It's much harder to propose a solution than describe a problem. I think that John did pretty well with his proposal, although I'm not sure it will work.
1. National Bulletin Board: a very intelligent no-brainer. (That's not an oxymoron--I would never have thought of this, but it is hard to argue with.)
2. Algorithms as publishing: The devil is in the details. Is "publishing" a matter of strict liability?Algos aren't quite deterministic in practice, and even if they were, they can be putty in the hands of a sophisticated abuser. (I could imagine a Nazi manipulating a more-or-less legally compliant social medium. I could imagine other Nazis staying one fresh ambiguous meme ahead of the law.) I suppose one could allow some cruft, but legal process is awful at these kinds of judgments.
3. Education: I'm cynical. I was a banker long enough to remember that every banker with suspect practices loved "consumer education," and viewed regulation as unnecessary. My mental model is that of a tripartite population, with many not needing education, many ineducable, and only some in the middle.
Yeah, and while I trust John's commentary, I would have liked a small amount of extra information to be added for justification there.
Is Bandt especially prolific relative to other politicians, or was Bandt's use of X deemed to be especially inconsistent with his own political stance? Or should all politicians be encouraged to get off X for moral reasons, no matter what their politics are?
And also, John's main point in that paragraph - about moral leadership - is very good. Do we have any good examples of people who are providing this leadership, please?
(This is all in the interests of friendly critique, of course.)
I left X (née Twitter) a couple of months ago as I felt overwhelmed by the RWNJ on the platform and I no longer wished to provide Musk with any more contributions to his billions. I personally believe it is no longer viable as a platform for rational discussions in good faith. Being on that platform is just legitimising the far right angry voices that occupy the space. So my view is that neither The Greens or the ALP should be on the platform. But that’s just me.
I really wanted to give up X and go to Bluesky because I like learning stuff and debating topical issues. But I straight away found that Bluesky is just as toxic as X (although it is nowhere as harmful as X because it doesn't have a toxic multi-billionaire with 200 million followers churning out vile tweets that then dominate the whole media and political landscape).
Punishing social media companies whose algorithms promote unlawful material sounds like an excellent idea. But the issue then becomes one of what should be lawful speech (and political acts) here in Australia, a country that doesn't have robust constitutional protection of free speech and laws are constantly made to limit what political things we can do and say.
Am I allowed to self identify as a Nazi and promote Nazi ideology? Can a conservative Christian say homosexuality is an abomination and all homosexuals should rot in hell? Can a gender critical feminist say that a woman is exclusively a biological female? If the Left enthusiastically outlaws right wing speech and fetters the rights of association of centrists and conservatives, can the Left expect the same when the Right is in office? Do we need a Bill of Rights to protect us from parliament's overreach?
I would immediately ban gambling advertising because of the harm done by gambling. I'd go even further and ban pokies and look at banning any other form of gambling that causes major harm. But Labor is too gutless to do it and the Liberals are too cynical and immoral to do it.
Education is desperately needed. Educating kids (and adults where possible) about critical thinking, disinformation is absolutely essential if we're to avoid the Black Mirror episode that is the US.
1. The point about the distraction from gambling advertising is a strong one. I wonder how much regret we'll have about the social media ban? Will it be similar to AUKUS regret? The most important question about the social media ban was whether the legislation was inappropriately rushed for political reasons? It looks that way to me.
2. Yes, it's not just social media but all media. And even more broadly than that, it's about how people interact in society in a digital age. I still think that the precedent of physical public space (the town square in particular) is extremely relevant when conceiving what digital public space should look and feel like. There's a huge body of evidence that shows the vital importance of public space to society and to democracy (e.g. space for protests), and it's time we expanded this thinking to the digital space.
3. Comments about the public alternative to for-profit social media:
- Absolutely yes.
- The organisation needs to be demonstrably public and transparent, and at arms-length from the government, for trust.
- It's vital that people make and shape the public social media space. For example, people won't use it if it becomes an officious and stale government messaging platform, like a MyGov version of MySpace.
- Beyond just ending algorithmic promotion of toxic material, is it possible for a public platform to have a positive algorithm (that is publicly released) that seeks to help align ideas and help solve disagreements?
- This could also play an important role in mental health - helping people connect, giving people support, and helping prevent ill-health.
4. Comments about public education:
- Absolutely yes.
- Hopefully this could be something empowering, something that deals with the role of the citizen in contemporary Australian society... as well as being something defensive, like a digital version of a 'slip, slop, slap' campaign.
“The next step would be to end the algorithmic promotion of toxic material. The remedy here seems simple enough. If a network platform selects material to promote, its owners should be considered as the publishers of that material.”
That works for toxic recommendations, but not for the wider problem of making media fit for democracy. Traditional media are run by publishers, and the sector is almost as broken as the new forms.
Let’s concentrate on newspapers, radio and TV. (Nobody is worried about university presses or Trotskykite street papers.) None of them have targeted recommendations. They ought to provide reliable news, in a balanced selection, and diverse opinion from qualified people. Current media only meet the reliability test, as it is enforced by laws on defamation. Even Fox News rarely resorts to fabrication, and you can trust the reporting in the WSJ even if the opinion page is full wingnut. They do a poor job on news selection and diversity of opinion.
I suggest a utopian approach could at least reframe the debate. What would a healthy media landscape look like in a real deliberative democracy? How do you ensure expert input without technocracy? How can an excellent media be paid for?
On the contrary, Fox routinely resorts to outright fabrication. That's how Dominion landed a $787 million settlement even though US laws make successful defamation lawsuits by companies extremely difficult.
What I'm not sure about is whether Fox is more cause or more effect. It seems to me that maybe Fox just tapped into a pre-existing market of crazy right wing low information, liberal hating, conspiracy theory prone nuts that just so happens to make up one-third of the US population. Of course Fox then won over gullible converts as well but it seems clear that the US is inherently full of batty right wingers.
The Fox "opinion" people lie like rugs, which is legally okay as long as they are careful about it. (A mere opinion cannot be libellous.) Not all of them were.
I think that Wimberley was referring to the Fox news people. They seldom lie, in the lawyers' very narrow sense of the term. Even the New York Post's facts are true, although often presented in the most misleading possible way. I would imagine that the Murdoch Australian papers are similar, although I don't know.
Yep, some of the worst social media dross has come from the "OK boomers".
It's much harder to propose a solution than describe a problem. I think that John did pretty well with his proposal, although I'm not sure it will work.
1. National Bulletin Board: a very intelligent no-brainer. (That's not an oxymoron--I would never have thought of this, but it is hard to argue with.)
2. Algorithms as publishing: The devil is in the details. Is "publishing" a matter of strict liability?Algos aren't quite deterministic in practice, and even if they were, they can be putty in the hands of a sophisticated abuser. (I could imagine a Nazi manipulating a more-or-less legally compliant social medium. I could imagine other Nazis staying one fresh ambiguous meme ahead of the law.) I suppose one could allow some cruft, but legal process is awful at these kinds of judgments.
3. Education: I'm cynical. I was a banker long enough to remember that every banker with suspect practices loved "consumer education," and viewed regulation as unnecessary. My mental model is that of a tripartite population, with many not needing education, many ineducable, and only some in the middle.
The consumer education (broadly defined) should start in school and be as prominent as maths and reading. Anything short of that probably won't work.
Hi John, might want to amend that first paragraph
Fixed now, I hope
I was surprised to read that The Greens are still on X (née Twitter). I agree it is time for them to drop the platform.
Yeah, and while I trust John's commentary, I would have liked a small amount of extra information to be added for justification there.
Is Bandt especially prolific relative to other politicians, or was Bandt's use of X deemed to be especially inconsistent with his own political stance? Or should all politicians be encouraged to get off X for moral reasons, no matter what their politics are?
And also, John's main point in that paragraph - about moral leadership - is very good. Do we have any good examples of people who are providing this leadership, please?
(This is all in the interests of friendly critique, of course.)
I left X (née Twitter) a couple of months ago as I felt overwhelmed by the RWNJ on the platform and I no longer wished to provide Musk with any more contributions to his billions. I personally believe it is no longer viable as a platform for rational discussions in good faith. Being on that platform is just legitimising the far right angry voices that occupy the space. So my view is that neither The Greens or the ALP should be on the platform. But that’s just me.
I really wanted to give up X and go to Bluesky because I like learning stuff and debating topical issues. But I straight away found that Bluesky is just as toxic as X (although it is nowhere as harmful as X because it doesn't have a toxic multi-billionaire with 200 million followers churning out vile tweets that then dominate the whole media and political landscape).
Punishing social media companies whose algorithms promote unlawful material sounds like an excellent idea. But the issue then becomes one of what should be lawful speech (and political acts) here in Australia, a country that doesn't have robust constitutional protection of free speech and laws are constantly made to limit what political things we can do and say.
Am I allowed to self identify as a Nazi and promote Nazi ideology? Can a conservative Christian say homosexuality is an abomination and all homosexuals should rot in hell? Can a gender critical feminist say that a woman is exclusively a biological female? If the Left enthusiastically outlaws right wing speech and fetters the rights of association of centrists and conservatives, can the Left expect the same when the Right is in office? Do we need a Bill of Rights to protect us from parliament's overreach?
I would immediately ban gambling advertising because of the harm done by gambling. I'd go even further and ban pokies and look at banning any other form of gambling that causes major harm. But Labor is too gutless to do it and the Liberals are too cynical and immoral to do it.
Education is desperately needed. Educating kids (and adults where possible) about critical thinking, disinformation is absolutely essential if we're to avoid the Black Mirror episode that is the US.
Hi John, another great article.
1. The point about the distraction from gambling advertising is a strong one. I wonder how much regret we'll have about the social media ban? Will it be similar to AUKUS regret? The most important question about the social media ban was whether the legislation was inappropriately rushed for political reasons? It looks that way to me.
2. Yes, it's not just social media but all media. And even more broadly than that, it's about how people interact in society in a digital age. I still think that the precedent of physical public space (the town square in particular) is extremely relevant when conceiving what digital public space should look and feel like. There's a huge body of evidence that shows the vital importance of public space to society and to democracy (e.g. space for protests), and it's time we expanded this thinking to the digital space.
3. Comments about the public alternative to for-profit social media:
- Absolutely yes.
- The organisation needs to be demonstrably public and transparent, and at arms-length from the government, for trust.
- It's vital that people make and shape the public social media space. For example, people won't use it if it becomes an officious and stale government messaging platform, like a MyGov version of MySpace.
- Beyond just ending algorithmic promotion of toxic material, is it possible for a public platform to have a positive algorithm (that is publicly released) that seeks to help align ideas and help solve disagreements?
- This could also play an important role in mental health - helping people connect, giving people support, and helping prevent ill-health.
4. Comments about public education:
- Absolutely yes.
- Hopefully this could be something empowering, something that deals with the role of the citizen in contemporary Australian society... as well as being something defensive, like a digital version of a 'slip, slop, slap' campaign.
“The next step would be to end the algorithmic promotion of toxic material. The remedy here seems simple enough. If a network platform selects material to promote, its owners should be considered as the publishers of that material.”
That works for toxic recommendations, but not for the wider problem of making media fit for democracy. Traditional media are run by publishers, and the sector is almost as broken as the new forms.
Let’s concentrate on newspapers, radio and TV. (Nobody is worried about university presses or Trotskykite street papers.) None of them have targeted recommendations. They ought to provide reliable news, in a balanced selection, and diverse opinion from qualified people. Current media only meet the reliability test, as it is enforced by laws on defamation. Even Fox News rarely resorts to fabrication, and you can trust the reporting in the WSJ even if the opinion page is full wingnut. They do a poor job on news selection and diversity of opinion.
I suggest a utopian approach could at least reframe the debate. What would a healthy media landscape look like in a real deliberative democracy? How do you ensure expert input without technocracy? How can an excellent media be paid for?
On the contrary, Fox routinely resorts to outright fabrication. That's how Dominion landed a $787 million settlement even though US laws make successful defamation lawsuits by companies extremely difficult.
What I'm not sure about is whether Fox is more cause or more effect. It seems to me that maybe Fox just tapped into a pre-existing market of crazy right wing low information, liberal hating, conspiracy theory prone nuts that just so happens to make up one-third of the US population. Of course Fox then won over gullible converts as well but it seems clear that the US is inherently full of batty right wingers.
The Fox "opinion" people lie like rugs, which is legally okay as long as they are careful about it. (A mere opinion cannot be libellous.) Not all of them were.
I think that Wimberley was referring to the Fox news people. They seldom lie, in the lawyers' very narrow sense of the term. Even the New York Post's facts are true, although often presented in the most misleading possible way. I would imagine that the Murdoch Australian papers are similar, although I don't know.