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Archive | Freedom of Speech

Norwegian Aftenposten vs. Facebook

By on September 21, 2016 in Facebook, Freedom of Speech

The Norwegian editor who successfully took on the might of Facebook over its censorship of the famous “napalm girl” photograph has challenged Mark Zuckerberg to publicly face up to his responsibility as one of the world’s most powerful people.

Espen Egil Hansen, whose newspaper Aftenposten helped force the social media site to back down in it decision to remove The Terror of War image from Facebook versions of its articles, accused Zuckerberg of ducking the debate. He branded Facebook a “frenemy of the people” because of the way it dominates the internet.

Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder, has refused to comment on the issue. The company has relied instead on anonymous quotes released by a Swedish PR firm, Hansen said.

The Guardian: Norwegian editor challenges Zuckerberg to discuss censorship »

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New net censorship law proposed in Italy

By on September 19, 2016 in Censorship, Freedom of Speech, Internet, Italy

Under the proposed law, the “site manager” of Italian media, including bloggers, newspapers and social networks would be obliged to censor “mockery” based on “the personal and social condition” of the victim — that is, anything the recipient felt was personally insulting. The penalty for failing to take action is a fine of €100,000. Truthfulness is not a defense in suits under this law — the standard is personal insult, not falsehood.

BoingBoing: Italy on the verge of the stupidest censorship law in European history »

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The narrow Facebook mindset

By on September 11, 2016 in Big Data, Civil liberties, Democracy, Facebook, Freedom of Speech, Internet, social media

We live in a time of trigger warnings, safe spaces, and young people being offended by other people’s opinions – to a point where they seem to be perfectly willing to silence others.

For society, this is disastrous. For a community to evolve, different opinions and ideas must be tested against each other in a free and open debate. Especially unconventional or controversial ones. Without a free exchange of thoughts, democracy becomes pointless. Without diversity, our culture will die. Without new input, there will be no progress.

Especially young people ought to question everything, explore new ideas and oppose conformity. Instead, today many of them seem to be narrow-minded, politically conform, anxious, and frantic. I’m pretty sure this is a new phenomenon.

Why are people so easily offended, upset and disgruntled these days?

For young people born in the Facebook era, conflicting information and alternative views are things they might not be used to. Entangled in Facebook’s algorithms they mostly communicate with like-minded people. So when faced with alternative views and opinions, many of them react with hostility. (This is nothing strange. People often react negatively to the new, to the unknown and to things that they might perceive as threatening.)

This is just an observation – not the full or only explanation. But it might be a clue to what’s going on: Facebook is limiting free speech and the development of new ideas.

This is a very sad and unfortunate way to use a tool for instant, unlimited global communication such as the Internet.

/ HAX

Also read satire website The Onions piece: Horrible Facebook Algorithm Accident Results In Exposure To New Ideas »

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Prepare for the next EU copyright war

By on August 28, 2016 in Big Entertainment, Copyright, EU, Freedom of Speech, Intellectual Property, Internet

The EU is to update the unions copyright laws. The first step was a public consultation, with a lot of input from so-called stakeholders, civil society, and ordinary citizens. The next step is to make an “impact assessment”.

Thanks to State Watch, this impact assessment has now been leaked. [Link, PDF»] As far as this document goes, we can expect a rather problematic proposal for a law (a directive or possibly a regulation) late September.

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For example, the EU Commission seems to be rather keen on the idea of a “link tax” – also known as the “Google tax“.

The idea comes from Spain and Germany where the big media houses managed to lobby trough a fee for links with short snippets from the news material in question. The (rather ill-conceived) idea is that Google News and others linking to articles and other copyright protected material should share their potential revenues with the media they link to.

In Spain, it lead to Google News abandoning the entire Spanish market – resulting in the media having fewer clicks on their articles. And in Germany, many media organisations learned from the Spanish fiasco and have opted out from being a part of this scheme – in order to have a lot of incoming link traffic.

It ought to be obvious to everybody: If you are on the Internet you would like to have as many clicks as possible. Thwarting linking to your own material is just stupid.

As links are the Internets nerve system a link tax will also be a threat to the entire open dynamics of the Internet.

But the EU Commission seems decided to move on with this terrible idea.

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There has also been a discussion about “fair use”, i.e. the right to use copyright protected material in the public and political debate, in satire, for memes, for sampling etc. There are no indications in this impact assessment that the EU intends to loosen up the copyright regime in this regard.

Only small steps will be taken to relax geoblocking (where you cannot see national television broadcasts on the net in other countries or Netflix if you go on holiday abroad). In essence, there will be no common European digital market.

There might also be new and possibly stricter enforcement of copyright on platforms for user-generated material, like Youtube and Soundcloud. As a consequence, this might make it more difficult for others to compete with existing platforms, as automated systems for copyright enforcement are complicated and very expensive to implement.

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This impact assessment implies that there will be no substantial copyright reform to move the EU into the 21:st century.

Now it’s up to civil society, Internet freedom activists, advocates for free speech and others to voice their concerns to the EU Commission. (The copyright industry’s and Big Entertainment industry’s lobbyist are already all over the place.)

It is easier to change things now – before they are laid down in a formal proposal for European law.

The next step is for the Commission to table a proposal for a directive (probably in late September). Then it needs to be approved by the Council (member states) and the European Parliament (the people’s elected representatives).

/ HAX

• The EU Commissions leaked impact assessment (PDF) »
• Ars Technica: Google snippet tax, geoblocking, other copyright reform shunned in EU plan »
• EFF: European Copyright Leak Exposes Plans to Force the Internet to Subsidize Publishers »
• The Mozilla Blog: EU Copyright Law Undermines Innovation and Creativity on the Internet. Mozilla is Fighting for Reform »
• Ars Technica: “Google tax” on snippets under serious consideration by European Commission »

Update: TechDirt – Leaked EU Copyright Proposal A Complete Mess: Want To Tax Google To Prop Up Failing Publishers »

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When algorithms become politics

By on August 16, 2016 in Big Data, Censorship, Facebook, Freedom of Speech, Google, social media, Twitter

Are Facebook, Google, and Twitter politically biased? The jury seems to be out on that one. But one thing is clear – Facebooks algorithms do have political consequences.

It’s very simple: If enough people flag a Facebook post as offensive, it will automatically disappear. If this happens frequently, a user or a group can be banned from the platform – sometimes forever.

This is often used by various parties to silence others, for the simple reason that they do not agree with the information posted. It can be for e.g. political or religious reasons.

In my world disagreement is something positive. It promotes debate, fosters logical reasoning, widens our views, often adds relevant information and encourages progress.

That might be exactly why some find other people’s opinions offensive. They do not want to have their views questioned. They do not want people to think for themselves. They cannot defend their positions in a free and open debate. So, they try to silence dissent.

And crappy Facebook algorithms makes silencing others extremely easy.

Silencing people will have consequences for society. It will hinder human advancement, thwart enlightenment and make the world a poorer place.

Facebook is a private company, and we all have agreed to (but not read) their terms and conditions. They can do more or less as they like. But they can never escape criticism when acting in an imprudent way.

My recommendation would be for Facebook only to delete posts, users and groups if clearly illegal. And even that would be a slippery slope.

/ HAX

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Atheism – a reason to be banned by Facebook?

By on August 15, 2016 in Censorship, Facebook, Freedom of Speech, social media

In February 2016, ten of the largest Arabic-speaking atheist groups, with a total of about 100,000 members, have been deactivated for the same reason: heavy reporting campaigns that are organized by “cyber jihadist” fundamentalist Islamic groups, especially for the removal of any anti-Islamic group or page. In such coordinated campaigns, very large numbers of people, and possibly automated scripts, simultaneously file reports falsely claiming that a page, group, or personal account has violated Community Standards.

Facebook Facing Heavy Criticism After Removing Major Atheist Pages »

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“You don’t have Freedom of Speech without Privacy”

By on August 10, 2016 in Freedom of Speech, Privacy

Freedom of Speech is the idea that you can discuss ideas without fear of harassment. But the judicial protection is actually quite weak; it only protects you from repercussions from your government. In order to allow society to discuss forbidden ideas, ideas that may turn out to be in the right, a much wider Freedom of Speech is needed: one that requires Privacy.

Falkvinge: You don’t have Freedom of Speech without Privacy »

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A free and open Internet is crucial for a free and open society

By on August 9, 2016 in Big Brother, Big Business, Big Government, Censorship, Civil liberties, Democracy, Freedom of Speech, Hacktivism, Intellectual Property, Internet, Transparency, War on Terror

We live in interesting times.

There is Big Brotherism, censorship of social media, information warfare, the war on terror, the war on drugs and politicians curtailing our civil liberties one small piece at a time. Soon we might have an entirely erratic president in the White House (who e.g. has threatened to close down the Internet) in control of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. In Russia, it’s all war rhetoric these days. In Turkey, the failed coup d’état has lead to an even more totalitarian political climate. Nationalism, protectionism, xenophobia and authoritarianism seems to be in demand. Corporatism has a firm grip over western politics, and the democratic deficit is growing. Things are shifting.

It is easy to be pessimistic and wise to be cautious.

My hope is with free flows of information. Not top down, but between people.

Information is power. An integrated network of citizens on the Internet limits the possibility for those in power to get away with bullshit. So, politicians hate it. (And they often gang up with other enemies of free information – e.g. the law- and intelligence community, the copyright industry and practically everybody who will never miss an opportunity to throw a moralistic, self-righteous fit.)

On the Internet – people can scrutinize the power elite. Citizen journalists and activists have platforms to publish significant and delicate information – that the ruling political class would prefer to keep away from the public eye. Knowledge, facts, and information are searchable at our fingertips. Lies can quickly be exposed. Authority can be questioned in a meaningful way. Spontaneous networking knows no borders and can give people a chance to look into, understand and change politics.

A free flow of information promotes cooperation. Often in new and unexpected ways. People in different places and countries will work together, spontaneously. The academic world will blossom. Relationships will develop. Good things will happen. Progress will occur. And people will never go to war against each other again. Stability, prosperity, and liberty will be the preferred position.

That is why a free and open Internet is important.

/ HAX

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