| >>> Of course, there are many practical matters that would have to be ironed out. For one, Facebook might be a US company, but its utility-like services are delivered to the entire globe, so there are real questions about what a publicly owned or regulated Facebook would actually look like — questions like “Which public?” or “Regulated by whom?” >>>Avoiding mass censorship efforts doesn’t mean we’re powerless to do anything. There are clear changes that can be made to Facebook’s algorithms, design, central mission, and resourcing that would bring it closer to the true public service it claims to be than the nihilistic, profit-making juggernaut it operates like, and none of them would threaten our right to speak freely or mess with our ability to stay in touch with loved ones, organize events, or such platforms’ other useful features. The author makes a couple of attempts to characterize Facebook as a "utility", and even provides a link [1] to eff.org as proof of that claim as though being a public service is enough to constitute being declared a utility in need of direct regulation. The author also claims that Facebook is "deliberately designed to be addictive", which I concede is true. I'd like to further point out that HN is also addictive, and seems to have been designed with absolutely no interest in making it addictive. And lastly, I'd like to mention that the US government recently relaxed its laws concerning government funded propaganda[2]. So I have a couple of questions: 1. If government wants a social media utility, then why doesn't it attempt to buy or build one that it can more easily regulate/understand? 2. Is social media itself an addictive element in our lives? 3. Is the level of addiction similar in harm to that of television, YouTube, or news aggregation sites? How would you rate it? 4. How do you justify asking government to offer (potentially) addictive services as public utilities? 5. With respect to the deregulation of propaganda, should Facebook be held to a higher standard than our government? [1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/utilities-governed-emp... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization... |