Cloudflare isn't as ideologically pure as you might think. To this date, they have only refused service to Daily Stormer and 8chan for political reasons. Real neonazi sites like stormfront dot org (unlike 8chan that had many apolitical communities like for games or anime) continue to enjoy their protection because it hasn't negatively affected their stock (the news on DS and 8ch broke before the IPO, but their launch might have been a failure due to bad press).
Sure, but that's like "if the utility companies are cutting of your water and electricity, just make your own! nobody is stopping you from hooking an exercise bike to a dynamo and buy bottled water at the store". Technically true, practically not really a thing.
In monopoly situations (or duopoly, if you wish), there are generally different rules that apply, because you can't just go somewhere else to do business: there is nothing else. Hence utility companies can't simply go "I don't like your nose, no water for you".
I think creating new platforms has actually gotten easier since twitter's inception. Back in the day it was almost magical to have a website that performed at scale. Now you just hand a credit card to your favored cloud provider.
In your metaphor I see the internet as the utility not the platform provider. If akamai or level 3 decide that they wouldn't carry your traffic, then you might have a case that you're being censored.
If Apple can keep Epic out of the app store then @Jack can ban whomever he damn well feels like.
Other companies/platforms are free to advertise or offer services to entice users to switch. As conservatives like to remind us money is speech. You are not entitled to someone else's attention but you can try to buy it.
If they were banning Russiagate conspiracies, while letting conservative stuff run rampant, would you be giving me the pitch about how private property is more important than free expression?
Maybe there's a higher principle here than partisan warfare?
In this particular case, where there's a common carrier for information, we figured out the market failures and how to handle them long ago, the answer is neutrality to the message. There are some people in the thread making the case that it's different now, and maybe it is, maybe we need a different approach, but "just trust the market" is the dumbest idea ever.
The market is paper-clip-optimizing gray goo. Harness it, but don't anthropomorphize it and certainly don't "trust" it.
Don't impute principles to the market.
Those companies wouldn't touch gay rights with a 10 foot pole until one day all of a sudden they're beating their way to the front of the line at the pride parade.
Republicans have only won the popular vote for president once since 1990. Trump isn't even attempting to win the popular vote this year. The median income in 2018 was 10k higher in blue states than red states. And you wonder why advertisers (and thus twitter) value blue tribe users more?
Conservatives can't gerrymander the market. They are going to need to find a way to compete for relevance with the majority of the public not just their base.
They'll follow what's popular, and if that's liquidating jews, they'll do it (some of them did!).
In conclusion, I will say there is a way out of this morass for conservatives. They have to kick the neo-nazis, the proud boys, and qanon out of the party. They have to accept science and that the scientific method is the best way to determine objective reality. If they continue to call anything that falls outside of their accepted narratives "fake news", they will continue to lose the culture war. And thus, be more and more sidelined from the national discourse. Due the undemocratic elements of our constitution they conservatives may retain political power, but in the end, the consent of the governed is more important.
Don't trade principles for that, it's not worth it, the news cycle will be different tomorrow anyways. Certainly don't trust the corporations over individuals or the press for a one news-cycle 'win'. What kind of liberal values are those? "George W Bush liberals"?
(I'm a Bernie voter, not a conservative, btw).
They will go to the supreme court to fight for [a sole proprietor's] right not to sell cupcakes to gay people but then turn around and demand to control what [giant corporation] does with their servers.
This is a nonsense hypothetical.
Without limited liability, Twitter would not exist in its current form or size.
Correct.
I also mistakenly thought the cake baker was a sole proprietor. They are incorporated. I should have done a simple search before posting my original comment.
That said, I now mostly agree with the comment I was originally replying to.
> What does limited liability have to do with a corporation being owned by one person?
Correct, nothing. To clarify:
My position is that an entity enjoying limited liability (which in the US includes an LLC or corporation owned by a single person) has exchanged "rights" for indemnity and therefore can be compelled to - for example - bake a cake or not censor content hosted on their servers, but that a sole proprietor can do whatever they want re: refusing service or moderating content.
On the morals of it; I think that if twitter thinks that banning all conservatives will make them more revenue they can and should be allowed to do it. My value statement would hold equally if you :s/conservatives/liberals/g.
Conservative lawmakers have become very found of the Obama quote, "Elections have consequences." Well, the culture war has consequences too. And conservatives have completely gotten their asses kicked in the culture war in the last 30 years. Due to anachronisms in our means of determining representation this has not translated into a loss of legislative power. But if they want to hold sway outside of Washington they will have to make an effort to win back the hearts and minds of the public and more importantly the American consumer.
In Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, the owner declined to perform a creative service, that being decorating a cake for a gay wedding.
You might think that is also wrong, and that’s fine, but it’s a very important distinction. Legally compelling someone to perform a service that violates their religious beliefs is tricky to balance against non-discrimination. You have to consider the precedent that doing so would set. The supreme court recognized this in a 7-2 decision, so it’s clearly not a trivial or ridiculous objection. It only is to you because you don’t share the religious belief. But we must balance everyone’s rights, and that isn’t always easy.
You can say just about anything you want, but that doesn't mean other folks are required to listen to you or expend their resources to amplify your speech.
And that's a good thing. Because if you can force others to publish/host/amplify your speech, others can force you to do the same with theirs.