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Indeed, what I have found in missing from these discussions has been a critique of the power these platforms have. In my opinion, what we should be talking abo

Indeed, what I have found in missing from these discussions has been a critique of the power these platforms have. In my opinion, what we should be talking about isn’t the moderation decisions Twitter et al are making, but why they have so much power over information in the first place. Government policy over the last forty years has promoted far too much concentration in traditional media, and it, along with social media, needs to be checked. Another aside is that the 2013 NDAA legalized domestic propaganda. This needs to be discussed more and reversed.

JadeNB 4y ago
> In my opinion, what we should be talking about isn’t the moderation decisions Twitter et al are making, but why they have so much power over information in the first place. While I agree with you in principle, experience shows that public pressure can change Twitter's moderation policy—but I think suggesting that Twitter remove or reduce its power over information is less likely to have success. So, in a regulation-hostile environment such as the US, where it is preferred to leave decisions to businesses whenever possible and beyond (and what could Twitter do, even if it wanted to, to limit its power over information?), it seems like we might as well pursue the policy that has some chance of success, in the hopes that it gives us enough time to address the bigger problem.
- comte7092 4y ago
  What does success even mean in such a context though? The fundamental problem is one of governance over hundreds of millions of not billions of users. People talk about the first amendment, but that is a fundamentally America centric worldview, while most users on these platforms are outside of the United States. Platforms may be accountable to some users, but certainly they are far from being accountable to all, most, or even a large subset of their users.

JadeNB 4y ago

> In my opinion, what we should be talking about isn’t the moderation decisions Twitter et al are making, but why they have so much power over information in the first place. While I agree with you in principle, experience shows that public pressure can change Twitter's moderation policy—but I think suggesting that Twitter remove or reduce its power over information is less likely to have success. So, in a regulation-hostile environment such as the US, where it is preferred to leave decisions to businesses whenever possible and beyond (and what could Twitter do, even if it wanted to, to limit its power over information?), it seems like we might as well pursue the policy that has some chance of success, in the hopes that it gives us enough time to address the bigger problem.

comte7092 4y ago
What does success even mean in such a context though? The fundamental problem is one of governance over hundreds of millions of not billions of users. People talk about the first amendment, but that is a fundamentally America centric worldview, while most users on these platforms are outside of the United States. Platforms may be accountable to some users, but certainly they are far from being accountable to all, most, or even a large subset of their users.