Twitter Attempts To Add A Bit Of Friction In Run Up To The Election
from the interesting-experiment dept
Over the last few months, we've seen various internet sites (mainly Twitter and Facebook) experimenting, adjusting policies, and (well, to be honest) scrambling to put in place various policies to deal with the concerns many have about how their sites will be used for mis- and disinformation regarding the election. Most of this has been focused on questions about what content to remove, or what (and how) to "flag" certain content. Last week, Twitter announced some bigger plans to adjust some elements of how the site works at least through the election. It's an interesting experiment, and it will be worth following to see how effective the changes are.
It's ramping up its limitations on sharing content that Twitter deems to be "misleading." This is the content that, as of a few months ago, Twitter is appending a bit more information to, and (sometimes) limiting the ability to reply or retweet. Twitter is now going even further on those tweets, but still short of removing them entirely.
In addition to these prompts, we will now add additional warnings and restrictions on Tweets with a misleading information label from US political figures (including candidates and campaign accounts), US-based accounts with more than 100,000 followers, or that obtain significant engagement. People must tap through a warning to see these Tweets, and then will only be able to Quote Tweet; likes, Retweets and replies will be turned off, and these Tweets won’t be algorithmically recommended by Twitter. We expect this will further reduce the visibility of misleading information, and will encourage people to reconsider if they want to amplify these Tweets.
Twitter recently started popping up a message to some users if you try to retweet a link to a news article without clicking through -- in effect urging you to click and read the article before you actually retweet it. I've seen this idea discussed in the past, and while it adds a bit of friction on retweeting, I doubt it will be particularly effective. Often when I've seen it, it's been on articles I've already read, so the warning is more of a nuisance than anything else, and I'm guessing most people will just click through without hesitating. However, with the new change the company is going even further, encouraging people to add their own commentary:
First, we will encourage people to add their own commentary prior to amplifying content by prompting them to Quote Tweet instead of Retweet. People who go to Retweet will be brought to the Quote Tweet composer where they’ll be encouraged to comment before sending their Tweet. Though this adds some extra friction for those who simply want to Retweet, we hope it will encourage everyone to not only consider why they are amplifying a Tweet, but also increase the likelihood that people add their own thoughts, reactions and perspectives to the conversation. If people don’t add anything on the Quote Tweet composer, it will still appear as a Retweet.
That is going to be very interesting. I have a personal mental model on which things I just retweet and which I add commentary too, and I wonder for me, personally, whether these prompts will change my behavior. I do think that there is some value in encouraging people to add their thoughts, though who the hell knows how it will work in practice. Still, at the very least it strikes me as (again) a free speech supportive change -- encouraging more commentary, rather than focusing on taking down content.
Second, we will prevent “liked by” and “followed by” recommendations from people you don’t follow from showing up in your timeline and won’t send notifications for these Tweets. These recommendations can be a helpful way for people to see relevant conversations from outside of their network, but we are removing them because we don’t believe the “Like” button provides sufficient, thoughtful consideration prior to amplifying Tweets to people who don’t follow the author of the Tweet, or the relevant topic that the Tweet is about. This will likely slow down how quickly Tweets from accounts and topics you don’t follow can reach you, which we believe is a worthwhile sacrifice to encourage more thoughtful and explicit amplification.
Again the focus here is on friction -- though this "feature" (showing tweets liked by people loosely connected to you) has always been somewhat controversial -- especially given that people use "like" to mean very different things. I was among those who thought that Twitter never should have been showing this content in the first place, but having seen a fair amount of it in my feed, will admit that it has been more relevant and interesting than I had expected. I don't know how much friction this will actually add, nor how significant it will be, but it's noteworthy that Twitter decided to at least temporarily kill this particular feature after people had been complaining about it for a while.
Finally, we will only surface Trends in the “For You” tab in the United States that include additional context. That means there will be a description Tweet or article that represents or summarizes why that term is trending. We’ve been adding more context to Trends during the last few months, but this change will ensure that only Trends with added context show up in the “For You” tab in the United States, which is where the vast majority of people discover what’s trending. This will help people more quickly gain an informed understanding of the high volume public conversation in the US and also help reduce the potential for misleading information to spread.
This is also a good move -- and I've definitely been seeing more of this over the last few weeks on Twitter. Many have argued that Twitter should do away with the trends feature altogether, as it's usually hot garbage, and frequently gamed. However, a version that has more context could potentially work better. I'm skeptical, but will be watching it.
Twitter also says that it will not allow anyone to claim victory in an election unless a major news organization has called the election. I'm not sure how they will be able to make this work in practice:
People on Twitter, including candidates for office, may not claim an election win before it is authoritatively called. To determine the results of an election in the US, we require either an announcement from state election officials, or a public projection from at least two authoritative, national news outlets that make independent election calls. Tweets which include premature claims will be labeled and direct people to our official US election page
Unless they pre-review tweets from candidates, I don't see how that will work. Indeed, Wired suggested that Twitter should have gone one step further and put Trump's tweets on a time delay to review them before letting them go through:
Why not put Donald Trump’s tweets and his Facebook posts, as well as those of other political elites, on a time delay? (See here for a smart and similar earlier proposal focused on how a delay might strengthen national security.) Twitter and Facebook have extensive and well-documented content rules that prohibit everything from electoral to health disinformation. The platforms have singled out these categories of content in particular because they have significant likelihood of causing real world harm, from voter suppression to undermining the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s public health guidelines. The FBI found that the plot to kidnap Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer was, in part, organized in a Facebook group.
To date, the enforcement of these policies has been spotty at best. Twitter has labeled some of the president’s tweets as “potentially misleading” to readers about mail-in ballots. The platform hid a Trump tweet stating “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” for “glorifying violence,” and it recently hid another tweet equating Covid-19 to the flu, claiming that the president was “spreading misleading and potentially harmful information” when he wrote that “we are learning to live with Covid, in most populations far less lethal!!!" Facebook has taken similar actions, providing links to reliable voter and health information and removing posts that it deems violate its policies.
But these actions often take hours to put in place while this content racks up thousands of engagements and shares. In those hours, as recent research from Harvard shows, Trump is a one-man source of disinformation that travels quickly and broadly across Twitter and Facebook. And we know that the mainstream media often picks up on and amplifies Trump’s posts before platforms moderate them. Journalists report on platforms’ treatments of Trump’s tweets, making that and them the story, and giving life to false claims.
I shudder to think about the ways in which some would argue this removes Section 230 for such content (even though there are cases ruling that pre-reviewing content doesn't take away 230). However, it does seem like a potentially interesting move as well.
All in all, Twitter did seem to focus not on holding back speech, but on putting in a little friction, in an attempt to at least slow down the possibility for misinformation and disinformation to spread. I don't know if it will work, but it's at least a more thoughtful approach than the way that many just call for more aggressive pulling down of information. Still, I find the Trump campaign's response to these changes quite telling:
Yet according to Samantha Zager, deputy national press secretary for the Trump campaign, Twitter’s changes are “extremely dangerous for our democracy” by “attempting to influence this election in favor of their preferred ticket by silencing the President and his supporters.”
Except that the changes do no such thing. The only thing it does is seek to slow down the pace at which you could spread mis- and disinformation. So, unless the Trump campaign is flat out admitting that it needs mis- and disinformation to win its campaign, then that statement is bizarre. But, of course, that does seem to be the stance of Trumpworld these days. It needs misinformation to win. That it's so quick to admit that, though, should still be somewhat shocking.
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Filed Under: content moderation, disinformation, election, friction
Companies: twitter
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Gotta love that own goal
If someone puts in place a system/rules designed to reduce the spread of lies and other misinformation and your immediate response is to cry foul and claim that it's targeting you, that's a rather telling and damning argument to make, as even if you're right you've not actually done yourself any favors.
As for delayed posting for Trump's tweets and posts at this point I'd say that is more than justified, as taking down a post filled to the brim with lies(potentially lethal ones) after tens if not hundreds of thousands of people have seen and potentially shared it is a perfect example of 'locking the barn doors after the horses have already escaped', as at that point all you can really do is damage control rather than damage prevention.
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Censorship
Censorship is so cool when the cool-kids do it!
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Please explain who is being censored, who is doing the censoring, and what makes their methods “censorship” instead of “moderation”. Keep this in mind before you answer:
Moderation is a platform/service owner or operator saying “we don’t do that here”. Personal discretion is an individual telling themselves “I won’t do that here”. Editorial discretion is an editor saying “we won’t print that here”, either to themselves or to a writer. Censorship is someone saying “you won’t do that anywhere” alongside threats or actions meant to suppress speech.
Now, by all means: Answer me if you can.
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Infinite Friction
Today, Twitter completely deleted the NY Post's original two tweets about the Hunter Biden corruption email story that they broke this morning. Apparently, simply holding back some speech has now escalated into deleting certain speech from the press. So while I'm sure that they want to editorialize and shadow-slowdown news that's embarrassing to them, the complete censorship is still very much the real focus.
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Twitter is under no legal obligation to host the NY Post’s tweets or content. Now, for bonus points, answer me this: Did Twitter delete the NY Post’s content on the NY Post’s website when it deleted those tweets? Because if the answer is “no”, Twitter didn’t censor the NY Post.
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Re: THEN YES, A. Stephen Stone, it's censorship, by your own sta
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/smoking-gun-emails-show-hunter-biden-introduced-vp-dad-b urisma-executive
Also has this:
OKAY. Twitter HAS censored, according to your prior standard, so let's see your NEW standard, I know you have one, because you nasty little fiends will never concede.
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Re: Also, The Public is "under no legal obligation" to ALLOW
Twitter to exist AT ALL.
You keep putting out this assertion, without ever taking notice that The Public has ultimate say over corporations.
You've turned into an open corporatist, like Masnick, never advocating what's good for individuals, only for corporations. You're not for "Social Justice" at all, no more than a veneer, but in practice only for The Rich and their corporations.
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Re: Re: THEN YES, A. Stephen Stone, it's censorship, by your own
Calling absolute bullshit on that assertion. Also, that "email" was found to be a fake.
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Re: Re: Also, The Public is "under no legal obligation" to ALLOW
Utter tripe. Where's your evidence?
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Nope. Twitter hasn’t censored anyone. The NY Post article remains on its website. People who want to share the article can do so outside of Twitter. Twitter is under no legal obligation to host the tweet by the NY Post or allow the posting of links to the article in question. It’s moderation, not censorship — no matter how much it pisses you off.
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How can a corporation control and enforce a copyright when you believe corporations have no legal rights, and how do you feel about corporations using copyright to censor speech?
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Re:
Nahh, you have your "mind" and it ain't mine.
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Re:
Moderation is censorship. Too bad for you this statement is true.
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Only to people who think losing an audience is the same thing as not being allowed to speak.
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Your failure to answer the question is itself an answer — though I doubt it’s the one you wanted to give.
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Re:
Twitter is under no obligation to censor the content and access to this highly sought after news article.
Wherever that may occur.
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Re: How can a corporation control and enforce a copyright
By using our corrupt Justice system. It ain't rocket science.
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Re:
If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice
Yeah, I like that song, too.
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Re:
Nahh, moderation is censorship. This is soo obvious.
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If it were “obvious”, you could explain it. I’m not seeing you explain it.
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Yes, and by choosing not to answer, you’ve still given an answer — which is, in fact, “I can’t answer your questions”. I can take that to mean you’re acknowledging your ignorance, which means your further contributions will be read accordingly.
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Re:
Sounding very authoritarian, Step Stone. I can see why you enjoy the corporate censors running around. You still dream of joining the Big Leagues.
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Re:
I won't explain how the sky is blue, either
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Yes, that’s correct. Twitter admins can choose to either deny or allow the posting of links to the NY Post article; they have that right. What they can’t do — and what they haven’t done, unless you’re sitting on information the rest of us don’t know about — is make any other service do the same. And they sure as hell can’t make the NY Post take down the article from the NY Post website.
So please explain how Twitter has censored the NY Post.
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Won’t or can’t? 😁
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I’m sorry you’ve confused knowledge (and the expression thereof) for authoritarianism. But that’s your problem, not mine.
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Why? Seems like replies are exactly what you want. People can refute the tweet right there an the tweet. Making them quote tweet instead just amplifies the tweet more!
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Re: Re:
At least Stephen has a mind, unlike you.
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Re: The Twitter account is ALSO "its website".
That was of course BAIT for you. As always I have FACTS which you simply can't grasp.
It's clear in Section 230 that there are "providers" and "users". NY Post is the "user" using the mechanisms of Twitter "the provider" to put out another website. In that respect, it's NO different from whatever corporation(s) HOSTS NYPost's OTHER websites. The WEBSITE as such even though "on Twitter" is the NY Post's.
THEN, Twitter HAS censored. Period.
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Re: Re: THEN YES, A. Stephen Stone, it's censorship, by your own
Why link zerohedge instead of anywhere fact-based?
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Re:
Nahh, I aptly described your self-perceived "knowledge" and demands for me as the authoritarian claptrap it is.
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Neither Section 230 nor the First Amendment (and all related jurisprudence) allow someone to use someone else’s private property as a platform for speech. You can’t point to a single law, statute, or “common law” court ruling that says “the U.S. government can force Twitter to host tweets by the NY Post”.
Twitter admins cannot censor the NY Post. They can moderate speech attributed to the NY Post — but only on Twitter.
Also, side note: Your arguments are getting worse than ever, Blue.
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I think you answered your own question. 😁
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Re: As always, A. Stephen Stone distracts with stupidity:
You are entirely OFF-TOPIC. Get back onto Twitter and its censoring, TROLL.
In specific, I point out above that the website on Twitter is the NY Post's website, it's NOT Twitter's. Twitter is merely the HOST. That's no minor difference, else you're going to have to argue that any mere HOST has total control over speech.
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Re: Re: Re:
If that is what you want to call it . . .
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Re: Censorship
Quick question:
If Fox News refuses to post my opinion piece, is that censorship?
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I demanded nothing from you. I asked you to answer my questions if you could (which you’ve proven you can’t). And my knowledge is exactly that, because I’m the one making arguments with that knowledge instead of pre-pubescent playground horseshit.
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Re:
Hundreds of thousands of people that read the article or parts of the article on their devices through the twitter portal can not do that now.
That is censorship.
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Not really. You brought up corporations and censorship; I’m more than free to thus ask you how you reconcile the dissonance of two positions you’ve explicitly expressed in the past. So again, I ask:
How can a corporation control and enforce a copyright when you believe corporations have no legal rights, and how do you feel about corporations using copyright to censor speech?
The website on Twitter is Twitter. A link to a website is not a website (I can’t believe I have to explain that to anyone), and Twitter is under no legal obligation to host any link to any website outside of Twitter. You can’t offer anything that says it must.
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Re:
Giving one baby a bottle makes the other ones want their own.
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Twitter didn’t host the article. The NY Post website did. People linked to the article on Twitter. A link does not host a website, and Twitter has no obligation to host any third-party content (including links).
Feel free to cite the law that says otherwise. Y’know, if you can. (ProTip: You can’t.)
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Speaking from current experience, I assume.
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Re: Twitter allowed it, made a contract, then breached it.
The contract is implicit in the words "provider" and "users", which state a merely mechanical relationship, NOT of Publisher and controlled author. Period.
Twitter is censoring the NY Post's website, which merely happens to be hosted by Twitter.
There's nothing in law which authorizes Twitter to censor. You are advocating Nazi-style censorship.
And below, you are OFF-TOPIC yet here saying my arguments are getting worse? -- Well, could be true, coming down from high level, but yours are as ever just trivially stupid
AND again, a browser session stopped working because Techdirt CHEATS out of sight to favor fanboys and discriminate against other viewpoints.
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Re: Here's good indication of coming black letter law, Stone:
https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/6405555/Enigma-Malwarebytes.pdf
THE PUBLIC IS TO BENEFIT, NOT PROVIDERS. GET IT?
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Last time I checked, the NY Post website wasn’t hosted by Twitter. If you have information that says otherwise, now would be the time to show it. And if you’re going to claim that a link is the equivalent of hosting an entire website, you’re going to look like a bigger fucking idiot than you already do.
Correct — which is why what Twitter admins are doing is moderation, not censorship. You can still read the NY Post article on the NY Post website, and Twitter admins can’t stop you from doing it because Twitter doesn’t host the article or the website it’s on.
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And yet, the law doesn’t allow the public to force their speech on privately-owned third-party platforms — whether that’s Twitter, the New York Times opinion page, or your front porch. If it did, you could point to the law, statute, or “common law” court ruling that says so.
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Re: Re: Censorship
IF they remove it from their website it is.
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Re:
I never mentioned any laws - why are you?
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Yes and look how many bottles you are demanding.
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Could Fox News legally stop him from posting his opinion piece elsewhere? If not, either refusing to publish it or taking it down after publication is merely an act of editorial discretion.
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Re:
Now now, don't be too quick to dismiss this idea, as I can see some real potential in it.
Just imagine someone going to a popular 'conservative' platform and posting something they disagree with, like, I dunno, covid is bad and/or black people deserve equal treatment under the law, then when they kick that person off they'll have shown that they are just as censor-happy as the platforms they are whining about, and as such they have absolutely zero grounds to object when platforms that civilized people use give them the boot for acting like raging jackasses.
(As an aside damn did the two trolls come out in force on this one, though I can't possibly imagine why they might be so upset with the idea that platforms might be taking steps to tackle disinformation as it's not like that kind of person is likely to idolize a particular person who lies with the frequency that most people breathe or anything.)
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Because you’re talking about censorship. The law doesn’t permit Twitter to censor other people — to violate their First Amendment rights. Now if you can point out how Twitter admins taking down the NY Post tweet or blocking the sharing of a specific link on Twitter and only Twitter actually violates anyone’s First Amendment rights, feel free to do so. (You can’t, but you can try anyway.)
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I think the trolls are more upset that someone with more actual intelligence than the two of them combined — and someone armed with actual arguments instead of playground insults or appeals to emotion — is essentially spitting in their face.
Just a thought. 😁
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Re:
Censorship doesn't have to have anything to do with any law.
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Re:
Twitter hosted the article in every tweet that mentioned all or part of the article.
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Being denied the use of someone else’s property as a platform for your speech isn’t censorship. If you can explain how it is, feel free to do so.
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Twitter hosted, at best, a copy of the NY Post article (or part of it). And I should note that unless the article was less than 240 characters long, Twitter couldn’t have hosted the whole article in a single tweet.
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Re:
Removing it after publishing it is censorship.
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Re:
How did I read parts of the article in someone else's twitter feed if twitter did not host it?
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As I said: Twitter hosted a copy of it. The original is still on the NY Post website and Twitter admins can’t do shit about that.
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Only if Fox News tried to stop him from publishing it elsewhere.
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Re:
Nahh, removing it from anywhere is censorship. It's a pretty easy concept to understand.
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Re: REMOVING CONTENT IS CENSORSHIP.
Twitter removed the content of hundreds of thousands of tweets and committed massive censorship.
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Re:
You need to learn how twitter works. It is obvious you have no clue as to what people can post.
Answer me this - question guy - How many characters are in a meme?
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Re:
Yeah, you write a lot of things . . . .
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Re: (which you’ve proven you can’t)
What kind of dumb-ass community would say your non-sensical post was insightful?
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Who lives under the bridge...
Compared to what you post, most things could be considered to be insightful.
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Re: Re:
There once was an out of the blue
Who hated the process of due
Each tweet that he'd made
Was DMCAed
And shoved up his ass with a screw
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Mr. Out Of Context
I see you are lying by omission again. Why didn't you quote the full paragraph? Hmm? Perhaps because it doesn't say what you want?
You are so bad at this it's embarrassing.
Oh well, old man yells at clouds.
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Simpletons don't have arguments
So you don't have an argument then? You are just going to repeat yourself like a simpleton?
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Okay then, hot shot, let’s give you another hypothetical and see what you (allegedly) think.
I sumbit a letter to the editor of my local newspaper. I also publish the same exact letter — every letter, all the punctuation, nothing different at all — on my personal website. The newspaper publishes my letter online, then decides for whatever arbitrary reason to unpublish it. My letter remains up on my personal website.
Now tell me: Have I been censored, such that the newspaper violated my constitutional rights?
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And the law allows Twitter admins to do that. If you can prove otherwise, now is the time to do that.
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Until I left it earlier this year, I’d been a Twitter user since 2007. I know how Twitter works from an end user standpoint.
They can’t post more than 240 characters in a single tweet.
Depends on the meme. I think there’s a Brazzers meme that has six characters…
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And you haven’t once proven anything I’ve said is flat-out 100% wrong.
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Re: Re: Re: Censorship
So, Fox News censors?
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/13/business/media/fox-news-george-floyd-protests-seattle.ht ml
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Re: Re:
It did not. Twitter has said it removed the links for violating its policies on two accounts:
We've written about both of those issues in the past. Is it your contention that Twitter cannot have such policies?
Also, Twitter has allowed version of the article (including one tweeted out sentence by sentence) that do not violate either of those rules to remain on its site.
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Re: Re: Re:for some strange reason Twitter didn’t ban the NYT
Twitter didn’t ban the New York Times when they obtained Trumps tax returns. That info is supposed to be illegal to access and release, yet there was no banning of links on social media.
Facebook and Twitter shot themselves in the foot today. Regardless of whether they have the right to suppress the NY Post’s article it looks bad
As most people have pointed out, Section 230 was designed to be a shield for free speech, not a sword to suppress it. If Section 230 is ever modified or repealed it will be because of companies like Facebook and Twitter suppressing with a heavy hand.
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The NY Post article is still available on the NY Post website. The link to that article can still be shared outside of Twitter. Whose speech has been suppressed, such that their First Amendment rights were violated by Twitter?
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Re:
One could argue that Marsh v. Alabama could apply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsh_v._Alabama
The court pointed out that the more an owner opens his property up to the public in general, the more his rights are circumscribed by the statutory and constitutional rights of those who are invited in.
In its conclusion, the Court stated that it was essentially weighing the rights of property owners against the rights of citizens to enjoy freedom of press and religion. The Court noted that the rights of citizens under the Bill of Rights occupy a preferred position. Accordingly, the Court held that the property rights of a private entity are not sufficient to justify the restriction of a community of citizens' fundamental rights and liberties.
The more large social media sites try to shape and suppress news they don’t like the more offensive it becomes to more people.
One can make the argument that people don’t have to use Facebook or Twitter but in reality being exiled from these platforms cuts off communication from the wider world. Facebook and Twitter have now cut off the ability of the NY Post from posting new articles.
This may be the tipping point for the removal of Sec 230mfrom large social media companies. And it will be their fault.
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Re: Re: Censorship
Not aware that there is a “Fox News Messenger” they can block you from.
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The case isn’t a direct parallel. In that case, a trespassing law infringed upon someone’s First (and Fourteenth) Amendment rights. Twitter admins, in their decision to ban users from posting a specific link, have violated no constitutional rights. And Twitter being exceptionally popular does not make it a public forum or public property, so the law can’t force Twitter to host third-party speech.
While you may be right about Twitter potentially putting 230 in danger — key word: “may” — it hasn’t violated any laws. If anything, an attempt to force Twitter into hosting that link would violate the First Amendment rights afforded to the corporation what owns and operates Twitter. (Whether you think corporations should have rights is irrelevant here.) So please, let’s kill the argument that Twitter is violating someone’s rights with its (dumb) moderation decision and kick it in the shallow grave it barely deserves.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:for some strange reason Twitter didn’t ban the
As most people have pointed out, Section 230 was designed to be a shield for free speech, not a sword to suppress it. If Section 230 is ever modified or repealed it will be because of companies like Facebook and Twitter suppressing with a heavy hand.
No, it will be because of idiots who either don't understand, or refuse to admit, that no-one has a first amendment or 'free speech' right to speak on someone else's property, and the property owner revoking or refusing to grant someone the ability to speak on their property is not in any way an attack on free speech.
Not a single right is being violated when a private platform tells a user 'not on our property', as that is merely the platform exercising their first amendment rights and the rights that come with property ownership, and what makes the 'it's a shield, not a sword' argument extra funny is that with 230 far more speech stays up that otherwise might get the axe, such that stripping 230 would remove that shield and force companies to wield the sword, removing or outright blocking anything that even might be questionable lest they face an avalanche of lawsuits.
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Re:
Facebook and Twitter may have started out as small sites but they have morphed into Telecommunications platforms. And I am using the word Telecommunications on purpose. They are large social media sites that grew by being open then when they got big enough started using their power to control speech they didn’t like. Saying that people can just quit using Facebook or Twitter Ismaili nonstarter, as it would require everyone else they communicate with to have to install new apps.
Once a company gets big enough to start censoring mass communications then they need to be balanced. Either both of them need to be regulated as telecommunications services like landlines and cellphones to prohibit them from controlling mass communications or their messaging services need to be opened up so they don’t control everything.
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Re:
You know... looking at your post history is not nearly as difficult as you presume. The average reader can tell who's the shitposter throwing a tantrum because his favorite politician and party isn't getting their cock sucked hard enough.
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How do Twitter admins control speech outside of Twitter, the one service where they have the absolute legal right to moderate third-party speech for virtually any reason?
I only used Facebook for a month over a decade ago. I quit Twitter two months ago. People can and do quit using social media, even when it means losing touch with their mutuals, for various reasons.
How can the law “balance” Twitter such that it retains the right to moderate speech for virtually any reason but also has to host all legally protected speech, including racial slurs and COVID disinformation?
Not possible. You can’t make the argument that Facebook and Twitter are in any way comparable to phone service, landline or mobile. People may need a phone to communicate, but they don’t need Facebook on their phone to do it.
Neither Facebook nor Twitter control everything. Neither company can moderate speech on the other’s platform, nor can they moderate speech on…
…and literally every other goddamned website and interactive web service on the entire Internet.
If you say Facebook and Twitter “control everything”, maybe consider that they only thing either service “controls” is the size of a potential audience for your speech. But you’re not entitled to an audience for your speech, and you’re not entitled to use either platform. Neither is anyone else.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:for some strange reason Twitter didn’t ban
There are several laws that prohibit telecommunications companies from restricting speech. Verizon is not allowed to refuse you cellphone service because of your religion. AT&T can’t refuse Asians the right to use AT&T cell phones. They are regulated under common carrier rules that mandate open access.
For several decades there were no rules on phone service. Any phone company could refuse to serve you. Phone service went from novelty to rich person’s toy to indispensable. Along the way the government passed laws to prohibit phone companies from violating their customers rights.
Facebook, Twitter and other large social media are reaching the point where they are not just novelties but are able to choose who is allowed to say what. Saying that social media sites have the right to do whatever they want and ban whatever conversations they want is giving them too much control. If they wish to continue acting as a mass communications company they need to act like an open and free one.
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And if Facebook or Twitter were as necessary for communications as mobile phone service providers, they’d already be “regulated”. But they’re not, so they’re not.
I’m able to choose who is allowed to say what on my private property. What makes the admins of Facebook, Twitter, or any other social media service unable to do the same?
The alternative is forcing social media services to host all legally protected speech, which is going to end up forcing off all the “good” speech (and users) in favor of garbage like racial slurs, spam, and quotes from Breitbart articles. You can’t “balance” this equation — either Twitter, Facebook, etc. have the right to moderate speech on their private property or they don’t. Which is it?
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Re: Re: Re:
The Pentagon Papers were stolen from an office.
Deep Throat leaked sensitive government operations to Woodward and Bernstein
The fact that the information was stolen is irrelevant to the press’s free speech rights. It is the height of hypocrisy to claim that they should suppress the news because of a hacking incident.
Having information stolen from a laptop is wrong, it when it involves the son of a Presidential candidate taking money from a foreign power is is our business.
Strangely, if Facebook and Twitter hadn’t banned the NY Post being able to post links to the story it would have been forgotten in a few days. Now people are noticing it even more. I think someone once called this the Streisand Effect.
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Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey rapidly backpedaling:
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/smoking-gun-emails-show-hunter-biden-introduced-vp-dad- burisma-executive
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How does Twitter banning the posting of links to an NY Post story “suppress the news” when anyone can go right to the NY Post website, which is where the article was originally published and is still available to read? (I mean, the article is still on the front page.) And for the record, even Jack Dorsey thinks Twitter fucked up in this situation.
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Re: Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey rapidly backpedaling: UNACCEPTABLE!
Dorsey himself states it, so you little leftists are now all by yourselves, fully exposed as liars and censors.
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we get it, you repeat conservative talking points without a second thought
find a new schtick
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Re: Re:
The PragerUwU sham lawsuit failed to dupe the court into falling for the "Marsh V Alabamama applies to internet platforms" lie.
Tl;Dr:
You're 100% full of shit, AC, same as every other anti-230 troll.
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Re: Re:
Wow, we've finally dug up someone who somehow understands the word "telecommunications" even less than Ajit Pai.
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Re: Conservatism is not "schtick", PUNK but reasoned philosophy.
And you just tacitly admitted that you've no response except to try and divert.
Feeble little PUNK.
Also, see you watch the site so close that responded in two minutes!
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Was that before or after we dug the grave for network neutrality?
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Re: A. Stephen Stone now 100% WRONG according to Jack Dorsey.
It's censorship, reversed and stated "UNACCEPTABLE". -- Though like you, won't give up, have a number of NEW excuses.
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just because you call something censorship doesn't make it so
back up the assertion or fuck off back to your straitjacket
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Re: Re:
Remember the Nunes thread you failed to shit on bro? Went about as well as your John Steele defense fund. How's that Richard Liebowitz scheme coming along again?
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Re: Mr. Out Of Context
Why didn't you quote THE WHOLE PDF?
FOCUS, IDIOT. What you copy-pasted there is simply not very relevant.
But it's not contradictory to my focus!
The next sentence after my fragment mentions "protecting internet users"! How is that possibly in any way contradictory to me or supporting your wish for corporate censorship? HMM?
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Re: Re: Re: I DO recall the Nunes piece, and will get to it.
Lost the URL. Accumulating more items.
Thank you for noticing, though, that I "failed to shit on" it! That was not my intent, never is, only Truth is. -- YOU, though, are clearly one of the regular muckworms here at TD (too chicken to use your account), and can't imagine any other goal than shitting all over this fine site.
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You’ve ignored a couple of other key words in that sentence, bro: “suppressing competition”.
Show me how Twitter’s moderation decision intended to “suppress competition” from Facebook, Mastodon instances, Parler, etc. Go ahead. I’ll wait.
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You’ve literally shitposted here for over a decade because someone mildly insulted you once and you took it so personally that you’ve literally shitposted here for over a decade.
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Re: Re: Re: BTW: nothing to do w John Steele, Richard Liebowitz
I've NO idea why you kids keep accusing / digging me with those. I've ignored them -- and it's FINE with me when you ankle-biters continue to be barking mad wrong -- but this once I deny it comprehensively: no relation beyond vaguely recognize the Steele name, don't know the other at all.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:for some strange reason Twitter didn’t
There are several laws that prohibit telecommunications companies from restricting speech. Verizon is not allowed to refuse you cellphone service because of your religion. AT&T can’t refuse Asians the right to use AT&T cell phones. They are regulated under common carrier rules that mandate open access.
Which would be relevant if social media were telecommuniations companies.
But they're not.
So it isn't.
Facebook, Twitter and other large social media are reaching the point where they are not just novelties but are able to choose who is allowed to say what.
Yes, they absolutely can decide who can say what, on their platforms. The difference between them and say, AT&T is that if AT&T decides they don't want to connect you unless there's an alternative available to you you're screwed(and given the natural monopoly that is telecommunications there very well may not be), as you can't communicate at all long-distance. If a social media platform decides they don't want to carry your speech on the other hand there are numerous other options, and finding another alternative is trivial.
As another example of the flaw in this argument, let's apply it to a hypothetical offline business shall we?
Say a club markets itself as the social gathering place in a given town, telling people to come and meet and mingle, share a drink and/or a meal and just have a good time. Like any other business run by someone with a working brain they have rules at the club, no harassing other people, you need to wear a certain amount of clothing, leave the KKK hoods at home, and so on.
Over time more and more people use the club as the town's social hub, such that as time passes if you aren't going to the club your social interaction options are likely to be rather slim.
Now then, with the groundwork laid comes the question: At what point should the club be forbidden from applying their rules and kicking people out of the club for violating them? What percentage(roughly) of the town should be making use of the club for their social interactions before the local government gets to step in and tell them that they in fact aren't allowed to kick someone out for swearing at one of the staff, that they are not allowed to give the boot to a group of people who are loudly discussing how inferior women/black/non-heterosexual people are, that no in fact they may not prohibit someone from walking through the doors wearing nothing but a g-string?
Saying that social media sites have the right to do whatever they want and ban whatever conversations they want is giving them too much control.
Yes, how dare they be able to decide who gets to use their privately owned property, the utter gall of those people.
Doubling-down on what Stephen wrote, that 'control' is also what allows them to remove and/or block entirely legal but otherwise objectionable content like racism, sexism, bigotry of other flavors, pictures of car crashes and rotting animal corpses and similar delightful content, such that telling them 'you will carry anything legal' is effectively telling them 'you will allow the most disgusting people you can think of so long as they stick with legal speech', which is great for the assholes but not so great for everyone else.
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Re: A. Stephen Stone, you're just a PUNK! Quit nagging me.
Your repetitive comment there only shows how vacuous you are. That means empty.
And if you think that YOUR comments as that one improve the site... Well, just this once please state that you think such improves the site, instead of makes anyone reasonable click CLOSE and not come back. Go on, just state that you help with such remarks.
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Re: Re: Re:because laws never ever change
And at one point segregation was completely legal due to,Supreme Court rulings. As time passes things change.
At one point it was legal for companies to form non-competitive monopolies.
Congress passed laws prohibiting these things because they were harmful to society. In the case of segregation it was because it was a violation of human rights. With the monopolies it was companies who were abusing their market share and unfairly raising prices and destroying competitors, which harmed regular people. Now people are concerned that large tech companies will deplatform and segregate them if they say or do the wrong way.
A few years ago it would have been unthinkable that Facebook or Twitter would have censored a story involving a presidential candidate a few weeks before the election. Social media was more open and less restrictive a decade ago.
Ten years ago no one was advocating for Section 230 repeal. Now there are many people who see what Facebook, Twitter and other sites have morphed into. Section 230 was passed because congress didn’t want lawsuits to strangle the infant internet. They wanted it to grow with minimal regulation. It wan never intended to allow large tech corporations to control the flow of information.
More people are seeing how much power tech companies have to censor and control, and they don’t like it. Most people believe in the concept of freedom of speech, and the fact that tech companies may legally be able to kick people off because they don’t like what they say doesn’t sit right with them. As I said, if Section 230 is rolled back or repealed it will be because tech companies have overstepped their bounds and angered enough people with their heavy handed tactics.
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And it’s unthinkable now, because I can still read the story on the website that first published it.
Show me how Twitter controls “the flow of information” across the entire goddamn Internet, such that all information published on the entire goddamn Internet must go through Twitter first.
I believe in freedom of speech. I also think the law shouldn’t force owners of private property to host anyone else’s speech. You’re not doing anything to convince me I should think otherwise.
And when companies refuse to host third-party content out of fear of legal action, or when they refuse to moderate content so they can avoid knowing about said content and being held legally liable for it, I’d bet good money that lots of people would ask for 230 to come back.
You’re all for yanking back the reins on social media companies. But have you really stopped to consider the consequences of hamstringing Twitter’s ability to moderate speech?
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Re:
It suppresses it by removing exposure. Search Google Tax - Spanish newspapers to see how Google removing Google news links caused traffic to dry up to Spanish newspaper sites.
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“Exposure” isn’t speech. No one has the right to an audience, and no one has the right to force other people (or companies) to give them an audience. Feel free to explain why I should think otherwise, if you can.
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Re:
Wait, Are you actually arguing that people posting Twitter links doesn’t drive traffic to sites? Or that Twitter blocking links doesn’t affect website visibility?
Wow.
See Google News Tax - Spain
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150725/14510131761/study-spains-google-tax-news-shows-how- much-damage-it-has-done.shtml
And I know it’s talking about Google, not Twitter, but the principle still applies.
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Re:
The First Ammendment does not protect popular speech. It protects un-popular speech. Popular speech doesn’t need protection because the vast majority doesn’t find it offensive.
Threatening, harassing or obscene speech isn’t protected. But everything else is.
Besides, since when the hell did it become acceptable for corporations to have more free speech rights than regular,people. If Facebook cannot accept free speech, screw em.
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Re:
It wasn’t that long ago that Techdirt was arguing that trying to remove hate speech and terrorists from Facebook was a bad idea
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20160929/17431035666/fbis-comey-actually-chasing-isis-off-twitter -makes-it-more-difficult-us-to-follow-them.shtml
Besides, why should Facebook be wasting money on moderating ‘hate speech’? Doesn’t Section 230 protect them? Most decent people will ignore racists idiots and block them.
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Re: Re: Censorship
I wasn’t aware that Fox News let just anyone post articles to their site. Unlike Facebook and Twitter.
Besides, can someone explain to me why Facebook and Twitter should care what their users post? After all, aren’t they protected by Section 230? Why are they wasting millions of dollars to hire moderators to block stuff they don’t like? It’s almost like they are trying to punish people with views they don’t like.
Besides, when do corporations get more First Amendment rights than ordinary people? If they can’t respect free speech rights of ordinary people then they should go into another line of business.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:because laws never ever change
They wanted it to grow with minimal regulation. It wan never intended to allow large tech corporations to control the flow of information.
About that, take a wild guess as to who will suffer the least from a repeal of 230, and who will end up worse off, potentially to the 'site's closed, no more user content allowed' level?
Also, you might want to go tell the authors of 230 that they're wrong as to their original intent, because they don't seem to agree with you at all.
First we've got Cox, from the 'Author Of Section 230 Chris Cox Says All The Critics Are Wrong About The History And Intent Of 230' article here on TD(I'm not linking to it to avoid having the comment caught in the spam filter, you can search TD if you want the whole thing):
'We named our bill the Internet Freedom and Family Empowerment Act, to describe its two main components: protecting speech and privacy on the Internet from government regulation, and incentivizing blocking and filtering technologies that individuals could use to become their own censors in their own households. Pornographers illegally targeting minors would not be let off the hook: They would be liable for compliance with all laws, both civil and criminal, in connection with any content they created.'
'To avoid interfering with the essential functioning of the Internet, the law would not shift that responsibility to Internet platforms, for whom the burden of screening billions of digital messages, documents, images, and sounds would be unreasonable -- not to mention a potential invasion of privacy. Instead, Internet platforms would be allowed to act as “Good Samaritans” by reviewing at least some of the content if they chose to do so in the course of enforcing rules against “obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise objectionable” content.
...
It is also useful to imagine a world without Section 230. In this alternative world, websites and Internet platforms of all kinds would face enormous potential liability for hosting content created by others. They would have a powerful incentive to limit that exposure, which they could do in one of two ways. They could strictly limit user-generated content, or even eliminate it altogether; or they could adopt the “anything goes” model through which CompuServe originally escaped liability before Section 230 existed.
We would all be very much worse off were this to happen. Without Section 230’s clear limitation on liability it is difficult to imagine that most of the online services on which we rely every day would even exist in anything like their current form.
And then Wyden from 'Ron Wyden Explains Why President Trump (And Many Others) Are Totally Wrong About Section 230':
'Without Section 230, sites would have strong incentives to go one of two ways: either sharply limit what users can post, so as to avoid being sued, or to stop moderating entirely, something like 8chan — now operating under the name 8kun — where anonymous users can post just about anything and speech supporting racism and sexism is common.
I think we would be vastly worse off in either scenario. Just look at Black Lives Matter and the protests against police violence over the past week as an example. The cellphone video that captured the officer kneeling on George Floyd's neck spread across social media platforms — and it's the reason Americans learned about his unjust killing in the first place. So many of these cases of unconscionable use of force against black Americans have come to light as a result of videos posted to social media.
In a world without 230, I cannot imagine that Facebook or Twitter would allow posts about police violence that could possibly be defamatory. These horrible injustices would never get the public attention they deserve. And accountability would be even less likely.'
Either of those two people sound like they don't like how 230 is currently being used or believe that it shouldn't apply today?
More people are seeing how much power tech companies have to censor and control, and they don’t like it. Most people believe in the concept of freedom of speech, and the fact that tech companies may legally be able to kick people off because they don’t like what they say doesn’t sit right with them.
Then they're not fans of free speech(or the idea of private property), because 'you will host my speech even if you don't agree with it' most certainly does not fall into that category.
As I said, if Section 230 is rolled back or repealed it will be because tech companies have overstepped their bounds and angered enough people with their heavy handed tactics.
And again, no, it will be because idiots and/or the dishonest don't like the fact that platforms have rules and they're being punished for violating those rules, and/or that they don't in fact get to dictate what is and is now 'acceptable' on someone else's property.
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Re: Re:
Do you even listen to yourself?
“though I can't possibly imagine why they might be so upset with the idea that platforms might be taking steps to tackle disinformation”
You know what scares me the most about this site? It’s how quickly people pivoted from
‘More free speech not less”
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200527/01005344579/trump-twitter-free-speech.shtml
To “taking steps to tackle disinformation”
It’s always easiest to start taking rights away from the despicable people first. Instead of banning people who disagree with you just block them. Eventually when they get blocked by enough people they will go somewhere else, or they will find other like-minded people to talk to. Since Facebook monitors posts it wouldn’t be hard to place such undesirable people in their own isolated group. And with Section 230mrights they don’t have to worry about being sued.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
Don't kid yourself. Really not hard to look for the threads where copyright lawyers were found to be misbehaving and you thoroughly pissed your pants at the idea that copyright might be criticized.
Nobody believes you, you ignorant motherfucker.
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Re: Re: Re: Censorship
Besides, can someone explain to me why Facebook and Twitter should care what their users post? After all, aren’t they protected by Section 230? Why are they wasting millions of dollars to hire moderators to block stuff they don’t like? It’s almost like they are trying to punish people with views they don’t like.
No, it's 'almost like' they're trying to keep their platform from being overrun by assholes and turned into a cesspit, something that would drive away the majority of users and advertisers who have no interest in using a platform where bigotry and trolls run wild and leave them with a user base just as small and toxic as the likes of Gab or Parler.
Besides, when do corporations get more First Amendment rights than ordinary people?
They don't. The right that I have to tell someone to leave my house, even if I invited them earlier, is the same one they are using to decide who they will and will not allow on their property. Trying to strip them of that ability is if anything trying to make it so they have less rights than ordinary people.
If they can’t respect free speech rights of ordinary people then they should go into another line of business.
Once more for the slow: You have no free speech rights to use someone else's property without their permission or despite their objections, so a platform telling you 'not on our property' is not, in any way, a violation of your 'free speech rights'.
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Re: Re:
It's cute that you think everyone else is obliged to play your favorite game of "shit on everyone's hand and claim that it's raining".
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Re:
Stephen is MIke.
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Re: Re: Twitter allowed it, made a contract, then breached it.
"Twitter is censoring the NY Post's website, which merely happens to be hosted by Twitter."
It's always fascinating to see which alternate universe you will feel compelled to invent next, even though dealing with the way things work in the real world is much easier.
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Re: Re: Re: THEN YES, A. Stephen Stone, it's censorship, by your
Fact-based outlets don't agree with his worldview.
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Re: Re: As always, A. Stephen Stone distracts with stupidity:
"the website on Twitter is the NY Post's website"
So, are you trying to claim that a user profile page is that user's website now? You might need to look into that. Or, are you just redefining the dictionary again in order to pretend you have a point?
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Re: Re: REMOVING CONTENT IS CENSORSHIP.
"Twitter removed the content of hundreds of thousands of tweets"
Yes, and they have every right to do that, just as your favoured places like Stormfront and Breitbart can and do regularly censor and ban users with opinions from outside of their echo chambers.
Funny how you guys never complain about that, isn't it?
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Re: Re:
"Are you actually arguing that people posting Twitter links doesn’t drive traffic to sites?"
No, he's arguing that the NY Post have no constitutional right to that free traffic, nor should they be compelled to host content that violate their community standards because the NY Post wants free traffic.
He's also arguing that anyone who wants to read the NY Post article can do so no matter what Twitter wants, and it's not censorship to deny providing them free marketing.
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Re: Re:
"Besides, why should Facebook be wasting money on moderating ‘hate speech’? Doesn’t Section 230 protect them? "
It protects them from legal liability from that speech. It does not protect them from the loss of advertisers and user interactions that would come as a result of leaving such things unchecked.
"Most decent people will ignore racists idiots and block them."
Most decent people appreciate not being exposed to those people in the first place while they're just trying to browse family updates and cat picture.
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Re: Re:
"The First Ammendment does not protect popular speech. It protects un-popular speech. "
This is true. But, speech is not being prevented here. In fact, it can be argued that by forcing Twitter to host the content against their will, that's a removal of their free speech rights.
"Besides, since when the hell did it become acceptable for corporations to have more free speech rights than regular,people"
It didn't. You and Twitter both have the same right to free speech. Which includes the ability to disassociate from people you don't want on your property.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
Look, you've made your point. You can't stand the community here. So why stay, exactly? Simping a "funniest post" for Sunday? Sexually identifying as a masochist?
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Re: Re: (which you’ve proven you can’t)
I'd hazard a guess and say it's probably the same community which has had to watch you spew white supremacy rhetoric and "But Obama!" projection everywhere which is giving Stephen "insightful" votes and flagging your one-line troll rolls as "irrelevant".
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Re: Re:
"The average reader can tell who's the shitposter throwing a tantrum because his favorite politician and party isn't getting their cock sucked hard enough."
And "seedeevee", "shel10" and "restless94110" always fail to realize this which is why they believe they can still establish credibility using the same account which came out swinging in favor of white supremacy a few months past.
Just sayin' that the people persistently arguing for utter lunacy aren't necessarily the sharpest tools in the shed to begin with...
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Re: Re:
And here we have the real core of your complaint about the big social media sites, they will not help you spread your unpopular views to people who do not want to listen. Free speech does not mean that you can force others to spread you speech for you, or allow you to take over their site and audience.
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And if you had the right to use someone else’s private property as your personal soapbox, you might have had a point there.
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The First Amendment protects the right to speak freely. It doesn’t give anyone the right to use someone else’s private property — whether it’s your front porch or Facebook — as their personal soapbox. It also doesn’t give anyone the right to force other people into being an audience for that person’s speech. And those statements apply equally to both popular and unpopular speech — after all, nobody gets more rights for saying “Birdemic is the greatest movie ever made”.
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Re: Re: Re:
As usual, context matters. Now go and read the first paragraph of the post you linked to.
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Re: Re:
For an example for what happens when you don't keep abreast what kind of UGC is on your site:
Anyone building a website have an intended audience, if the intended audience is swamped with spam, hate-speech, off-topic content and other dross - what are the consequences do you think?
People using Youtube, FB, Twitter etc shouldn't have to wade through racists content, hate-speech and other shit to get to the content they expect to see.
The very action of a user blocking someone or some content means that they had to be exposed to that content first.
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Re: Re: (which you’ve proven you can’t)
What kind of dumb-ass community would say your non-sensical post was insightful?
2 of Stephen's comments on this thread are marked insightful while none of yours are. So, draw your own conclusion. It seems you are too smart for Techdirt, so go away.
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Re:
Because the Supreme Court has always held that free speech is not allowed on company property.
Oh, wait
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsh_v._Alabama
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Re: Re:
Context matters... Even considering the amount of shit both Twitter and FB flushes out through moderation, I doubt they can be considered to perform the full spectrum of municipal powers.
Do you people even read and understand what you link to? It certainly doesn't seem so.
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Re: Re:
A comment stating how many ways that example is completely irrelevant to the situation at hand would probably be longer than the Wikipedia article.
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Re: Re:
Tell your handler he needs to be faster with your talking points.
That one was already debunked before you posted it.
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Hey, you let me know when Facebook and Twitter start “perform[ing] the full spectrum of municipal powers”, so I’ll know when you have a point worth arguing instead of a case you’re misunderstanding. Now, let’s see if you understand me this time:
The First Amendment protects your right to speak freely. It doesn’t give you the right to make others listen. It doesn’t give you the right to make others give you access to an audience. And it doesn’t give you the right to turn someone else’s private property into your personal soapbox.
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New Nork Post: "Hey, Twitter and Facebook, will you tell everyone you can about the latest scam we're trying to pull for us, okay?"
Twitter: "No, do it yourself."
Shit-for-brains sheep: "OMG censorship!!!1!Q!"
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I don't think I understand how your metaphor applies to my post. Who is the baby(s)? What is the bottle(s)?
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You sound like someone who would have defended the Comics Code Authority's guidelines as being "not censorship".
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Nah, fam, that shit was censorship. Here’s the key difference: The Comics Code prevented specific forms of speech from being published, partially because of threats by the government to keep that speech from being published in the wake of the controversy started by Seduction of the Innocent. While it was possible for a comic artist to self-publish their comics outside of the system, doing so was not nearly as feasible then as it is now. Either comic artists (and their writers, and the editors, and the higher-ups) played along with what the Code said was good or they didn’t get work.
The most famous example of an attempt by the CCA to censor someone’s speech was the infamous situation with EC Comics. When that publisher planned to reprint the story “Judgement Day”, the CCA wanted the reveal at the end — an ambassador from Earth, visiting a planet where the aliens are divided by color, was a Black man — changed so the astronaut wasn’t Black. After threats of bad press from EC Comics’s two higher-ups (Al Feldstein and William Gaines) over an objection which had no basis in the Code itself, they reprinted “Judgement Day” as it was in Incredible Science Fiction #33. (Unfortunately, the Code had done its work by then. That issue would be the last comic book that EC Comics ever published.)
Stan Lee also ran into something of a roadblock when he was writing “Green Goblin Reborn”, a Spider-Man storyline in which one of the characters becomes a drug addict, in 1971. The Code had rules against that sort of thing. Problem was, the storyline was written with explicit government permission (the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare recommended the story), and Marvel had the clout to legit defy the CCA. Marvel published the three issues of Amazing Spider-Man without CCA approval — to critical acclaim, which likely embarassed the hell out of the CCA.
So yeah, the Comics Code and film’s equivalent in the Hays Code were censorship. You won’t find me saying otherwise.
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Because the Supreme Court has always held that free speech is not allowed on company property.
Oh, wait
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsh_v._Alabama
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You do realize that spamming that debunked bullshit you've obviously never even read like that makes you look pretty stupid, right?
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It's funny how you keep clinging to that case, but still have no idea what it means.
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And Shiva Ayyadurai didn't invent email, Hamilton.
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