The Internet's "Nazi Purge" Shows Who Really Controls Our Online Speech

["Dave Farber" <farber () gmail com>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
> Date: August 22, 2017 at 8:35:03 AM EDT
> To: Multiple recipients of Dewayne-Net <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>
> Subject: [Dewayne-Net] The Internet's "Nazi Purge" Shows Who Really Controls Our Online Speech
> Reply-To: dewayne-net () warpspeed com
>
> The Internet's "Nazi Purge" Shows Who Really Controls Our Online Speech
> You might not worry about companies censoring Nazis. But you should be worried about the unelected bros of Silicon 
> Valley being the judge and jury.
> By Jillian York
> Aug 21 2017
> <https://www.buzzfeed.com/jillianyork/silicon-valleys-nazi-purge>
>
> The Daily Stormer’s unceremonious booting from large swathes of the internet has made plenty of headlines; tech 
> companies, the story goes, are “joining the resistance.” Silicon Valley is conducting a “Nazi purge,” and 
> Charlottesville is “reshaping the fight against online hate.”
>
> But the demise of this hateful website has also raised a new debate about an old problem: Silicon Valley’s control of 
> our online speech.
>
> Companies like Facebook and Twitter have been making hard decisions about hate speech for a long time. These 
> platforms, as well as web-hosting companies and other intermediaries, are not governed by the First Amendment. 
> Instead, they must obey 47 U.S.C. § 230, known colloquially as “CDA 230.” This gives them immunity from liability for 
> most of the content they host, and says they are free to host (or not host) whatever they want.
>
> Those rights are important, but they also come with great responsibility. And I believe these companies are failing 
> to live up to that responsibility.
>
> The truth is companies get these decisions wrong a lot of the time. And because they’re not transparent about how 
> their rules are enforced or about how much content is taken down, we only hear about the bad decisions when they make 
> headlines. That is happening increasingly often these days, as those in media circles take more interest in the issue.
>
> Just this summer, Facebook used its hate speech policies to censor queer artists and activists for using words like 
> “dyke” and “fag”; Twitter booted several leftist activists, apparently for engaging in uncivil counterspeech; and 
> YouTube’s algorithms deleted masses of videos from the Syrian civil war that activists had archived for use in war 
> crimes investigations.
>
> This is nothing new. Over the years, I’ve watched as Silicon Valley companies have made globally important decisions 
> that have stirred less debate than this week’s Daily Stormer episode. Last year, when Twitter boasted that it deleted 
> 235,000 “terrorism-related” accounts from their service, hardly anyone blinked. But in that case, as in this one, we 
> need to ensure that these companies are accountable to their users, and that people have a path of recourse when they 
> are wronged.
>
> I’m not so worried about companies censoring Nazis, but I am worried about the implications it has for everyone else. 
> I’m worried about the unelected bros of Silicon Valley being the judge and jury, and thinking that mere censorship 
> solves the problem. I’m worried that, just like Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince woke up one morning and decided he’d 
> had enough of the Daily Stormer, some other CEO might wake up and do the same for Black Lives Matter or antifa. I’m 
> worried that we’re not thinking about this problem holistically.
>
> In the case of the Daily Stormer, companies were undoubtedly very aware of the site’s presence on their platforms and 
> made not just a moral decision, but a business one as well. But that’s not how content moderation typically works: In 
> most instances, companies rely on their users to report one another. The reports enter a queue that is then moderated 
> either by humans — often low-wage workers abroad whose job requires them to look at horrible images so you don’t have 
> to — or by algorithms. A decision is made and the content is either left up or removed.
>
> Some platforms, like Facebook, mete out punishment to their users, temporarily suspending them for up to 30 days; 
> others may boot users for their first or second infraction. Users are only able to appeal these corporate decisions 
> in certain circumstances.
>
> How comfortable you are with this kind of set up depends on your view of speech and who should police it. There are 
> different kinds of free speech advocates — some believe that a pluralistic, democratic society is nothing without 
> freedom of expression, and that we must protect the rights of all if we want to protect the most vulnerable. The 
> “slippery slope” argument is popular, although it’s not always convincing.
>
> [snip]
>
> Dewayne-Net RSS Feed: http://dewaynenet.wordpress.com/feed/
> Twitter: https://twitter.com/wa8dzp



-------------------------------------------
Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now
RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/18849915-ae8fa580
Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-aa268125
Unsubscribe Now: 
https://www.listbox.com/unsubscribe/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-32545cb4&post_id=20170822084602:D7CB1E96-8737-11E7-8756-F9CC8CAF95B8
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com