I know it's a bad thread to raise the issue, because everyone is so focused on Trump. But forget about Trump for a minute.
If I recall correctly, for years all these internet giants — Twitter, Google, FB, etc. — protected themselves from any legal action pretending they are not mass-media, because they don't do any censorship and serve just as a middleman between content providers and consumers. Now, we all know that this obviously wasn't true for at least a couple of years, but we also know that governments are slow and lazy, and it takes some time for them to adjust. So it wasn't that surprising that there was no real consequence.
But over the last year all boundaries were so ridiculously, so mindbogglingly crossed, that I wonder if something has to change now. Or do they really have so much power now, that there's zero reasons to be careful of government?
If I recall correctly, for years all these internet giants — Twitter, Google, FB, etc. — protected themselves from any legal action pretending they are not mass-media, because they don't do any censorship and serve just as a middleman between content providers and consumers. Now, we all know that this obviously wasn't true for at least a couple of years, but we also know that governments are slow and lazy, and it takes some time for them to adjust. So it wasn't that surprising that there was no real consequence.
But over the last year all boundaries were so ridiculously, so mindbogglingly crossed, that I wonder if something has to change now. Or do they really have so much power now, that there's zero reasons to be careful of government?