[Laaas]

> "Legal demands" include a combination of court orders and other formal demands to remove content, from both governmental entities and lawyers representing individuals.

I am very very much in doubt that it was publicly _known_ (not theorised) that the government was asking Twitter to delete _legal_ but _undesirable_ tweets!

When the government is suggesting Twitter to censor specific users/subjects/tweets, is that not close to (if not outright) violating the first amendment?

[noirscape]

No? They just used the same reporting functionality everyone else had available from what I can tell. Twitter has, at least according to the transparency report also more often than not just straight up rejected the requests from the government (the last known report data shows that they only complied 40% of the time[0]). Twitter basically received a report, practically no different from if you or someone else clicked on the report button in their interface and then decided whether or not to act on it. There would be no consequences to saying "no", which again, according to their transparency report, they did more often than not.

So no, I don't consider that to be a free speech violation; nobody went to jail, nobody was threatened into being silenced by the government. By all metrics, that is not a free speech violation. Section 230 allows internet service providers (that's not just your ISP; anyone with an internet site that allows for user-generated content is an ISP for this law) to make their own decisions[1]. Twitter made their own decisions based on the information given.

If we're talking first amendment though, Twitter also had a rather notable history of butting in on lawsuits that actually would affect the government crossing a free speech boundary to give its own input on those cases, specifically to prevent the US right to free speech from being neutered[2]. (And with another great irony, Musk fired the person who was chiefly responsible for that because she also was the person that signed off on Trump getting suspended.)

EDIT: Also as for it being known - yeah it was. No social media site really hides this. Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, they all have openly discussed the fact that at some point, the government will just ask you to take stuff down. Each of those sites has their own limitations on what they allow. Reddit is for example rather compliant with those requests (since Reddits entire success is due to staying just below the surface of the attention of the news) while Facebook has been infamously flip-floppy with say, the Christchurch shooter video where they weren't sure on whether or not to comply with the request from the NZ government.

[0]: https://transparency.twitter.com/en/reports/countries/us.htm...

[1]: This is without delving into the broader section 230 conversation, which also has come under fire. No comment on that.

[2]: https://www.techdirt.com/2022/10/28/elon-musks-first-move-is...

[Georgelemental]

- No, the government and politicians don't use the same reporting functionality as us plebes, they e-mail Twitter Safety directly, as revealed by the Twitter Files.

- When the government (with their regulatory powers, monopoly on legitimate violence, etc) asks a private company to do something, the coercion is implicit. Just like if a heavily armed thug looms over you and asks, in a threatening tone of voice, for your wallet—the "or else" doesn't need to be aired out loud.

[ifyoubuildit]

> They just used the same reporting functionality everyone else had available from what I can tell.

I think a major part of the Twitter files is exactly the fact that all of these social networks have close working relationships with tons of government and government funded agencies, where these groups can just send along lists of people and topics that they want removed on dubious grounds (this is not the same as things like getting a warrant or court order which I'm assuming the transparency report is about).

The recent release includes things like "true facts about covid vaccines that might cause hesitancy". You can have whatever opinion you want about what they should and shouldn't be platforming, but I for one agree that these organizations shouldn't be able to casually tap twitter/fb/etc on the shoulder and nix random legal speech.