[jaredklewis]

Of course no one wants to see people harassed, but it's just that Twitter until recently was both censorship free and well known by the general population.

Personally I think it would be great if these things could be settled in courts with due process. Harassment is a crime and nothing would please me more than to see some of these harassers serve time.

But what's the other way? Twitter becomes non-neutral arbiter of what is right and wrong? One person's rebel is another's terrorist. One person's mob is another's protest. If Twitter starts to get involved in some censorship, it raises the obvious question from members of why that one thing they don't like wasn't censored. The only viable way for a free platform is all or nothing. Can't half way free speech.

[richmarr]

> Can't half way free speech.

Twitter isn't your town square. They have legally set out T&Cs that specify what you are and aren't allowed to do using their service.

Abuse damages Twitter's reputation so it's totally fair for them to shut it down.

[VLM]

> Twitter isn't your town square.

Its a mall full of insane rentacops and the teens they hunt. The kids, good and bad, just want to hang out, almost no one goes there other than to hang out, but the mall owners are solely interested in selling $300 jeans to your mom.

[jaredklewis]

Yes, I am well aware Twitter has no obligation to maintain a censorship free platform, and indeed doing so may not make good business sense.

I was simply pointing out that for a brief time, Twitter was a unique Internet platform: both well known (celebrities and politicians use it) and free of censorship. Plenty of sites are censorship free but they are esoteric and laregly unknown to the general population. I admired that Twitter was a popular platform with unrestricted free speech.

[Nullabillity]

> Twitter isn't your town square.

And yet, that's what they want to seem like they are. Until something like this happens...

[richmarr]

> And yet, that's what they want to seem like they are. Until something like this happens...

They want to be as close to being a town square as it's possible for a commercial service to be... but there'll always be differences in behaviour caused by anonymity, and scale.

Perhaps more importantly, if the town square turns into a huge argument, and all the reasonable people go home, the town square doesn't have to explain what happened to its shareholders.

[Nullabillity]

As close as possible and as close as profitable are vastly different goals. As a user, the latter is not particularly interesting, even though most platforms (including this one, of course) take that approach, sadly.

[richmarr]

> As close as possible and as close as profitable are vastly different goals.

Sure, if you want to set up a non-profit or p2p social network (or contribute to an existing one) then good luck getting widespread adoption.

I sympathise, in the social networking world you're bound to the low common denominator of the group you want to talk to.

As a niche user you have a set of opinions that may or may not be bourne out by evidence of majority behaviour. The majority seems to without fail opt for profit-making services because they're usually higher quality & the conditions are broadly considered acceptable.

Edit: Corrected "down-sides" to "conditions" because I don't consider them entirely negative.

[croon]

Why sadly? Is there any meaningful discourse - AT ALL - that's been upended by Twitter "censoring" posts or banning users?

If they never have impeded on peoples abilities to have meaningful conversations and exchanging of ideas, then what exactly is the problem? If all you want to do is fling poo, go to the zoo (rhyme unintended).

[jonathankoren]

You can't say "harassment is a crime" and then cry that you can't have "censorship" in some sort of misguided idea of free expression absolutism.

There has never been a successful platform without moderation. Even 4chan moderates. Even 8chan. Without it, you quickly get a cesspool of trolls. And then you have nothing but a cesspool.

[Nullabillity]

> You can't say "harassment is a crime" and then cry that you can't have "censorship" in some sort of misguided idea of free expression absolutism.

If it's bad enough that it's illegal then there are legal procedures to be followed. As little as I generally trust judges, there's at least far more oversight than having some random PR rep make the call in secret.

[csydas]

But twitter isn't a public service; at the end of the day, you're still playing by their rules and it is your choice to play with twitter or to play somewhere else. The difference in userbase between twitter and other services doesn't mean you don't have to follow twitter's house rules.

There's no reason a judge would need to get in on something like this, especially since Milo likely would be culpable by association under the US justice system, the result ultimately being the same. Personally, I don't like the idea of having to get the government involved in all online transactions - I'd like a place to say what I want where the worst that can happen is I get banned - it's not that I plan to say horrible things, it's that I don't trust when automated systems merge with state/federal law. (see: DMCA and youtube). Systems, even non-computer ones, can be gamed.

The US justice system has pretty much been gamed by this point, and it's a pretty expensive game to play. For someone like Milo, if Breitbart wanted to, they could bankroll him so he could play. For an individual like me? I can't afford to play the game. I don't want it to come to this, where you have to be able to afford participating in discussions online. You don't even have to say anything particularly egregious (or anything at all) to be the target of someone just fucking around with the systems.

I'd rather that the ramification for stuff like this was kept to accounts on websites instead of going to the courts.

[Nullabillity]

> I'd rather that the ramification for stuff like this was kept to accounts on websites instead of going to the courts.

I agree with that in a sense, but that's not currently the case. The question isn't public court or private company "court", it's whether there should be a private company "court" in addition to the public ones (which, mind you, can already get involved).

At least there is some degree of transparency and public influence on the public ones.

[csydas]

Mmm...ultimately, Milo Yiannopoulos, Leslie Jones, and everyone else has a choice to use Twitter - the fact that it's one of the largest social outlets doesn't really change that. The ban is an internal matter for Twitter as far as I'm concerned - and legal action stemming from the same issue is independent of that. There are plenty of reasons why there should be individual self-governance for non-public entities; like, for example, would you argue that cheaters in online games should have to be tested against the CFAA as opposed to a small private tribunal? There are things that happen online which are disruptive to the online communities, but not really illegal - I think that the communities should be allowed to self-govern. If you don't like the community rules, you can leave it.

And I do disagree that the transparency that is given in US courts is even useful. The jury process, for example, has nothing to do with justice and all about how easily influenced an individual juror is. It's a horrible component of the US legal system that should have been abolished a long time ago, or at least reformed. Likewise, Judges frequently will cowtow to personal prejudices or outside influences; even if appeals can eventually resolve the issue, this gets back to being able to afford to play, which is not a good system. Even if the legal costs are awarded at the end of the case, there's still the entire time while the case is being processed, lawyers who may not be willing to participate until that time, etc. It's an unacceptable solution in most cases.

[jonathankoren]

Well the consequences, are a lot more than not being able to play with someone else's web page.

My point is, no one really believes in absolutism.