
CloudFlare CEO says his Daily Stormer takedown was “arbitrary” and “dangerous” - untangle
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/08/cloudflare-ceo-the-people-behind-the-daily-stormer-are-assholes/
======
Loic
In the company blog post[0] one can read: _" The tipping point for us making
this decision was that the team behind Daily Stormer made the claim that we
were secretly supporters of their ideology."_

If this is true, then I agree with the takedown, because the Daily Stormer
crossed the content neutral line first. But in this interview, the CEO says
something totally different. This is what annoys me, because this is breaking
the trust I have in CloudFlare.

[0]: [https://blog.cloudflare.com/why-we-terminated-daily-
stormer/](https://blog.cloudflare.com/why-we-terminated-daily-stormer/)

~~~
CodeWriter23
You're free to let Ars' editing of the interview determine your trust level
for CloudFlare. Ars used to be a Bastion of Truth, but slowly after the
acquisition by Condé Nast, a bias started to appear. And then it started
growing.

My take on this is the idea that any tolerance of free speech by extremists
goes completely against Ars' bias. And that's why they didn't print the
passage you highlight, despite Ars linking to that exact blog post.

I can see both being true; the decision to terminate based on the Stormer
saying that CF and Prince supported them and Prince saying the decision was
arbitrary. They pissed him off and he exercised his right to refuse service to
anyone. Pissed off = arbitrary.

~~~
Loic
Quoting the quote:

> "My rationale for making this decision was simple: the people behind the
> Daily Stormer are assholes and I'd had enough," Prince wrote. "Let me be
> clear: this was an arbitrary decision."

I understand your point that being severely annoyed can lead to arbitrary
decision, but nowhere it says in the interview, something like - I'd had
enough _because they even implied we supported them_ \- here I would have
understand. My problem is that it looks like either:

1\. Ars removed this from the interview or

2\. CloudFlare added this line in the PR blog post even so it was not the case

I cannot tell which one is true or both or none...

Note: Updated for formatting.

~~~
CodeWriter23
The possibility of revision is an important thing to consider. Here's a data
point, though not concrete proof. The first pass by the Wayback scraped that
quote:
[http://web.archive.org/web/*/https://blog.cloudflare.com/why...](http://web.archive.org/web/*/https://blog.cloudflare.com/why-
we-terminated-daily-stormer/)

------
NaliSauce
There's a chilling effect to this. If checks and balances at cloudflare are so
nonexistent that the CEO having a bad mood results in the company violating
its own policy - well, you set the precedent no matter how much you're
claiming that you didn't. Precedent is determined by your past actions, not by
what you claim.

Blogging what appears to be post hoc rationalizations doesn't make this any
better.

~~~
skybrian
You might compare this to a governor's power to pardon people. It's arbitrary
(not rule-based and not based on letting the judicial system work). But it's
limited to special cases mainly because the governor has better things to do
than issue pardons all day.

~~~
danarmak
This is less like a governor pardoning people, and more like a governor
condemning people without due process.

(The logic being that a pardoned criminal is a much lesser evil than a
condemned innocent.)

------
untangle
> "It's important that what we did today not set a precedent," Prince added.
> "The right answer is for us to be consistently content neutral."

Huh? What changed then – why even do it? Cloudflare's action today could set a
dangerous precedent. Prince now seems to be arguing for a committee of some
sort to arbitrate who gets taken down. To me, that's not much better.

IMO the internet should be free. Let filtering be conducted at the edge and
driven by users.

~~~
celticninja
They clarified why they changed their position in this instance. Daily Stormer
started telling people that Clodflare and Prince supported them, this took
away from the neutral content provider stance that cloudlfare took. If daily
stormer had not mentioned cloudlfare they would still be able to use its
services.

~~~
Sacho
What exactly did the Daily Stormer say about Cloudflare and Prince? I haven't
found a source for it anywhere.

~~~
celticninja
I believe it was on their site as the articles usually say something like:

"the web blog's administrators suggested Cloudflare was protecting them
because it secretly agreed with the site's neo-Nazi articles."

So you need to visit the site to confirm why cloudlfare dropped them and their
site is down because Cloudlfare dropped them. Joseph Heller would be proud.

------
patrickg_zill
Whatever happened to:

"the Internet detects censorship as damage, and routes around it" and

"the answer to speech you don't agree with is more speech"?

I guess, like "don't be evil", those concepts have ended up on the trash
heap...

~~~
StavrosK
What _did_ happen to it? Why is the Daily Stormer site down?

~~~
celticninja
Go daddy suspended their registration, then they went to Google who also
suspended it. So they went to a Russian host, all the while they had
cloudlfare protection. Then they said they had cloudlfare protection because
cloudlfare supported them, thus taking cloudlfare from an independent, neutral
party to being involved and a supporter. So cloudlfare withdrew services from
them and hackers DDoS the site to oblivion.

~~~
StavrosK
Ah, DDoS, that makes sense, thanks.

------
damnfine
This invalidates all of their previous statements. A very bad PR move. I think
we all knew it was at their whim, based on some of the other sites they
continue to host. Just more greed masqurading as virtue. That seems to be the
speed of progress these days.

------
Grue3
Has anyone even heard of this website before all of this? What's the point of
all this free publicity for them? Streisand effect is real.

~~~
zimpenfish
People following the rise of the far-right (and to some extent the MRA
movement since there's a strong overlap) have, yes, because it's been a focal
point for a good long while now.

~~~
xiaoma
MRA? You mean the group of mostly men pushing for equal rights to custody
and/or visitation of their kids? Wasn't that group started by a male feminist
scholar?

What do they have to do with this fringe hate website most of us never heard
of before?

~~~
zimpenfish
Well, for a current example, there's Christopher Cantwell - Daily Stormer
writer, helped organise "Unite The Right", was at the rally waving guns
around, unabashed racist, etc. - and also quite a popular contributor to A
Voice For Men (until he fell out with Elam.)

Also many articles along this theme, eg:
[https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/12/14/13576192/alt-right-
se...](https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/12/14/13576192/alt-right-sexism-
recruitment)

~~~
xiaoma
And Hitler himself was a big believer in no smoking spaces. That doesn't mean
that anti-smoking groups have anything to do with the genocide Nazis engaged
in, just because Nazis were also officially against smoking.

~~~
zimpenfish
Ok, I can't even understand how you've got to this analogy.

~~~
xiaoma
Giving you the benefit of the doubt that you're trying to understand, I'll
restate the logical fallacy a bit more formally:

    
    
        Person A believes thing 1.
        Person A believes thing 2.
        Therefore people who believe 1 also believe 2.
    

This line of reasoning can be rhetorically powerful but it's flawed and, IMO,
toxic to the discussion.

~~~
zimpenfish
> the far-right (and to some extent the MRA movement since there's a strong
> overlap

What I actually said was:

    
    
        People in set A believe thing 1.
        People in set B believe thing 2.
        There is a strong overlap between set A and set B.
    

You'll note there's nothing about a causal connection, only a correlation.

[edit for formatting]

------
koenigdavidmj
This is the first week in my life I've been genuinely afraid for the First
Amendment. Charlottesville is the one event that pushed government content
neutrality outside the Overton window. Up until now, most people (or at least
the loudest) treated groups like the EFF and ACLU as kind of like garbage
collectors: they do an unpleasant job, defending people who say wicked things,
in order to protect the rest of us from government persecution when someone we
don't like has the reins. This is the first time I've seen this view being
described as literal Nazi sympathizing. It's the first time when hate speech
laws are considered so necessary that we're willing to give that power to the
Trump administration of all people.

~~~
micheljones
You are right in your fear.

I don't know if you have already linked it yourself, but this is why there has
been orchestrated removal/damage of confederate monuments in multiple cities
recently. They are trying to taint and delegitimize the original writers of
the constitution by associating them with slave ownership/racism, in order to
then delegitimize their product, i.e. the constitution and especially the 1st
and 2nd amendment rights.

------
Greg-J
I am clearly in the minority in my opinion here, but I'm happy for this.
CloudFlare is a private business and as such have a right to refuse service to
anyone.

"It's important that what we did today not set a precedent," Prince added.
"The right answer is for us to be consistently content neutral."

------
mywittyname
> one that gives publishers a right to due process and doesn't put power over
> those decisions in the hands of a few CEOs like Prince.

Fox and CNN have the final say in the content they host, they don't give
publishers due process. I don't see how google is any different, other than
scope.

------
empressplay
I really hope this isn't the beginning of the end

~~~
MichaelGG
Me too, but it wouldn't be bad if it takes Cloudflare down a notch.

------
napa15
This entire ordeal has had many other hidden consequences, for me personally
for example I've made the decision to never ever voice my political opinion
ever again, whether offline or online. It is simply too dangerous, I do not
consider my political opinions to be anywhere near as important as my
livelihood or internet access. Take that as an overreaction if you want, but
that's a real consequence that I've drawn for my life. I cannot risk
accidentially running afoul somebody's idea of 'unacceptable opinion to hold'.

------
ashildr
There is no "neutral" when people are questioning other people's right of self
determination, existence and value as a human being.

To quote Elie Wiesel: “We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the
oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the
tormented.”

~~~
Chris2048
There is a big difference between speech and action. People can "question"
things all they want.

I'd also note, If Nazis are banned, then they will simply no longer go by that
label - then their right to self-determine means you won't be able to call
them Nazis.

