We have heard the rumblings, now it comes.... the Code of Conduct for social media along with the banhammer.
From Bloomberg we get this warning:
U.S. Internet giants Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc., Google and Microsoft Corp. pledged to tackle online hate speech in less than 24 hours as part of a joint commitment with the European Union to combat the use of social media by terrorists.
Of course terrorists are defined down to "unambiguous hate speech that they said promoted racism, homophobia or anti-Semitism" before the short article ends.
Buckle up folks, the ride is is about to get bumpy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 02 2016, @04:11AM
What legislation? This is a collection of private companies making a promise, the government is not involved.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday June 02 2016, @04:33AM
Where have you been over the last 30 years? Big companies *are* government now, by the golden rule ("he who has the gold makes the rules").
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Jiro on Thursday June 02 2016, @04:36AM
"The European Union counts as a government, and this amounts to "media companies had better obey because otherwise hate speech laws can be used against them". When the government "asks" you to do something it's rarely voluntary.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 02 2016, @05:12AM
> The European Union counts as a government,
Barely. The EU can neither create nor enforce any laws.
It is up to the member states to actually pass any local laws that may or may not be inline with EU guidelines.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 02 2016, @05:24AM
> Barely. The EU can neither create nor enforce any laws.
I had to look it up, to my embarrassment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union#Legal_system [wikipedia.org]
> Acts
>
> The main legal acts of the EU come in three forms: regulations, directives, and decisions. Regulations become law in all member states the moment they come into force, without the requirement for any
> implementing measures,[ and automatically override conflicting domestic provisions.[ Directives require member states to achieve a certain result while leaving them discretion as to how to achieve the result.
> The details of how they are to be implemented are left to member states.[m] When the time limit for implementing directives passes, they may, under certain conditions, have direct effect in national law against
> member states.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 02 2016, @07:55AM
This is a collection of private companies making a promise, the government is not involved.
AHAHAHAHAHAH! hahaha... ha...haaha...
the government is not involved
Oh wait, you're serious! HAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHTAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHTAH!
[CARRIER DROPPED]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 02 2016, @11:31AM
The government promised to arrest Facebook's executives [archive.is] if they fail to comply, and sent a team of "activist" thugs to smash up Facebook's office [archive.is], but the government is not involved!