To use your example, whether I put up a website or a billboard with defamatory information is irrelevant. We have laws that protect us, which declare that defamatory speech is not protected. Why does it matter that the speech is online or not when considering the essence of the law? As you stated, if you put up a billboard they can find you and sue you for defamation. Why shouldn't the same be possible online? If I get an injunction against a billboard with defamatory speech the owner of the billboard is required to take it down. Why shouldn't an online provider be equally obligated?
Does running an add linking to the article for anyone interested in that person's name count as defamation? And if so, why would it be different if google chose included it prominently amongst the search results?
I'm not entirely convinced that this should count as defamation, but there is room for debate.
He should be, but in many cases it's just not doable, because governments are local and the Internet is global. I think it should be accepted as a fact. So maybe we need some rethinking. Maybe banning books was never a good idea, even if ideas presented there seemed dangerous, inconvenient and sometimes plainly false.
To me the situation looks like this: A goes to the police station to report that B has stolen something. They are fully aware that there is no chance they can catch B, so they arrest A.
I'm not saying that there is no problem, just that the solution they have chosen is worse than lack of any action.
Whether or not you think that should be allowed, you cant pretend that the search engines are not responsible in some part for the process being possible
That would be insane if that was how the law works. It's not how the law works.
In Germany newspaper are not allowed to name people, especially if they are accused but not convicted. The exception is people "of public interest", which is obviously not a clear line. So, quite literally libraries would have to remove newspapers with your name if you don't like what's written there about you ... unless it is of public interest. I consider this law ok.
This is why the EFF opposes the Right to be Forgotten.
And the bigger questions: why the fuck is Google is soul source of record for things on the Internet. We need other viable search engines that are no subject to this kind of pressure.
I want to publish a website with thoughts so far and looking for more brains. What I have in mind is a global, multilayered web of trust. It would be a game changer.
Of course, I don't mean it as a startup, it must be decentralized. I don't care who creates it, I just really want to have it.
I'm sure you know about the small world effect[1]. Example of layer: coding skill. I assign weights to friends I know. Now if I want to know if X is a good coder I check what friends of my friends think about it and multiply it by weights I have assigned to those friends (recursive). But it's much more than just having reasonable opinion about coding skill of somebody who you want to hire or cooperate with.
The crucial thing is that this rating is always relative. It depends on your place in the network. Any global rating can be and will be cheated. Also, it's perfectly fine that for different group of people different things have different values.
It enables trustworthy reviews, trustworthy project dependencies, tenants, online stores, doctors, mechanics etc. Could probably help with scams and spam. If successful it has power to change politics inside out.
I'm sorry I don't have a write up yet and I know that with an analytic mind you probably can find many problems with the potential implementation.
Let's be clear, it's hard. But so very worth it. There are many problems to solve. Apart from bootstrapping it (which could probably be done with help of some other services) The big one to me is privacy. If I assign 2/10 coding skill to one of my friends I don't want him to find out. I've already came up with some potential solutions. But more people, preferably with cryptography background and definitely smarter than me are needed, who are interested in this problem and are willing to spend time thinking about it.
I'm going to try to collect all my notes and thoughts into a website and post it on HN.
(If you were able to deduce enough from this short description, you like it and you're interested, drop me an empty e-mail at [email protected], I'll send you a single e-mail when I have some place to point to)
So, basically, your multilayered web of trust is just a popularity contest. Sorry, but I do not think this is a good idea.
It would be, if the ranking would be global and not through the lens of your network.
You can have the most popular coder A, he does lot's of video tutorials and blogs. But you have your finely cured network regarding this technology because you are pro yourself. You know that according to people you trust, A is just good. B on the other hand, who never worked for his popularity and whose skills are only known to few other pros who worked with him, is excellent.
That is what you need web of trust for. That's what you likely use today. It's just without strictly specified protocol, using your brain as a storage and meetings with your friends or conferences as a communication channel. It can be improved and made more efficient.
Once again, using it to "rate coders" is just one of use cases, but I'll stick to it for the sake of this argument.
So you need a DBA. There's one here that could work for you. You can check data online about him, but you don't know who wrote it. You ask your friends around. Some guy you barely knows says he's a fraud. One of your friends says he worked with him and he's good. You're best friend doesn't know him, but his friend, who he trusts, says he's great.
This is how you build your opinion about people (I'm aware it's a simplification but it's not relevant here). The mechanics doesn't change. Just the technology. But it's a leap as big as switching from snail mail to e-mail.
How much you trust some information depends on where it comes from. But it doesn't always come directly from the trusted source. So you use your trusted sources to learn about this information source.
You also learn to lessen your trust in sources that turned out to lead you to some bad information. It's not always easy to keep it all in your head. Business people learn to master that skill because that's the algorithm that works for acquiring trustworthy information and information is money. However not everybody's live revolves about building network of great contacts and staying in touch with them polling for some useful data.
The problem is that if I put up a billboard that says John is a thief, they can find me and sue for defamation. If I do a website and use SEO, then it's not so easy, even though it serves similar purpose.
But that is how the world works now. We are able to send information to many people, anonymously, often in a targeted way. That's how politics work, that's how ads work, that's how HN works. The problem is not the information, the problem is trust. It's not easy to solve, but it's doable.