What I was trying to say is that there is a continuum between the New York Times kind of editorial control and Reddit/Twitter/Facebook moderation of content.
I am not saying that section 230 should not apply, I am saying that, to my knowledge, under current laws if a social media company decide to apply excessive editorial control (let's say twitter decides to only allow factually true tweets) they would lose the protections granted by section 230.
> The rights granted need to have some kind of obligation.
By "need" I meant that I believe these obligations already exist in laws.
> Proving too much
By proving too much I meant to say that since section 230 does not apply to newspapers the law must make a difference between them. To my understanding this difference is editorial control.
Finally I am not trying to have a debate over this, I am only trying to understand better the issue; I clearly have a side/bias, and I am trying to learn more about the many other facets of the issue.
> By proving too much I meant to say that since section 230 does not apply to newspapers the law must make a difference between them. To my understanding this difference is editorial control.
Instead of guessing what the difference is why not read the very short section 230? The difference is that 230 specifically deals with the web. The difference isn't editorial control its literally that the law directly speaks to the web. I would suggest in half the time required to watch the video one could read 230 twice over. This misunderstanding directly stems from concerning oneself with bad secondary sources.
>, I am saying that, to my knowledge, under current laws if a social media company decide to apply excessive editorial control (let's say twitter decides to only allow factually true tweets) they would lose the protections granted by section 230.
There is no clause that specifies that a company even can in a blanket fashion "lose protection" in such a fashion.
First relevant section.
(c) Protection for “Good Samaritan” blocking and screening of offensive material
(1) Treatment of publisher or speaker
No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.
This is completely without qualification.
Second relevant section
(2) Civil liability
No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be held liable on account of—
(A) any action voluntarily taken in good faith to restrict access to or availability of material that the provider or user considers to be obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise objectionable, whether or not such material is constitutionally protected;
or
(B) any action taken to enable or make available to information content providers or others the technical means to restrict access to material described in paragraph (1).[1]
It says you can't be held liable for blocking something in "good faith" Nowhere on earth does it suggest that any action will cause you as an actor can lose protection under this act. It just says that no action taken in good faith can result in you being held liable for that particular act.
This means that in order for a party to sue they would have to prove both that they were blocked in bad faith AND completely aside from this title they possessed a legitimate cause to sue.
To be completely clear someone could post on reddit the libelous allegation that you ate babies causing you to lose your job at the day care a clearly obvious cause of action and then the ceo of reddit could personally block your profile to keep you from running against him for mayor of your little town. A judge could agree that your content was blocked in bad faith and you STILL wouldn't be able to sue reddit for the baby story.
If you don't like that reddit or facebook or twitter blocked your story your problem becomes finding a legal right to exercise your legitimate freedom of speech VIA their platform.
The DMCA has existed for 24 years longer than some readers here have been out of diapers and I can no platform has been censured yet for removing deplorables in a nation full of both deplorables and lawyers. It seems likely none ever will without a new law not a new interpretation.
It applies to the New York Times comment page or indeed places where they offer people who don't work for the times a place to communicate. When someone who is paid by the times writes an article for publication they are responsible for that work.
I am not saying that section 230 should not apply, I am saying that, to my knowledge, under current laws if a social media company decide to apply excessive editorial control (let's say twitter decides to only allow factually true tweets) they would lose the protections granted by section 230.
> The rights granted need to have some kind of obligation.
By "need" I meant that I believe these obligations already exist in laws.
> Proving too much
By proving too much I meant to say that since section 230 does not apply to newspapers the law must make a difference between them. To my understanding this difference is editorial control.
Finally I am not trying to have a debate over this, I am only trying to understand better the issue; I clearly have a side/bias, and I am trying to learn more about the many other facets of the issue.