Source: Washington Times What do you think? On the one hand, censorship was intended to be a prohibition on government, not private companies or individuals, but the protection of our censorship laws have been extended to businesses and organizations before. An argument could be made that the larger social media companies, such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and I would add Google as well, do have a practical monopoly. Sure, there are alternatives to Facebook but not realistic ones, and there are few alternatives to Twitter and Youtube. Certainly, the government has gone against other companies as monopolies who had more competition than Twitter and Youtube. You may not be aware of it but the government was about to split Microsoft up into several parts. Bill Gates wanted to keep his business focused on business and wasn't contributing largely to political causes. He now contributes to Democrat candidates and leftist causes everywhere and has the protection of the government. To a large extent, our government is quite capable of using such Mafia-like strongarm tactics to extort money from people who simply want to run their businesses. But what do you think? Is this one of those things that Trump sometimes voices as a personal opinion, with no intention of acting on it, or is this something he will seek to enforce. Will he be successful?
I don't know how Trump would do anything against the social media giants, even if he tried to get them declared monopolies or utilities. They could ramp up anti-Trump sentiment faster than even the MSM, and I don't think he wants that. The only real alternative would be to start another conservative-leaning social media company. As I once posted, some people are trying to get Jeff Bezos to do an impartial, Prime Members-only social media system. I don't know if Bezos will agree to the idea, though, and I don't know how impartial it would be.
I don't know. Most Facebook users I know are not in love with Facebook and would love to have a viable alternative, and the same is true of those who spend time on Youtube. There is also the question of how much more could they do to him than they are already doing?
It seems like facebook and YouTube are both getting worse and worse, and not better; so it is not looking like our President is going to be able to hold the line for conservative American patriots to have equal time on either one. We like to think that we should have free speech, because the Constitution says we should have that; but neither one of these social media is publicly owned, and so the owners have a right to decide what content they will allow. I have looked at some of the alternatives to Facebook, but it really doesn’t help if there is not one that people use, like we have been on facebook. I don’t see any reason why we can’t visit with friends and family on Facebook, and then have the political groups somewhere that more freedom of speech is allowed. I just found this one today, haven’t signed up, but it looks hopeful. Has anyone else found an alternative that seems to both viable and growing for conservatives who want to opt out of the media propaganda ? https://conservativefiringline.com/rightbook-new-conservative-alternative-to-facebook/
I think when we went with the notion that certain stated opinions are considered 'hate crimes', then we kind of shot ourselves in the foot. People use that argument if you say you don't agree with any particular thing. If they can get it under the hate crime category, then social media companies have no option but to censor it. If people really want freedom of speech, then they need to quit whining and playing the victim card when other people don't agree with them. I personally think the strength of America IS different opinions. It's how we keep things balanced. Until we can no longer speak out.....then the balance is lost.
While I don't entirely support the concept of anti-trust laws, Google and Facebook might be the poster children of arguments in favor of them. Yes, they are private companies but, at the same time, there is no serious competition for either of these companies. Facebook dominates social media by many times, and something like eighty percent of Internet searches in the United States are made through Google, and since these are among the main sources of information for Americans, there is a reasonable public concern.
FB dominates way more than most us even want to know. Mr Z is building more sloar stations this one in Texas. Four football fileds in width and length. He claims he needs this to store more our info photos and other FB posts. In the meantime this solar station supposedly can power 72,000 homes in the process . Sorry lost my source of info on this. Read this on Tuesday I think
If one goes to another social media outlet like talk radio for instance, the FCC is in control. Among the many mandates, a show has to give equal time to all political parties who wish to express their opinions. If the show interviews a Democrat running for a position in government, then equal time has to be given his or her opponent. The show is a private business but it still has to abide by certain rules and regulations in order to keep the license and remain on the air. Seems to me a similar program the FCC has can be implemented across the other facets of the social media.
I'm sure there are those in government who would love to be able to dictate just what someone can publish online but that won't be something I'd support. I'd rather see the company broken up, so that Google Search would have to survive on the basis of its search results again. Then maybe they wouldn't play around with them so much.