violation of other people's rights to control their own private property. It's predicated on using the threat of imprisonment against people acting peacefully, which infringes upon human rights. 2. Because it's lazy and lacking credibility: it's a claim to being privy to 'the correct path for society', without showing the ability to create something of value. The state could still tap market forces to bring about public squares that abide with its guidelines, by providing subsidies to private parties developing such platforms, in exchange for the parties entering into an irrevocable covenant that requires them to follow the state's rules.
- oefnak 5y ago
  1. A company is not a person. Also, the company did not have to go to jail, it got a fine.
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    "Punks" arguing for corporate rights to ban content in the name of human rights. I think I will take a stroll through the forest, maybe I meat a bear that plays guitar and sells refreshing lemonade. I am prepared for anything.
    - CryptoPunk 5y ago
      Punks don't rely on the state to force private citizens to let people use their platforms.
  - CryptoPunk 5y ago
    A company belongs to its shareholders. Commandeering it violates the shareholders' rights to their property. All legal injunctions are predicated on the threat of imprisonment, even fines: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/06/enforcing-the-law-is-inherently-violent/488828/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/06/enforci...
    - marcel-garus 5y ago
      In Germany, near the top of our most fundamental lawbook, the Grundgesetz, it says: > §14.2 GG: Eigentum verpflichtet. Sein Gebrauch soll zugleich dem Wohle der Allgemeinheit dienen. [0] Which roughly translates to: > §14.2 GG: Property obliges. Its use should also serve the public good. [0]: https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/gg/art_14.html https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/gg/art_14.html
      - CryptoPunk 5y ago
        Any state control over private citizens can be rationalized in this way. Private property is a private creation, and the use of public resources by the individuals that create it should not be used as an excuse to deny its creators their rights over it, any more than the use of public resources by individuals should not be used to invalidate their right to free speech.
    - josefx 5y ago
      > A company belongs to its shareholders. A company is generally its own legal entity, intentionally separated from its shareholders to protect them from any fallout should the company ever go bankrupt or get sued into oblivion. You can get into serious trouble if you founded a company and failed to correctly distinguish between your own and the companies property, because as far as the government is concerned you explicitly told it to make this distinction.
      - CryptoPunk 5y ago
        It's its own legal entity, that is owned by other people. And there is very little privilege that incorporation grants corporations that is not entirely contractual. Limited liability for shareholders for tort is the only one I can think of, and that, in my opinion, should be repealed. Limited liability for debt can be entirely contractual in its basis, and established by shareholders/companies operating outside of the corporate structure too, simply by stipulating that condition in any loan agreememt the business enter into with another party.

linspace 5y ago

The clause only affects when the platform is big enough. It's a concentration of power in the hands of a few, certainly not the shareholders as you say in other comment. That such a concentration of power will be abused is almost a law of nature and so laws are put into place, the same way there are laws to prevent monopolies, to the detriment of shareholders also. You may think that this practicalities don't align with your ideology which is fine but as someone living in a country with multiple nation wide and regional state owned television channels I think they are terrible idea because they are extremely inefficient compared with private ones and also degenerate into propaganda machines for the political party in power, and the longer the same party is in power the worse.

CryptoPunk 5y ago
It's not an abuse of power if a) it's contractual and b) it's private property. One doesn't automatically become a victim, incapable of provide genuine consent to the terms offered, by virtue of the party offering the terms having a service that they badly want or need. If you believe otherwise, then I challenge you to convince a court of that. Courts, under common law, will invalidate any contract where the parties to it did not provide informed and genuine consent to the terms contained in it. Resorting to legislative intervention suggests lacking the confidence in the validity of the allegations that premise it to use the judicial free market track. >>as someone living in a country with multiple nation wide and regional state owned television channels I think they are terrible idea because they are extremely inefficient compared with private ones and also degenerate into propaganda machines for the political party in power, and the longer the same party is in power the worse. Two points: a) you think the polity is incapable of managing large organizatons competently enough to compete with shareholder-run private enterprises, yet you think this same polity can craft effective cookie-cutter rules that will affect millions of interactions a day. It's not a coherent model of the world. b) the state is not limited to organizations under its direct management to support its policies. As I explained in a response to a sibling comment of yours, the state could still tap market forces to bring about public squares that abide with its guidelines, by providing subsidies to private parties developing such platforms, in exchange for the parties entering into an irrevocable covenant that requires them to follow the state's rules. Yet another option would be the state funding decentralized open-source protocols that are capable of entirely replacing centralized parties in many markets. The state, being publicly funded, is the only entity capable of cost-effectively funding non-profit initiatives like this that produce public goods. My larger point is that the state should not be monopolizing industries. It should provide alternatives to the private options. If it fails, the public still has the private options. If it succeeds, it did so by providing an option superior to those provided by the private sector. This imposes accountability on the state, by leaving it with competitors to act as a yardstick, while ensuring its interventions only impact the market to the extent that they improve it.

codeflow2202 5y ago

Put limitations to what a private entity can do on national soil is completely in the hands of local governments. If you want to make money here, you follow our rules. Completely free capitalism brings the kind of aberrations that we can already see destroying the livelihood of millions of people in the USA

CryptoPunk 5y ago
That is abuse of the monopolistic control the state exerts over the land within its jurisdiction. It would be equally abusive if the state used it to prohibit homosexual intercourse, marijuana usage or atheism-promoting speech. >>Completely free capitalism brings the kind of aberrations that we can already see destroying the livelihood of millions of people in the USA The idea that the US has "completely free capitalism" is the Big Lie promoted by the state's unionized activist bureaucracy. The US, along with the rest of advanced nations, has rapidly moved away from being a free society with economic liberty, toward one that has a significant amount of centralized control over the private actions of its citizens: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/social-spending-oecd-longrun https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/social-spending-oecd-long...

stickyricky 5y ago

Is it really a mainstream position of modern libertarians that state-owned corporations competing against private interest is better than passing a law against some externality? This reads like a Chinese Communist Party press-release and not a non-aggression-pact, individualist libertarian.

CryptoPunk 5y ago
I can't speak for the mainstream libertarian position, only my own beliefs on what is consistent with human rights and what ruleset would likely be conducive to economic evolution towards greater functionality. There is nothing wrong with state-owned corporations in principle. They need not violate any one's rights. How they are funded, and what laws are created to assist them, can of course be problematic, as can the general inefficiency of the state sector. But if the funding sources for the state subsidies are not based on violating private property or contracting rights, there are no laws enacted to give the state-sponsored enterprise a monopoly over a market, and the subsidies address an externality to produce significant positive economic returns, then it would be fine. This approach to government intervention is less risky, as failure of government administration will only waste the resources expended on the state-sponsored enterprise, while leaving private citizens with the private sector alternatives. Regimenting an entire sector with top-down rules risks destroying that entire sector if the government chooses the wrong set of rules.