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Bad Takes!
Feb. 16th, 2021 07:43 pmAnd the INEVITABLE bad follow-up take from the Baen Books thing: "There oughta be a law!"
Specifically, that maybe it's time to reconsider Safe Harbor laws and make companies legally liable for speech on their platforms.
This is what the DMCA does. I know of NO ONE who thinks that has worked out well, and malicious DMCA takedown notices are quite common. Do you really want to expand that to the entire internet?
Like, yes, Baen is absolutely being bad here. I am in favor of them losing customers and reputation over this, and for anyone making actionable speech to get gone after, particularly the death threats crowd.
But no, Baen should not be liable for the speech; there are way too many knock-on effects from that which we don't want. Ye Gods, people, think about all the ways a law can be weaponized against the most powerless groups you like and how you will build in systemic blocks that are not "But it's not meant to be applied that way!" before you start agitating for it.
(There's also the usual ranting about how we should expand hate speech laws, but I've been over why that's a bad idea here before; I don't need to do it again.)
Specifically, that maybe it's time to reconsider Safe Harbor laws and make companies legally liable for speech on their platforms.
This is what the DMCA does. I know of NO ONE who thinks that has worked out well, and malicious DMCA takedown notices are quite common. Do you really want to expand that to the entire internet?
Like, yes, Baen is absolutely being bad here. I am in favor of them losing customers and reputation over this, and for anyone making actionable speech to get gone after, particularly the death threats crowd.
But no, Baen should not be liable for the speech; there are way too many knock-on effects from that which we don't want. Ye Gods, people, think about all the ways a law can be weaponized against the most powerless groups you like and how you will build in systemic blocks that are not "But it's not meant to be applied that way!" before you start agitating for it.
(There's also the usual ranting about how we should expand hate speech laws, but I've been over why that's a bad idea here before; I don't need to do it again.)
