5 ms·

How is an elected government with checks and balances worse than a faceless corporation?

genocidicbunny 2y ago
The government tends to have a monopoly on violence, which is quite the difference. A faceless corporation will have a harder time fining you, garnishing your wages, charging you with criminal acts. (For now at least...)
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2y ago
  Conversely, the US government in particular will have a harder time with bans (first amendment), shadow bans (sixth amendment), hiding details about their recommendation algorithms (FOIA). The "checks and balances" part is important.
- mrguyorama 2y ago
  >The government tends to have a monopoly on violence They don't literally, as can be seen by that guy who got roughed up by the Pinkertons for the horror of accidentally being sent a Magic card he shouldn't have been. Nobody went to jail for that. So corporations have at least as much power over your life as the government, and you don't get to vote out corporations. Tell me, how do I "choose a different company" with, for example, Experian, who keeps losing my private info, refuses to assign me a valid credit score despite having a robust financial history, and can legally ruin my life?
  - aidenn0 2y ago
    > They don't literally, as can be seen by that guy who got roughed up by the Pinkertons for the horror of accidentally being sent a Magic card he shouldn't have been. Source for that? I found [1] which sounds like intimidation; maybe a case for assault depending on how they "frightened his wife" but nothing about potentiall battery, which "roughed up" would seem to imply. The Pinkertons do enough shady stuff that there's not a need to exaggerate what they do. 1: https://www.polygon.com/23695923/mtg-aftermath-pinkerton-raid-leaked-cards https://www.polygon.com/23695923/mtg-aftermath-pinkerton-rai...
bentley 2y ago
A faceless corporation can't throw me in jail for hosting an indie web forum.
- mikewarot 2y ago
  A faceless corporation could be encouraged to use it's algorithm for profit in a way that gets you killed.... as was the main point of the article.
  - krapp 2y ago
    That's far more abstract than sending men with guns to your house.
  - personomas 2y ago
    [dead]
  - falcolas 2y ago
    That can also be done today by way of the government (at least in the US): swatting. To be a bit cliched, there's a rather a lot of inattention and time that lets a child kill themselves after watching a video.
  - tedunangst 2y ago
    So the theory is the girl in question was going to start competing with TikTok, so they showed a suicide inducing video to silence her?
- nradov 2y ago
  True, but this particular case and Section 230 are only about civil liability. Regardless of the final outcome after the inevitable appeals, no one will go to jail. At most they'll have to pay damages.
  - falcolas 2y ago
    > no one will go to jail Did you know that there's has been a homeowner jailed for breaking his HOA's rules about lawn maintenance? The chances are good that someone will go to jail.
personomas 2y ago
[dead]
dehrmann 2y ago
I can sue the corporation. I can start a competing corporation. Elected governments also aren't as free as you'd think. Two parties control 99% of US politics. Suppose I'm not a fan of trade wars; both parties are in favor of them right now.
- pixl97 2y ago
  >I can sue the corporation. I can start a competing corporation. Ah, the libertarian way. I, earning $40,000 a year will take on the corporate giant that has a multimillion dollar legal budget and 30 full time lawyers and win... I know, I saw it in a movie once. The law books are filled with story after story of corporations doing fully illegal shit, then using money to delay it in court for decades... then laughably getting a tiny fine that represents less than 1% of the profits. TANSTAFL.
- kmeisthax 2y ago
  Big Tech is a government, we just call it a corporation.
  - matwood 2y ago
    And it's unelected.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - passwordoops 2y ago
    That's what most people miss
- BriggyDwiggs42 2y ago
  >I can sue the corporation. I can start a competing corporation. Yeah good luck with that buddy. I’m sorry, but you can’t do a thing to these behemoths. At least when a government bends you over it loses your vote, which sorta kinda matters to them. A corporation is incentivized to disregard your interests unless you are profitable to them, in which case they treat you like glorified livestock.
gspencley 2y ago
Government is force. It is laws, police, courts and the ability to seriously screw up your life if it chooses. A corporation might have "power" in an economic sense. It might have market significant presence in the marketplace. That presence might pressure or influence you in certain ways that you would prefer it not, such as the fact that all of your friends and family are customers/users of that faceless corporation. But what the corporation cannot do is put you in jail, seize your assets, prevent you from starting a business, dictate what you can or can't do with your home etc. Government is a necessary good. I'm no anarchist. But government is far more of a potential threat to liberty than the most "powerful" corporation could ever be.
- ohashi 2y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Wars#American_fruit_companies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Wars#American_fruit_com... You sure?
- em-bee 2y ago
  But what the corporation cannot do is put you in jail, seize your assets, prevent you from starting a business, dictate what you can or can't do with your home etc. a corporation can "put me in jail" for copyright violations, accuse me of criminal conduct (happened in the UK, took them years to fix), seize my money (paypal, etc), destroy my business (amazon, google)... But government is far more of a potential threat to liberty than the most "powerful" corporation could ever be. you (in the US) should vote for a better government. i'll trust my government to protect my liberty over most corporations any day.
  - srackey 2y ago
    No, they can appeal to the state to get them to do it. But you still think parliament actually controls the government as opposed to Whitehall, so I understand why this may be a little intellectually challenging for you.
    - em-bee 2y ago
      they can appeal to the state to get them to do it the end result is the same. Whitehall 1: i was talking about the US government and my own. 2: i am not from the UK therefore your comment is entirely inappropriate.
lostmsu 2y ago
You can trivially choose not to associate with a corporation. You can't really do so with your government.
- vkou 2y ago
  Trivially is doing a lot of lifting in that. By that same logic, you can 'trivially' influence a democratic government, you have no such control over a corporation.
  - opo 2y ago
    >...By that same logic, you can 'trivially' influence a democratic government, you have no such control over a corporation. That is a misrepresentation of the message you are replying too: >>You can trivially choose not to associate with a corporation. You can't really do so with your government. You won't get into legal trouble if you don't have a Facebook account, or a Twitter account, or use a search engine than Google, etc. Try to ignore the rules setup by your government and you will very quickly learn what having a monopoly of physical force within a given territory means. This is a huge difference between the two. As far as influencing a government or a corporation, I suspect (for example) that a letter to the CEO of even a large corporation will generally have more impact than a letter to the POTUS. (For example, customer emails forwarded from Bezos: https://www.quora.com/Whats-it-like-to-receive-a-question-mark-e-mail-from-Jeff-Bezos-at-Amazon-Inc https://www.quora.com/Whats-it-like-to-receive-a-question-ma...). This obviously will vary from company to company and maybe the President does something similar but my guess is maybe not.

The government tends to have a monopoly on violence, which is quite the difference. A faceless corporation will have a harder time fining you, garnishing your wages, charging you with criminal acts. (For now at least...)

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2y ago
Conversely, the US government in particular will have a harder time with bans (first amendment), shadow bans (sixth amendment), hiding details about their recommendation algorithms (FOIA). The "checks and balances" part is important.
mrguyorama 2y ago
>The government tends to have a monopoly on violence They don't literally, as can be seen by that guy who got roughed up by the Pinkertons for the horror of accidentally being sent a Magic card he shouldn't have been. Nobody went to jail for that. So corporations have at least as much power over your life as the government, and you don't get to vote out corporations. Tell me, how do I "choose a different company" with, for example, Experian, who keeps losing my private info, refuses to assign me a valid credit score despite having a robust financial history, and can legally ruin my life?
- aidenn0 2y ago
  > They don't literally, as can be seen by that guy who got roughed up by the Pinkertons for the horror of accidentally being sent a Magic card he shouldn't have been. Source for that? I found [1] which sounds like intimidation; maybe a case for assault depending on how they "frightened his wife" but nothing about potentiall battery, which "roughed up" would seem to imply. The Pinkertons do enough shady stuff that there's not a need to exaggerate what they do. 1: https://www.polygon.com/23695923/mtg-aftermath-pinkerton-raid-leaked-cards https://www.polygon.com/23695923/mtg-aftermath-pinkerton-rai...

bentley 2y ago

A faceless corporation can't throw me in jail for hosting an indie web forum.

mikewarot 2y ago
A faceless corporation could be encouraged to use it's algorithm for profit in a way that gets you killed.... as was the main point of the article.
- krapp 2y ago
  That's far more abstract than sending men with guns to your house.
- personomas 2y ago
  [dead]
- falcolas 2y ago
  That can also be done today by way of the government (at least in the US): swatting. To be a bit cliched, there's a rather a lot of inattention and time that lets a child kill themselves after watching a video.
- tedunangst 2y ago
  So the theory is the girl in question was going to start competing with TikTok, so they showed a suicide inducing video to silence her?
nradov 2y ago
True, but this particular case and Section 230 are only about civil liability. Regardless of the final outcome after the inevitable appeals, no one will go to jail. At most they'll have to pay damages.
- falcolas 2y ago
  > no one will go to jail Did you know that there's has been a homeowner jailed for breaking his HOA's rules about lawn maintenance? The chances are good that someone will go to jail.

personomas 2y ago

[dead]

dehrmann 2y ago

I can sue the corporation. I can start a competing corporation. Elected governments also aren't as free as you'd think. Two parties control 99% of US politics. Suppose I'm not a fan of trade wars; both parties are in favor of them right now.

pixl97 2y ago
>I can sue the corporation. I can start a competing corporation. Ah, the libertarian way. I, earning $40,000 a year will take on the corporate giant that has a multimillion dollar legal budget and 30 full time lawyers and win... I know, I saw it in a movie once. The law books are filled with story after story of corporations doing fully illegal shit, then using money to delay it in court for decades... then laughably getting a tiny fine that represents less than 1% of the profits. TANSTAFL.
kmeisthax 2y ago
Big Tech is a government, we just call it a corporation.
- matwood 2y ago
  And it's unelected.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- passwordoops 2y ago
  That's what most people miss
BriggyDwiggs42 2y ago
>I can sue the corporation. I can start a competing corporation. Yeah good luck with that buddy. I’m sorry, but you can’t do a thing to these behemoths. At least when a government bends you over it loses your vote, which sorta kinda matters to them. A corporation is incentivized to disregard your interests unless you are profitable to them, in which case they treat you like glorified livestock.

gspencley 2y ago

Government is force. It is laws, police, courts and the ability to seriously screw up your life if it chooses. A corporation might have "power" in an economic sense. It might have market significant presence in the marketplace. That presence might pressure or influence you in certain ways that you would prefer it not, such as the fact that all of your friends and family are customers/users of that faceless corporation. But what the corporation cannot do is put you in jail, seize your assets, prevent you from starting a business, dictate what you can or can't do with your home etc. Government is a necessary good. I'm no anarchist. But government is far more of a potential threat to liberty than the most "powerful" corporation could ever be.

ohashi 2y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Wars#American_fruit_companies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Wars#American_fruit_com... You sure?
em-bee 2y ago
But what the corporation cannot do is put you in jail, seize your assets, prevent you from starting a business, dictate what you can or can't do with your home etc. a corporation can "put me in jail" for copyright violations, accuse me of criminal conduct (happened in the UK, took them years to fix), seize my money (paypal, etc), destroy my business (amazon, google)... But government is far more of a potential threat to liberty than the most "powerful" corporation could ever be. you (in the US) should vote for a better government. i'll trust my government to protect my liberty over most corporations any day.
- srackey 2y ago
  No, they can appeal to the state to get them to do it. But you still think parliament actually controls the government as opposed to Whitehall, so I understand why this may be a little intellectually challenging for you.
  - em-bee 2y ago
    they can appeal to the state to get them to do it the end result is the same. Whitehall 1: i was talking about the US government and my own. 2: i am not from the UK therefore your comment is entirely inappropriate.

lostmsu 2y ago

You can trivially choose not to associate with a corporation. You can't really do so with your government.

vkou 2y ago
Trivially is doing a lot of lifting in that. By that same logic, you can 'trivially' influence a democratic government, you have no such control over a corporation.
- opo 2y ago
  >...By that same logic, you can 'trivially' influence a democratic government, you have no such control over a corporation. That is a misrepresentation of the message you are replying too: >>You can trivially choose not to associate with a corporation. You can't really do so with your government. You won't get into legal trouble if you don't have a Facebook account, or a Twitter account, or use a search engine than Google, etc. Try to ignore the rules setup by your government and you will very quickly learn what having a monopoly of physical force within a given territory means. This is a huge difference between the two. As far as influencing a government or a corporation, I suspect (for example) that a letter to the CEO of even a large corporation will generally have more impact than a letter to the POTUS. (For example, customer emails forwarded from Bezos: https://www.quora.com/Whats-it-like-to-receive-a-question-mark-e-mail-from-Jeff-Bezos-at-Amazon-Inc https://www.quora.com/Whats-it-like-to-receive-a-question-ma...). This obviously will vary from company to company and maybe the President does something similar but my guess is maybe not.