Very interesting: Section 230 is shit. Trump is also shit. One shit removing another shit (for entirely the wrong reasons to boot) is about as good as we can expect in 2020, I guess.
The good thing would be (if it is in fact a move to remove section 230) that this would afford decentralised alternatives that are owned and controlled by individual a huge advantage.
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-social-media-executive-order-tech-legal-fight-2020-5
@aral
Paywall - so its tough to understand what you mean.
What's Section 230 about?
@dsfgs @aral There are better definitions at the EFF -- https://www.eff.org/search/site/230 -- but the tl;dr is that it is a US law that basically says that the company that host content are not liable for what that content says.
In other words, if I post libel on Twitter, you can bring legal action against me, but you can't bring that legal action against Twitter.
@aral @dsfgs It's a tough one. The likes of Twitter and Facebook might be able to hire enough moderators to get libel (etc) taken down. but small "social media" platforms (like Mastodon) wouldn't really be able to keep up. In theory, 230 helps protect those little guys. In practice, it unfortunately allows the big guys to get away with too much.
I totally agree that individually owned and controlled spaces is the ultimate answer. The road to get there for non-techies isn't clear to me ... yet.
@kcoram
1) #Tor and #i2p need to be seen as the #newInternet (we always thought it was weird that we had to run to a #centralAuthority to get a #domainName),
2) #monopolies like #Youtube (see #Google), #Microsoft and #Clouclare need to be broken up, and
3) we need to understand the importance of #decentralisation, as a form of #censorship resistance and #immunity
The #legacyInternet need to be left to die in peace.
@aral