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Comment by adventured | Hacker News Reader

Wonderful news. If how the US Internet is regulated - how it functions at its core as a result of liability - is going to change, it should be done through actions by Congress.

If social media companies were guilty, then so is every newspaper that spreads news of terrorist events, supposedly providing a platform for terrorism (which would also be the argument in cases of eg mass shooters that seek attention, copying prior mass shootings that are heavily publicized by the press/media/news). It's an excellent outcome that they're not guilty in this case. I'm glad to see the justices so relatively united.

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Newspapers are publishers and are liable for what they print. That's the point of section 230, Twitter is not legally a publisher.

Where is the line between choosing what people see and exerting editorial control over what to print?

If a newspaper puts up a dark corner of their website that gives people labyrinthine access to all of the submissions that they decided not to publish, are they no longer liable for the content they post and promote on their main site?

> Where is the line between choosing what people see and exerting editorial control over what to print

The line is different online vs in print, because of Section 230, whose scope is pretty explicit...

> If a newspaper puts up a dark corner of their website that gives people labyrinthine access to all of the submissions that they decided not to publish, are they no longer liable for the content they post and promote on their main site?

Are you under the impression that the main content of newspapers (either in print or on the web) is third-party submissions that the newspaper chooses to print or not but does not actively assign and pay people to write, and/or actively purchase for publication?

Online newspapers do mix editorial and community content in the articles and comments. The difference between them is pretty clear as is the moderation.

Also, there are sites like Forbes that have editorial articles but also have blogs posted by users. These do get confused on Forbes.

Your question doesn't make any sense. If a newspaper creates an interactive computer service then they receive the same Section 230 protections as anyone else. The law doesn't define any line of editorial control.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/230

> access to all of the submissions that they decided not to publish

You mean a comments section?

Isn't 230 to protect UGC? Newspaper publish content they create.

Or imagine claiming that pay phone companies were liable in 1980 for facilitating mafia crime activity.

It is so stupid that no one at the time even considered it.

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