I too agree that social media as a common medium probably does not, in itself, confer "common carrier" status on it. Even if many have been bought up by Facebook, there is still room for competitors to arise that provide alternative. This is not like ATT&T before its breakup where it was literally the only option. Heck, nothing stops someone from rolling their own stack on a local PC or local "cloud" and running their own social media service there, with mobile friendly sites that don't need an Android or Apple apps no need to rely on 3rd party cloud infrastructure. Then they would only be relying on the common-carrier ISP infrastructure that couldn't ban them for content. They aren't entitled to use the private infrastructure services or content distribution networks of other private organizations.
Re:Amazon, Apple and Google Cut Off Parler
by ineedasername on Sunday January 10, 2021 @06:14PM
(#25721377)
I'm not sure what you mean by my sadness at google. Could you elaborate?
The current generation not knowing how to communicate without social media does not imply or suggest that social media is necessary for communication. If a person believes their values and entitlements limited by private entities they find alternatives not facilitated by those private entities, as in alternatives to social media.