Or put another way: As much as Americans like to act like it, we can't enforce our ideals around the world without significant investment that I don't think anyone wants us making after the last couple of times.
Google left China rather than submit to their censorship regime, and the Chinese market is like 18 Turkeys.
And if you do remove content, you can make that action transparent on Chilling Effects[1]. Facebook doesn't do that, either.
There are alternatives.
And if you decide to build censorship tools to stay in the good graces of the regime, then don't say "I am Charlie" while you're doing it.
Many companies could decide not to operate in USA due to the snooping, gagged court orders, civil rights attacks, selective and repressive law enforcement, etc.
I get this is a hard issue to speak in "western" sites because many see it as "us vs them" but let me tell you, I could easily subdivide "us" many times and make your portion "them".
Maybe it got flagged off temporarily by his adversaries, but it's fully available now.
You're ignoring all my other examples of censorship, though.
I knew it was going to be a hard issue so the downvotes are not unexpected.
China wanted to censor inconvenient history. Turkey wants to censor offensive (to them) religious images. I think that's the important comparison, not the size of the market.
This means Facebook has a lot of power to resist censorship.
Make repression costly for the regime in terms of widespread public outrage and international pariah status.
Maybe Erdoğan will pay those costs, maybe he won't.
But if you make censorship free then you're certain to get a lot more of it.
If this were used instead as an opportunity to get Facebook to make censorship moves like this more transparent, I'd be in full support.
For me at least: it's the idea of making a public pronouncement that you support some political view (because that's easy). Then you do something that, at least on the face of it, goes against that position when there could be business repercussions (because that's hard).
Why not just keep your mouth shut?
But there is not one bit of me that doesn't believe Mark really does support free speech everywhere. He didn't have to say that, but he did. He made that effort, even though he knew it opened his flank. And of course he knew that, because he's not a complete idiot.
This is the real world. Where while complying with the law, you protest it, because that's how you act in a civilized society.
"How you act in a civilized society" leads to normalization and eventual acceptance of problems caused by compliance.
Lots of talk in your comment about the "real world", without a hint of irony that our "civilized society" only exists in its current form thanks to revolutions and wars.
The idea that protests should only occur within the confines of the law tells me you have a bit to learn about the "real world".
>He made that effort
I know the Facebook crowd might think so, but saying "Je Suis Charlie" takes effort?
Does Facebook have any offices, servers or employees in Turkey? If not, they aren't required to do a thing. Even if they did, they just don't store that content on those servers (and maybe compartmentalise dealing with such data away from any employees based there) and they're fine. If that wasn't the case, then any random tinpot dictatorship (such as turkey) could make arbitrary things illegal for anyone in the world, and expect compliance from every single person in the world.
I'm sure turkey would want anyone in the world they could force to be to be brought under sharia law too, not just facebook. Does that mean we should even if we don't live there and don't visit? I for one, don't think so.
lol, what are you talking about? I suggest you remove your head from your arse and read a bit more about Turkey
Argentina's constitution says they own the Falkland Islands, yet they don't either. The US constitution guarantees freedom of speech, protection from unlawful searches and surveillance, probable cause for any search, and separation of church and state, yet the actual reality is almost the direct opposite of all of those.
As such, Turkey going "hey, look, we're secular" is worthless when they act like a psychotic dictatorship.
It's not that complying with the law would be noble or right, but it's not really reasonable to expect everyone in a country to be a martyr.
YouTube and Twitter refused to take down material in Turkey, and they were both banned for two months.
If anything, their principles enhanced their brands in Turkey and around the world.
If I disagree with the TSA and decide to go through without caring about their scans they're going to detain me. It doesn't matter if I "shouldn't do it".
A service choosing not to censor, and then potentially being censored in turn by ISPs in another nation, could be costly, sure. It wouldn't seem to be in the same ballpark as a military invasion of another nation? (Honestly though, when has a USA military invasion ever actually been about enforcing ideals?)
When this issue was discussed yesterday, I pointed out that it's not Zuck's actions that surprise us, because money. Rather, we're surprised by what he says while taking those actions. It's incongruous to appropriate the rhetoric of freedom while happily making money undermining freedom.
The only incongruity is on the part of people who believed Zuck when they have plenty of data that they shouldn't.
Zuck: Just ask
Zuck: I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS
[Redacted Friend's Name]: What? How'd you manage that one?
Zuck: People just submitted it.
Zuck: I don't know why.
Zuck: They "trust me"
Zuck: Dumb fucks
I think you're missing a major point: unless FB has something like a CDN physically located inside of Turkey -- or has some other corporate presence there -- then it is under no legal obligation to comply with its laws (or court orders) whatsoever. The reality is that FB is complying with the Turkish government's requests for no other reason than that it chooses to, because it considers the (perceived) business advantages to be more important than the social and human costs of doing so.
The laws of Lebanon require you to observe a boycott of any products and services that originate in or transit through Israel. Meanwhile the laws of the US forbid you from observing the Arab Boycott of Israel. What do you do?
Facebook Inc.
Buyukdere Cad. Maya Akar Center No:100-102
B Blok K:18 Esentepe
Istanbul, Turkey
tolga.ismen@ismen.av.tr
+90-212-2726364
+90-212-2726365Yes, you absolutely can. Jurisdiction: As long as you're following the laws of your own country, and you don't plan to live in, visit, or do business in some other country, you have no obligation whatsoever to respect that country's laws.
In this case, it sounds like Facebook cares about doing business in Turkey (specifically, continuing to reach the citizens of Turkey).
Isn't that Uber's basic approach?
> you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently
Facebook, and many American tech companies like it, have no problem breaking the law in other countries when it suits their bottom line. Primary battlefield: privacy rights.
> As much as Americans like to act like it, we can't enforce our ideals around the world
Facebook, and many American tech companies like it, enforce their puritan values around the world by fanatically censoring all kinds of harmless content (mostly, "boobies") on their services.
These companies are clearly willing and able to make both commercial and ideological choices with complete disregard for local laws and values.
And your argument about enforcing their values around the world is enforcing THEIR values, not American ones. Yes, their values are influenced by their being American no doubt, but it's facetiously cynical to imply the two are related in any way, shape, or form.