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[Tempy]

Soooo....what's to stop any government from adopting the "criticizing our policies is hate speech and criticizing our government leaders is harassment" stance? Or, imagine this policy with Marie Le Pen as the French president. (Reminder that Turkey is a NATO member that was a democracy, and it's a full on dictatorship at this point. This stuff happens more frequently than people want to admit)

Also - Russia has to be licking their chops at this. They can basically shut down anything on FB or Twitter by getting trolls to post enough racist / bigoted for a few days to overwhelm any moderation, watch them get fined into oblivion, and call it a day. Every FB group is basically super vulnerable to this, especially since we are assuming heavy automated moderation.

Uhh, Turkey/China/Russia are already blocking social media sites for criticism of their government. This is about the European Union which none of those countries are a member of.

And Le Pen is not president of France, and even if she was she'd still have to convince all of the EU to follow her shitty policies.

 

[Hari Seldon]

4500 Moderators for 2 billion users.

Thats roughly one moderator per 500 thousand people.

They get paid 15$.

Don't apologize for them when they are not putting in the effort and manpower with "that shit is hard yall". It's like employing 1 cop, or 1 fireman, or 1 judge, or 1 politician, to oversee 500000 people alone and then saying "welp it's hard".

That is my point entirely, they could hire 100s of thousands of people to moderate, but at that point it won't be profitable anymore (especially for Twitter who already makes no money lol). So why operate in Europe at all if they have to do this? They are probably going to pull out* and only return when they have a way to do this without employing human moderation.

* note: only if turning lobbying and lawyering up to 11 fails

 

[Tonedeff]

They're almost certainly gonna have to go automated with this. Which invites its own brand of fuckery. Fuck that

 

[platocplx]

Trolls and vehement racists add nothing to social media discussions. Many of these people use these networks as sources of recruitment. Destroying their way of allow this to happen will help in the long run.

 

[Cagey]

They're almost certainly gonna have to go automated with this. Which invites its own brand of fuckery. Fuck that

The level of policing people want is impossible otherwise.

YouTube had an estimated 300 hours of content uploaded every minute back in *2014*.

 

[tonysidaway]

Soooo....what's to stop any government from adopting the "criticizing our policies is hate speech and criticizing our government leaders is harassment" stance?

In Europe, the ECHR which protects all citizens from such abuses by their governments.

 

[Cybit]

Uhh, Turkey/China/Russia are already blocking social media sites for criticism of their government. This is about the European Union which none of those countries are a member of.

And Le Pen is not president of France, and even if she was she'd still have to convince all of the EU to follow her shitty policies.

I guess the article isn't making clear whether the EU itself has an "EU" definition of hate speech, or if the hate speech rules are tailored to what each country's specific definitions are, but the EU is the enforcement vessel?

I'm still worried about the "this opens the door for getting stuff shut down with troll farms" aspect - that was the big argument in the US against doing this IIRC.

 

[PdotMichael]

It's actually a much harder problem though

The difference is that there was a will to target something despite the trivial nature of the topic.

 

[andythinkpad]

Should have kicked them out a long time ago like China did.

 

[PdotMichael]

Soooo....what's to stop any government from adopting the "criticizing our policies is hate speech and criticizing our government leaders is harassment" stance?.

That little thing called constitution If a group has the will and power to get rid of the constitution then they wouldn't need hate speech laws as trojan horse in the first place.

 

[entremet]

The level of policing people want is impossible otherwise.

YouTube had an estimated 300 hours of content uploaded every minute back in *2014*.

Yep. This is scaling problem. I doubt FB and Twitter want to get fined, it's just a harder problem to solve.

 

[Archaix]

But monitoring our platforms is so haaaard. We'd have to spend money on people and...well, literally nothing else. But we want to reap the benefits of serving millions of people using our service but not have any actual responsibilities, is that so much to ask?

 

[Yohane]

Would be glorious if fb and twitter were banned in EU.

People would riot against the governments like never before.

 

[PdotMichael]

The level of policing people want is impossible otherwise.

YouTube had an estimated 300 hours of content uploaded every minute back in *2014*.

The amount of content to moderate isn't really an argument to accept the internet as some wild west place. Internet is not a legal vacuum.

 

[Plumbob]

Sounds like a good way to squeeze some money out of these American corporations.

 

[Cagey]

Yep. This is scaling problem. I doubt FB and Twitter want to get fined, it's just a harder problem to solve.

The scale of the problem requires new technology. It's so much more than the reductionist nonsense getting posted here.

Acknowledging the problem for what it is, instead of intentionally or unintentionally minimizing it like these platforms are newspaper scale, doesn't absolve a company from having to solve it. That'd be a false dilemma.

 

[tuxfool]

Sounds like a good way to squeeze some money out of these American corporations.

I see this bullshit still persists...

 

[Dyson Industries]

Get them all. No safe spaces for bigots.

 

[Audioboxer]

Would be glorious if fb and twitter were banned in EU.

I hope that is sarcasm, otherwise, yeah, glorious

Social media platforms need to handle their T&Cs far better, but I'm not quite sure how the EU can just blanket fine a private company like this. I'm sure they probably can do it somehow.

 

[Plumbob]

I see this bullshit still persists...

So you're saying these fines WON'T be a big payday for Europe.

 

[PdotMichael]

I see this bullshit still persists...

Understandable, the higher the fines in Europe the less taxes they can pay in the USA... pft.

So you're saying these fines WON'T be a big payday for Europe.

peanuts

 

[dragonelite]

People would riot against the governments like never before.

I wouldn't mind seeing the EU prepping up their own tech giants, its a shame we have no big tech brands in the EU. While the USA, Russia and China all have a big IT sector we have almost nothing.

 

[Plumbob]

I wouldn't mind seeing the EU prepping up their own tech giants, its a shame we have no big tech brands in the EU. While the USA, Russia and China all have a big IT sector we have almost nothing.

I'm sure European regulators share your vision.

 

[Ferulci]

Good.

 

[Plumbob]

peanuts

If it's not a big fine, how could it possibly change American firms' behavior?

 

[Caja 117]

I guess the article isn't making clear whether the EU itself has an "EU" definition of hate speech, or if the hate speech rules are tailored to what each country's specific definitions are, but the EU is the enforcement vessel?

I'm still worried about the "this opens the door for getting stuff shut down with troll farms" aspect - that was the big argument in the US against doing this IIRC.

This "arguement" are just excuses made by half of US governing body because they are as racist as those people on social media.

 

[tonysidaway]

The scale of the problem requires new technology.

Sounds like you're finally agreeing with me. They're the tech companies, they're the ones who knowingly maintain the firehoses producing hate speech alongside cat photographs. They created the problem. Fines will hopefully persuade them to solve it.

 

[Spiritwalker]

This is a good thing. Fuck these companies for doing so little.

 

[glow]

peanuts

Yup, compared to the cost of actually policing their damn websites, they'll be happy to pay the EU fines

 

[PdotMichael]

If it's not a big fine, how could it possibly change American firms' behavior?

The EU totally collected less than 10 billions Euros on fines in thelast 5 years. Just the EU budget for 2016 was over 155 Billions.
Fines as part of the budget are meaningless.

You don't need company destroying fines to force companies to change their policy.

 

[Sophist]

The time to erect the great firewall of Europe has come!

 

[Kthulhu]

That's the law in the EU, they gotta follow it. I understand it isn't anything close to easy, but that's their job.

Just do humanity a favor and shut down both FB and Twitter all together.

How would that be doing humanity a favor?

 

[CheesecakeRecipe]

I hope that is sarcasm, otherwise, yeah, glorious

Social media platforms need to handle their T&Cs far better, but I'm not quite sure how the EU can just blanket fine a private company like this. I'm sure they probably can do it somehow.

Money is, unfortunately, how you get to the heart of a company's priorities. Twitter and Facbeook's responses to the massive amount of vile content posted to their networks have been unacceptable, and the only communication on these issues they give are "We're listening" and "We must do better", without actually making any attempts to curb said behaviors. Just a few days ago, Twitter announced it was extending the character limit to 280 characters instead of 140, while squirming away from any questions about what they were doing to curb abuse on the platform. More space for extra hate is not going to do anything.

I would hate to see platforms which have led to a much closer connection to friends, family, and communities worldwide get shut down, but it's clear that they might need to be fined until their bank accounts are dust in order to get them to clean up what doesn't deserve a platform at all.

 

[PdotMichael]

Yup, compared to the cost of actually policing their damn websites, they'll be happy to pay the EU fines

That not gonna work

 

[Tain]

gee how will facebook and twitter ever afford more of a focus on moderation?

golly i just can't imagine a universe in which that's possible, the money to pay more employees simply does not exist

gosh

 

[Audioboxer]

Money is, unfortunately, how you get to the heart of a company's priorities. Twitter and Facbeook's responses to the massive amount of vile content posted to their networks have been unacceptable, and the only communication on these issues they give are "We're listening" and "We must do better", without actually making any attempts to curb said behaviors. Just a few days ago, Twitter announced it was extending the character limit to 280 characters instead of 140, while squirming away from any questions about what they were doing to curb abuse on the platform. More space for extra hate is not going to do anything.

I would hate to see platforms which have led to a much closer connection to friends, family, and communities worldwide get shut down, but it's clear that they might need to be fined until their bank accounts are dust in order to get them to clean up what doesn't deserve a platform at all.

There are millions if not billions of users. Some sort of automation/AI is most likely going to have to be required, and we know how that can go (check YouTube DMCA abuse/takedowns).

Unless people are more bemoaning high-profile social media accounts that get left standing (easy for Google/Facebook to monitor/see these), micro-management of every single Tom, Dick and Harry on platforms this size is almost an impossible task. Or at least an incredibly long and slow task as everyday people report arguments with their friends/spouses/colleagues/randoms on mass. To some extent using the block/ignore features on social media are often going to be the DIY required.

Or, you make your profiles private and keep to small known circles.

I'm not always 100% championing the Government getting involved, and as you can see my first post in this topic was prodding that poster for a response if they were serious or not. State-wide bans of websites is not a route anyone should be wanting to go down. It's already happening in europe with torrent/piracy sites (and some video streaming), with porn potentially next. We don't need social media and forums on top of that as Governments get all authoritarian and tell the people they'll block on behalf of everyone to protect eyes and ears.

 

[CheesecakeRecipe]

There are millions if not billions of users. Some sort of automation/AI is most likely going to have to be required, and we know how that can go (check YouTube DMCA abuse/takedowns).

Unless people are more bemoaning high-profile social media accounts that get left standing (easy for Google/Facebook to monitor/see these), micro-management of every single Tom, Dick and Harry on platforms this size is almost an impossible task. Or at least an incredibly long and slow task as everyday people report arguments with their friends/spouses/colleagues/randoms. To some extent using the block/ignore features on social media are often going to be the DIY required.

Or, you make your profiles private and keep to small known circles.

Not my or anyone who has suffered abuse's problem, according to the EU. That's on the companies whose very services are being used for targeted abuse.

 

[ClosingADoor]

Soooo....what's to stop any government from adopting the "criticizing our policies is hate speech and criticizing our government leaders is harassment" stance? Or, imagine this policy with Marie Le Pen as the French president. (Reminder that Turkey is a NATO member that was a democracy, and it's a full on dictatorship at this point. This stuff happens more frequently than people want to admit)

Also - Russia has to be licking their chops at this. They can basically shut down anything on FB or Twitter by getting trolls to post enough racist / bigoted for a few days to overwhelm any moderation, watch them get fined into oblivion, and call it a day. Every FB group is basically super vulnerable to this, especially since we are assuming heavy automated moderation.

The EU consists of 28 (soon to be 27) member states. What do you think will happen when one of them goes "well, block all government criticism!". The others will say: how about we don't do that, because we have laws and agreements in place about this sort of thing.

You can apply this kind of thought to pretty much anything. What is stopping Canada from blocking Facebook. Well, nothing. But they will probably get a ton of shit thrown their way by their population and other countries for it.

gee how will facebook and twitter ever afford more of a focus on moderation?

golly i just can't imagine a universe in which that's possible, the money to pay more employees simply does not exist

gosh

Seriously. People need to look at some stats of Facebook. Year on year revenue growth of almost 50%. Almost 10 billion in revenue last quarter with 1.3 billion of that being profit. But how on Earth will they pay for moderation!

 

[Koren]

golly i just can't imagine a universe in which that's possible, the money to pay more employees simply does not exist

gosh

Not saying you have to do it by hand, but Facebook net profit each year is enough to pay half a million people full time at western wares.

Money does exist.

 

[jstripes]

it's not trivial to algorithmically detect most hate speech without a lot of false positives

That, and you have to continuously train the AI as the hate speech code words change.

But it is doable.

 

[Cybit]

This "arguement" are just excuses made by half of US governing body because they are as racist as those people on social media.

Those arguments were made in the mid 90s...by primarily Democrats. They (rightfully) feared that weaker organizations fighting for rights could be brought down by any group with sufficient resources to bombard them and get them booted (since government officials aren't exactly known for their tech savvy).

I mean, the more I think about this, the more I think this is something Russia is probably desperately wanting to have happen. Any automated censoring / monitoring gives them a) more leverage points on the specific platform to abuse and b) increases the odds that a bunch of smaller, more isolated networks pop up, and significantly decrease the effectiveness of a viral protest. Imagine the Arab Spring if Twitter were 8 different platforms run in different countries. If your goal is to increase polarization in the West (and decrease stability), getting people to flock to their own echo chamber platforms (Breitbart + a lefty version of Breitbart) is pretty much what you would want to do.

That said, a lot of this comes down to whether the EU is going to generate EU wide specific hate speech guidelines, or each country is going to use their own specific rules.

 

[tonysidaway]

People are acting as if handling all valid complaints would be impossible, yet the EU's own monitoring records that YouTube and Facebook have achieved 66% success in removing reported hate speech. This really is a tractable problem.

 

[Bolivar687]

Good on them. Here in the U.S. our laws are so ancient, we still treat these companies with kiddy gloves as if they're some fledgling new industry that would collapse without government support.

 

[kess]

Soooo....what's to stop any government from adopting the "criticizing our policies is hate speech and criticizing our government leaders is harassment" stance? Or, imagine this policy with Marie Le Pen as the French president. (Reminder that Turkey is a NATO member that was a democracy, and it's a full on dictatorship at this point. This stuff happens more frequently than people want to admit)

France and Germany both have a strong independent judiciaries, which is why any comparison to Turkey and Russia is ill founded. It is effectively the bulwark against mass censorship and state overreach, which is why Poland's reactionary government is extremely dangerous in its attempts to dismantle the independence of the judiciary in that country.

 

[ramparter]

Yeah this wont make things worse...

 

[IrishNinja]

I support this 100%

amen - give bigotry no platform

Yeah this wont make things worse...

historically speaking, normalizing hate shit leads to pretty bad places, but do go on

 

[tonysidaway]

In the interests of more accurate and productive discussion, here's a link to the European Commission's statement. On the bottom of that page there are also internal links to other relevant documents.

https://ec.europa.eu/commission/news/security-union-2017-sep-28_en

 

[PdotMichael]

Those arguments were made in the mid 90s...by primarily Democrats. They (rightfully) feared that weaker organizations fighting for rights could be brought down by any group with sufficient resources to bombard them and get them booted (since government officials aren't exactly known for their tech savvy).

I mean, the more I think about this, the more I think this is something Russia is probably desperately wanting to have happen. Any automated censoring / monitoring gives them a) more leverage points on the specific platform to abuse and b) increases the odds that a bunch of smaller, more isolated networks pop up, and significantly decrease the effectiveness of a viral protest. Imagine the Arab Spring if Twitter were 8 different platforms run in different countries. If your goal is to increase polarization in the West (and decrease stability), getting people to flock to their own echo chamber platforms (Breitbart + a lefty version of Breitbart) is pretty much what you would want to do.

That said, a lot of this comes down to whether the EU is going to generate EU wide specific hate speech guidelines, or each country is going to use their own specific rules.

You are just repeating your same point again and again, while ignoring any real world examples of functional hate speech laws and stuff like constitutions and separation of power to stop that "now everything we dislike is hate speech" nonsense slippery slope argument.

I'm sorry if the USA doesn't have any of the two.

 

[Kurdel]

Good.

People making impassioned pleas about the freedom of corporations to profit off racism is fucking gross.

 

[frontovik]

Europe vs the trolls of the Interwebs.

The epic struggle of the internet age.