As to your point of information that can potentially do harm, who gets to be the judge of that? That seems like it can be very controversial and subjective.
So far the courts have erred on the side of only ruling against things that pretty much everyone agrees upon and I think we should stick with that.
Having objective criteria for limits to speech is important. Otherwise we run into scenarios where people start claiming "your opinions and words I don't agree with are considered violence against me". At which point ALL speech is fair game.
No new legal precedent has been created, nor has any existing legal precedent been changed. Youtube has always had the right to curate or ban content for any reason, and has always done so, albeit typically in service of advertisers and copyright owners. Legal precedent has never recognized "freedom of speech" to mean that no form of speech can be abridged or forbidden, rather, it has recognized that censorship is permissible under certain circumstances for the common good (laws against slander, libel, fraud, perjury, etc.)
>As to your point of information that can potentially do harm, who gets to be the judge of that? That seems like it can be very controversial and subjective.
Just because it can be controversial and subjective in some cases, doesn't mean it is equally controversial and subjective in all cases, nor does it follow, therefore, that no cases can reasonably be judged by any criteria, because all cases cannot be equally judged on exactly the same criteria.
>Otherwise we run into scenarios where people start claiming "your opinions and words I don't agree with are considered violence against me". At which point ALL speech is fair game.
The problem with the slippery slope argument is that it assumes humans merely process the law like algorithms, and that it will consider a statement like "your opinions and words I don't agree with are considered violence against me". perfectly valid merely because it is logically consistent. Even without "objective" criteria for limits to speech, someone making the argument you're presenting will be laughed out of court, both of law and public opinion.
The only way the slope can be slippery is if no one had ever looked at the slope, considered that it might be slippery, and maybe added a sidewalk or some stairs or a railing or a sign or something. We as a society are already aware that the dynamics involved in something like speech can be complex, and that the potential to abuse freedom of speech exists. Feedback has already been added to the system, because the system is self-aware and self-correcting. It may not be perfect in that regard, but it's still there.
You dodged GPs question. Who gets to be the judge? We already have a system in place which has answered that question - one which aims to prevent abuse of the power, give every party an opportunity to make their case and be judged by a jury of their peers.
All you are asking for is for this to be circumvented.
If the press have the editorial freedom to chose which of their reporters articles they publish -- be it factual, opinion, or even outright biased -- then why shouldn't other private platforms have the same editorial freedom?
The "who" in your "who gets to judge?" then becomes a simple answer: the platform owners. The uncomfortable part is that some platforms have a larger impression on people than others. But short of government intervention -- which is a hugely unpopular option in America -- that's just the markets working the way you guys want your markets to work (ie given the psychology of confirmation bias, if platforms were to focus on unpopular view points their viewership would diminish).
That's the paradoxical part of all this. The same freedoms are being used in both cases but in one instance it enforces principles you believe in and in the other instance it erodes those principles. But you cannot have one instance without having both.
Why shouldn't platforms be stripped of their legal protections (and some effectively destroyed) if they are exercising editorial discretion? Why shouldn't YouTube be responsible for the videos that they do allow/have approved?
If someone doesn't think that YouTube should be accountable for content, then should a newspaper be accountable? Should a person be accountable for his content?
In fact the only defence platforms like YouTube had was the telephone company defence you’re making (as it happens telephone companies haven’t been immune from the demands of censorship either) but the moment platforms do start self-censoring they lose that ISP/telephone defence because they’ve proven they can moderate contributions (even if that moderation is effectively worthless in a great many cases)
In many regards I think "common carrier" status applies. Private companies like ISP's, telcos, and parcel delivery services are not allowed to discriminate based on the content nor the individual. This is similar in spirit to "net neutrality".
The larger a platform becomes, and the more essential it is for communication and daily business, then the more important it is that it does not discriminate.
The grey area is that platforms like YouTube both are public communication platforms, but they also curate content as well. Not sure the correct answer in that case.
What muddies the water even further is that some platforms even pay contributors, albeit for ad impressions rather than directly, but again it makes the distinction more subjective than it appears at first glance.
Eventually there will come a point where the people outside the tech community will deem the responsibility of moderation greater than the the need for an open platform. I’m not sure which side of the fence I sit on but I do agree that the government mandating moderation has the dangerous side effect of raising the barrier for entry too high for any new players to challenge existing networks.
No... because the legal system and the courts were never involved in these matters to begin with.
You, however seem to be insisting that every online platform first go before a judge and jury and seek permission to be allowed to moderate their content, as if doing so should implicitly be considered a crime, which would be far more fascist than anything Youtube is actually doing.
Like it or not, freedom of speech and freedom of association are considered equal to one another, alongside freedom of the press and freedom of religion. Your right to speak doesn't override my right not to allow you to speak on my private property, especially if I object to your speech.
And no, just to preempt that possible rebuttal, Youtube and other sites are not de facto public property. No matter how popular they are, they are actually private platforms whose use requires accepting terms of service under which which those platforms maintain the right to delete and moderate content or terminate service at any time. The only exception that I'm aware of is Trump's personal Twitter account, in order to keep him from blocking anyone who criticizes him.
And even public property has laws, and thus limits, on free speech and expression. "Post no bills" and such.
We have so little precedent with these society shaping forms of communication and content, it would seem very strange to me if we had already arrived at an optimum when it comes to how we should treat them. I don't necessarily have an answer to said predicament, but I definitely think 'do nothing and let unelected business decide how the conversation should end' is not a good answer.
And where precisely has that happened here? Icke floated a theory. Some of his other theories include Hillary Clinton being a literal lizard. Should we ban his videos saying that as well, before people start trying to put chemicals toxic to lizards in the food of politicians?
The only way this could be comparable if someone threaten or assaulted you to get Medicare for all or stop Climate Change.
>"Information" that's not only going to get people killed but also is factually wrong is definitely fair game IMO.
We don't want an advertising company in a capitalist society deciding that. That's the whole point.
Everyone has the responsibility to decide that! Their platform, their responsibility.
At some level of "taken responsibility" (which I think should have been passed), they should be considered publishers and be stripped of their legal protections.