I really do think we could neuter social media’s harm by requiring them to positively identify users as actual people or own the consequences of what gets posted - like how a newspaper has the legal accountability for what it says. This “neutral platform” is not healthy for our democracy.
I’m all for freedom of speech - but I don’t think those freedom of speech laws had anticipated how wide the damage of speech can flow and how stealthily things can be spoken. Is “freedom of speech” the same as “freedom to amplify anonymous voices to millions, with someone else choosing what voice to amplify”?
And it’s not hard to set up. The EU’s new identity network requires zero-knowledge-proofs - ie “this is a real person” is all that social media platforms would be able to verify. I’d obviously be deeply against the social media companies being able to positively identify users.
But I usually get downvoted to oblivion for making this point.
They also spread the truth as well even when government and media have conspired to obscure it. Social media has led to people beating companies, governments and politicians simply by providing an avenue to share reality. Social media defends democracy and protects democracy. There has always been an enormous power balance issues between the elites and the peasants and social media for the first time is allowing the peasants to speak to each other rather than the only voice being the elites through their media platforms.
My guy… Social media ARE the elites media platforms you Dingus.
They aren’t letting people do shit, they are all censored and monitored to ensure we stay fractured and disengaged
He seems stuck at what social media was in 2012 and hasn’t realized how they are now.
Yet in principle the social benefit described (amplifying voices of the unheard) isn’t entirely out of reach for social media as a category, especially if we can escape the era of closed platforms. Open alternatives are still relatively new. There is a plausible future in which closed platforms are left behind and we become much more capable of keeping mass public manipulation in check.
