If you think of internet communication as a utility, then perhaps we should? Would you think it's OK for an electricity or a water company to decide who it wants to serve based off that company's fallible determination of an individual or group's beliefs?
I think if only because communication is such a basic human right, then we shouldn't risk the 'false guilty verdicts'.
If you think about it - giving a business the right to cut off customers decreases the chance of guilty people being empowered and skating by without punishment (which is awesome!), but increases the chance of innocent people being victimized through a 'false conviction'.
I'd argue that for very fundamental services, it's not the job of the business to try to play judge and jury and determine who is right and who is wrong, if only because the risk of an innocent party (like a false conviction putting an innocent person behind bars in the legal system) is so high stakes.
Stop equating access to the internet (a utility) with a purpose of the internet (communicating your message). Nazis are free to post up a server from their living room and spread their message all they want to try. But nobody, especially private companies, should have to help them keep it up, that's absurd.
So since food and water are also basic human rights, should we disallow Walmart from turning away Nazis? If I was a jewish business owner, why shouldn't I have a right to turn away someone advocating for my death? At that point isn't it just self defense?
Who determines what is hate speech and what is not?
The Daily Stormer is obviously a truly vile organization, but the risks of abuse that arise are incredible when it becomes normalized for a company like Cloudflare that's truly at the backbone of the internet to start to exert control over what is allowed online and what is not.
These aren't phantom boogey man futures we're talking about here with regards to the fear of future government and corporate control of the internet and widespread censorship. These things are taking place right here, right now.
It used to be just China. Then it was China and Russia. Then it was China, Russia, and Turkey. Now the UK wants to censor its internet.
The US congress introduces a new variant bill of internet censorship every year. SOPA. CISPA. CISA. PIPA. ACTA.
We're headed towards a future of widespread global censorship one step at a time.
Look to the forefathers of the internet and see what they're saying about control of the internet being wrenched away from the people and into the hands of government and multinational control.
Arguments about nazis, human trafficking, terror, drugs, etc. are the tools being used to seize power from the people and put us in a little prison a la Brave New World.
You do not need to announce your political ideology to do business with Walmart, etc. Walmart does not collect that info by nature of a normal transaction.
You do need to announce your political ideology to whoever you're buying services from when you're buying services for a website for a politically charged website.
> You do need to announce your political ideology to whoever you're buying services from when you're buying services for a website for a politically charged website.
Actually, you don't - at least not here in the United States. That said, if the company finds out about your political ideology before they sell the service to you, or after the service has been sold to you, they don't need to sell it to you or continue to sell it to you.
They do need to give you back your money, though, if you have paid for service already (minus whatever you have used).
I think if only because communication is such a basic human right, then we shouldn't risk the 'false guilty verdicts'.
If you think about it - giving a business the right to cut off customers decreases the chance of guilty people being empowered and skating by without punishment (which is awesome!), but increases the chance of innocent people being victimized through a 'false conviction'.
I'd argue that for very fundamental services, it's not the job of the business to try to play judge and jury and determine who is right and who is wrong, if only because the risk of an innocent party (like a false conviction putting an innocent person behind bars in the legal system) is so high stakes.