#Parler can't use #antitrust to sue against "political animus" because the First Amendment protects Twitter & Amazon's right to refuse to carry abhorrent content

Parler's lawsuit will be dismissed for failing to allege that AWS & Twitter conspired to suppress competition

🧵
Under clear Supreme Court precedent, Parler would have to prove that Amazon shut off service for non-political reasons

Parler & AWS don't compete. To show that AWS blocked Parler for anticompetitive reasons, Parler must show that AWS conspired with Twitter against Parler.
Instead, Parler complains that AWS was inconsistent in enforcing its Acceptable Use Policy, which reserves broad discretion to remove "harmful" or "offensive" or "otherwise objectionable" content
Parler claims AWS tolerated equally incendiary content on Twitter and that it should have been enough that Parler took down incendiary content when AWS complained about it
This completely misses the point: Twitter's content moderation system is imperfect, as are all content moderation systems

But Parler has chosen NOT to build any content moderation system at all, and instead only to take down content (including child porn) upon complaint
AWS made an editorial judgment not to associate itself with a service that refused refused to take any proactive measures to clean up content that would NEVER survive on any respectable social network

Content like this
And it's not just the attack on the Capitol. Parler has been a cesspool of racist and openly Nazi content since it launched
Morally, AWS *should* have shut off service to Parler as soon it became clear that the site wasn't going to moderate this kind of content in 2019

But the First Amendment protects AWS's right to change its mind and decide that, at last, enough is enough
Our recent paper explains in detail why the First Amendment will not allow the courts to second-guess editorial judgments about how much incitement or Nazi shit AWS is willing to tolerate

gaidigitalreport.com/2020/10/04/sec…
Parler's breach of contract claim will fail for the same reasons: AWS always required adherence with its acceptable use policy and is now, belatedly, enforcing that policy

How to interpret the policy is entirely up to them--an editorial judgment protected by the First Amendment
Read Parler's garbage pseudo-legal complaint here techfreedom.org/490405156-parl…

And here's Lorain Journal (1951), the Supreme Court case that recognized that #antitrust law can't supersede the First Amendment
casetext.com/case/lorain-jo…

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More from @BerinSzoka

12 Jan
A tiny Idaho ISP has blocked Facebook & Twitter, citing complaints from its subscribers about their "censorship" of conservatives

At last we can see that the #NetNeutrality wouldn't have banned such blocking IF it were properly disclosed to consumers

Because the First Amendment
First, let's stipulate that what the ISP is doing is galaxy-brain-level insane

And let's note that they are about as fringey, as it gets, only serving a few rural communities with mostly wireless service

Their subscribers are some of the Trumpiest people in country

So this doesn't tell us anything about what the ISPs that serve nearly everyone will do Image
Read 19 tweets
12 Jan
Awarding electoral college votes on a winner-take-all basis by gerrymandered Congressional district may be even worse than doing it by entire state

If we're going to keep the Electoral College, votes should be awarded proportionally within each state for ALL states
Note that proportional electoral college vote allocation would make it more likely that no party would have 270 electoral votes, in which we'd see coalitions form, as in every other democracy, with small parties to get over 270
It would also be wise to change the crazy way the House decides elections (one vote for each state Congressional delegation), but EV coalitions would likely avoid elections going to the House unless...
Read 4 tweets
11 Jan
Anyone sane wants to see less of the kind of content that led to the storming of the Capitol

#Section230 may be unsatisfying but it plays a vital role: protecting sites’ 1A right to take down content gov't can’t ban, eg misinformation & (most) incitement
protocol.com/we-need-sectio…
The storming of the Capitol should make clear once and for all why all major tech services ban hate speech, misinformation and talk of violence: Words can have serious consequences — in this case, five deaths (plus a Capitol officer’s suicide days later).
The MAGA crowd is crying "censorship," conveniently forgetting (or more likely disingenuously abandoning) all of the First Amendment and free market arguments it has wielded in the past against people who they don't agree with
Read 14 tweets
7 Dec 20
I've been wondering: Why rush Simington onto the FCC (with just 5 months of telecom experience) if Pai doesn't have time to vote out a #Section230 order anyway?

I now think the FCC could, and likely will, vote out an order without further comment on January 13

Here's why...
Even most telecom lawyers assume FCC actions fall into two buckets:

1) rulemakings follow NPRMs and public comment and aren't final until published in the Federal Register

There isn't time for an NPRM/comments and the Biden FCC could block publication in the FedReg anyway
2) Declaratory orders can resolve adjudicatory disputes, but are only binding on the parties to the proceeding, which won't do what the Administration (NTIA) has asked the FCC to do here

But there's actually a third category that the FCC does have time to use here...
Read 23 tweets
17 Nov 20
Can't wait to hear @LindseyGrahamSC, the guy who urged Georgia's Secretary of State to throw out Democratic votes, accuse #BigTech of trying to steal the election 🤣

Watch this thread for more debunking of GOP nonsense about free speech and #Section230
"I don't want the government to have the power to decide what content stays up"
-@LindseyGrahamSC

No, he just wants to amend #Section230 to enable, especially, for Republican hack state AGs to sue websites for removing hate speech, misinformation, voter suppression, etc
Content moderation involves difficult trade-offs that we think are better resolved through the democratic process
- Mark Zuckerberg

Um, no, the First Amendment bars the government from making decisions about online speech

No, you can't just "leave it up to Congress"
Read 39 tweets
19 Feb 20
1/ What might AG #BillBarr say at tomorrow's DOJ workshop on “#Section230—Nurturing Innovation or Fostering Unaccountability?"

Expect him to call for banning strong #encryption, as he did last July—but this time, via amending 230 and focused on "protecting the children"
2/ The whole point of the half-day workshop appears to be for Barr to make the case for a bill DOJ has no doubt helped @LindseyGrahamSC & @SenBlumenthal draft—that would empower a commission (stacked with DOJ allies) to effectively ban encryption

My take: techdirt.com/articles/20200…
3/ Last July, Barr gave a LONG speech denouncing encryption
justice.gov/opa/speech/att…
Read 85 tweets

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