Australia's High Court just delivered a crushing blow to free speech by holding that media companies are liable for third party comments on their site

[CaughtInThe]

Now maybe people here will understand why 230 is important.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

Don't forget, Australia also took the fun out of surfing, too.
You can actually get a ticket for surfing wrong, or even just cutting off another surfer, even if by accident.

 

[RetiredUSN]

Now maybe people here will understand why 230 is important.

You love defending free speech when it suits your agenda.

 

[CaughtInThe]

You love defending free speech when it suits your agenda.

can you point out which free speech i'm against?

 

[mrjurrs]

Now maybe people here will understand why 230 is important.

This protection isn't that important. It has enabled the internet to become a place of untruths. I've got no issue with dumping this protection, because media companies could police their sites, it just costs them too much of their profits.

 

[Ishm]

It's becoming a global struggle to suppress/control etc deliberate misinformation masquerading as 'free speech'. There isn't an easy answer to protecting truly desirable free speech, while protecting the easily fooled masses from being deliberately led into false beliefs. The massive growth of conspiracies theories as people have found the power of social media is the most obvious example. Take a simple case for instance ....." 5G cell towers spread covid". People literally started attacking cell towers because some crazy managed to get social media convinced this was true. Lots of damage that served no one. So either we 'censor', or as the Australians seem to be doing, make people responsible for deliberately spreading misinformation. Personally I'm in favor of holding people responsible for their actions rather than censorship. How you do that is the problem.

 

[Helix]

Revoking 230 would kill smaller social media sites and political debate online.

 

[Fletch]

can you point out which free speech i'm against?

Yes, any speech you disagree with

 

[Napoleon]

Revoking 230 would kill smaller social media sites and political debate online.

That’s what content moderators are for.

 

[Phys251]

Everything that righties accuse others of doing, they do or enable themselves. Every single thing.

For instance:

You love defending free speech when it suits your agenda.

 

[Slartibartfast]

Now maybe people here will understand why 230 is important.

Now they get to see

 

[Slartibartfast]

Revoking 230 would kill smaller social media sites and political debate online.

Maybe

if posts weren’t accessible to people who weren’t logged in and people sign the right language in the EULA it may still work

 

[Helix]

That’s what content moderators are for.

Most sites can't pre-moderate all comments. If they did, i doubt that you'd like the result.

 

[Helix]

Maybe

if posts weren’t accessible to people who weren’t logged in and people sign the right language in the EULA it may still work

It would be shit. If my goal were to crush online political speech, i would revoke 230 and do one more simple thing that i won't expand on, because i don't want to give them ideas.

 

[Ishm]

Where do you guys, if you do, draw the line between free speech and just plain BS designed to cause problems or benefit a person/group at others expense? By BS I mean an outright falsehood, not someones opinion.

Consider say a simple case. Let's say that someone starts claiming, mid major drought, that California's govt is actually hiding lots of water and that there isn't really a drought. Or maybe that the govt is actually lighting the wildfires etc. Looking for their 5 minutes of fame or to score political points maybe. The theory is stupid, but millions of the right political views would doubtless climb on board. Maybe someone in the govt gets killed by a now needlessly angry citizen who thinks the govt is robbing him/her.

Do we protect peoples 'right' to cause senseless harm for their own self interests, censor their communications, or charge them with inciting a murder? Don't read anything into the left/right bias in the scenario above..It was just the easiest example I could think of to explain.

 

[maxparrish]

Now maybe people here will understand why 230 is important.

Section 230 isn't important, except to those who feel that the first amendment isn't itself enough of an "exemption" to being held accountable under defamation, slander, liable, criminal, etc. law. The point being is that media companies have no additional rights to free speech and no less responsibility for illegal or actionable speech than other outlets.

Twitter, facebook, and youtube are not entitled to have it both ways. EITHER it is responsible for content it publishes and therefore can and should censor content to protect itself OR it has an unprecedented legal exemption as a public message board, and therefore with that exception is not entitled to censor anything legal.

In short, you are not defending "free speech" when you advocate for 230. Your arguing against tort claims accepted under centuries of common law, that a person's good name is a form of property that cannot be devalued without consequence.

For shame.

 

[AliHajiSheik]

This protection isn't that important. It has enabled the internet to become a place of untruths. I've got no issue with dumping this protection, because media companies could police their sites, it just costs them too much of their profits.

How much of DP's profits do you think would be eaten up by policing this site?

 

[Gaius46]

Where do you guys, if you do, draw the line between free speech and just plain BS designed to cause problems or benefit a person/group at others expense? By BS I mean an outright falsehood, not someones opinion.

Consider say a simple case. Let's say that someone starts claiming, mid major drought, that California's govt is actually hiding lots of water and that there isn't really a drought. Or maybe that the govt is actually lighting the wildfires etc. Looking for their 5 minutes of fame or to score political points maybe. The theory is stupid, but millions of the right political views would doubtless climb on board. Maybe someone in the govt gets killed by a now needlessly angry citizen who thinks the govt is robbing him/her.

Do we protect peoples 'right' to cause senseless harm for their own self interests, censor their communications, or charge them with inciting a murder? Don't read anything into the left/right bias in the scenario above..It was just the easiest example I could think of to explain.

That’s an education problem not a censorship one.

 

[mrjurrs]

How much of DP's profits do you think would be eaten up by policing this site?

Don't know and don't care. If a business can't afford to operate within certain standards, they go out of business, just as they always have. I imagine a business like DP would be able to continue operating in a 'membership' model.

 

[CaughtInThe]

Don't know and don't care. If a business can't afford to operate within certain standards, they go out of business, just as they always have. I imagine a business like DP would be able to continue operating in a 'membership' model.

that pushes all the little guys out of business (like Walmart once did) and consolidates the power to the major players. kind of like what happened to radio.

 

[mrjurrs]

that pushes all the little guys out of business (like Walmart once did) and consolidates the power to the major players. kind of like what happened to radio.

The govt has also allowed Walmart to take advantage of govt largesse to supplement their profits. Imo, Walmart operates in a monopolistic model that should not be allowed.

 

[Allan]

How much of DP's profits do you think would be eaten up by policing this site?

DP would need to show due diligence in removing problematic comments as soon as reasonably possible. Maybe a few more moderators but likely no additional cost.

BTW DP is not a profitable enterprise.

 

[Allan]

The govt has also allowed Walmart to take advantage of govt largesse to supplement their profits. Imo, Walmart operates in a monopolistic model that should not be allowed.

Walmart has 9.5% retail market share in the US. That's not a monopoly.

 

[ThirdTerm]

The Sydney Morning Herald and The Australian are punished for defamatory comments posted on their Facebook pages. Since these companies can moderate offensive comments on their Facebook pages, they are legally liable for the contents of these pages, according to the High Court. Any degree of participation in that process of communication, however minor, makes the participant a publisher. Coincidentally, the two papers are owned by Rupert Murdoch, Australia's media tycoon who always gets his own way in Australia.

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Former Northern Territory detainee Dylan Voller wants to sue the companies in the New South Wales Supreme Court over alleged defamatory comments on their Facebook pages.
But the case had been stalled by a dispute over whether the outlets were the publishers of the material.
The High Court found that, by running the Facebook pages, the media groups participated in communicating any defamatory material posted by third parties and were therefore responsible for the comments.

High Court rules media outlets are responsible for Facebook comments in landmark case

The High Court rules on whether media outlets should be legally responsible for comments left on their social media pages in a landmark case.

www.abc.net.au

 

[AliHajiSheik]

Don't know and don't care. If a business can't afford to operate within certain standards, they go out of business, just as they always have. I imagine a business like DP would be able to continue operating in a 'membership' model.

Standards that didn't exist yesterday in Australia.