Yet FCC is still around regulating speech on broadcast television.
I'm quite sure it doesn't want to call itself one. But once it made an algorithmic feed it decided to have a hand in what users do and do not see. It's not unreasonable to ask for some accountability in what that algorithm does, and such accountability is definitely not a violation of the first amendment.
> Will it continue to edit/censor Presidents and Prime Ministers
Point of clarification here: Twitter censored and edited absolutely nothing. They attached a warning to Trump's tweet. It is still available for all to read in its entirety.
No Twitter actually removed a video[1] that Trump posted.
[1]: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/twitter-labels...
So they didn't remove it because of their own demands for censorship, they removed it because the DMCA required them to.
Do memes also attract DMCA notices now? How about this Nickelback meme that was removed from Trump's tweet: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/10/twitter-nixes-tr...
Are you actually telling me that this doesn't constitute fair use? If this doesn't constitute fair use then Twitter will have to delete a billion tweets that use the same meme. Will Twitter be fair in its policy and remove all of them?
Yes, if they want to keep their safe harbor protections. If they think it's fair use, refuse to comply with the DMCA notice, and it turns out it wasn't fair use, they're now liable as infringers.
But that is not as simple as it sounds. If you issue a DMCA counter-notice there is no compulsion for the service provider to honor the counter-notice. In fact, the default is to deny the counter claim because of contractual obligations between the service provider and the first party.
You can read more about it here: https://www.newmediarights.org/copyright/DMCA/youtube_refusi...
When you connect to twitter do you see the same monolithic platform that everyone else sees before you each sort it as you please?
Of course not.
You see a specific-as-possible individual experience published just for you.
Edit: Twitter clearly needs and should have the ability to manage the content they publish.
But they also clearly function like a platform in significant ways.
It does not make sense to try to argue that Twitter is either a platform or a publisher and nothing in between
Then they should be held liable for every post/tweet that goes on their platform! Will they be willing to accept that liability like the media houses do? You can sue the media house if it posts something that is false. You can't sue Facebook for a post someone put on it. Facebook will call itself a platform and deny taking liability for someone's post.
> It does not make sense to try to argue that Twitter is either a platform or a publisher and nothing in between
It does make sense. Your nature of business defines the regulations that apply on you. I can't start a software business today and 3 years later arbitrarily decide to convert it to a defense manufacturing company and still hope to retain the same regulatory rules that apply for software companies. There are regulatory policies for every company based on its nature of business. You are creating a monster if you allow these social media companies to have all sorts of policies without any regulatory oversight!
EDIT:
> You see a specific-as-possible individual experience published just for you.
Yes and it still is a platform because the functionality (personal recommendations) is built into the platform as a feature right? It is a AI tool that recommends a feed based on your likes and dislikes. Is this the same as publishing? Nope. With publishing you have a process where posts are edited, verified and then shown to the public. There is some notion of "trust". So when I watch news I know that the news channel has not just curated, but also verified and then is showing me the content that I can then consume. That verification step is essential and is what separates a "Publisher" from a "Platform". Twitter never "verified" the feed right? It just curated it. As a platform it can only "moderate" based on its policies that prohibit certain acts that are illegal by law: like sharing child pornography or calling for violence or gambling. This is required by law and that is where moderation tools come into play. Twitter, by censoring/editing/attaching information to Trump's tweet is behaving as a "publisher" by actually verifying the content of the tweet in question. It does not fall under "moderation" as there is nothing there that is illegal for them to moderate. The feed I consume through personal recommendations is curated but still unverified. I still have to figure out for myself if the post/tweet in question is correct or incorrect. The onus of verification rests with me, the user. That is why it is a platform. The onus of verification in case of media channels rest with the channel. Because they are operating on the notion of "trust". That as a consumer of their content I have trust in what they show me. I don't need to verify. That trust is broken if they start lying. They can lie and spread fake news. But they will be held liable for it. That is why they are a publisher and have to go through the headache of verifying the news before it is broadcast to the public.
Twitter is like a post office. You send mails via post, you expect the postman to deliver the post to the nearest post office, which sorts and aggregates those posts and then pushes those posts to the relevant po box for dispatch. Imagine if the post office started to open the mails and tamper with the messaging. Would you be okay with it? The post office can only open posts if they find something criminal and that also has to be done in a systematic manner: An authority should be present while the post is being opened, every step is to be recorded, the items within the post should be carefully handled and recorded all the way up until the post is sealed. And then the authority must sign off by saying that the post did not contain anything bad (like drugs/weapons whatever that is declared illegal in that jurisdiction). That is the only powers a post office has.
Now imagine if the post office started messing with the posts. Imagine if you were running for election and you distribute flyers through postal mail. One of the employees in the post office doesn't agree with your ideology and decides to tamper with the flyer. Instead of modifying the flyer he attaches a sticky note with his own comments so whoever reads the flyer will also read the sticky note. Would this not be considered tampering with the messaging? How is Twitter attaching a notice to Trump's tweet any different from this? Only difference is that it is virtual and not physical?
Do you think the post office should be able to check the content of your message to determine whether to deliver it to you tomorrow, next week, now (if the sender pays more)?
This is a much more complicated issue than a simple publisher-platform determination. The only thing that is clear is that Twitter, Facebook, etc, behave very much like both a platform and a publisher.
I do agree with you that new regulation is critical to help manage these systems.
Oh I meant humans opening the envelope, reading and manipulating the content. Not just opening it. I should have been more clear. The feeds are still created out of reading it but it is not being tampered with. A publisher does still collect and read reports provided by the reporter. However, the decision to publish is only based on verification of facts because the ultimate liability rests with the publisher not the reporter. If the publisher still goes ahead (some do) with fabricated news they can and will be held liable for it. The reporter is not held liable for it. The max that can happen to the reporter is getting fired from the media house.
But with Twitter, once it attaches it's opinion to the tweet, it is essentially indulging in fact-checking. That is what a publisher does.
That is why I said that the key difference between a platform and a publisher is the step of "verification". With a feed you are still being shown unverified user generated content. The onus of verification rests on your shoulders. But once Twitter decides to verify a tweet, the onus of verification now lies on Twitter's shoulders.
> I do agree with you that new regulation is critical to help manage these systems.
Exactly. Either content is regulated or not regulated. Moderation I agree with because those are clearly defined by law (like no calling for violence, racial abuse, bomb threats, child pornography etc). But anything more than that needs to be regulated. Else these social media companies will have too much power in their hands. They can censor anything at will. I have seen many of my comments in Youtube get deleted just for the mention of the word "China". I never get an alert for it. Only after I refresh the page do I see that it has been removed. And I live in a free country not bound by any dictatorial laws. So I am sure that Youtube algorithms have some bias added into it. Censorship is so prevalent now that people are gaming the Youtube algorithms by using words like "Chyna". I remember during the initial days of the Coronavirus outbreak Youtube was removing any mention of Coronavirus and restricting/demonetizing any videos that spoke about the issue. So much so that even legitimate videos got shadow banned. So many content creators started using the word "ramen" for Coronavirus.
This sort of censorship is not good. This is not what internet was built for!
It will definitely not work to expect everyone to show exemplary good faith behavior in public interest like Twitter. Even though they don't appear to be doing enough to handle astroturfing.
"However, the fact that a law affects speech protected by the First Amendment does not necessarily mean that it is unconstitutional. As explained below, the First Amendment allows some regulation of speech and does not prohibit regulation of conduct.[...]"
If a law does regulate speech, a court would consider the type of speech being regulated to determine how closely to scrutinize the regulation. For example, a court may ask whether that speech is commercial and, as such, deserving of less protection under the First Amendment.[...]
Certain categories of speech receive even less protection than commercial speech. For example, the Supreme Court has said that states may prohibit speech advocating violence if that “advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.” Thus, certain types of threatening or violent speech posted on social media may not be entitled to First Amendment protection"
And also concerning internet platforms in particular:
"A court might also look to the particular nature of the medium being regulated, asking whether there are special characteristics that might justify greater regulation. The Supreme Court has said that “[e]ach medium of expression . . . must be assessed for First Amendment purposes by standards suited to it, for each may present its own problems.”"
So there's considerable complexity to the regulation of speech. It's not at all a binary issue.