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I didn't realize how draconian and big brother-ish the law was: > AB 587 passed in September 2022, requiring social media platforms to submit a "terms of servi

I didn't realize how draconian and big brother-ish the law was: > AB 587 passed in September 2022, requiring social media platforms to submit a "terms of service report" semi-annually to California's attorney general, providing "a detailed description of content moderation practices used" and "information about whether, and if so how, the social media company defines and moderates" hate speech or racism, extremism or radicalization, disinformation or misinformation, harassment, and foreign political interference. Under the law, social media platforms must also provide information and statistics on any content moderation actions taken in those categories. This is quite literally thought police. You literally have to send the state's lawyers details on how you moderate content to ensure it complies with whatever arbitrary thing the state believes in at the time. This is clearly not constitutional and the state has no business whatsoever dictating how speech is moderated.

two_handfuls 3y ago
> the state has no business whatsoever dictating how speech is moderated. Red herring. It does not dictate anything, just requires companies to report what they’re doing.
- londons_explore 3y ago
  Reporting stats is usually step 1 to regulating those things... It won't be long before laws say things like "99% of takedowns must occur within 1 hour of a report being made" or "No more than 1% of users may see content which is later taken down on any given day, otherwise we will fine you for insufficient moderation" That, combined with a court making a few decisions on moderation (months after the fact), means that the only way way for a platform to make sure that < 1% of users see content taken down by a court later is to remove all except the safest content right away before anyone sees it. End result: Self policing to only uncontroversial boring stuff.
  - mingus88 3y ago
    Slippery slope fallacy
    - johngladtj 3y ago
      It's not a slippery slope when that's literally the law in the EU.
      - dzader 3y ago
        [dead]
      - atoav 3y ago
        And as an EU citizen: Good 1. Corporations having "free speech" is a fucking perversion of the original purpose of that law. Corporations are not people. Governments protecting corporate rights more than individual rights is the root of a good chunk of all problems the US is having right now. 2. I expect my government to scrutinize the hell out of corporations and protect the rights of individuals. Article 1 of the European Charter of Human Rights states: the dignity of man is inviolable. People having to be at the receiving end of discrimination, racism, sexism etc. is a violation of their dignity — their rights. Rights I expect them to protect. Now I always thought of people in the US to be adamant about individual freedoms, but maybe I have been wrong and it is more about shilling for corporations and letting them divide you into small, easy to manage camps with the help of corporate media and lobbied politicians that get surprisingly rich when they are in office. Government + Corporations = Fascism And there is 99% chance you won't profit from it
        mrguyorama 3y ago
        It upsets me that "companies shouldn't have the same rights as people" is apparently controversial in the US. A "company" is explicitly an organization that we throw a handful of benefits and handouts to as a society, like limited liability and apparently the unwillingness to punish you for crimes. Surely it's justified that this legal fiction should be held to some standards that you couldn't necessarily hold a person to. Hell, if you believe "Free speech" should apply to businesses, then "False marketing" laws should be unconstitutional! That's insane.
- JackFr 3y ago
  > It does not dictate anything, just requires companies to report what they’re doing. And what possible interest does the State of California have in gathering this information? It's close enough to have a chilling effect, and thus the state should have to provide a justification.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - Ar-Curunir 3y ago
    LOL, if we left everything to companies, they wouldn't even report the list of ingredients they put in your food. I get that governments can overreach, but not all constraints on private entities are bad.
    - JackFr 3y ago
      Yes, there is an obvious public health interest in food labelling. I feel that the compelling interest is not obvious here, and given that the law is not censorship, but lives in the same zip code as censorship, the state should demonstrate a public interest being served that would withstand 1st amendment scrutiny.
  - atoav 3y ago
    One possible interest: You are living in a democracy. Social media has shown that there are strong tendencies to support abolishment of democracy (or how it is also called: fascism). It is expected of a government to resist against any tendencies to abolish democratic rule and peaceful transition of power. That is the single most important task given to a government by us. And soley for that purpose we often allow them to wear a big stick — why? Because outside of democratic rule the law is a arbitrary set of words that can be interpreted by the ruling class in any way they please and that isn't good for the individual, unless you are foolish enough to believe you'd end up in that ruling class (that is 50% of the appeal of fascism). Now as a government would have any right to forcefully resist coup attempts and such, it can (and does) also restrict certain social movements that aim for its abolishment. Usually this happens more on the left than on the right tho, remember the whole communism craze in the US?
titzer 3y ago
Huh? This requires the actual thought police--you know, the unaccountable social media platforms--to publish their rules. Or would you rather they just continuing applying their own unaccountable and secret moderation with no consequences or oversight?
- nemo44x 3y ago
  > Or would you rather they just continuing applying their own unaccountable and secret moderation with no consequences or oversight? Yes, it is their business. If people don't like that and advertisers, etc don't like that then don't use it or advertise there. The market will determine if it's viable or not. The state has no business policing that.
  - vman81 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - the_optimist 3y ago
      [flagged]
  - titzer 3y ago
    It's a shock to me that the "free speech absolutists" running X can't be bothered to even put down their policy in writing. Actually, it's not a shock. They don't want it because they're not free speech absolutists and are actually planning on being unaccountable, biased, and corrupt.
    - the_optimist 3y ago
      [flagged]
    - taylodl 3y ago
      BINGO!!! You sir have hit the nail on the head! We know X is moderating content (so much for "free speech", but that's another issue). What we don't know is on what basis the content is being moderated, what's being moderated, and so forth. In other words, Elon Musk is flat-out lying when he calls X a "free speech" platform. It is not - and that's not necessarily a bad thing. What is bad is hiding your moderation policies. That's what this law addresses. Moderation is okay so long as it's done in the open. Everyone is talking about California taking away free speech, what they're really doing is preserving free speech by forcing companies to disclose when speech was moderated. That is serving the public good.
XorNot 3y ago
Companies don't have thoughts. How do you think a company hires and trains moderators, or develops classifier systems to moderate, without already having documented all of this already?
throwawaay3455 3y ago
[flagged]
303uru 3y ago
>to ensure it complies with whatever arbitrary thing the state believes in at the time Nope, see you had to whip that part up out of the ether to make your case.
user3939382 3y ago
From my perspective, social media censorship is a huge threat to our rights and democracy and these executives decided they were going to use their massive influence to set the bounds of acceptable discourse at the population level. That behavior is the root problem. I'd prefer the government is hands off to the extent possible, but something has to be done one way or the other. Ideally the platforms would be painfully fined or even people sent to jail for what they did with the Hunter Biden laptop story which AFAIK illegally changed the result of our presidential election.
hindsightbias 3y ago
I'm glad that HN recognizes Corporations are people.
- Karellen 3y ago
  Alternative take: HN recognizes that the law recognizes corporations are people.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Jerrrry 3y ago
> it complies with whatever arbitrary thing the state Except if they'd like to keep their "anointed" status, from both a legal (platform vs publish) and extrajudicial (third party doctrine, parallel construction) Security vs Convenience, as always; the security of the privacy of personal data and papers, versus the convenience of the government's interests of national importance, such as, in their minds, maintaining social order. If it's our government's job to keep the peace, our job to make sure the ends justify the means.
- mrguyorama 3y ago
  >platform vs publish This myth is so stupid. There is no distinction in law. There is only a distinction for "common carrier" which has a MUCH higher legal requirement of basically being physically required for survival, and even then, often not applied to systems which arguably should be a common carrier (internet)
atoav 3y ago
Sorry to chime in, but that law just says they have to disclose it, not that it has to follow a certain ideology. That is not thought police IMO. There is no right for social media corps to not have to disclose how they moderate their content. That isn't infringing on their free speech, just like you having to file your taxes isn't infringing on yours. And if there are hate speech laws, they have to of course comply with them. That being said, tobacco manufacturers have been forced by law to adjust the designs of their packaging in many parts of the world (including showing full scale pictures that cover everything else). I am not a big fan of governments, but to me even that isn't thought police — it is a governments job to weigh different rights against each other. In this case the tobacco manufacturers right to choose their own packaging design has been given lower priority than the health iasues it causes within society. We expect governments to make these weighing deciaions all the time. Now maybe it is because I am a European, but: - A company having the right to free speech is a perversion of the purpose of the rights these laws were originally intended to protect. But for the sake of discussion let's assume they shall have that right - A government could still weigh the rights of X against those whose rights are harmed by the speech of X. Just because you have free speech doesn't mean it trumps any other right in all circumstances, especially if we are talking about the company of one of the richest persons on earth (and quite frankly: a society where this was the case would be very distopic). A government has to weigh the rights of a corporation with the impact that corporation has on society. That is part of why we have governments. So maybe the point where we disagree is that I literally believe that e.g. a person who has been born with a dark skin has the right not to be discriminated against — and that it is the job of a government to ensure that these rights are not violated by others. Not at all cost of course and naturally that right has to be weighed against other rights, but with great power comes great responsibility. I'd rather live in a nation where the rights of the individual are taken more seriously than those of corporations, but hey, billionairs in a pickle and such.
- nemo44x 3y ago
  > So maybe the point where we disagree is that I literally believe that e.g. a person who has been born with a dark skin has the right not to be discriminated against — and that it is the job of a government to ensure that these rights are not violated by others. You don't have a right to not be offended. If someone wants to write an op-ed about why a certain group of people are awful and someone wants to publish that then so be it. The government's job isn't to make sure someone has hurt feelings. Everyone else will condemn them and they'll be marginalized for it and life will go on. Now, if someone wanted to open a public business and not allow a certain group of people allowed in to shop then the government can step in. That's not speech but rather discrimination.
mrguyorama 3y ago
>This is quite literally thought police. It is not. "We make no attempt to moderate content that is not illegal" is 100% compliant report. The law is about providing information to consumers about the systems they participate in. It's literally a transparency law.

two_handfuls 3y ago

> the state has no business whatsoever dictating how speech is moderated. Red herring. It does not dictate anything, just requires companies to report what they’re doing.

londons_explore 3y ago
Reporting stats is usually step 1 to regulating those things... It won't be long before laws say things like "99% of takedowns must occur within 1 hour of a report being made" or "No more than 1% of users may see content which is later taken down on any given day, otherwise we will fine you for insufficient moderation" That, combined with a court making a few decisions on moderation (months after the fact), means that the only way way for a platform to make sure that < 1% of users see content taken down by a court later is to remove all except the safest content right away before anyone sees it. End result: Self policing to only uncontroversial boring stuff.
- mingus88 3y ago
  Slippery slope fallacy
  - johngladtj 3y ago
    It's not a slippery slope when that's literally the law in the EU.
    - dzader 3y ago
      [dead]
    - atoav 3y ago
      And as an EU citizen: Good 1. Corporations having "free speech" is a fucking perversion of the original purpose of that law. Corporations are not people. Governments protecting corporate rights more than individual rights is the root of a good chunk of all problems the US is having right now. 2. I expect my government to scrutinize the hell out of corporations and protect the rights of individuals. Article 1 of the European Charter of Human Rights states: the dignity of man is inviolable. People having to be at the receiving end of discrimination, racism, sexism etc. is a violation of their dignity — their rights. Rights I expect them to protect. Now I always thought of people in the US to be adamant about individual freedoms, but maybe I have been wrong and it is more about shilling for corporations and letting them divide you into small, easy to manage camps with the help of corporate media and lobbied politicians that get surprisingly rich when they are in office. Government + Corporations = Fascism And there is 99% chance you won't profit from it
      - mrguyorama 3y ago
        It upsets me that "companies shouldn't have the same rights as people" is apparently controversial in the US. A "company" is explicitly an organization that we throw a handful of benefits and handouts to as a society, like limited liability and apparently the unwillingness to punish you for crimes. Surely it's justified that this legal fiction should be held to some standards that you couldn't necessarily hold a person to. Hell, if you believe "Free speech" should apply to businesses, then "False marketing" laws should be unconstitutional! That's insane.
JackFr 3y ago
> It does not dictate anything, just requires companies to report what they’re doing. And what possible interest does the State of California have in gathering this information? It's close enough to have a chilling effect, and thus the state should have to provide a justification.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- Ar-Curunir 3y ago
  LOL, if we left everything to companies, they wouldn't even report the list of ingredients they put in your food. I get that governments can overreach, but not all constraints on private entities are bad.
  - JackFr 3y ago
    Yes, there is an obvious public health interest in food labelling. I feel that the compelling interest is not obvious here, and given that the law is not censorship, but lives in the same zip code as censorship, the state should demonstrate a public interest being served that would withstand 1st amendment scrutiny.
- atoav 3y ago
  One possible interest: You are living in a democracy. Social media has shown that there are strong tendencies to support abolishment of democracy (or how it is also called: fascism). It is expected of a government to resist against any tendencies to abolish democratic rule and peaceful transition of power. That is the single most important task given to a government by us. And soley for that purpose we often allow them to wear a big stick — why? Because outside of democratic rule the law is a arbitrary set of words that can be interpreted by the ruling class in any way they please and that isn't good for the individual, unless you are foolish enough to believe you'd end up in that ruling class (that is 50% of the appeal of fascism). Now as a government would have any right to forcefully resist coup attempts and such, it can (and does) also restrict certain social movements that aim for its abolishment. Usually this happens more on the left than on the right tho, remember the whole communism craze in the US?

titzer 3y ago

Huh? This requires the actual thought police--you know, the unaccountable social media platforms--to publish their rules. Or would you rather they just continuing applying their own unaccountable and secret moderation with no consequences or oversight?

nemo44x 3y ago
> Or would you rather they just continuing applying their own unaccountable and secret moderation with no consequences or oversight? Yes, it is their business. If people don't like that and advertisers, etc don't like that then don't use it or advertise there. The market will determine if it's viable or not. The state has no business policing that.
- vman81 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - the_optimist 3y ago
    [flagged]
- titzer 3y ago
  It's a shock to me that the "free speech absolutists" running X can't be bothered to even put down their policy in writing. Actually, it's not a shock. They don't want it because they're not free speech absolutists and are actually planning on being unaccountable, biased, and corrupt.
  - the_optimist 3y ago
    [flagged]
  - taylodl 3y ago
    BINGO!!! You sir have hit the nail on the head! We know X is moderating content (so much for "free speech", but that's another issue). What we don't know is on what basis the content is being moderated, what's being moderated, and so forth. In other words, Elon Musk is flat-out lying when he calls X a "free speech" platform. It is not - and that's not necessarily a bad thing. What is bad is hiding your moderation policies. That's what this law addresses. Moderation is okay so long as it's done in the open. Everyone is talking about California taking away free speech, what they're really doing is preserving free speech by forcing companies to disclose when speech was moderated. That is serving the public good.

XorNot 3y ago

Companies don't have thoughts. How do you think a company hires and trains moderators, or develops classifier systems to moderate, without already having documented all of this already?

throwawaay3455 3y ago

[flagged]

303uru 3y ago

>to ensure it complies with whatever arbitrary thing the state believes in at the time Nope, see you had to whip that part up out of the ether to make your case.

user3939382 3y ago

From my perspective, social media censorship is a huge threat to our rights and democracy and these executives decided they were going to use their massive influence to set the bounds of acceptable discourse at the population level. That behavior is the root problem. I'd prefer the government is hands off to the extent possible, but something has to be done one way or the other. Ideally the platforms would be painfully fined or even people sent to jail for what they did with the Hunter Biden laptop story which AFAIK illegally changed the result of our presidential election.

hindsightbias 3y ago

I'm glad that HN recognizes Corporations are people.

Karellen 3y ago
Alternative take: HN recognizes that the law recognizes corporations are people.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

Jerrrry 3y ago

> it complies with whatever arbitrary thing the state Except if they'd like to keep their "anointed" status, from both a legal (platform vs publish) and extrajudicial (third party doctrine, parallel construction) Security vs Convenience, as always; the security of the privacy of personal data and papers, versus the convenience of the government's interests of national importance, such as, in their minds, maintaining social order. If it's our government's job to keep the peace, our job to make sure the ends justify the means.

mrguyorama 3y ago
>platform vs publish This myth is so stupid. There is no distinction in law. There is only a distinction for "common carrier" which has a MUCH higher legal requirement of basically being physically required for survival, and even then, often not applied to systems which arguably should be a common carrier (internet)

atoav 3y ago

Sorry to chime in, but that law just says they have to disclose it, not that it has to follow a certain ideology. That is not thought police IMO. There is no right for social media corps to not have to disclose how they moderate their content. That isn't infringing on their free speech, just like you having to file your taxes isn't infringing on yours. And if there are hate speech laws, they have to of course comply with them. That being said, tobacco manufacturers have been forced by law to adjust the designs of their packaging in many parts of the world (including showing full scale pictures that cover everything else). I am not a big fan of governments, but to me even that isn't thought police — it is a governments job to weigh different rights against each other. In this case the tobacco manufacturers right to choose their own packaging design has been given lower priority than the health iasues it causes within society. We expect governments to make these weighing deciaions all the time. Now maybe it is because I am a European, but: - A company having the right to free speech is a perversion of the purpose of the rights these laws were originally intended to protect. But for the sake of discussion let's assume they shall have that right - A government could still weigh the rights of X against those whose rights are harmed by the speech of X. Just because you have free speech doesn't mean it trumps any other right in all circumstances, especially if we are talking about the company of one of the richest persons on earth (and quite frankly: a society where this was the case would be very distopic). A government has to weigh the rights of a corporation with the impact that corporation has on society. That is part of why we have governments. So maybe the point where we disagree is that I literally believe that e.g. a person who has been born with a dark skin has the right not to be discriminated against — and that it is the job of a government to ensure that these rights are not violated by others. Not at all cost of course and naturally that right has to be weighed against other rights, but with great power comes great responsibility. I'd rather live in a nation where the rights of the individual are taken more seriously than those of corporations, but hey, billionairs in a pickle and such.

nemo44x 3y ago
> So maybe the point where we disagree is that I literally believe that e.g. a person who has been born with a dark skin has the right not to be discriminated against — and that it is the job of a government to ensure that these rights are not violated by others. You don't have a right to not be offended. If someone wants to write an op-ed about why a certain group of people are awful and someone wants to publish that then so be it. The government's job isn't to make sure someone has hurt feelings. Everyone else will condemn them and they'll be marginalized for it and life will go on. Now, if someone wanted to open a public business and not allow a certain group of people allowed in to shop then the government can step in. That's not speech but rather discrimination.

mrguyorama 3y ago

>This is quite literally thought police. It is not. "We make no attempt to moderate content that is not illegal" is 100% compliant report. The law is about providing information to consumers about the systems they participate in. It's literally a transparency law.