Resolved that Twitter can legally boot you for any reason, other than membership in a protected class

Great Debates
41

Everything you quoted is correct and true, but until there is more competition and regulation among cloud providers (leased elastic computing), I don’t feel 100% honest saying “leave Twitter alone, go start your own microblog network.” Parler did that, got kneecapped for their trouble, and is now hosted on Russian infrastructure outside of US jurisdiction.

So, tl;dr, regulate elastic computing as something like a common carrier. Divest AWS from Amazon and do the same to other providers when they approach monopoly status. Leave social networks alone; anyone displeased with Twitter can commission a platform that looks like whatever they want.

42

They did that because they have Russian backing to begin with, not for lack of options. We both know that Parler could have rolled a rack into any data center of their choosing and gone to town.

I think the Amazon/AWS discussion is best left for a different thread. I started this because there were two different attempts to have discussions that were basically driven by the Trump Twitter ban. They kept meandering to the point that no one seemed to even know what questions were being asked.

43

I agree with OP and the resolution stated therein.

~Max

44

That’s exactly the point. We regulate financial businesses for the good of society. We regulate natural resource companies for the good of society. Why are people so horrified at the idea of regulating social media companies? What is wrong with demanding transparency in the algorithms they use to promote tweets/articles, or fair terms of service applied consistently?

And you’re agreeing with them? I’ve never seen so many progressives extolling the virtues of the free market before in my life.

There are already plenty of regulations that only apply to companies over a certain size. Do the same for this.

45

We don’t demand banks reveal their proprietary algorithms, and my bank is free to close my account at their discretion.

And you’re doing it wrong; “What is wrong with” isn’t an argument. You’re free to make one, of course.

46

“Libruls hate the free market” is a reductive strawman. You can certainly do better than that. Perhaps try reading my posts in context, look at my suggested relationship between what needs regulating and what doesn’t, and respond to that.

47

I don’t think that anyone is horrified, that’s just something that you made up to personalize the argument. Not sure why you would choose to do that.

Disagreement with a proposition is not being horrified by it.

As a consumer, nothing. If you don’t like the algorithms, then don’t use it. When you ask for the government to get involved, it’s a bit higher of a bar to justify. You want the government to come in and get involved in the area of free speech, and that’s a fairly dicey thing to ask of it.

You have to ask more than “what is wrong with”, and more make an argument as to why proactive measures should be taken to alleviate the concerns that you have expressed.

Your argument from incredulity is simply an application of fallacious logic, and doesn’t make much of a persuasive case. Progressives have never had a problem with the free market. All progressives ever point out is where the free market fails to meet the needs of those who depend on it for their elements of survival.

You have failed to make a persuasive case that government intervention is necessary in order to preserve one’s ability to express themselves. The only argument that you have made is that government intervention is necessary to protect you from any consequence of your speech. I disagree that that is the government’s job.

Perhaps the very fact that those who usually express doubts as to the free market’s ability to ensure that everyone has the elements of survival do not feel that this sort of regulation is necessary should give you some insight.

I could very well express the same incredulity that I’ve never seen so many conservatives extolling the virtues of government regulation.

Not all that many. Most regulations apply to an entire industry, or to the entire workforce. Very, very few have any form of exceptions carved out for smaller companies.

I cannot go ahead and open my own oil refining company without complying with the same regulations that Exxon has to comply with, even if I were a smaller entity. In fact, due to the nature of the humans that are in charge of actually investigating and enforcing these regulations, Exxon can get away with things that I would not.

So, yeah, in the same way, twitter would be able to get away with things that the SDMB wouldn’t be able to get away with.

Once there is any form of regulatory body, that becomes subject to regulatory capture. The larger companies would be able to lobby for regulations that make competition harder to create, and it would be a revolving door between their employees and the regulators that are supposed to investigate and enforce their regulations.

This would not be an easy industry to put in piecemeal regulation. What criteria would you use? Company revenue, number of employees, number of users? How would you regulate overseas companies? Would you not allow users in your country to use a social media site hosted in a country that was not under your regulations? Would you not allow me to go ahead and move my servers and my company to another country in order to get around them?

You are asking for some pretty big changes in government oversight over the individual right of free speech and expression. When it is pointed out that this is much more complex, and involves some pretty concerning reaches of the government into the rights of free speech and expression, you just handwave that away. Your demands that something be done, without actually saying what it is, specifically, that you want to be done is no more than simple complaining that things are not exactly as you want them to be.

Things will never be exactly as you want them to be, which is why, in the case of an industry that probably is the closest humanity has ever had to a free market, asking the government to come in and put its thumb on the scales should be put under some pretty strict scrutiny.

48

Well the two separate thread openers both stated the questions were these.

Sorry if what was written is too obtuse for you. I do try my best.

But this is your OP. And so far as your proposition? Twitter alone? No.

Can Twitter legally boot anyone off for any or no reason? Yes. If they, and the several other platforms that currently dominate the social media platform space, with no statement or reason given, decided in the face of a Trump win, to try to win governmental favor by slowly kicking off those posting that wearing masks was good, and to allow those who said mask wearing was bad for your health, causing low oxygen and high CO2 and rebreathing of your own germs … that would be legal. They can currently selectively allow whatever disinformation they want and disallow whatever factual information they want. To fawn for favor if they want.

Those who do not see these few CEOs as having control of overwhelmingly dominant market share would have no problem with that. The marketplace would fix it.

Those who do have a problem with it do not see it as a 1A issue, other than awareness of how 1A assures the companies of their rights as corporate persons.

Having access to the platform is not giving an audience. If I had a Twitter feed my audience might be a friend or so and maybe my kids. My wife would not follow me I suspect… she hears me bloviate in real life enough!

I get the argument that ease of entry of any tiny player into the platform marketplace currently so dominated by a few behemoths controlled by a few individuals means that almost any voice has a place it could be heard, theoretically. And that the Trump in particular, as a specific case, has many other ways too many other to be heard, and has long been a major source of harmful disinformation.

Let me ask you this though, as a hypothetical …

Is there a degree of market dominance by one to several companies acting in concert with each other, that would concern you? Or would it be fine so long as they do not engage in anticompetitive behaviors at any level of market dominance with its power used to any end, inclusive of fawning for favor from those with political power inclusive of wannabe autocrats?

Do the public interests I listed exist in your take?

49

They can, but we have a right to ask whether this is fair and in the public interest.

Far be it from me to defend Donald Trump, but we need to look beyond one distasteful individual and consider the kinds of disproportionate power and influence these tech companies can wield.

50

Government regulations are often implemented specifically because private companies are not sufficiently self-regulating and are thus allowing behaviors, actions, etc harmful to the public (or their employees, the environment, the market and so forth) to happen. It would be odd to say that we need to regulate social media more because they’re being too conscientious about removing people and accounts responsible for, say, inciting and planning violence or other crimes.

The SDMB have been fairly clear about the incentives for moderation - at a basic level, allowing individuals to violate the agreed terms and behavioral norms of the board risks driving away everyone else, resulting in the death of the board. And allowing people to promote or organize illegal activities courts actual RL legal action against the board’s owners. There is far more reason to demand that social media sites do “boot” people who damage or threaten their existence than to allow them to continue with toxic behavior of whatever sort.

51

Huh?

Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act expressly provides that the owners of the board are NOT legally liable for posts made by the people who are posting to the board. It also provides that boards like this may choose to moderate, or not moderate, the content that people post on their website, without incurring legal liability for their moderation choices.

I agree with you about the SDMB’s moderation decisions as they relate to issues of behavioral norms and the general popularity and health of the board, but the argument made by the SDMB that they prohibit the promotion of illegal activity because it makes them legally liable are, and always have been, wrong.

52

I suppose - or was the argument simply that it makes them more likely to get sued (justifiably or not)?

53

Pretty much, yeah.

And my concern would be that, if you got the government involved, then the larger players that have more influence over the government would then have more ability to restrict the market.

54

I think that this is a legitimate concern. In recent congressional hearings about social media, some of the biggest players in the game, like Twitter and Facebook, have expressed considerable willingness to be regulated, and have also suggested they would be amenable to some reduction in the protections offered by Section 230.

If the government imposes regulations, then complying with those regulations will cost money. If the government rewrites Section 230 in a way that mandates greater efforts on the part of social media companies to track and regulate and remove (some definition of) unsavory speech, then that will also cost money.

Massive companies like Twitter and Facebook can easily spend the millions or tens of millions of dollars it would take to comply with the new regulatory framework. A new or much smaller social media company might be driven out of business by the increased cost.

It has periodically been the case, in the history of American business, that large and established firms are amenable to greater government regulation, because that regulation can sometimes help them entrench and protect their market domination. I’m a progressive who believes that there are places where government regulation is absolutely necessary, but we need to be cognizant of the consequences, and we need to recognize that regulation doesn’t always level the playing field or benefit the consumer.

55

To make sure I understand - your concern centers around a few powerful companies exerting control over the government, getting the government to implement measures that favor them, so therefore you believe that government should have less to do do with how their power is used, and the transparency of how it is used, no matter how that power use impacts any possible public interest regarding disinformation and/or access to a diversity of ideas and dissent?

56

Post 204 in a thread is a thread opener? Here are the OPs in question, neither of which states those questions:

The first one could have easily been a GQ, as it had a factual answer that almost everyone but the OP and the person who started the second OP in question agreed on, yet it continued until a moderator closed it because there was no actual debate to be had.

The second one, well, I’ll let that one speak for itself, but it also doesn’t ask the questions you seem to think it does.

57

One of the two OPs was this one

It indeed was asking the question.

The specific impetus was Navalny’s take. The concern from a dissident’s perspective. His awareness of how autocrats accomplish control over the public square with powerful private companies as their wink wink nudge nudge accomplices.

58

Sure, we have the right to ask. The platforms in question have the right to tell you and I to fuck right off.

Remember that I specifically chose Twitter as I think there are potential antitrust issues that could be discussed around Google and Facebook, for example, just that those discussions have shit-all to do with freedom of speech or expression. Twitter is just not that powerful. If I ran the 45th largest newspaper or the 45th largest television network, no one would be whining about my monopolistic power. Hell, Facebook has a subsidiary (Instagram) that is more popular than Twitter.

59

Maybe we disagree on what the term OP means, but you just linked to post 36 in one of the threads.

60

Nope. You are mistaken. Confused. Wrong.

I started that thread and it WAS the OP. The opening post. It was then merged. See the mod note to that effect post 51 or 52? Really it was pretty clear even if what had been from which was not.

One of the two you linked to was a closed thread. Locked. NOT merged, NOT one of the OPs.