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> When are public individuals held accountable for their statements? "Public individual" is not exclusive to members of the american government. Should we legi

> When are public individuals held accountable for their statements? "Public individual" is not exclusive to members of the american government. Should we legislate that as well? Nations have started legislating laws against falsehoods after all. Minor public figures, the latest most "current" example being video creators on social media platforms, are routinely held accountable for failure to disclose sponsorships. Why aren't corporations found in legal trouble for failing to disclose that XYZ feature was never going to happen? I should add, private individuals are also held accountable for statements in court. Why should such things be exclusive to courts? Does the truth only matter in front of a judge? Should we not find the act of lying for the sake of greater sales, a despicable act? > Nothing is stopping customers from holding corporations accountable, by taking their business elsewhere if they find a corporation to be unreliable. This is a blatant lie. Customers boycotting Chevron doesn't stop them from buying judges and violating the environments of various nations such as Ecuador. Individual consumers, even consumers coming together to form a large group, still cannot effect any major damage to a corporation. The only entities that can truly "fight" a corporation are similarly sized governments or organized violent attacks on corporate property.

imgabe 3y ago
> Nations have started legislating laws against falsehoods after all. Which nations? How? Who determines what is a "falsehood"? A failed prediction is not the same thing as a lie. It might be disappointing if a company predicts they will be able to deliver a feature and it turns out that they can't, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were lying when they said they were going to. Yes it would be nice if the world were perfectly controllable and predictable and everything that went wrong was a result of bad people deliberately deceiving you, but that's not reality. All such laws would accomplish is to ensure that nobody ever makes a definitive statement about anything, ever again. Couch everything in weasel words to ensure that there is sufficiently vagueness to combat an accusations of "lying" and you're good to go. > Customers boycotting Chevron doesn't stop them from buying judges and violating the environments of various nations such as Ecuador. Because customers en masse largely don't know or care about the environment in Ecuador and no significant percentage of them are going to engage in any such boycott. The end-users filling up their cars at gas station are also not "customers" in any meaningful sense for Chevron, who is selling petroleum products wholesale in an entirely different market. Meanwhile, customers finding that Sears is no longer a good place to buy the things they need and shopping for appliances at Home Depot and Lowe's absolutely did have an effect on Sears and let them know that they were failing to meet the needs of their customers.
- Prickle 3y ago
  > Which nations? How? Who determines what is a "falsehood"? Fakenews laws specifically. They are popping up everywhere from Europe, Asia, some American states, etc. For better or worse. > A failed prediction is not the same thing as a lie. It is absolutely a lie/falsehood if you use it during a sales pitch. "We promise to create XYZ feature in the near future. That's why our product is a great deal!" should be immediately binding, with legal ramifications looming. You are selling the concept of future features as a reason to purchase or invest. Failure is no longer an option. Don't like that? Then don't make bullshit statements! It's very very easy to not make false statements! > It might be disappointing if a company predicts they will be able to deliver a feature and it turns out that they can't, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were lying when they said they were going to. If you make a promise you cannot keep, you lied. Simple as that. Corporations should never receive the benefit of the doubt. > Because customers en masse largely don't know or care about the environment in Ecuador and no significant percentage of them are going to engage in any such boycott. The end-users filling up their cars at gas station are also not "customers" in any meaningful sense for Chevron, who is selling petroleum products wholesale in an entirely different market. Which is why the laws are needed. > Meanwhile, customers finding that Sears is no longer a good place to buy the things they need and shopping for appliances at Home Depot and Lowe's absolutely did have an effect on Sears and let them know that they were failing to meet the needs of their customers. Which resulted in Sears attempting to catch up VIA IP theft. They have lost multiple legal suites over this, with entire expose' written about it. Overall, this example is irrelevant, as Sears is a local company beholden to local consumers. Completely unlike major corporations like Chevron or Microsoft.
jq-r 3y ago
Generally I agree with you but this is dangerous: > Nations have started legislating laws against falsehoods after all. Unfortunately, this is just a tool in quite a large government's drawer for suppressing any kind of dissent. "My" government and their political party are the biggest spreaders of misinformation and blatant lies, but don't even for a second think this will be used against them or any lying corporation. This is squarely aimed at the political opposition, and even more so at anyone daring to upset the status quo. One might think that tool morality is a result on how it’s used, bit I would rather not have it because it’s ripe for abuse.

imgabe 3y ago

> Nations have started legislating laws against falsehoods after all. Which nations? How? Who determines what is a "falsehood"? A failed prediction is not the same thing as a lie. It might be disappointing if a company predicts they will be able to deliver a feature and it turns out that they can't, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were lying when they said they were going to. Yes it would be nice if the world were perfectly controllable and predictable and everything that went wrong was a result of bad people deliberately deceiving you, but that's not reality. All such laws would accomplish is to ensure that nobody ever makes a definitive statement about anything, ever again. Couch everything in weasel words to ensure that there is sufficiently vagueness to combat an accusations of "lying" and you're good to go. > Customers boycotting Chevron doesn't stop them from buying judges and violating the environments of various nations such as Ecuador. Because customers en masse largely don't know or care about the environment in Ecuador and no significant percentage of them are going to engage in any such boycott. The end-users filling up their cars at gas station are also not "customers" in any meaningful sense for Chevron, who is selling petroleum products wholesale in an entirely different market. Meanwhile, customers finding that Sears is no longer a good place to buy the things they need and shopping for appliances at Home Depot and Lowe's absolutely did have an effect on Sears and let them know that they were failing to meet the needs of their customers.

Prickle 3y ago
> Which nations? How? Who determines what is a "falsehood"? Fakenews laws specifically. They are popping up everywhere from Europe, Asia, some American states, etc. For better or worse. > A failed prediction is not the same thing as a lie. It is absolutely a lie/falsehood if you use it during a sales pitch. "We promise to create XYZ feature in the near future. That's why our product is a great deal!" should be immediately binding, with legal ramifications looming. You are selling the concept of future features as a reason to purchase or invest. Failure is no longer an option. Don't like that? Then don't make bullshit statements! It's very very easy to not make false statements! > It might be disappointing if a company predicts they will be able to deliver a feature and it turns out that they can't, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were lying when they said they were going to. If you make a promise you cannot keep, you lied. Simple as that. Corporations should never receive the benefit of the doubt. > Because customers en masse largely don't know or care about the environment in Ecuador and no significant percentage of them are going to engage in any such boycott. The end-users filling up their cars at gas station are also not "customers" in any meaningful sense for Chevron, who is selling petroleum products wholesale in an entirely different market. Which is why the laws are needed. > Meanwhile, customers finding that Sears is no longer a good place to buy the things they need and shopping for appliances at Home Depot and Lowe's absolutely did have an effect on Sears and let them know that they were failing to meet the needs of their customers. Which resulted in Sears attempting to catch up VIA IP theft. They have lost multiple legal suites over this, with entire expose' written about it. Overall, this example is irrelevant, as Sears is a local company beholden to local consumers. Completely unlike major corporations like Chevron or Microsoft.

jq-r 3y ago

Generally I agree with you but this is dangerous: > Nations have started legislating laws against falsehoods after all. Unfortunately, this is just a tool in quite a large government's drawer for suppressing any kind of dissent. "My" government and their political party are the biggest spreaders of misinformation and blatant lies, but don't even for a second think this will be used against them or any lying corporation. This is squarely aimed at the political opposition, and even more so at anyone daring to upset the status quo. One might think that tool morality is a result on how it’s used, bit I would rather not have it because it’s ripe for abuse.