| > It’s an update to older law that was written pre-internet for older style publishers Specifically, common law defamation. The two cases that the authors of Section 230 principally had in mind were Cubby v. CompuServe[1] and Stratton Oakmont v. Prodigy[2]. > It doesn’t have to do with recommendation algorithms. It theoretically could. Section 230 basically immunizes websites from defamation suits. The question in the above two cases was the degree of editorial control that CompuServe and Prodigy exercised. If you exercise insufficient editorial control, then you're not liable for defamatory statements made by users of your platform; you're just a passive entity, no more liable for libel than the telephone company is for slander. If you exercise sufficient editorial control, then you're directly liable for any defamatory statements as if you made them yourself in the first instance, much like a newspaper is liable. There's no hard-and-fast rule for what constitutes sufficient editorial control, especially as it regards online interactive services. Section 230 stopped the evolution of the caselaw in its tracks. If the bar is relatively low, then some automated recommendation systems conceivably could trigger liability, presumably based on how sophisticated they are. I mean, that is the impetus for removing Section 230 protections afterall--recommendation algorithms that seemingly popularize "fake news", some of which is defamatory in nature. The selection of which user posts to popularize, and the manner in which they're presented, could constitute editorial control the same way a newspaper selects and frames statements taken or revealed by journalists. In fact, it might be worse for some websites--journalists and editors can interject weasel wording[3] to avoid liability, but algorithmic systems aren't that smart. And because defamation is a common law claim, the rules are likely to vary state by state. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubby,_Inc._v._CompuServe_Inc. [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratton_Oakmont,_Inc._v._Prod.... [3] Or another way to put it: reasonable qualifiers and narrative structure that make it clear the publisher isn't affirming the truth of the matter asserted. |