Me thinks this will have huge implications for big tech. A Pandora’s box was just opened.
Regardless, if Trump wants to, he has official means (through whitehouse.gov) to issue statements. He choose Twitter when he had other options.
It's crazy naive to not see the implications of this
This is a President who wouldn't even use the designated @potus account because he is so narcissistic he wanted the follower count for himself.
You might argue that it has lesser reach compared to a major social media site, but there are countless individuals and organizations that would jump to be the first one posting a link to a presidential address on social media sites.
Which is more than just semantics. Suspending an account and the associated momentum without actually banning the person might be a good mechanism to have in place.
Now, maybe they should be, and should be regulated as such. Maybe we should have a conversation about delegating services which are key to our social fabric to what are just private companies. But that's somewhat orthogonal to the issue at hand.
Additionally, should be noted: if the government attempted to coerce or strong-arm Twitter to keep Donald Trump's account online, that would absolutely be a textbook 1st Amendment violation.
Corporations are legal persons, and have constitutional rights under the 14th Amendment. Coerced speech is not free speech.
They are not though. They are just private companies. We can argue until the cows come home about how people see them, how they use them, how they feel about them... but at the end of the day they are just private companies.
I agree that we should consider whether that should remain the case. But right now... it is the case.
It’s not. It’a a bunch of rich people in California. If you want a public utility for communication and socializing, go help build one. Contribute to Mastodon or the rest of the fediverse. Write to representatives (or become one yourself) and propose legislation to fund a public tool that is actually owned by the people. It could even be part of the fediverse!
But asking Twitter to do any random thing someone wants because they are a big company is insane and is going to cause us nothing but pain.
The only reason is these companies are “new” and were not viewed as much more than a toy until a few years ago and now we’re seeing the consequences of that.
A utility is different than a regulated company.
Today it's rich people in California, once it was rich people building railroads and pumping oil.
No specific company is obligated to broadcast his messages. The government can't obligate anyone who doesn't want it to run his propaganda.
No, no they're not. If you or others personally perceive them as utilities, you have skewed perception of reality. I mean not even the ISP you're using to access them aren't considered utilities. It's funny that the same people who applauded Pai for the net neutrality thing are the ones complaining about 'big tech censorship'.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media_as_a_public_utili...
If the second point is not true anymore... it's going to start getting regulated like a utility. Your electric and phone providers can't simply decide to stop serving people it doesn't like, and likely, Twitter won't either.
In the years since then, what was once a constellation of internet platforms has shrunken and consolidated to only a handful that are the de facto gatekeepers.
Legally, of course, nothing has changed since then. But it's willfully ignoring the unprecedented power of major platforms in shaping popular dialog to compare them to a local supermarket escorting someone out.
[1]: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-protest-is-the-language-...
What does suppression of free speech in America look like to you then?
How long until it happens to a marginalized population at scale?
Generally curious your thoughts otherwise. Thanks and be well
* A world where they weren't the arbiters of truthiness, and were a place that supported 'free speech'.
* A world where they decide what posts to show, and it's their job to moderate the platform.
The decision to take the second approach is actually a pretty recent development. These companies can no longer hide behind the 'we are just a platform for free speech' line of thinking, because they have now decided that's not what they are about.
Clearly different sites will choose a different position on filter vs free speech.
Filtering / moderation has usually been applied to “forums” (of which I would lump HN with) rather than “social graph websites” where posts are typically shared between friends and followers.
> I'm sure you would expect basic protections.
Actually I don’t to be honest! I think free speech is generally the best policy. I do think reform is required though in how posts (and advertisements) are displayed and ranked on social feeds though for instance.
* experiences backlash, gets banned *
"Help, that's unfair! The left is censoring me!!"
Astonishing how many times I've seen this exact situation play out. Reminds me of kids doing a bad thing and then crying and shifting blame when they get caught.