Law in the Internet Society

View   r5  >  r4  ...
ShakimaWellsFirstPaper 5 - 23 Aug 2014 - Main.EbenMoglen
Line: 1 to 1
Changed:
<
<
META TOPICPARENT name="FirstPaper"
>
>
META TOPICPARENT name="FirstEssay"
 The Private Actor

After President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney debated over the future of nation’s economy, healthcare and domestic policies, user TheDailyConversation? ? posted the 1.5 hour long video on Youtube. While many of the comments regarding the video focused on the personal and political attributes of the candidates, there were also some less relevant remarks. Joh2628, for instance wrote, presumably in regards to the President, “People are mad because that half-black motherf*cker doesn’t know what he is doing!” Roshg1 contributed, apparently in reference to Mitt Romney, “Mormons are just as f*cked up as Jehovah’s Witnesses.” The commentary is a potent reminder that the internet, while arguably ranking as one of the most remarkable of human inventions, is also commonly host to inflammatory speech, controversial opinions and antisocial behavior. This has caused some observers have to suggest that more action- such as tracking user information- be taken to regulate online activity. In the United States, freedom of speech, for instance, is generally protected by the First Amendment and the government is limited in its abilities to infringe on that right. In the current American regime, however, private actors arguably chaperone the internet far more than the government. Should these entities, therefore, be allowed to regulate where the government cannot?


Revision 5r5 - 23 Aug 2014 - 19:31:22 - EbenMoglen
Revision 4r4 - 31 Mar 2013 - 22:53:18 - EbenMoglen
This site is powered by the TWiki collaboration platform.
All material on this collaboration platform is the property of the contributing authors.
All material marked as authored by Eben Moglen is available under the license terms CC-BY-SA version 4.
Syndicate this site RSSATOM