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by WarOnPrivacy 31 days ago
> That's not true. It would stifle centralized platforms but it would not meaningfully impact those self hosting.

IDK why you think this. 230 is brief; it doesn't distinguish between size of internet entities. It protects every site that hosts a comment section from bad-faith lawsuits by deep pockets who don't like that speech.

That's all it does. It doesn't provide cover for illegal activity or any of the other 1k things it gets accused of.
1 comments
fc417fc802 31 days ago
I think we're in agreement? I'm not clear how what you wrote is at odds with what I said.
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WarOnPrivacy 31 days ago
You indicated different outcomes for centralized platforms and self hosters and that the latter would be fine - did you not?

If so, removing 230 would bring the greatest harms to the smallest (aka largest number of) sites.

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fc417fc802 31 days ago
I don't think so. Section 230 only applies if you host other's content. If you are self hosting only your own content then it does not apply to you.

In case we have a misunderstanding, I wasn't describing the current common practice of rather large multi-user AP nodes. Rather I had in mind the idea of each user hosting his own instance, or at most perhaps exceedingly small multi-user instances for immediate family or a hobbyist group or similar. Those are all situations where section 230 currently offers approximately zero benefit to the operator as I understand it.

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WarOnPrivacy 30 days ago
> I don't think so. Section 230 only applies if you host other's content.

230 protects every site with a comment section (from SLAPP, etc suits). That includes a lot of blogs, inc self-hosted.

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fc417fc802 30 days ago
Agreed, it would make hosting a comments section where you solicit contributions from the world at large somewhat less appealing. However a self hosted federated social media protocol such as AP or ATProto isn't substantially impacted. Under such a model your blog can still have comments you just can't host those comments yourself unless you're willing to assume some amount of risk (probably not much in practice TBF).

As such I'm not convinced that anything of value would be lost. That said as I've stated in other comments I'm also not in favor of that.

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