My colleague Wayne Brough and I recently went on the “Kibbe on Liberty” show to discuss how to discuss the state of free speech on the internet. We explained how censorship is a Big Government problem, not a Big Tech problem. Here’s the complete description of the show and the link to the full episode is below.
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With Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, we are in the middle of a national debate about the tension between censorship and free expression online. On the Right, many people are calling for government to rein in what they perceive as the excesses of Big Tech companies, while the Left wants the government to crack down on speech they deem dangerous. Both approaches make the same mistake of giving politicians authority over what we are allowed to say and hear. And with recent revelations about government agents leaning on social media companies to censor speech, it’s clear that when it comes to the online conversation, there’s no such thing as a purely private company.”
A growing number of conservatives are calling for Big Government censorship of social media speech platforms. Censorship proposals are to conservatives what price controls are to radical leftists: completely outlandish, unworkable, and usually unconstitutional fantasies of controlling things that are ultimately much harder to control than they realize. And the costs of even trying to impose and enforce such extremist controls are always enormous.
I’ll offer a few more thoughts here in addition to what I’ve already said elsewhere. First, here is my response to the Rosen essay. National Review gave me 250 words to respond to her proposal:
While admitting that “law is a blunt instrument for solving complicated social problems,” Christine Rosen (“Keep Them Offline,” June 27) nonetheless downplays the radicalness of her proposal to make all teenagers criminals for accessing the primary media platforms of their generation. She wants us to believe that allowing teens to use social media is the equivalent of letting them operate a vehicle, smoke tobacco, or drink alcohol. This is false equivalence. Being on a social-media site is not the same as operating two tons of steel and glass at speed or using mind-altering substances.
Teens certainly face challenges and risks in any new media environment, but to believe that complex social pathologies did not exist before the Internet is folly. Echoing the same “lost generation” claims made by past critics who panicked over comic books and video games, Rosen asks, “Can we afford to lose another generation of children?” and suggests that only sweeping nanny-state controls can save the day. This cycle is apparently endless: Those “lost generations” grow up fine, only to claim it’s the
next generation that is doomed!
Rosen casually dismisses free-speech concerns associated with mass-media criminalization, saying that her plan “would not require censorship.” Nothing could be further from the truth. Rosen’s prohibitionist proposal would deny teens the many routine and mostly beneficial interactions they have with their peers online every day. While she belittles media literacy and other educational and empowerment-based solutions to online problems, those approaches continue to be a better response than the repressive regulatory regime she would have Big Government impose on society.
I have a few more things to say beyond these brief comments. Continue reading →
A major policy battle has developed regarding the wisdom of regulating social media platforms in the United States, with the internet’s most important law potentially in the crosshairs. Leaders in both major parties are calling for sweeping regulation.
Specifically, President Trump and his presumptive opponent in the coming presidential election, former Vice President Joe Biden, have both called for “Section 230” of the Communications Decency Act to be repealed. Last week, the president took a misguided step in this direction by signing an executive order that, if fully carried out, will result in significantly greater regulation of the internet and of speech.
A Growing Call to Regulate Internet Platforms
The ramifications of these threats and steps could not be more profound. Without Section 230—also known as “the 26 words that created the internet”—we would have a much less advanced internet ecosystem. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Wikipedia would have never grown as quickly. Indeed, the repeal of Section 230 means many fewer jobs, less information distribution, and, frankly, less joy.
Shockingly, by backing Trump’s recent push for regulating these internet platforms, many conservatives are betraying their own principles—the ones that support freedom of expression and the ability to run private businesses without government interference.
Section 230 limits the liability online intermediaries face for the content and communications that travel over their networks. The immunities granted by Section 230 let online speech and commerce flow freely, without the constant threat of legal action or onerous liability looming overhead for digital platforms. To put it another way, without this provision, today’s vibrant internet ecosystem likely would not exist. Continue reading →
Writing over at the conservative Big Government blog (part of the Breitbart.com network of blogs), someone who goes by the pseudonym “Capitol Connection” has posted an editorial about the debate over retransmission consent reform that is full of misinformation and misguided policy prescriptions, at least if you believe is truly limited government. The piece is entitled, “Big Cable Would Prefer if You Paid Their Bills,” and the problems are almost immediately evident from that headline alone. First, what is a supposedly small government-oriented blog doing using a silly label like “Big Cable” to describe a vigorously competitive sector of our capitalist economy? Using terms like “Big Cable” is a silly lefty tactic. Second, no one in the cable industry is proposing anyone “pay their bills” except for the customers who enjoy their services. Isn’t a fee for service part of capitalism?
Anyway, that’s just the problem with the title of the essay. Sadly, the rest of the piece is filled with even more erroneous information and arguments about the retransmission consent regulatory process as well as the bill that aims to reform that process, “The Next Generation Television Marketplace Act” (H.R. 3675 and S. 2008). That bill, which is sponsored by Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) and Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA), represents a comprehensive attempt to deregulate America’s heavily regulated video marketplace. In a recent Forbes oped, I argued that the DeMint-Scalise effort would take us “Toward a True Free Market in Television Programming” by eliminating a litany of archaic media regulations that should have never been on the books to begin with. The measure would:
eliminate: “retransmission consent” regulations (rules governing contractual negotiations for content);
end “must carry” mandates (the requirement that video distributors carry broadcast signals even if they don’t want to);
repeal “network non-duplication” and “syndicated exclusivity” regulations (rules that prohibit distributors from striking deals with broadcasters outside their local communities);
end various media ownership regulations; and
end the compulsory licensing requirements of the Copyright Act of 1976, which essentially forced a “duty to deal” upon content owners to the benefit of video distributors.
This represents genuine and much-needed deregulation of a market that has been encumbered with far too much top-down control and micro-management by the FCC over the past several decades. To be clear,
none of these rules apply to any other segment of our modern information economy. Every day of the week, deals are cut between content creators and distributors in many other segments of the media industry without these rules encumbering the process. The DeMint-Scalise bill is an attempt to get big government out of the way and let these deals be cut in a truly free market without regulators putting their thumb on the scale in one direction or the other. Continue reading →
Declan McCullagh of CNet News reports (“Congress May Roll Dice, Legalize Net Gambling“) that some in Congress are reconsidering the wisdom of prohibitions on Internet gambling, which we have discussedhere many timesbefore. Declan notes there’s another hearing on the issue today and Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) will be discussing his continuing effort to allow Internet casinos to obtain licenses from and be regulated by the federal government:
Frank, who will be testifying during Wednesday’s hearing, says that because nearly all states already permit some form of traditional gambling–including lotteries, betting on horse and greyhound racing, and sports wagering — the federal government should legalize and regulate the online equivalents. Instead of a blanket legalization, his legislation would require the Treasury Department to police the industry and ensure that it takes adequate steps to identify minors and compulsive gamblers.
My TLF colleague Tom Bell has done seminal work in this field and you will definitely want to check out his recent essay, “The UnInGEn-ious Act’s Non-Impact on Internet Gambling” and his classic 1999 Cato white paper, “Internet Gambling: Popular, Inexorable, and (Eventually) Legal.” What Tom has done better than anyone else is to show that, as is the case with almost every “market activity devoted to the pursuit of happiness,” eventually the law will adjust to accommodate these activities. It may take some time for the law to adjust, but it will.
You really have to hand it to the folks over at the (Un)Free Press with their endlessly shameful attempts to use doublespeak to remake the entire media, communications, and Internet landscape in their preferred Big Government image. Their latest bit of charlatanism is the so-called “Stop the Internet Rip-Off of 2009” campaign. It’s another one of their computerized “stuff-the-FCC-and Congressional-complaint-box-with-electronic-form-letters” efforts that involves getting their merry band of radical reformistas to encourage lawmakers to sign on to Rep. Eric Massa’s (D-NY) newly-introduced “Broadband Internet Fairness Act.”
Ah yes, “Internet fairness.” Who can possibly be against it? Well, before you rush to click send on that UnFree Press form letter, let’s be clear what this effort is really all about. Free Press claims that the Massa bill is needed because “phone and cable giants [are] weighing schemes to hike prices, shut down the free-flowing Web and keep user innovation in check.” How are those companies doing that? Tiered pricing! Rep. Massa says that, “Time Warner has announced an ill-conceived plan to charge residential and business broadband fees based on the amount of data they download.” Oh my God, no… you mean some people might be charged for the costs they impose? What’s next? Are we going to force people to pay for their own energy use by metering gasoline, electricity, or water? Think of the horror! (This is sarcasm, folks. All those things are metered currently. And yet, somehow, the Earth hasn’t spun off its axis.)
Like all the other propaganda produced at the Free Press techno-spin factory, their latest crusade is based on a combination of outright lies and blatant economic ignorance. Metering broadband access is not an effort “to restrict Internet use,” as Free Press claims. Rather, like every other metered system under the sun, it’s an effort to price a scarce resource in such a way so as to
maximize use. Broadband operators don’t sit around all day scheming to find ways to decrease network usage. They wouldn’t make any money that way!! They need to find business models that encourage increased uptake while also investing in and growing their networks to meet new demand and competitive challenges.
Moreover, there are other pro-consumer reasons for companies to consider metering options. Unless it is your goal to allow some particularly aggressive users to be subsidized by all other users, it is sometimes sensible to price usage based on demand. If you don’t, you potentially create a perverse incentive for a small handful of over-grazers to to be feeding at the trough at everyone else’s expense. As economist Russell Roberts aptly noted in the title of a famous 1995 Wall Street Journal editorial, “If You’re Paying, I’ll Have Top Sirloin.” Thus, you would never want to make the “all-you-can-eat” pricing model the only option for the provision of a scarce resource. Even if you choose not to deploy it, it is useful to have the metered pricing model available in case you need to charge the over-grazers at some point.
Writing at Slate, Tim Wu tries to make Obama out to be the real Big Government candidate on media policy, who will deliver “if not a chicken in every pot, a fiber-optic cable in every home.” By contrast, Wu implies that McCain is just another pro-big business lackey who doesn’t understand “that the media and information industries are special—that like the transportation, energy, or financial industries, they are deeply entwined with the public interest.” Wu goes on to say:
Ultimately, most of the difference in Obama’s and McCain’s media policies boils down to questions about whether the media is special and a dispute over how much to trust the private sector. Camp McCain would tend to leave the private sector alone, with faith that it will deliver to most Americans what they want and deserve. The Obama camp would probably administer a more frequent kick in the pants, in the belief that good behavior just isn’t always natural.
First, as a factual matter, Wu is just wrong about McCain being some sort of a radical hands-off, pro-market liberalizer on media policy issues. Oh, if only that were true! But for those of us who have been in DC covering telecom and media policy for many years, it is widely understood there is no nailing down John McCain on any tech, telecom or media policy issue. He’s been all over the board. While he has sponsored or supported
some deregulatory initiatives on the telecom front in the past, he’s also been a supporter of other regulatory causes. His battles with broadcasters and cable, for example, are well-known. Most recently, McCain has been leading the effort to impose a la carte mandates on cable and satellite operators.
Continue reading →
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A major policy battle has developed regarding the wisdom of regulating social media platforms in the United States, with the internet’s most important law potentially in the crosshairs. Leaders in both major parties are calling for sweeping regulation.
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.