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These two situations are easily distinguishable, which when translated out of legalese, means your analogy sucks shit.

This is a bullshit argument. Covering someone a certain way is not the same as suspending an account and inhibiting their first amendment rights.

The point of 230 is that the platforms are “just” a public square and can’t be held liable for the editorial choices of their users. putting their thumbs on the scale seems worthy of oversight in a way that grilling Chris Hayes is not.

Ah yes - the current Supreme Court. Nothing more to see or say.

There is no way for content moderation to follow clearly transparent rules. There will always be edge cases and judgement calls and cultural differences. Being too transparent with the rules could lead to intentional boundary pushing. This podcast ep has a good overview: radiolab.org/podcast/post...

These companies are monkeying with and effecting politics in other countries with no oversight. At the very least it makes them a national security concern. That should result in something being done. /end

I don't think Zuckerberg would agree that any of his platforms are publishers, news outlets, nor do exerts any editorial decisions on the content published on the platforms. Bc that would mean that they'd lose Section 230 protections, which protected Facebook from content related litigation.

Meta's growth depends on us using AI Agents and wearing video cameras on our faces We're told to give up our personal, financial, health & work life access to his AI while being surveilled 24/7. In a business like this, TRUST becomes key to scaling. They NEED our trust to grow. Trust is earned

and the underlying infrastructure can be investigated, no?

He can also answer questions about throttling Ukraine defense systems! Effen murderer.

Isn't that what the "Twitter Files" were though? Like, that already happened.

There’s a difference between coverage and sabotage.

How would I feel? I legitimately wouldn’t give a shit. Tax these fuckers out of existence.

Right. They’re reporting on the factual stuff he does. If the administration doesn’t like it, maybe they should figure out why they don’t like the truth

One is effectively state media censorship. That isnt an editorial choice.

But hearings don't have to be only about violations of law, and where are you getting that the 1st Amendment is a shield that can prevent a Congressional hearing?

I used to. Then we saw how cravenly they all capitulated in 2025. Why? Because the only party that turns the thumbscrews on them are the Republicans. They fear retribution when the GOP get back in power if they don't go along with their shit. I don't like it but there has to symmetry.

Still no comment on why the Cross Check system they created as a result of those hearings to protect conservative and other “high-profile” accounts for automated action failed utterly in this case? Your acting like it was editorial action when they claim it was the automated systems. No 230 here.

You are ridiculous Mike. Absolutely ridiculous.

Literally the "upset about a thing" meme with a splash of dril's "zero difference between good and bad things."

You are comparing apples to oranges. They are not even close to the same platform.

I think it’s worth investigating whether there was any government pressure. Absent any credible technical explanation it’s a legitimate question.

Not necessarily? In theory, this could be the result of jawboning or explicit coercion by the executive. And even assuming it's not, there's political value is getting Zuck to openly say "when Donald Trump tells me to jump, I say, 'how high?'" as long as there's no retaliation for it.

Thanks for taking the time to explain a lot of your intricate knowledge of this law, Mike. I think the baseline issue is that there clearly seems to be problems with the law as written if these are the outcomes we are getting.

It would be more like if Comcast dropped MSNow and was hauled before congress to answer as to whether it was merely a business decision, or if they did it under pressure from Trump.

Long time fan, first time caller. I love your work, but Congress should haul MSNOW and most news organizations in front of committees to explain sanewashing Trump.

Isn’t this part of the argument when people wanted social media regulated like those cable channels? Also, covering Trump negatively (accurately) is not the same thing as defying others their ability to speak freely.

Hell, I’ve testified in a Senate hearing, and I’m a harmless dork nobody cares about. Congressional hearings are, at their core, fact-finding, not adversarial. The only become that way if theres something you don’t want to talk about

Why? Why would that be a bad thing or something we want Congress to stop? I would actually love it if Bluesky decided to ban everyone posting a swastika and don't think the government should be able to step in and force them to let swastikas on their site Same thing with your MSN analogy

Why would you need a hearing about that? No one has a right to a comments section lol #postersrights Companies choose how they want to moderate and users choose what company they want to use

You are a fucking idiot for suggesting that an oligarch banning voices on a platform is equal to a government punishing people for reporting accurate facts.

Exactly. Put it on the pile.

That's a stretch of an argument considering that the heart of their legal position re their responsibility and liability for their posts is that it's not them, it's the posters over whom they have no control nor liability or responsibility. Seems they do have editorial control after all.

Totally fine with it. Though, those two things are not the same.

You are factually wrong

Ok, thank you for educating me.

Sorry I'm clearly getting the terms wrong/live in the UK. My point is that they depend on being able to disavow responsibility for content on the platform when it suits and cry "free speech" when it doesn't, which just isn't tenable

Mike doesn’t understand the distinction.

Yes, but the REASON for the immunity was to ENCOURAGE platforms to moderate, because without it, the only way for them to liable was to have knowledge. That would have encouraged no moderation (and lots of hate and garbage and spam) to avoid knowledge. 230 was put in place to ENCOURAGE editorial

Mike is correct on this. The purpose of that indemnification was to protect private blocking and screening by interactive computer services.

They did question Twitter execs about Hunter Biden’s laptop. And from a political point of view, that was a huge win for Republicans. The exercise would show to moderates how co-opted Facebook/Twitter/TikTok have become. And show the hypocrisy. ny1.com/nyc/all-boro...

change their behavior based on a backlash. But at the end of the day, technofascists gonna fascst. They may turn down the temperature temporarily but when you are not noticing they'll slowly raise the temperature to start slowly boiling the frogs again (the frogs being us and democracy). /2

Yeah, the answer is not to "haul Zuck before Congress" but to get the hell off of those platforms. Easier said than done though, when you have relationships with 100's of friends on the platform. This is the "capture" problem. The big social media companies have a captured market to a large extent.

Mastodon’s audience is closed to open communication and also eliminates non-conformist choruses, making his analysis a failure. And the US First Amendment? Ancient history. The US is currently a reactionary, neo-reactionary supremacist nation. #2k115

​Platforms aren't public squares; they are far-right networks mirroring their execs. Unaligned voices are shadowbanned or silenced. Mastodon, proposed as an alternative, is even worse: an echo chamber that permanently banned 2K15 for empirical graphics.

Shockingly people don't understand that the first amendment only applies to censorship by the government and not private entities... OR that the first amendment protects private companies from the government compelling them to publish speech they object to. Weird!

False equivalency. MSNow has never shut down access to anything.

How about the hearing is about why the government should nationalize the whole company

Why? No one has a right to post. You can ban antivaxxers don't hey have a roght to post?

I don't believe they should be hauled in front of congress if they decide to not let conservatives comment on their website.

That one I think is valid! Because there you have actual clear evidence of suppression at the request of a gov't employee!

Section 230 protects operators from the content on their platform, _because_ the speech belongs to their users. If they start selectively curating the content, it’s no longer the speech of their _users_ but rather the speech of the operator. They don’t deserve 230 protections in that case.

The two situations are not the same.

No hyperbole: few dozen scientific KDMs shape G7 "capital widening & deepening". One, Mr. Zhirnov, validates a paradigm prism where a highly probable/beneficial outcome is: 1) a new #HigherHumanRace, 2) AGI vested w/ designated legal cap. as #GodLegalFiction: 17Oct26, 46:25 youtu.be/bptlKuzmhio

You're stumping for the assholes who elected this regime. No?

The problem is we all dump $70/mo into an Internet slush fund that is mostly captured by a handful of massive companies. Cap access fees at $10/mo. Move the rest of the network costs to the sending side. Make publishers deliver enough value to recover their costs.

Yes, reporting on the administration from a barely centrist position is exactly the same as suspending a protest movement's account.

Yes. I am pointing out that we shouldn't support Dems using MAGA's unconstitutional playbook. There are so many constitutional things to do instead.

I’m also not convinced that reaching a state of jurisprudence where constitutional protections are only afforded to an ownership class is something we should just “aw shucks, that’s just the way it is” about

I dunno that I agree that suspending a popular account for no reason qualifies as an editorial decision

I think they should do what they think is the right thing to do. If they think the Trump admin pressured him or there were some other corrupt circumstances, they should make him testify. AFAIK the MSNow folks aren’t corrupt and could testify if they had to, but they aren’t the danger.

Yeah I agree. There are already 10 things higher and there will probably be 25 more by January. That said, while I don’t think there is a legal basis to actually do anything about it, it would be nice if the jawboning just gets them to come out and say “yeah, this is what we believe and there is

if he doesn't want public scrutiny, zuck should shut down his shrimp jesus gacha ass websites

i’m old enough to remember that maga did haul people in front of congress for less than this talk to your doctor about memory

It’s astounding how many of you do not at all understand Mike’s argument or the First Amendment

Except Meta is exempt from a ton of copyright law because they claim to be a platform not a publisher. If they are making editorial decisions then they should also not be able to hide behind the DMCA safe harbour and they should prescreen all content and be liable for all copyright infringement.

They actually do do this regularly with executives of all sorts of companies that don't even have the slightest liberal slant and it gets them successful fucking results every time. We should absolutely do the damn thing that works well and no judge apparently feels is unconstitutional.

Doesn’t feel like a fair comparison.

but but I don't see this as anywhere near hauling a news network in. *Obviously there are a lot of other things he should answer for.

§ 230 applies to third party content. It wasn't passed to protect Prodigy from liability for their own materials. It doesn't protect a news service from the claims in their Op-Ed publications. If Meta exerts editorial control over what they publish, it's less "third party" the content is.

I replied to that so no need to repost it.

Zuck has skirted so much because he claims he is not “news” he is a social media company, therefore he doesn’t have editorial rights, he is there to let people get to know one another. MSNow is a a news organization and has editorial responsibility and rights. We need an alternative to META

Explain why they cover trump "the way they do"? You mean as the corrupt child molester that he is? Telling the truth? Wtf are you talking about? Those aren't the same at all.

You gotta get the Normies with a large amount of social clout on these platforms to threaten to leave like billionaire Californians do or the needle will not move

Not a 1A lawyer by any means so would welcome thoughtful replies and critiques from those who are.

Organizers will always go where the people are, and that's places like Insta. The practical move for the long foreseeable future is probably having to live in both: a home base you control (as Mike suggests), plus corporate platforms you treat as rented megaphones that you might lose any day.

I guess if only to find out if the administration had anything to do with it..

MSNow and Meta are entirely different experiences w diff expectations. Meta’s traffic is due to its performing the role as a common carrier. MSNow is like a single newspaper that makes editorial decisions. To be clear, I don’t think Murdoch has any obligation to cover anyone either.

Thank you.

I agree with this argument, and that the 1A protects both. At the same time, I think the MAGA GOP would absolutely do that, and suffer no repercussions for having done it. SCOTUS would probably say it was fine. It is hard to support playing by the rules when only one side does it.

Shame on you for schilling for oligarchy.

Yes! The platforms are much more like utilities than publishers or news networks. If Comcast cut people's cable/Internet because of what they viewed, we would expect their execs to be hauled in front of Congress. Zuck has a team of lawyers to protect his 1st amendment rights.