230 is what prevents websites from having the legal obligation to identity users.
with 230, any crime in user content, they can just tell the govt that they will take content down and gov can go and hunt the criminals.
without 230, they have to provide an alibi to what now is their crime. so no operator will ever allow you to post a word without providing a photo id and credit card payment as proof.
and this what they want so the digital id, which will be totally optional, Will end up being required everywhere because it would be the easier way to implemented the "way out".
The distinction between civil and criminal liability seems minor- either way this will have a massive chilling effect and force any website to carefully vet hosted content for fear of being sued. The threshold for criminal prosecution is very high. The threshold for a civil suit is comparably low.
>The distinction between civil and criminal liability seems minor
It is an immense difference though. Civil and criminal law differ in almost every single conceivable way.
You literally go on to name one very important difference. The threshold for civil litigation is someone deciding to file a pro se suit against you by giving something vaguely resembling a legal document to a court. The chilling effect of that is much more dramatic than criminal liability.
Does that mean the owners of a site could be prosecuted if one of their users ever uploads criminal content, regardless of how quickly the site owner identifies and removes the content?
I think it's more nuanced than that, while there are bound to be people who are only pushing for it for profit, regular people who talk about getting rid of it are doing it because they're sick of the "moderation" excuse being used to take down stuff unreasonably with no recourse, where even if somehow they manage to get the problem fixed, they just get an apology with no actual change from the company. This is more of a problem with big platforms with millions of users, as so much discourse happens on these.
Plus, there's the worker protections angle, many people depend on these platforms for their livelihood, and the platforms get the benefit of their content in exchange, yet the platform can massively harm their livelihood and the victim typically can't do much in return. In contrast, even gig workers with Uber etc get some basic legal protections.
To pick a benign, non-polarizing example, YouTube is constantly banning or demonetizing people who have not broken their stated policies, be it a history channel or a completely sfw drawing tip channel.
Another example of the power imbalance would be how Reddit can delete anything they want in the name of moderation, but when the users revolt and start to take away their content, Reddit can just undelete it.
By talking of repealing 230, they're in-effect throwing out the baby with the bathwater, but it was supposed to be our representatives' job to understand the people's underlying concerns and draft appropriate legislation.
Not a lawyer but I'm pretty sure if you undelete it without the user's permission then it's just _your_ content then and no longer liable for 230 protection.
It seems like these and other restrictions would be a natural partisan issue for whichever party to adopt.
Think a lot of younger people feel that the government is treating them like infants with their recent forays into social media regulation. I’m surprised the Republicans don’t view this as a chance to pick up votes.
banning tiktok is a good way to get younger people to vote
55% of younger people voted in 2020 compared to 66% turnout overall. it seems incredibly foolish to ignore that demo just because they have 10% points lower turnout
combine this ban with Trump's recent stance on tipped wages & Biden's polling and it is looking awful for Ds among precisely the demos they need to get to turnout
I can’t speak to real motivations but there are a lot of legitimate reasons to restrict and discourage kids’ social media access, especially TikTok. The TikTok ban had some baloney in the fine print, but the idea is a pretty good one. Filling young people’s heads with rapid fire nonsense is not good for anyone but the people profiting from it or using it to exert influence (as in those that control the algorithm and moderation, not “influencers”).
