How often have lawmakers and regulators proposed things that would significantly break the Internet and online communities/activities? It seems to happen continuously, a few times a year.Fair point. You can argue that not regulating the internet at all is overall better than dealing with all of the bad proposals. However, bringing it back to the post I was responding to, everyone wasn't celebrating the EU regulating the internet, everyone was celebrating privacy regulation in an instance where the system had gotten to a bad place on its own.
I think you're somewhat missing the key nuance of a point. There are actually two debates. 1. Whether to text while driving. 2. Whether a specific texting is too distracting.
You and I agree that the potential benefits are tiny compared to the harms of allowing texting while driving. On the other hand, you and I disagree that the balance is in favor of deregulating the internet.
That's a crucial difference. We never get to question 2 with texting while driving. We get to question 2 with internet legislation all the time.
Here's the thing, though. Is legislation a remedy for bad internet legislation?
Legislation doesn't exist in a vacuum, and bad legislation is remedied in multiple ways, one of which is more legislation.
That said, your question sounded to me like a rhetorical way to say that the risk of bad legislation isn't worth the occasional good one. Fair point. I disagree, but fair point. I don't think it's a useful debate to have because it's too fuzzy to be non-ideological, and, practically speaking, the world has already moved on from the question of whether to regulate the internet.