For some more context about how Parler might not actually be free speech:
"the lack of moderation on Parler is not the issue. they actually have very robust moderation tools and all new users start out shadowbanned until enough of their post get approved for rightthink by their user moderators" [0]
"This is not an ad network. This is a system where their most "influential" users can get paid to post organic-looking sponsored content. Their CEO talks about it here" [1]
EDIT: Updated the first tweet to include the full tweet. If Parler actually has robust and capable moderation tools, as documented by the person who led the effort to archive their entire site before it went down, it's worth noting Amazon's position as stated in the article:
“Instead, this case is about Parler’s demonstrated unwillingness and inability to remove from the servers of Amazon Web Services (‘AWS’) content that threatens the public safety, such as by inciting and planning the rape, torture and assassination of named public officials and private citizens.” [2]
Parler notes 3 times AWS complained about specific messages and Parler removed all of them within 24 hours each time, some within a few hours and each time AWS noted they were satisfied.
"Parler had no moderation!" and "Parler wouldn't moderate!" are clearly untrue. If the complaint is "not enough moderation" that could be legit.
Regardless of your feeling on Parler, we NEED our legal system, contracts, and contract enforcement to be based on facts.
Having robust moderation tools doesn't necessarily mean moderation there works well. You actually need enough people with the right policies using said tools.
According to articles, Parler had some huge backlog of reports that they were planning on using volunteer mods to get through.
I don't necessarily think using volunteer mods is always a bad idea. But you have to be aware of the biases of your demographic, and in this case that means users who are likely to be tolerant of calls for violence, as long as they're targeted at 'bad people' (read: people with different political views).
Also, IIRC there was an interview where the CEO talked about how he was banning "left wing trolls"[1], not to mention they obviously don't allow pornographic images (which are not, in the large, illegal).
Parler is about free speech the same way Fox News is fair and balanced. They say that because that's what their target demographic wants to hear, not because there's any truth to the statement.
Not sure what this means but Tim must had not been on Twitter last year. There was a moment that went on for 4+ months of wild endless violence against federal agents.
We live in a conspiracy theory with neoliberal corporate racketeers proclaiming they’re saving us from the ill affects of their own corporate communication platforms for not the public but for woke leftists that vote for Democratic party establishment figures.
Not Bernie, that guy’s a socialist and a threat to my 401k.
> until enough of their post get approved for rightthink
People keep posting this bullshit tweet but it's not getting any less bullshit. From my previous reply [1]:
> Based on the screenshot you linked to, their "moderation" categories are "spam", "ads", "impersonation", "defamation", "nudity", "pornography", "illegal", "terrorism", "trademark" and "threat".
> Can you please explain how they use that to "ensure ideological conformity in their posts"?
I doubt he knows what incitement to violence means[1], or can point to an example on parler. One of Apple's laywers probably told him to say that. But let's assume he does know and can point to some instances there.
Does he know there's incitement to violence elsewhere on the internet? Time for iOS and macOS to whitelist certain trustworthy ip blocks belonging to "reputable" internet companies which police content, and prevent apps from connecting anywhere else.
Not going to go into free speech = government because I think that point has been beaten to death.
Was there speech on Parler that was above board in the sense that it wasn’t people up to no good? I’m sure there was. It’s unrealistic to think that everyone there was advocating for a violent act to happen. Unfortunately, Apple and Amazon (Amazon documenting cases of threatened murder, rape, etc. that Parler wouldn’t remove) allegedly had been requesting that Parler clean up the more extreme content which allegedly they refused to/didn’t do. To Apple, that’s probably no different than an application being riddled in bugs and as such they don’t want it on their app store.
Apple has a private platform. Apple can do what it wants, whether they use the typical definition of free speech or they redefine terms. The bigger problem is that there are no public platforms despite this technology. And I don't know if governments have ever given citizens more than rights (like, do they have these rights and a platform to express those rights).
You're argument is a lazy argument that accepts the weaponization of free speech, which is even more scary. Parler was never about free speech. If you read up on its making, it was dark money, russian bots, alt-right hate groups and their cover is this absurdly stupid front of free speech that no alt-right fascist person actually wants. They just use it against you.
I would say the only thing lazy here is your interpretation of this situation. Speech can be used to sow conspiratorial rage and foment/plan real life harm. At some point it can't be tolerated. That cutoff line is not easy to define, but that doesn't mean it doesn't or shouldn't exist.
Corporations don't have to protect first amendment rights of others, they actually have them in the US.
The Supreme Court has granted corporations in the US at least a partial right to free speech and political speech in special. Even against protected minorities (Gay wedding cake decision).
Maybe Tim Cook could say that Apple is using it's free speech rights as a corporation when denying service.
Ok... but we know, for a fact now, that most of the Capitol Riots were planned on Facebook. Where is their slap on the wrist?
And, frankly, you can find truly awful stuff on Twitter without much searching. "Hang Mike Pence" was trending, for example. Twitter removed it from trending, but didn't delete tweets containing that phrase. Will AWS take them down for this?
Hang Mike Pence was trending because a video came out showing people chanting it during the riots. People then quoted the video saying it was a bad thing, which made the trending algorithm trip. It was not people for hanging Mike Pence, it was people surprised that actually happened.
I'm thinking all of these bans on the major platforms are simply a result of risk mitigation rather than deliberate stifling of free speech (although it has become evident that the platforms hold too much power over it).
The attack on the US Capitol sent the big wigs into panic - nobody wants to be linked to something like that. The easiest solution is to completely ban, deny service and deny affiliation with anyone involved. Much lower risk of the US government blaming them for enabling people to do what they did.
I don't think anyone high up in these companies gives a rat's ass about freedom of speech, incitement to violence or hate online, every platform was (and still is) full of that.
Up until this incident they maintained the usual "we're a neutral platform" spiel, sometimes banning people who were too aggressive, trolling or being reported a lot by others. But now that "shit got real", they're covering their asses.
This is mostly my assessment also, and I don’t think it would’ve happened as fast or as (seemingly) lightly if it happened at some point during the Trump term before the election. Possibly it wouldn’t have happened at all for fear of costly reprisals from the administration.
My personal opinion is: good riddance. I believe in free speech, but I also believe in the paradox of tolerance and that something’s gotta give. While I do believe in free speech, I don’t believe that’s the same thing as everyone having a right to be listened to, or having the right to a megaphone.
I have no answers to any of the problems that come with moderating forums, I think it’s a hard (impossible perhaps?) problem to solve. But I’m also glad that hard as it may be, the places online that are worth hanging out seem to be doing a mostly pretty good job of it. (Thank you dang! <3)
I mean, why go there? App Store is Apple's playground where Apple can and do enforce arbitrary rules. Of course Apple can suspend Parler, they don't need any reason whatsoever. It shows how bad Apple is, not how bad Parler is.
The number of commenters here who apparently believe "free speech means businesses have to let me say whatever I want inside their business" is both sad and disappointing.
The mobile world has trained users to think that they should only be able to run sanctioned software approved by the device maker -- so much for the personal computer era.
Now, people pay a higher price but they have less control over their devices than ever before. Why is Apple even involved here? If people want a nasty app on their phone, then they should be able to have it.
This idea of the vendor dictating terms (and taking profits) has now become normalized. I see no real fight against it, so far, which is sad. Personally, I install hardly any apps (literally only 3) for my phone.
Tim Cook is free to have his opinion, but his company should play no role in suppressing others' opinions. He should not have to host an app he hates, but he should not dictate that to all his customers. Who elected him?
> Why is Apple even involved here? If people want a nasty app on their phone, then they should be able to have it.
Exactly. The real problem isn't that Apple has some policy about moderation for their app store -- it's their app store, some amount of curation is completely necessary, that they have policies to that end is completely fine. That's how stores work.
The real problem is that people don't have a choice to use any other app store, or independently install an app some other way (e.g. directly downloading it from a webpage or transferring it over a USB cable).
In Androidland, once Parler is back up on some web host, it will be technically possible to get their apk from somewhere else and install it, if you want it. Just like I can get NewPipe somewhere other than Google's app store.
If you check my comments you will find similar reactions. But recently I have revisioned my view on Big Tech.
Big Tech has money and budgets of a small countries. They obviously are part of political spectrum and will be the gateway and control outlet for 4th Industrial Revolution.
I highly recommend everyone to read this:"A Framework for Developing a National Artificial Intelligence Strategy" - WEF link - (https://tinyurl.com/y6lwfdcy).
They are using current political stage to test and establish (normalise) the idea of censoring in the name of security, privacy and common good.
I see no real fight against it, so far, which is sad
In fairness, Android was specifically created to be nothing but fight against it. First the pre-smartphone carriers acting as gateways (and they were absolutely happy to do what Apple are doing now), and then Apple when the iPhone came out. Google put billions into establishing a parallel ecosystem where you can install apps outside of the Play Store and even fork the entire OS.
They did this because the creators of Android were very wise. They knew that total power over what apps could be run would corrupt them, so they made sure to put in back doors so if they did become corrupted, users could still escape. And indeed they were correct about that: Google is now fully corrupted in the same way Apple is. However, you can still install the Parler app on Android if you want. It's not as convenient as through the Play Store but it's not much worse than the experience of doing so on a PC or Mac.
The extent to which conservatives now believe this utter nonsense is pretty crazy.
For decades they've talked up how businesses should be able to decide whatever they want for their business. Their business, their rules.
Now when it goes against them, suddenly private businesses making decisions for their own platforms is now "authoritarianism". Funny how people getting mysteriously fired when bringing up unions with colleagues wasn't authoritarianism. Getting fired from your job because you're gay? Also not authoritarianism, obviously.
>"Asked by Wallace whether Apple’s booting of Parler would only serve to drive the app’s users “underground,”"
I hope it does. They can rediscover that the internet at its' core has no rules and is open to anyone willing to put in the technical effort. There's nothing stopping them from building their own platform from the ground up. However, that requires a modicum of technical skill, which by the looks of every "Parler-like" community that has been stood up, is non-existent among these people. Similar to things like ISIL, these type of people are great at taking over existing infrastructure and crowding out voices of reason, however left to their own devices, they crumble due to total technical incompetency.
The so called community may not have the skills, however there are plenty of people,who can see an opportunity in such a crowd, and they do have money,skills,and resources.Also, it's very dangerous to underestimate a motivated fool.
After reading a bunch of back-and-forth debate on HN about this free speech vs. private speech saga, what still confuses me is the role of corporations in this.
Some responses say “corporations don’t legally have to protect speech” others say “corporations are people so this is 1st amendment”.
What I gather is that corporations are in this nebulous legal chasm of technically-a-person while also not-a-person?
So corporations can be a person at times (ex. political contributions) while not at other times (ex. limited liability)?
I admit my ignorance of not knowing how corporate law works. Maybe someone can explain.
As I have said in other, similar discussions, there are a lot of different (forms of) freedoms. There is no absolute freedom and deciding what form of freedom to rank higher than another is a value judgement.
Collective freedoms intrude on individual freedoms (and vice versa).
So if a society decides, that (absolut) free speech is the most important value, it also says, that everybody must endure everything another person does say about them. Taken to the extrem every form of lie, verbal abuse, and so on is ok.
So you can either have (absolut) free speech. Or you can have some forms of things that are not allowed to say (at least not without potentially facing consequences).
As these are value calls/judgments this will always be a topic of debate. And that is good. Because in the end every generation, every society and every group needs to define what is the major consensus. What is allowed and what is not. What are the value hierarchies.
In the USA, for example, it is perfectly legal to deny the Holocaust. In Germany, this is a punishable offense.
If Apple, as a private company, now determines what is permissible speech within their ecosystem and what no longer falls under free speech, then that is their right. Just as it is then the customers' right to no longer buy the company's products.
The question could be, at what point is a company perhaps more than a purely private company and more arrived at the status of infrastructure. And should different rules then apply? Is it permissible to dictate to Apple, for example, that they are not allowed to make such deletions. Should we (be allowed to) intervene so far in private-sector freedom as a company? And should the USA then be allowed to intervene differently than China, for example?
A much simpler and elegant solution compared to mandating changes for Apple's app store policies, is simply requiring them to allow users to install apps from other sources (e.g. directly from webpages, or from other app stores).
You could do this on the basis that the real problem isn't that Apple has some particular policy for their store, but rather the problem is that their store is a monopoly within the iOS ecosystem. And the government has a history of intervening when it comes to monopolies (at least some of the time), so it matches precedent.
It used to be that free speech was an ideal to strive for and not just a law companies could hide behind as private entities; the argument that the first amendement only applies to the government. Up until 2016 Silicon Valley was full of libertarians fully believing in free speech principles. The ACLU even defended the right of nazis to march through the streets. It seems things have changed.
I suppose I could rationalize my continued use of Apple products and even stock ownership with the TOS argument: people voluntarily decide to use Apple products and accept their ToS, and henceforth they are not living in "free speech land", but in "Apple ToS land".
So it's just Apple kicking an app for violating the ToS. Nothing to see here.
Only the timing seemed rather odd.
And of course if I want to use that rationalization, I also have to accept that I live in "Apple ToS land", which I actually do.
Edit: I wonder if apps will start to have vendor specific moderation. Instead of deleting messages, they could just be flagged with "deleted on iOS" or "deleted in China"? I suppose with the China example, they already do that? Certainly news sites already do that, I get "this content is not available in the EU" a lot.
I don't understand why "rationalization" is necessary. Of course any app store platform is going to have some minimum standards, it's both right and sensible that they be allowed to have such.
You can disagree with some of Apple's policies (I think their policy on emulators is dumb), but to me the solution would just be to allow other app stores so consumers can choose.
It’s only “free speech” when Twitter is used to plan violent riots in Seattle for the past year.
Got it.
That Apple, Google, and Amazon continue to host Twitter despite its continued use in planning violence speaks to the double standard conservatives have long alleged. They treated Parler differently than Twitter purely due to partisanship.
That Twitter and Facebook allow the CCP to spread messages of genocide (such as saying the CCP “emancipated the minds of Uyghur women in Xinjiang”) while silencing Donald Trump for telling his supporters to go home peacefully speaks to the actual morals of tech companies.
[+] [-] oarsinsync|5 years ago|reply
"the lack of moderation on Parler is not the issue. they actually have very robust moderation tools and all new users start out shadowbanned until enough of their post get approved for rightthink by their user moderators" [0]
"This is not an ad network. This is a system where their most "influential" users can get paid to post organic-looking sponsored content. Their CEO talks about it here" [1]
[0] https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1347939939120533506
[1] https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1346565749977051136 https://cnbc.com/2020/07/02/how-parler-app-plans-to-make-mon...
EDIT: Updated the first tweet to include the full tweet. If Parler actually has robust and capable moderation tools, as documented by the person who led the effort to archive their entire site before it went down, it's worth noting Amazon's position as stated in the article:
“Instead, this case is about Parler’s demonstrated unwillingness and inability to remove from the servers of Amazon Web Services (‘AWS’) content that threatens the public safety, such as by inciting and planning the rape, torture and assassination of named public officials and private citizens.” [2]
[2] https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.wawd.294664...
[+] [-] caseysoftware|5 years ago|reply
Parler notes 3 times AWS complained about specific messages and Parler removed all of them within 24 hours each time, some within a few hours and each time AWS noted they were satisfied.
"Parler had no moderation!" and "Parler wouldn't moderate!" are clearly untrue. If the complaint is "not enough moderation" that could be legit.
Regardless of your feeling on Parler, we NEED our legal system, contracts, and contract enforcement to be based on facts.
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
According to articles, Parler had some huge backlog of reports that they were planning on using volunteer mods to get through.
I don't necessarily think using volunteer mods is always a bad idea. But you have to be aware of the biases of your demographic, and in this case that means users who are likely to be tolerant of calls for violence, as long as they're targeted at 'bad people' (read: people with different political views).
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
Parler is about free speech the same way Fox News is fair and balanced. They say that because that's what their target demographic wants to hear, not because there's any truth to the statement.
[1] - https://www.forbes.com/sites/abrambrown/2020/06/27/parlers-f...
[+] [-] seebetter|5 years ago|reply
We live in a conspiracy theory with neoliberal corporate racketeers proclaiming they’re saving us from the ill affects of their own corporate communication platforms for not the public but for woke leftists that vote for Democratic party establishment figures.
Not Bernie, that guy’s a socialist and a threat to my 401k.
[+] [-] _red|5 years ago|reply
"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen."
[+] [-] tomp|5 years ago|reply
People keep posting this bullshit tweet but it's not getting any less bullshit. From my previous reply [1]:
> Based on the screenshot you linked to, their "moderation" categories are "spam", "ads", "impersonation", "defamation", "nudity", "pornography", "illegal", "terrorism", "trademark" and "threat".
> Can you please explain how they use that to "ensure ideological conformity in their posts"?
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=tomp&next=25731453
[+] [-] harshreality|5 years ago|reply
Does he know there's incitement to violence elsewhere on the internet? Time for iOS and macOS to whitelist certain trustworthy ip blocks belonging to "reputable" internet companies which police content, and prevent apps from connecting anywhere else.
For our safety.
Please save us, Tim!
[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/08/free-speec...
[+] [-] PartiallyTyped|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mc32|5 years ago|reply
However, it shows a nonchalant willingness to redefine what free speech is. That’s scary.
No, we’re not curbing free speech because that’s not free speech. Just redefine the terms so you can do what you want.
[+] [-] jsgo|5 years ago|reply
Was there speech on Parler that was above board in the sense that it wasn’t people up to no good? I’m sure there was. It’s unrealistic to think that everyone there was advocating for a violent act to happen. Unfortunately, Apple and Amazon (Amazon documenting cases of threatened murder, rape, etc. that Parler wouldn’t remove) allegedly had been requesting that Parler clean up the more extreme content which allegedly they refused to/didn’t do. To Apple, that’s probably no different than an application being riddled in bugs and as such they don’t want it on their app store.
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
Do you think Blizzard banning WoW idiots yelling racial slurs is abrogating their right to free speech too?
[+] [-] l8rpeace|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] supernovae|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TaupeRanger|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nabla9|5 years ago|reply
The Supreme Court has granted corporations in the US at least a partial right to free speech and political speech in special. Even against protected minorities (Gay wedding cake decision).
Maybe Tim Cook could say that Apple is using it's free speech rights as a corporation when denying service.
[+] [-] gjsman-1000|5 years ago|reply
And, frankly, you can find truly awful stuff on Twitter without much searching. "Hang Mike Pence" was trending, for example. Twitter removed it from trending, but didn't delete tweets containing that phrase. Will AWS take them down for this?
Rules for thee but not for me.
[+] [-] enkid|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bserge|5 years ago|reply
The attack on the US Capitol sent the big wigs into panic - nobody wants to be linked to something like that. The easiest solution is to completely ban, deny service and deny affiliation with anyone involved. Much lower risk of the US government blaming them for enabling people to do what they did.
I don't think anyone high up in these companies gives a rat's ass about freedom of speech, incitement to violence or hate online, every platform was (and still is) full of that.
Up until this incident they maintained the usual "we're a neutral platform" spiel, sometimes banning people who were too aggressive, trolling or being reported a lot by others. But now that "shit got real", they're covering their asses.
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
They also don't want to actually have been responsible for bad shit. They're still human, and have human interests.
(This is the point where someone jumps in to loudly point out every bad thing Google/Apple/FB/etc has ever done)
[+] [-] mstade|5 years ago|reply
My personal opinion is: good riddance. I believe in free speech, but I also believe in the paradox of tolerance and that something’s gotta give. While I do believe in free speech, I don’t believe that’s the same thing as everyone having a right to be listened to, or having the right to a megaphone.
I have no answers to any of the problems that come with moderating forums, I think it’s a hard (impossible perhaps?) problem to solve. But I’m also glad that hard as it may be, the places online that are worth hanging out seem to be doing a mostly pretty good job of it. (Thank you dang! <3)
[+] [-] sanxiyn|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gjsman-1000|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dr-detroit|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eplanit|5 years ago|reply
Now, people pay a higher price but they have less control over their devices than ever before. Why is Apple even involved here? If people want a nasty app on their phone, then they should be able to have it.
This idea of the vendor dictating terms (and taking profits) has now become normalized. I see no real fight against it, so far, which is sad. Personally, I install hardly any apps (literally only 3) for my phone.
Tim Cook is free to have his opinion, but his company should play no role in suppressing others' opinions. He should not have to host an app he hates, but he should not dictate that to all his customers. Who elected him?
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
Exactly. The real problem isn't that Apple has some policy about moderation for their app store -- it's their app store, some amount of curation is completely necessary, that they have policies to that end is completely fine. That's how stores work.
The real problem is that people don't have a choice to use any other app store, or independently install an app some other way (e.g. directly downloading it from a webpage or transferring it over a USB cable).
In Androidland, once Parler is back up on some web host, it will be technically possible to get their apk from somewhere else and install it, if you want it. Just like I can get NewPipe somewhere other than Google's app store.
[+] [-] nbzso|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thu2111|5 years ago|reply
In fairness, Android was specifically created to be nothing but fight against it. First the pre-smartphone carriers acting as gateways (and they were absolutely happy to do what Apple are doing now), and then Apple when the iPhone came out. Google put billions into establishing a parallel ecosystem where you can install apps outside of the Play Store and even fork the entire OS.
They did this because the creators of Android were very wise. They knew that total power over what apps could be run would corrupt them, so they made sure to put in back doors so if they did become corrupted, users could still escape. And indeed they were correct about that: Google is now fully corrupted in the same way Apple is. However, you can still install the Parler app on Android if you want. It's not as convenient as through the Play Store but it's not much worse than the experience of doing so on a PC or Mac.
[+] [-] eplanit|5 years ago|reply
Now, the left and Democrats embrace authoritarianism, and want to limit speech, and create authoritarian technology to pervasively enforce it.
Sad for us, this thinking is now in a (bare) majority.
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
For decades they've talked up how businesses should be able to decide whatever they want for their business. Their business, their rules.
Now when it goes against them, suddenly private businesses making decisions for their own platforms is now "authoritarianism". Funny how people getting mysteriously fired when bringing up unions with colleagues wasn't authoritarianism. Getting fired from your job because you're gay? Also not authoritarianism, obviously.
[+] [-] aphextron|5 years ago|reply
I hope it does. They can rediscover that the internet at its' core has no rules and is open to anyone willing to put in the technical effort. There's nothing stopping them from building their own platform from the ground up. However, that requires a modicum of technical skill, which by the looks of every "Parler-like" community that has been stood up, is non-existent among these people. Similar to things like ISIL, these type of people are great at taking over existing infrastructure and crowding out voices of reason, however left to their own devices, they crumble due to total technical incompetency.
[+] [-] cosmodisk|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notatrumper|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gjsman-1000|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] siruncledrew|5 years ago|reply
Some responses say “corporations don’t legally have to protect speech” others say “corporations are people so this is 1st amendment”.
What I gather is that corporations are in this nebulous legal chasm of technically-a-person while also not-a-person?
So corporations can be a person at times (ex. political contributions) while not at other times (ex. limited liability)?
I admit my ignorance of not knowing how corporate law works. Maybe someone can explain.
[+] [-] db48x|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] IdontRememberIt|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sdoering|5 years ago|reply
Collective freedoms intrude on individual freedoms (and vice versa).
So if a society decides, that (absolut) free speech is the most important value, it also says, that everybody must endure everything another person does say about them. Taken to the extrem every form of lie, verbal abuse, and so on is ok.
So you can either have (absolut) free speech. Or you can have some forms of things that are not allowed to say (at least not without potentially facing consequences).
As these are value calls/judgments this will always be a topic of debate. And that is good. Because in the end every generation, every society and every group needs to define what is the major consensus. What is allowed and what is not. What are the value hierarchies.
In the USA, for example, it is perfectly legal to deny the Holocaust. In Germany, this is a punishable offense.
If Apple, as a private company, now determines what is permissible speech within their ecosystem and what no longer falls under free speech, then that is their right. Just as it is then the customers' right to no longer buy the company's products.
The question could be, at what point is a company perhaps more than a purely private company and more arrived at the status of infrastructure. And should different rules then apply? Is it permissible to dictate to Apple, for example, that they are not allowed to make such deletions. Should we (be allowed to) intervene so far in private-sector freedom as a company? And should the USA then be allowed to intervene differently than China, for example?
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
You could do this on the basis that the real problem isn't that Apple has some particular policy for their store, but rather the problem is that their store is a monopoly within the iOS ecosystem. And the government has a history of intervening when it comes to monopolies (at least some of the time), so it matches precedent.
[+] [-] vimy|5 years ago|reply
https://www.aclu.org/other/aclu-history-taking-stand-free-sp...
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
> The ACLU even defended the right of nazis to march through the streets.
Gee, I wonder what the difference is between this and Apple banning an app on their own store? Truly, it is a stupefying mystery.
[+] [-] notatrumper|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RickJWagner|5 years ago|reply
Is that violent enough? What's out of bounds and what's not?
[+] [-] notatrumper|5 years ago|reply
So it's just Apple kicking an app for violating the ToS. Nothing to see here.
Only the timing seemed rather odd.
And of course if I want to use that rationalization, I also have to accept that I live in "Apple ToS land", which I actually do.
Edit: I wonder if apps will start to have vendor specific moderation. Instead of deleting messages, they could just be flagged with "deleted on iOS" or "deleted in China"? I suppose with the China example, they already do that? Certainly news sites already do that, I get "this content is not available in the EU" a lot.
[+] [-] TulliusCicero|5 years ago|reply
You can disagree with some of Apple's policies (I think their policy on emulators is dumb), but to me the solution would just be to allow other app stores so consumers can choose.
[+] [-] AnHonestComment|5 years ago|reply
Got it.
That Apple, Google, and Amazon continue to host Twitter despite its continued use in planning violence speaks to the double standard conservatives have long alleged. They treated Parler differently than Twitter purely due to partisanship.
That Twitter and Facebook allow the CCP to spread messages of genocide (such as saying the CCP “emancipated the minds of Uyghur women in Xinjiang”) while silencing Donald Trump for telling his supporters to go home peacefully speaks to the actual morals of tech companies.