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Social Media Platforms are not Public Utility Companies

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Definition of Public Utility

As you may have recently heard, Twitter and Facebook are in the news due to their recent grilling on Capitol Hill. What is interesting to me about this, regardless of how you feel about the companies and the services they provide, is that not being public utilities they are not susceptible to government regulation.

Rather, they are private companies who have Terms of Service (ToS) people agree to when signing up that state they can ban or remove any content or users they find don’t meet their community standards. This is the same idea that companies all across the U.S. embody when they say they can refuse service to anyone. This is their freedom as a company and has nothing to do with individual rights. You do not have any first amendment rights except for in the presence of GOVERNMENT censorship. It has nothing to do with privately owned spaces including social media platforms. The fact is, social media platforms are for-profit companies who make money when people post their own opinions to them and they make a LOT of money when those opinions are contentious. It is in their own best interest NOT to censor their users when their users are operating within their ToS.

Thus, none of this makes sense for Congress to step into. There are several legal precedents for the government staying out of media-related industry censorship, which is why entities like the MPAA, CCA (now defunct), and ESRB exist – all being industry self-regulating bodies.  That said, maybe it’s time social media platforms establish their own so there are standards and regulations across them and content can be rated rather than completely removed. This would certainly help people avoid content they didn’t want to see and could allow for space where more objectionable content could exist within its own bubble that people could venture into at their own risk.

What SHOULD be of concern is personal data privacy. But, we all know that isn’t going to get anywhere. Those of us who do work in this space have been touting the issue of data privacy for several years to no avail. I don’t see it becoming a priority any time soon.

Faking them out

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The New York Times reports that the newly elected French President’s staff created fake accounts to mislead Russian Hackers.

“The National Security Agency in Washington picked up the signs. So did Emmanuel Macron’s bare-bones technology team. And mindful of what happened in the American presidential campaign, the team created dozens of false email accounts, complete with phony documents, to confuse the attackers.”

Authority to Hack

Authority to Hack

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Opinion article on Wired concerning the expansion of government surveillance.

“That’s why it’s so concerning that the Justice Department is planning a vast expansion of government hacking. Under a new set of rules, the FBI would have the authority to secretly use malware to hack into thousands or hundreds of thousands of computers that belong to innocent third parties and even crime victims. The unintended consequences could be staggering.”

Censorship Quotes by Literary Authors

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Censorship Quotes by Literary Authors

“I am against censorship. In all forms. Not just for the right of masterpieces ”high art” to be scandalous.

But what about pornography (commercial)?
Find the wider context:
notion of voluptuousness  la Bataille?
But what about children? Not even for them? Horror comics, etc.
Why forbid them comics when they can read worse things in the newspapers any day. Napalm bombing in Vietnam, etc.

A just/ discriminating censorship is impossible.”

Gamers Have the Skills to Make Great Politicians…

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Inspired by this:
World of Warcraft player Colleen Lachowicz captures seat in Maine state Senate despite Republican attacks on her ‘bizarre double life’ as a gamer

I think gamers would make great politicians. In game we have to be able to communicate, manage our time and resources, understand technology and how to use it, and work well with others. We also do all of this on top of our daily lives as parents, employees, students, and more. And, last but not least – we do it all for FUN!

So congratulations on your new state senate seat, Colleen Lachicz – Orc Rogue. From me, Diana Harrelson – Anthropologist, PhD Student, User Experience Designer, and proud to be a level 86 (working my way up to 90!) Night Elf Druid.

Game on!

Presidential Campaigning in Video Games

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I apologize at the lateness of this post as I was abroad and without Internet access when I first learned of it.

Barack Obama has made history again, this time as the first presidential candidate ever to advertise in video games. If you are in one of the following swing states, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Indiana, Montana, North Carolina, New Mexico, Nevada, Ohio and Wisconsin, and you play games such as Madden NFL 09 or Burnout Paradise then you will have the opportunity to see this for yourself.

I’d be interested to see what the opinions of gamers who witnessed these in their games before all the media hoopla thought of them. Personally I think it’s rather ingenious, I only wonder if they are truly hitting the demographic they are after with them and if there is any way to see if they made an impact or not.

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