Louis Ingenthron @LouisIngenthron@social.cleverlibre.org

@ottocrat That's literally how. If everyone stopped buying his shit and paying attention to him, he would, as dril once said, shrink into a corncob.

@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.

@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.

@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.

@interfluidity Say we pass these laws. Donald Trump gets elected. He puts Ron DeSantis in charge as social media czar.

Thoughts?

@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.

@freemo @trinsec Oh, I love Judge Judy. It's pure catharsis watching inconsiderate dimwits get thoroughly owned by a yenta on national TV.

@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?

@freemo @trinsec YouTube TV. My guilty pleasures are Shark Tank and Judge Judy.

@trinsec @freemo Yeah, ngl, I torrented it like a decade ago. It's so much better when you can just set the whole series on random with no commercials.

@trinsec @freemo True, but there are definitely some notable exceptions. Especially when Margaret puts him in his place.

@freemo On that note, I've been slowly collecting some reaction GIFs from that show if you want to use them:
https://giphy.com/channel/MashGifs

@freemo Ah, yeah, that's a good one.

@interfluidity Before I go further... what, exactly, kind of "government regulation or interference" would you advocate for social media?

@Zeugs @senficon lmao @ we have so many euphemisms for "died" that AI can't parse or convincingly replicate them.