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Comment by DoubleGlazing | Hacker News Reader

I think the EFF are clutching at straws a bit. Blocking someone from contracting you on social media isn't really a freedom of speech issue - so long as an alternatives means exists. Though restricting them from reading your content if those posts are in an official capacity is very questionable. More so considering how much official communication is moving online.

For example Twitter now seems to have become a default channel of sorts for announcing power outages and for urgent press releases from government agencies. Is it right that someone misses out on updates because they were blocked?

Maybe what is needed is for twitter/facebook etc to have a special kind of "read only" blocking for government and public official accounts?

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I have no expectation that any form of communication I make will be listened to. I can call my senator or Donald Trump on the phone but it's very unlikely I will actually be able to talk to them. I can send my senator or Donald Trump a letter but it's unlikely it will actually be read by them. There are many filters in place. Twitter blocks are just another filter on a specific communications medium.

Muting is a filter. Blocking imposes restrictions on the actual speech, and on the reception of Tweets.

Well, by that metaphor, Senators and the president should just ignore tweets they don’t like, same as mail and phone. That is different than returning mail to sender or blocking someone’s phone number.

"Blocking someone from contracting you on social media isn't really a freedom of speech issue - so long as an alternatives means exists"

Kicking someone out of a town hall meeting is not a free speech issue, so long as alternative means exist. Kicking someone out of a public square is not a free speech issue, so long as alternative means exist.

The only difference in the Twitter case is that Twitter as a private company can freely exclude whomever it wants. The point is that a public official cannot direct Twitter to do so, which should include directing Twitter to block a particular user.

People get kicked out of town hall meetings all the time.

The chaos and hostility of an average Twitter discussion would surely result in removal from an in-person town hall meeting.

> Though restricting them from reading your content if those posts are in an official capacity is very questionable.

I think this is probably the biggest issue overall. If all of Trumps tweets were published on whitehouse.gov or in the Federal Register, I wonder if that might make this lawsuit irrelevant?

The EFF says "The president’s tweets are official statements and the public has a First Amendment right to receive them." But if you could read them in the Federal Register, wouldn't this claim be satisfied?

Seems like EFF is in a specific bubble where eveyrone has blocked trump, so they and their friends are not getting trump's tweets, unless they hit the media. They think everyone else has the same issue. This is such a cliquish thing to do - is there anyone who would admit under oath that they seriously can't find trump's tweets?

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