The Social Media Thread

Ironically, I provided a source on things Musk has created/contributed (well, he patented those things in his own name, so barring some reveals about him stealing those ideas from someone else, let's give the benefit of the doubt and assume he came up with those things himself). To reiterate: those things amounted to designing a car body, designing a car door, and designing the specific connection point on Tesla charging stations, plus advising the use of certain fibers on one car design. Sure, that's more than I would be able to make, but it doesn't exactly scream "super-genius inventor", either. Also, to tie it back to this thread, none of that has anything to do with running a social media platform.

But whatever, my source (who was citing another source while making those claims) was dismissed out of hand for "having a bias", rather than any explanation what points brought up were wrong and how. Yeah, Cody Johnson has a bias, I'm not an idiot who can't tell that he does. But given he was citing other sources while making those claims, one should at least note how he's either misrepresenting those sources or selectively cherry-picking bad/misleading sources, if one wants to dismiss what was said there - not just categorically assume that everything is lies because some people who worked with Musk claimed he is "indispensable" (which I feel could also mean a lot of things, not necessarily related to inventing things) to the company.

Edited by Kardavnil on May 24th 2022 at 1:18:26 AM

I have to agree that these patents, while respectable on their own, don't really fit the narrative of genius engineer very well. From the way people talk about Musk, I'd at least expect a patent for a rocket engine or somesuch.

Dilbert is currently doing a storyline parodying the Twitter buyout.

Could we perhaps not link Scott Adams? It's problematic enough that the main topic of discussion has fallen down the right-wing rabbit hole without grasping for the guy who's spend the past six years praising Trump.

Seconding this. Not a creator I want to support with my time given how far off the deep end he's sunk.

Huh, what? What's wrong with the guy?

He's a full-blown Trumpet. Has been for years.

Huh, I never realized. I sure couldn't tell from the webcomic, at least.

Well, I'm sorry to have upset you, then. No more Scott Adams for me.

Judges block Florida law that says Facebook and Twitter can’t ban politicians: Unlike Texas, Florida fails in attempt to overturn preliminary injunction.

This article raises some interesting questions: to what extent should politicians have a right to a platform? Should they be protected in some ways that regular users are not? When does a ban cross the line into censorship?

This becomes especially relevant when political leaders enter the picture. Could a social media network under Republican leadership ban a Democrat president, not because they broke any rule, but simply because they disagreed politically?

That also goes into the question of to what extent social media networks are becoming news networks. Traditional news media generally shy away from outright banning politicians, even if they are very partisan. Would social media networks behave differently?

Edited by Redmess on May 24th 2022 at 3:24:27 PM

I think the difference is that traditional news sources are curators. They get to pick and choose what shows up and conspicuously not mentioning a particular politician is really noticeable. A politician being completely ignored by traditional news is entirely the choice of said traditional news.

For social media, if they have rules and enforce them, and a politician gets banned for breaking them, the social media site can just put up their hands and go "well, they knew what the rules are, it's their fault." A social media is a platform with very little focus on curation.

So yeah, they work really differently and have different pressures. Social media might be where you get your news from, but it's not the same thing as, say, a newspaper or a news network, because the social media site isn't picking and choosing what stories exist on it, the users are doing that.

Edited by Zendervai on May 24th 2022 at 9:31:22 AM

I doubt that any Democratic politician would want to go on Truth Social or Parler, but those platforms are very narrow in reach. The issue arises when a social media platform becomes the de facto "town square", as we have discussed previously.

Are news media obligated to put political speech on the air anyway? The First Amendment says nothing about that. It doesn't say that any political figure is owed airtime or print lines. We used to have the Fairness Doctrine which stated that any media that covers politics must give equal weight to opposing points of view, but how would that even apply to social media, where as noted above , there is very little active selection of content other than basic rules enforcement?

If we applied the Fairness Doctrine to social media — and still had it — it might say that political figures should not be quelled, but does that extend to blatantly violating the law, or even just the platform's terms of service?

Edited by Fighteer on May 24th 2022 at 9:35:10 AM

This is probably a dumb question, but if politicians really consider something like Twitter to be a public forum, where free speech should be upheld, then why doesn't the federal government, like, nationalize twitter?

Edited by GNinja on May 24th 2022 at 1:33:47 PM

One does not simply nationalize a company, to put it lightly

To add on to what I said earlier, it could be held that social media companies that perform algorithmic amplification of content, "promote" content in exchange for money, or employ editorial staff that select content to feature, are acting as news media because they are exercising some kind of editorial judgment, not merely acting as passive means of communication where users select what to engage with.

In addition to the problem of getting a legislative body to vote in favor of nationalization, how would content moderation be handled in a public platform? Would there be a "terms of service", or would it be more like a set of regulations empowered by legislation? Right now, if Twitter bans you, there's no Constitutional argument because it's a private company and thus not subject to First Amendment restrictions. If it became a publicly operated platform, there would be no end to the lawsuits filed because CobNobbler69420 got suspended for posting that all women are whores.

Edited by Fighteer on May 24th 2022 at 9:41:04 AM

That'd be a really fuzzy argument to make though, because pretty much everything is user-generated. At most, you could make the argument that social media sites are aggregators and they tend to work differently from most news sites anyway.

And there'd probably be a list of really strict regulations. In most public forums in person, you're not allowed to go up to a complete stranger and start screaming slurs at them, you can get arrested for that because it's legally harassment. They'd probably try and replicate that environment where you can't actually harass someone or actions along those lines.

Edited by Zendervai on May 24th 2022 at 9:43:06 AM

That is a legitimate concern with places like Facebook though, where the algorithm is effectively curating the news for its users. When an algorithm is picking what news stories you get to see, is the platform really still an independent actor from the news?

The Netherlands does have such a law mandating that political parties have equal rights to airtime on public television, so that idea is not without precedent.

A public social media platform analogous to public television sounds like an interesting idea. What would such a platform look like?

I should note that, by analogy, you cannot just be banned from watching public television. But of course there it is merely passive consumption. Things get far more complicated with active participation.

Edited by Redmess on May 24th 2022 at 3:44:24 PM

But the rationale behind the government being allowed to regulate terrestrial broadcasts is that the frequencies the broadcasters are broadcasting on are owned by the public as a whole, and terrestrial broadcasts are a public good. The same logic is not applicable to social media, which would be more like newspapers.

One other justification I can think of for the government regulating, or even nationalizing social media is that social networks are a network good that inherently gravitates toward monopoly.

refresh my memory on the first ammendment, (I'm british, you see), is it about censorship or being arrested by the government for your beliefs? Or both?

It's actually pretty straightforward. There are limitations in practice, like, you don't have a right to harass people, you don't have a right to do things like yell fire in a public theatre, and a corporation that employs you is legally allowed to tell you to shut up and stop talking.

(I still find it funny when people outside the US try to claim it. Like, if you're in Canada, you've just claimed the right to establish Manitoba as a province, which is a very useless right in most circumstances)

Edited by Zendervai on May 24th 2022 at 9:57:12 AM

The First Amendment in the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution reads:

This is deliberately written to be very broad because it's meant to be a declaration of fundamental rights. What this means, in a nutshell, is that the government may not take any action that silences or restricts the right of an individual to speak their mind. It has been later clarified by the Supreme Court and by Congress that this right excludes certain types of speech that constitute "fighting words" or incitements to hate or violence.

Note that it says nothing about the rights of private entities to restrict speech, and indeed this has been held as a First Amendment right: that no company shall be told by the government what it can or cannot say or allow to be said under its control.

Edited by Fighteer on May 24th 2022 at 9:58:17 AM

I think there should be an official, government-owned social media platform. Give it the same rules that govern public spaces, no indecent exposure, no speech that calls for imminent violence upon a person or group, etc.

I know we've talked about this before but would you feel comfortable using your national identity (Social Security number or equivalent) to register for such a service, knowing that the government could hold you, personally, accountable for anything you say and keep track of it? I don't see how such a service could operate if it allowed complete anonymity.

Would you be comfortable if it allowed a wider range of speech than what a private company might tolerate? It certainly wouldn't apply TV Tropes' standards of civility.

Edited by Fighteer on May 24th 2022 at 10:17:33 AM

I suppose the problem is that having ANY standards is seen as an affront to free speech.

Kick someone for spreading dangerous, baseless conspiracy theories? That's just a slippery step away from rounding up political dissidents and putting them into FEMA camps.

It's Orwell's nightmare!

Also, what happens if the government changes hands and now Republicans are the ones appointing regulators to moderate this social media platform? How does the U.S. platform interact with other countries? Can European citizens register for it and talk with Americans, or is it just for us? Would there be an individual platform for each nation or national bloc, or would there be some sort of protocols to allow cross-communication? How would this handle the case where US speech laws are different than EU speech laws?

There are a lot of things to work out, and frankly there seems to be no interest from any government in doing this, except for the more authoritarian ones that want to apply hardcore censorship.

Edit: To be clear, I'm not opposed to a centralized social media platform, and I've talked extensively about my vision for a centralized identity repository, but many of the people on these forums have expressed severe doubts about these ideas, so it's a little weird that we're now suggesting them as ways to fight corporate social media.

Edited by Fighteer on May 24th 2022 at 10:25:32 AM

For the record, I think platforms should probably stay in the hands of companies for that very reason. It's just weird hearing republicans crow about this but not also push for nationalisation.

It's like they think that Twitter should just... operate on first ammendment rules despite not being a government entity.