2 ms·
> Once you stop using moderation to implicitly endorse speech you aren't as responsible for anything that is said. This is the entire point of section 230. Are
by schoen 3y ago
> Once you stop using moderation to implicitly endorse speech you aren't as responsible for anything that is said. This is the entire point of section 230.
Are you suggesting that section 230 is meant to discourage Internet intermediaries from moderation?
The original intent of this law was to stop requiring intermediaries to choose between adopting a passive conduit role and having legal responsibility for content. The legislators hoped that providing a general protection from liability for user-generated content would encourage more moderation by intermediaries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230#Background_and_passage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230#Background_and_pas...
That might not have been the most pro-speech policy option overall but it was notionally very pluralist (with different platforms potentially having very different standards, purposes, goals, rules, communities, etc.) and it did manage to temper the previous somewhat paradoxical incentives, as well as providing a lot of legal certainty to facilitate the creation of new platforms of various sizes and models.
Pretty much everyone on the Internet is frustrated by moderation and sees pathologies and biases of moderation, intermediaries putting their thumb on scales, and so on. On the other hand, what we haven't seen is the enormous volume of litigation against intermediaries that would occur without §230. I expect people would literally be suing Y Combinator over HN moderation decisions. I can think of HN moderation decisions that I really disagree with, but it's impossible for me to imagine that having had those turn into lawsuits would somehow have been better for anyone.
- nonethewiser 3y agoIf you take moderation far enough you become a publisher
- timdev2 3y agoThat's not true. As far as the law is concerned, users/providers are shielded so long as they don't take part in authorship. You be as despotic or biased as you want, and you're still not considered the publisher of content provided by another user/provider.
- schoen 3y agoFurther to that, the idea that "if you take moderation far enough you become a publisher" is the situation prior to §230, that §230 was enacted in order to get rid of (so that there would no longer be a disincentive for intermediaries to choose to moderate!). https://www.techdirt.com/2020/06/23/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act/ https://www.techdirt.com/2020/06/23/hello-youve-been-referre... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230#Background_and_passage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_230#Background_and_pas...
- timdev2 3y agoYes, exactly that.