I was willing to give this report a genuine read. I read the first paragraph of the report and thought "there is no way a minimally competent, breathing human could have wrote this and thought it was ok for release"<p>Then I read the authors name and figured out why.
> Weaponizing Terms of Service<p>"Oh man, this sounds awesome, I can't wait to hear about the plague of impenetrable "click wrap" contracts of adhesion being given any sort of legal force, rampant privacy issues, lack of corporate liability for damage done by leaks, and--" *Click*<p>> [...] How online service providers use broad policies to silence conservatives, by Ted Cruz [Senator, R-Texas]<p>Ugh. That went from intriguing to <i>prima facie</i> trash so fast I think I just got whiplash.<p>For those similarly disappointed, I suggest perusing the category from the Electronic Frontier Foundation:<p><a href="https://www.eff.org/issues/terms-of-abuse" rel="nofollow">https://www.eff.org/issues/terms-of-abuse</a>
A strong Internet Bill of Rights (IBOR) would wreck lots of surveillance state tools, shady business models, and the burgeoning censorship industrial complex.<p>I wonder if undermining terms of service in this way is a stop on the road to IBOR?
The premise of this document is false:<p>> [C]ompanies ... have used their structural power to silence conservatives and deny them access to goods and services the companies readily make available to liberal Americans.<p>This is not happening. It is a lie.<p>What happens is some folks decide they want to make violent threats towards others, or espouse ideologies that are inherently violent (e.g. white supremacy, which aims for genocide to create a white ethno-state), or decide that they want to be misogynist, or racist. The folks that do this are selfish and don't deserve to have their hate* and ignorance amplified.<p>There's a difference between expressing an opinion and pushing ideologies that are incompatible with a free and open society where people <i>are actually able</i> to have civilized discussions on differences of opinion. (If you are unaware of this concept, brush up on "The Paradox of Tolerance".)<p>tl;dr - This is 40 pages of absolute utter nonsense.
This is an important discussion to protect America’s democracy. Most of our political discussion as a society happens online. The public square is now big online social media platforms, which are pretty shielded from competition due to network effects. This document leads with some loaded language, but I think its core ideas are true - technology companies have employees that are overwhelmingly left leaning and this shows up in their products - like their terms of service, content polices, moderation practices, etc. That skews our entire democratic process.<p>The recommendations on Page 10 are actually very mild. It’s basically pushing for transparency, and it’s hard to argue for something so basic. But I think the recommendations should actually go much further. Personally I think technology platforms above a certain number of users should just be treated like public utilities or common carriers and regulated to serve all users neutrally. Your power utility (even if privately operated) cannot cut you off based on your political opinion, and it shouldn’t be possible for big tech companies to do the same.