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Berin Szóka 🌐 Profile picture
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19 Apr, 7 tweets, 3 min read
Hawley's bill would force Amazon to spin off its Web Services division

He doesn't even allege any economic harms flowing from owning both a marketplace and a hosting service

Obviously, he's trying to punish Amazon for booting Parler after the January 6 insurrection
Hawley isn't subtle about the motive for the bill: he's trying to use #antitrust law to retaliate against a private company for exercising editorial judgment in a way that Hawley doesn't like Image
The bill's text isn't out yet, but "online hosting services" may well cover other Internet infrastructure, including hosting domain names & "hosting" apps in the Play store

If so, the bill would punish Google, too
Including "search engines" as well as "online marketplaces" (as things you can't own if you also own a web hosting service) suggests that Hawley's targeting both Amazon and Google for refusing to do business with Parler (for its failure to moderate incitement to violence)
Obviously, the First Amendment does not allow the government to retaliate against private entities for their editorial judgments--even when retaliation is dressed up to look like economic regulation
Laws that target specific companies are almost always subject to strict scrutiny, which almost always means they fail in court

Hawley knows better. He just doesn't care. Because this is pure political theater--yet another opportunity to "own the libs" Image
No one should be surprised that the guy who led the fight to steal the 2020 election is now grasping at straws to retaliate against tech companies that refused to continue associating themselves with what is now the social network of choice for insurrectionists, QAnoners & bigots

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More from @BerinSzoka

Berin Szóka 🌐 Profile picture
21 Apr
Livetweeting this hearing on app store competition

The central premise, that app stores have "gatekeeper" control, is greatly exaggerated, if not wrong
Klobuchar emphasizes that Apple won't allow sideloading of apps onto iOS photos (as Google does)

But Apple has, since 2018, allowed progressive web apps (PWAs) to run in the Safari mobile browser

And PWAs are increasingly able to duplicate the functionality of "native" apps
PWAs have some significant advantages over native apps (found in app stores): notably, you can build the same app to run on all major web browsers (except Firefox), so you don't have to build separate Android and iOS versions
Read 28 tweets
Berin Szóka 🌐 Profile picture
21 Apr
Just tuned in to @linamkhan's confirmation hearing. Of course, Wicker focuses on whether social media can be treated as common carriers, citing Justice Thomas

Apples & oranges: Lina's paper was about *economic* regulation of Amazon, not content moderation, protected by the 1A
Unfortunately, she didn't make that distinction clear, just saying that we need to be "a bit market specific"

I debunk Thomas's opinion here (with @corbinkbarthold) lawfareblog.com/justice-thomas…
And I explain the line between regulating economic conduct (what Dems are focused on) and regulating editorial judgments (what Republicans are focused on here:
gaidigitalreport.com/2020/10/04/sec…
Read 9 tweets
Berin Szóka 🌐 Profile picture
19 Apr
Republicans have relentlessly attacked "Big Tech" companies for "censoring" conservatives

Under pressure, Apple has caved, reinstating the #Parler app even though, for example, openly Nazi content is still readily available on the site. And that's just the tip of the iceberg...
It's hard to know what's really on Parler because the site doesn't allow full text search: unlike on Facebook or Twitter, you can only search for user names and hashtags

Even before the January 6 insurrection, Parler censored certain hashtags, like the N-Word
This was the bare minimum of what it took to create the veneer of respectability required to pretend that the site wasn't the cesspool of hate speech that it actually is

Parler seems to have expanded the list of banned hashtags to include other code words (eg "skittles"=Muslims)
Read 21 tweets
Berin Szóka 🌐 Profile picture
30 Mar
At noon, Prof. Hamburger will repeat his nonsense claims that the First Amendment is a sword by which government can force private websites to host speech they find reprehensible.
His Fairness Doctrine for the Internet is the opposite of what the right has argued for decades, as @AriCohn and I explained here

lawfareblog.com/wall-street-jo…
Read our thread here
Read 28 tweets
Berin Szóka 🌐 Profile picture
25 Mar
Another "Big Tech" hearing today (noon ET) with G, TW & FB CEOs

Dems will complain that tech companies don't moderate enough content and Republicans will say they're being "censored"

Both sides will attack 230, but the real issue is the First Amendment

energycommerce.house.gov/committee-acti…
Websites have the same First Amendment rights as parade organizers, newspapers or other media to exclude speech they find objectionable, however "unfair" their decisions may be

It's just not the government's job to second-guess those content moderation decisions
Republicans used to understand this. They spent 80 years attacking Fairness Doctrine mandates for broadcasting, yet are now demanding a Fairness Doctrine of their own

Here's Rep @CathyMcMorris Rodgers firmly rejecting such nonsense in late 2019
Read 134 tweets
Berin Szóka 🌐 Profile picture
23 Mar
.@BrendanCarrFCC is on a @FSFthinktank zoom now & about to talk about social media regulation
us02web.zoom.us/j/85978754303

Here's the thread I posted the last time he talked about #Section230

tl;dr: No, the FCC can't mandate "transparency" for content moderation akin to NN rules
Requiring ISPs to disclose how they block, throttle and prioritize is radically different from regulating how websites moderate content

The DC Circuit upheld 2015 NN rules because they applied only to ISPs that held themselves out as *not* curating the broadband experience
By contrast, social media ALL provide a curated, edited experience

And the First Amendment protects that exercise of editorial control

Read our comments to the FCC on the unconstitutionality of the NTIA's proposed #Section230 rules

techfreedom.org/wp-content/upl…
Read 8 tweets

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