>Yet they did host comments, if not exactly in 1990 in hacker news form, then in many years before section 230 [...] Lawsuits happened, but they were de facto n

>Yet they did host comments, if not exactly in 1990 in hacker news form, then in many years before section 230 [...] Lawsuits happened, but they were de facto not very effective in getting information taken down But lawsuits still cost defendants millions in expensive attorneys' fees to fight them in court. E.g. Oakmont's $200 million lawsuit against Prodigy. [1][2] So it's missing the point if people only emphasize that 1995 Prodigy didn't remove an anonymous user's comment about Oakmont. In other words, leaving the dangerous comment up isn't really "winning". Instead, it's not having to deal with lawsuits at all from future "Oakmonts" that Section 230 clarified. So would HN exist if Paul Graham had to deal with repeated $200 million lawsuits because anonymous posters kept writing "Facebook is a cancer on society..." ? It doesn't seem worth the liability risk without Section 230. [1] https://itif.org/publications/2021/02/22/overview-section-230-what-it-why-it-was-created-and-what-it-has-achieved#_Why_was_Section_230_Created https://itif.org/publications/2021/02/22/overview-section-23... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratton_Oakmont,_Inc._v._Prodigy_Services_Co https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratton_Oakmont,_Inc._v._Prod....