White House Drafts Order to Look into Google, Facebook Practices

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-22/draft-order-for-trump-would-crack-down-on-google-facebook

by petethomas • 8 years ago

34 9 8 years ago

Does anyone believe the Republicans are doing this because they believe in trust busting and regulation, or more likely, that they don’t like the outcomes about how their political messaging is handled or received on the internet.

Note that for years progressive voices have complained about censorship in media and lack of representation but they never had the political power to investigate anything.

Moreover, after the communications act of 1996, consolidation in media allowed the likes of Fox and Clearchannel to build conservative media empires, and while progressives complained and demanded a fairness doctrine or FCC regulation to prevent too much ownership, there was no zeal by GOP to do anything about it.

This looks to me to be a pure political play to the base and IMHO it is cause for concern that an administration that frequently attacks media and calls them an enemy is constantly attacking tech companies, not for the kinds of economic arguments economists would make, but for politically vindictive reasons. It looks like using government power to advance the interests of a political party.

Basically, opposing Trump or the GOP paints a target on your back, so expect corporate interests to fall in line and suck up to avoid a shakedown.

The GOP now controls all three branches of government, a majority of state governments, despite consistently losing the popular vote. Can they really claim they’re being harmed by tech companies, because if there is some conspiracy to silence their message, somehow they’re still winning like gangbusters.

cft• 8 years ago

This makes me happy that I never worked for your employer, Google, despite many unanswered emails from their HR. I do like the diversity of thought.

rfw• 8 years ago

What does diversity of thought even mean?

jakeogh2• 8 years ago

It's almost like they really do value the 1st Amendment...

Personally, I'm more than happy to keep handing out rope to the bubble makers. Corp's are made of people.

tobylane• 8 years ago

Can I check, the they are progressives and the bubble makers are the lawmakers allowing conglomerates?

lgleason• 8 years ago

It's one thing to oppose Trump. It's another when you control 80-90% of search traffic and you are banning certain people (moreso on the conservative side) and are biasing search results etc..

These companies were able to grow to the size they are because of safe harbor. The idea behind safe harbor was that it was for the public good IF the platforms stayed neutral.

If you are a progressive, you can openly talk about your political views at these companies, but if you are are a Trump supporter or a conservative you have to be underground or face being purged. This company ideology has made it's way into the products that they offer with Twitter and Facebook and Google banning accounts, shadow banning results etc. based on subjective criteria. In the mobile space for example, both Google and Apple can effectively shut you down by banning you from the app stores.

The lack of trust busting finally bit the republicans in the butt which is why their acting, but fixing this is a good thing. As much as this may allow some people with ideas I find extremely repulsive to spread those ideas, the alternative is a group of people who are un-accountable to the public filtering those views in ways that are very difficult for the average person to detect. That is giving way too much power to a select group of people. As history has shown power corrupts which is why we need to the checks and balances. Before Citizens United there was another check and balance in the system because that bias would have been considered an "in kind" political donation.

From a startup perspective this is also a good thing because in certain verticals these big players have the ability to squash upstarts, buy out their staff etc..

cromwellian2• 8 years ago

Most of the bans instituted appear to from external pressure, not internal employees, at least going by publicly available statements of various companies involved.

In the same way that consumer boycotts against advertisers got Fox News to censor some of its pundits.

PayPal just banned Alex Jones, you think this is because the rank and file progressive employees just decided to do it, or because they received massive numbers of public complaints?

There’s a huge difference between employee political views and product algorithms, and the idea conservatives don’t seem to understand that the general public is targeting companies with pressure campaigns against their ideology in much the same way religious groups used to get TV censored for criticism of religious or some mild sexuality.

Conservatives are not unique in this. Progressive channels on YouTube have been censored because of complaints that videos of civilian deaths caused by US military or anti terrorist videos were promoting violence.

Venezuela’s state TV which was promoting propaganda got censored at one point and a lot of progressives got really mad.

If you’re preaching white supremacy wrapped in a nice dog whistle, don’t be surprised a flood of public complaints and threats of boycotts against advertisers get your content taken down.

That’s how political action always worked, it’s how a lot of civil rights movements got TV to change what images they promoted.

eksemplar• 8 years ago

I find the republican stance on this a little ironic, considering the places that are the easiest to get banned from on the internet are right-wing. Just try posting that you like Hillary Clinton on the infowars or Breitbart forums.

You can make a Trump support group on Facebook just fine.

White House Drafts Order to Look into Google, Facebook Practices

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