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That's your choice. Isn't the point of the free market that consumers are free to vote with their dollars? I don't want to give my money to companies that hos

That's your choice. Isn't the point of the free market that consumers are free to vote with their dollars? I don't want to give my money to companies that host things that I find morally abhorrent. That doesn't mean other companies can't host that data, simply that I don't want any of my dollars to go to those companies. If the vast majority of consumers also don't want to give money to companies that host that content, that's the hosting company's problem. The free market is speaking. Nobody is making it illegal for that data to be hosted, but nobody is obliged to pay for it to be hosted. So it seems to me that things are working as intended.

teh_infallible 5y ago
I think the whole concept of “voting with your dollars” is flawed. Google will always have more votes than you.
- derek_codes 5y ago
  What? So because someone or something has more money than us, we should just say screw it and buy products we are morally against? That makes no sense.
- nybble41 5y ago
  The analogy to voting to flawed in that actual voting is much too powerful, because it involves politics and the use of force. When you "vote" with your dollars your choices are to either support something or ignore it and spend your money somewhere else. The amount of support you can provide is limited by the economic surplus you've created, and no matter how much money you amass you can't just shut down something you dislike as long as other people continue to support it. Voting in the political sense lacks these safeguards: a majority (or vocal minority) can subsidize their pet projects with the opposition's resources, or prohibit harmless activities merely because they find them distasteful.
jlawson 5y ago
No, because just a handful of companies control the entire ecosystem. There is no alternative, you cannot escape their influence and you cannot function without interacting with them. If Google and Apple ban you from their products and platforms, and Visa shuts down your payment processing, there is nowhere to go. You're done. This and much more has happened many times. You're making the "just build your own internet bro" argument.
- mason55 5y ago
  But I think we need to examine both sides of this. When the American concept of free speech was coined, it was valuable because you could go stand in a government owned square and communicate your message for free. It was a good balance between not forcing private companies to accept speech but still allowing the speech to happen. Online we don't have the concept of a government run square, and so your speech can be totally stifled by private companies. But the difference is that when you're standing in the town square shouting nonsense, your reach is constrained, your ability to reproduce your speech is low (you have to just stand there and keep shouting) and everyone knows who you are. Damaging speech just can't be that damaging. Online is totally different. I think the argument of "Google can't censor you, only the government can" is not great because there's no gov't equivalent of the town square. But I don't think the answer is just "make Google accept all speech" or "create a gov't equivalent of the town square" is necessarily the answer either. I think we should be starting from first principles and understand what free speech is trying to accomplish and come up with a framework that helps us accomplish it.
  - shkkmo 5y ago
    The history of printing things for wide scale distribution well predates the first amendment and it is silly to pretend otherwise.
    - inlined 5y ago
      But the history of forcing those publications to host your opinion is unprecedented
acituan 5y ago
We’re not talking about individual choice but an inherent ir/rationality in censorious behavior. Vast majority of the consumers probably make pragmatic rather than idealistic consumption choices. Eg when you source a new iPhone, you source certain unethical labor practices. When you make use of the US dollar, you make use of some amount of atrocities that built its international purchasing power (eg any of the petrodollar wars). I bet those rarely bother even the most so-called “idealistic” consumers because a) it is a hard calculus to compute b) it is impossible to live when every “impure” thing is removed from use. The difference with public content hosting is being able to twist arms to make them take down stuff and conform to an image of virtuousness which we narcissistically and psuedo-religiously identify with. It is not about the real damage the contents pose, it is our intolerance to being seen as a “person who can use such sites”. The threat is to our confirmation bias, in this case the confirmation of an idea that there is a clear right and wrong and we are definitely right.
- landryraccoon 5y ago
  I'm confused. I don't see the problem. What's the difference between the image of virtue and just virtue? If the majority of people believe that images of virtuousness are what they want, then that's just what they want. People aren't computing the outcome, their ethics are based on appearances and always have been. The internet doesn't change that fact. Whether it was in the middle ages or the post-industrial period or today, virtue has always been performative. So I don't really see what you think your argument demonstrates.
  - acituan 5y ago
    > What's the difference between the image of virtue and just virtue? What’s the difference between a real car and a perfect cardboard replica? One has functionality and interiority. The other is just exteriority. In the King Midas story, he wants everything to be mindlessly golden and thus turns them into unusable shiny crap. He got the golden exterior alright, with none of the real goldenness, goodness they would afford him.
    - 5y ago
LudwigNagasena 5y ago
There is no free market in big tech.
- TeMPOraL 5y ago
  There's little free market for the consumers in tech in general. The barriers to entry are extreme - between inherent complexity of the products, enormous capital investments required, and scale-related benefits (economies of scale, network effects), few can afford to start a real competitor. You can't just make a new Facebook or a new smartphone or even a new coffee machine - not without making a faustian bargain with investors, a deal which is usually the root problem behind why technology sucks. Consumers only get to choose out of what's available, and in this market, it's hard for an entrepreneurial consumer to make some things available when the market isn't providing them.
theandrewbailey 5y ago
> I don't want to give my money to companies that host things that I find morally abhorrent. Isn't that a sign of a moral panic? Back in the 90s, my parents didn't want to patronize companies that signed deals with pornographers. Even though I was only 10, that sounded ridiculous. Good luck finding any large company that doesn't.
- michaelmrose 5y ago
  If people wont do business with people who do business with pornographers what right do the pornographers or porn aficionados have to object. If it would render it more clear it wouldn't matter if the subject were avocados. It's not a moral judgement on the worthiness of porn its about consumer choice in aggregate.
- lostlogin 5y ago
  Can you explain this? Are you referring to tech only? Maybe I’m way too oblivious but of the large companies I pay money to I find it hard to imagine that most are signing deals with pornographers.
- Chris2048 5y ago
  Did the local utilities (water, electric) refuse them to pornographers, and did you parents boycott those?
- jjeaff 5y ago
  Just how many modern companies do you think are actively dealing in pornography?
- landryraccoon 5y ago
  I don’t see what’s changed. Youtube doesn’t host pornographic content either. The Apple App store doesn’t allow adult content of any kind. If you’re saying maybe Youtube and the Apple store should grow up a little and allow adult content I’m sympathetic but the horse has long left the barn on that one.
  - eurasiantiger 5y ago
13of40 5y ago
The impact of that is asymmetrical, though. A company that's making 1% profit (thinking a rural TV station here, not necessarily Google) can't afford to lose 10% of it's viewers, so they dial down their programming to the least objectionable possible. That's how we get in a situation where most people want to watch Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones but what they get are Brady Bunch reruns.
madmax96 5y ago
That is the point of the free market. But deplatforming certain kinds of offensive content is regressive. For instance, in the not-so-distant past many Americans found interracial marriage morally abhorrent. Wikipedia says only 5% of Americans thought interracial marriage should be legal in the 1950s. In today’s environment, that leads to deplatforming those who would’ve supported marriage equality. This is not something we would desire. People are full of prejudices. I’m sure our grandchildren will look back in horror at ours. Let’s not deplatform them for that.
- obedm 5y ago
  I always think I can draw the line in the sand as a very rational and relatively well read person. But then I remember that the best thinkers the world has ever seen (Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, ad nauseum) were never able to look beyond their noses to see the human suffering of others. Aka, they were perfectly happy to have a society run by slaves, to ignore the plight of the poor and sick, etc.
  - jjeaff 5y ago
    That may be true of Plato, Aristotle, etc. But one thing I have learned from history is that there is almost always a contingent of people that do find terrible things like slavery abhorrent and were even outspoken about it. But if you are an elite, and benefit greatly from something, you are probably much less likely to be outspoken against it.
    - obedm 5y ago
      I've never heard of any ancient philosopher being abhorrent about slavery and the like and I've read that there weren't any. Could you point to some readings if you're aware of it? I'd love to know
      - MatteoFrigo 5y ago
        Seneca had a somewhat more humane attitude towards slavery. See e.g. https://figsinwinter.medium.com/seneca-to-lucilius-47-on-slaves-and-human-beings-f13602f62b46 https://figsinwinter.medium.com/seneca-to-lucilius-47-on-sla...
ineptech 5y ago
> Isn't the point of the free market that consumers are free to vote with their dollars? Can you pinpoint the moral difference between "Google should be allowed to refuse to host content that they dislike" and "Restaurants should be allowed to refuse to serve ethnicities that they dislike"? It is a feature of free markets that consumers choose where to spend their money; but it is also a feature of liberal societies that the law precludes the majority from driving out an unpopular minority by refusing to do business with them.

teh_infallible 5y ago

I think the whole concept of “voting with your dollars” is flawed. Google will always have more votes than you.

derek_codes 5y ago
What? So because someone or something has more money than us, we should just say screw it and buy products we are morally against? That makes no sense.
nybble41 5y ago
The analogy to voting to flawed in that actual voting is much too powerful, because it involves politics and the use of force. When you "vote" with your dollars your choices are to either support something or ignore it and spend your money somewhere else. The amount of support you can provide is limited by the economic surplus you've created, and no matter how much money you amass you can't just shut down something you dislike as long as other people continue to support it. Voting in the political sense lacks these safeguards: a majority (or vocal minority) can subsidize their pet projects with the opposition's resources, or prohibit harmless activities merely because they find them distasteful.

jlawson 5y ago

No, because just a handful of companies control the entire ecosystem. There is no alternative, you cannot escape their influence and you cannot function without interacting with them. If Google and Apple ban you from their products and platforms, and Visa shuts down your payment processing, there is nowhere to go. You're done. This and much more has happened many times. You're making the "just build your own internet bro" argument.

mason55 5y ago
But I think we need to examine both sides of this. When the American concept of free speech was coined, it was valuable because you could go stand in a government owned square and communicate your message for free. It was a good balance between not forcing private companies to accept speech but still allowing the speech to happen. Online we don't have the concept of a government run square, and so your speech can be totally stifled by private companies. But the difference is that when you're standing in the town square shouting nonsense, your reach is constrained, your ability to reproduce your speech is low (you have to just stand there and keep shouting) and everyone knows who you are. Damaging speech just can't be that damaging. Online is totally different. I think the argument of "Google can't censor you, only the government can" is not great because there's no gov't equivalent of the town square. But I don't think the answer is just "make Google accept all speech" or "create a gov't equivalent of the town square" is necessarily the answer either. I think we should be starting from first principles and understand what free speech is trying to accomplish and come up with a framework that helps us accomplish it.
- shkkmo 5y ago
  The history of printing things for wide scale distribution well predates the first amendment and it is silly to pretend otherwise.
  - inlined 5y ago
    But the history of forcing those publications to host your opinion is unprecedented

acituan 5y ago

We’re not talking about individual choice but an inherent ir/rationality in censorious behavior. Vast majority of the consumers probably make pragmatic rather than idealistic consumption choices. Eg when you source a new iPhone, you source certain unethical labor practices. When you make use of the US dollar, you make use of some amount of atrocities that built its international purchasing power (eg any of the petrodollar wars). I bet those rarely bother even the most so-called “idealistic” consumers because a) it is a hard calculus to compute b) it is impossible to live when every “impure” thing is removed from use. The difference with public content hosting is being able to twist arms to make them take down stuff and conform to an image of virtuousness which we narcissistically and psuedo-religiously identify with. It is not about the real damage the contents pose, it is our intolerance to being seen as a “person who can use such sites”. The threat is to our confirmation bias, in this case the confirmation of an idea that there is a clear right and wrong and we are definitely right.

landryraccoon 5y ago
I'm confused. I don't see the problem. What's the difference between the image of virtue and just virtue? If the majority of people believe that images of virtuousness are what they want, then that's just what they want. People aren't computing the outcome, their ethics are based on appearances and always have been. The internet doesn't change that fact. Whether it was in the middle ages or the post-industrial period or today, virtue has always been performative. So I don't really see what you think your argument demonstrates.
- acituan 5y ago
  > What's the difference between the image of virtue and just virtue? What’s the difference between a real car and a perfect cardboard replica? One has functionality and interiority. The other is just exteriority. In the King Midas story, he wants everything to be mindlessly golden and thus turns them into unusable shiny crap. He got the golden exterior alright, with none of the real goldenness, goodness they would afford him.
  - 5y ago

LudwigNagasena 5y ago

There is no free market in big tech.

TeMPOraL 5y ago
There's little free market for the consumers in tech in general. The barriers to entry are extreme - between inherent complexity of the products, enormous capital investments required, and scale-related benefits (economies of scale, network effects), few can afford to start a real competitor. You can't just make a new Facebook or a new smartphone or even a new coffee machine - not without making a faustian bargain with investors, a deal which is usually the root problem behind why technology sucks. Consumers only get to choose out of what's available, and in this market, it's hard for an entrepreneurial consumer to make some things available when the market isn't providing them.

theandrewbailey 5y ago

> I don't want to give my money to companies that host things that I find morally abhorrent. Isn't that a sign of a moral panic? Back in the 90s, my parents didn't want to patronize companies that signed deals with pornographers. Even though I was only 10, that sounded ridiculous. Good luck finding any large company that doesn't.

michaelmrose 5y ago
If people wont do business with people who do business with pornographers what right do the pornographers or porn aficionados have to object. If it would render it more clear it wouldn't matter if the subject were avocados. It's not a moral judgement on the worthiness of porn its about consumer choice in aggregate.
lostlogin 5y ago
Can you explain this? Are you referring to tech only? Maybe I’m way too oblivious but of the large companies I pay money to I find it hard to imagine that most are signing deals with pornographers.
Chris2048 5y ago
Did the local utilities (water, electric) refuse them to pornographers, and did you parents boycott those?
jjeaff 5y ago
Just how many modern companies do you think are actively dealing in pornography?
landryraccoon 5y ago
I don’t see what’s changed. Youtube doesn’t host pornographic content either. The Apple App store doesn’t allow adult content of any kind. If you’re saying maybe Youtube and the Apple store should grow up a little and allow adult content I’m sympathetic but the horse has long left the barn on that one.
- eurasiantiger 5y ago

13of40 5y ago

The impact of that is asymmetrical, though. A company that's making 1% profit (thinking a rural TV station here, not necessarily Google) can't afford to lose 10% of it's viewers, so they dial down their programming to the least objectionable possible. That's how we get in a situation where most people want to watch Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones but what they get are Brady Bunch reruns.

madmax96 5y ago

That is the point of the free market. But deplatforming certain kinds of offensive content is regressive. For instance, in the not-so-distant past many Americans found interracial marriage morally abhorrent. Wikipedia says only 5% of Americans thought interracial marriage should be legal in the 1950s. In today’s environment, that leads to deplatforming those who would’ve supported marriage equality. This is not something we would desire. People are full of prejudices. I’m sure our grandchildren will look back in horror at ours. Let’s not deplatform them for that.

obedm 5y ago
I always think I can draw the line in the sand as a very rational and relatively well read person. But then I remember that the best thinkers the world has ever seen (Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, ad nauseum) were never able to look beyond their noses to see the human suffering of others. Aka, they were perfectly happy to have a society run by slaves, to ignore the plight of the poor and sick, etc.
- jjeaff 5y ago
  That may be true of Plato, Aristotle, etc. But one thing I have learned from history is that there is almost always a contingent of people that do find terrible things like slavery abhorrent and were even outspoken about it. But if you are an elite, and benefit greatly from something, you are probably much less likely to be outspoken against it.
  - obedm 5y ago
    I've never heard of any ancient philosopher being abhorrent about slavery and the like and I've read that there weren't any. Could you point to some readings if you're aware of it? I'd love to know
    - MatteoFrigo 5y ago
      Seneca had a somewhat more humane attitude towards slavery. See e.g. https://figsinwinter.medium.com/seneca-to-lucilius-47-on-slaves-and-human-beings-f13602f62b46 https://figsinwinter.medium.com/seneca-to-lucilius-47-on-sla...

ineptech 5y ago

> Isn't the point of the free market that consumers are free to vote with their dollars? Can you pinpoint the moral difference between "Google should be allowed to refuse to host content that they dislike" and "Restaurants should be allowed to refuse to serve ethnicities that they dislike"? It is a feature of free markets that consumers choose where to spend their money; but it is also a feature of liberal societies that the law precludes the majority from driving out an unpopular minority by refusing to do business with them.