The day the First Amendment Died

[gary m]

Twitter may well end up being little more than a somewhat refined version of Dumbocratic Underground.

[gary m]

Satire or prediction???

U.S.—After Facebook C.E.O. Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter C.E.O. Jack Dorsey removed President Trump from their social media platforms, President Elect Joe Biden was quick to add the two Silicon Valley tycoons to his cabinet to head the newly formed Ministry of Truth Department.

“They’ve been the best allies we have in the fight against disinformation, misinformation, malinformation, and pretty much any information out there,” Biden said at a press conference Saturday.

“Under the Biden administration, we’re only going to have true facts, and these guys are really the only people on the planet who know what true facts are,” he said.

Zuckerberg and Dorsey signed on right away. “We’ve already been working for the Democratic Party in an unofficial capacity for years,” Dorsey Tweeted. “This just makes it formal.”

One of the first tasks of the new federal department will be to toss all things Donald trump into the memory hole.

“We need to move on from Trump andby that we mean removing him and his presidency from history,” Dorsey said.

[Newman]

Or the other way around.

Sadly, they are not covered by the 1st Amendment, but should not be exempt from liability for content if they're going to control it. Make them liable for defamation, conspiracy, etc., and see what tune they sing.

Anti-trust legislation needs to be fashioned to suit. It's as if, back in 1776, one hyper-partisan publisher came to control 95% of all printed material in the colonies. Of course that was a physical impossibility at the time, but the ability of one (or a very few) publishers to control speech in such a way would be absurd. Still is.

Well, in fact, I don't want them liable. I want them to stop deciding what we see (if we choose to frequent such platforms). This should be the technological equivalent of traditional public forum, the town square, as it were, and subject only

In fact, there is some to the traditional limitations thereon. But if these companies decide to regulate what they publish, they become the equivalent of newspapers, and should then be responsible for their content to the extent such publications have been so under standard Constitutional analysis.

Yellow journalism is one thing, and inevitable in a free press. Monopoly is a different animal.

There actually is some precedent for requiring private spaces to allow free speech, on the grounds that such spaces (specifically, shopping centers, IIRC) are the modern equivalent of the "town square."

ETA: Ah yes. Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins, 447 U.S. 74 (1980). Damn, law school was a long time ago! Had to look that one up.

But who names their shopping center "Pruneyard"? Is that like Barfbay Shopping Center or Mucus Mall"

[Celeste Chalfonte]

Anti-trust legislation needs to be fashioned to suit. It's as if, back in 1776, one hyper-partisan publisher came to control 95% of all printed material in the colonies. Of course that was a physical impossibility at the time, but the ability of one (or a very few) publishers to control speech in such a way would be absurd. Still is.



But who names their shopping center "Pruneyard"? Is that like Barfbay Shopping Center or Mucus Mall"

A suburb of San Jose.

[scott]

Problem is that obviously, Big Tech also has Big Bucks and like any other conglomerate will either buy out competitors or buy off politicians to make sure their status remains unchallenged.

Yes, there are currently alternatives like Parler, Rumble, and Gab that have a more conservative bent but there are already calls from congresscritters as well as Democrat(ic) sycophants to have their apps pulled from Google and Apple for aiding and abetting treason, sedition and insurrection based on last Friday.

Anything one can do with an app, one can do with a mobile web page. Let the private platforms slit their own throats. They can't censor mobile websites.

Perhaps Google has gotten too big and too entrenched. That's okay, Sears & Roebuck innovated, stagnated, and then lost out to Sam Walton's new way of doing things.

[gary m]