Very large social media companies _______ be able to moderate content on their platforms as they see fit, without regulation or interference by government that wouldn't also apply to, say, a small-circulation magazine or an internet discussion forum with a few hundred participants.
@interfluidity If people really want a neutral platform, they should lobby the government to start one. And then they can wallow in the hell they hath wrought.
@LouisIngenthron I'm not sure the desire is a neutral platform. It's exercising a degree of democratic agency over vast platforms, recognizing that your and my right to say what we want on exactly our own terms has different implications than, say, letting ABC/CBS/NBC (if you r old enough to get that) do the same. (The state de facto exercised a lot of control over broadcast networks, despite the first amendment. We might have this stuff better worked out now if it had been less tacit, de facto)
@interfluidity Right, but the state exercised that power because those networks were utilizing a limited spectrum that was owned and doled out by the state, not because they had a wide reach.
A democratic platform must be viewpoint-neutral in its moderation, almost by definition. And the federal government already has its hands tied when it comes to viewpoint discrimination, hence my suggestion.
@interfluidity Isn't cable TV proof that they went unregulated the moment the spectrum was vacated?
It may have been a pretext, but without that pretext, it doesn't pass constitutional muster.
@LouisIngenthron as organs became less influential, they became less regulated. i don't think that's a coincidence — "the constitution is not a suicide pact", and a media organ of sufficient reach and near-monopoly influence supplants government authority if it is not, overtly or tacitly, regulated by it. "constitutional muster" helps determines forms, but is independent of that fact.
@interfluidity Before I go further... what, exactly, kind of "government regulation or interference" would you advocate for social media?
@LouisIngenthron Mostly preventing the existence of platforms as vast and influential as twitter, facebook, etc and encouraging conditions under which a multitude of platforms with different and diverse allegiances emerge. I have no enthusiasm at all for state regulation of communications platforms, but I think it both naive and undesirable to imagine large platforms capable of discretionary shaping of public discourse can exist and be regulated solely in the interests of their owners.
@LouisIngenthron ("regulated" in the sense of controlled in that last sentence, i'm objecting to the idea that oligopoly communications platforms should have unfettered discretionary control in the way that a small publisher surely should.)
@interfluidity So, correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't it make way more sense to not touch the speech issues at all and instead just hit them from the anti-competitive monopoly angle directly?
@LouisIngenthron absolutely. i'm all for doing anything and everything to break them up. but here they are. until then, how do we deal with them? just give them the same freedoms of any 'zine editor (more actually, because Section 230 gives them immunities no 'zine editor ever had).
@interfluidity Section 230 provides zero protection for the content of their own speech, so in that sense, the law works equally for both social media and a zine.
If the zine had a website with a comment section, they'd be afforded the same protections under 230 as social media.
I'm always immediately suspicious of any idea that involves constitutional rights being restricted or suspended on arbitrary boundaries... That opens doors we really don't want open as a society.
If your main problem is "they're too big", then take them down for that reason directly, rather than taking a circuitous route that could harm our access to other rights.
@LouisIngenthron a 'zines comment section is afforded Section 230 protection, sure. but a small organ can't make its comment section its business model. Section 230 immunity certainly is not a constitutional rights, and I'd prefer we draw a lot more lines—hopefully more wise than arbitrary, but of course there are risks—in its boundaries. I'd love stronger antitrust too, but given the reality of political obstacles, you can't fight just one front. 1/
@LouisIngenthron regardless of what I want or what you want, while they are what they are, they are and will be regulated, tacitly if not constitutionally. the govts of India + China very obviously regulate what speech is tolerable on Musk's Twitter. US political risk has completely inverted Google's bias from exposing novelty to suppressing what is not already somehow certified as safe or valuable. Congress shall pass no law. Fine. Formally "free", necessarily regulated just less transparently.
@interfluidity Say we pass these laws. Donald Trump gets elected. He puts Ron DeSantis in charge as social media czar.
Thoughts?
@LouisIngenthron We know WTF we are fighting against. Is Musk any better than DeSantis? The regulation the right is currently after is basically no moderation, common carrier status. Mostly, that just kills the megasites, which is fine, better than Elon picks. As you say, if vigorously enforced (including "reach") the user experience would be terrible. Overtly viewpoint-specific regulation is and should remain unconstitutional, though of course tacitly it does and will exist.
@LouisIngenthron A nice thing about the Constitution is the kind of regulation it allows to be overt is mostly the kind of regulation that makes the megasites unworkable. Which is what I'd like to see.
@interfluidity Yes, I think Musk is objectively better than DeSantis, for one simple reason: I can simply choose not to use Musk's products, and then he has no power over me.
Whereas DeSantis has power over so many aspects of my life unless I choose to completely uproot myself and move to another state.
@LouisIngenthron if Musk is able to swing an election (i have no idea whether he is or not, but i wish it were implausible), you have to live with the result unless you move to another country. i'm not dissatisfied with Musk because he makes twitter bad as a user. who cares? i'm dissatisfied because he makes my country bad as a citizen.
@interfluidity If Musk is able to swing an election, it's only because enough of the electorate has *chosen* to listen to him. Nobody is forcing them to get their news on X. They chose that.
And, as much as I hate the guy, Musk has just as much right as Taylor Swift does to try to use his platform to influence people politically, even if we think that's bad. That's the core idea of free speech.
@LouisIngenthron I don't think taking control of an chokepoint of influence is "free speech". If people listen to shit he says, fine. If he (and Zuck etc) regulate what people see in their feeds to privilege voices they prefer and suppress alternatives, that is not free speech but its opposite.
@interfluidity His feed algorithm is functionally no different from a blockbuster employee recommendation shelf, other than scale. People can choose to partake or they can choose to ignore. Twitter's audience at its peak was only about 10% of the population, and many of those (including myself) have chosen not to continue partaking. Those who remain must therefore like what Musk has to offer, or share some affinity with his message, just as those who signed up to Truth social did so because they liked what Trump had to offer.
I guess when it comes down to it, what really irks me about the idea that Musk can control elections is that it dehumanizes the people who make the choice to take his message to the voting booth.
@LouisIngenthron scale and network effects are real things. at some level, a firecracker is functionally similar to an atom bomb, but their implications are quite different.
twitter was never a numerically huge platform, but it was and is a disproportionately influential platform. in particular, it was and remains where journalists talk to one another. that is not because they have any affinity for Musk and his message. 1/
@LouisIngenthron it’s because there’s a network effect that is important to their careers. groups of journalists, economists, some academic disciplines tried to coordinate a common exit, but they failed, and the network effect bas reverted to twitter. it is not dehumanizing to point that out. many, many people active on twitter will be glad to tell you they wish they were elsewhere and they detest Musk. network effects are powerful. 2/
@LouisIngenthron Public spectrum was the pretext. But I don’t think they’d have gone unregulated had they achieved comparable dominance by other means (any more than facebook / twitter google etc will, tacitly already have).
And it was hardly viewpoint neutral. The fairness doctrine demanded presentation of viewpoints a publisher might wish not to present, and let the state affirmatively define what viewpoints counted and what could (in fact should, must) be excluded.