Re:Ron Paul locked out of his Facebook page
by 8note on Tuesday January 12, 2021 @03:50AM
(#25744061)
That they're only doing it now that trump is leaving office maybe suggests the opposite - that government does have a lot of control
Re:Ron Paul locked out of his Facebook page
by jq-r on Tuesday January 12, 2021 @05:18AM
(#25744768)
True. And if you remember all those hearings where they pretty much forced those Twitter/FB/Amazon/Google CEOs where they berated them like little kids. Those CEOs didn't really object much and knew they could get in a lot of trouble if they did so. Unfortunately, Trump could hurt those companies if he wanted I'm sure. Just look at what happened to Huawei, now the writing is on the wall for DJI and some others. I'm sure those CEOs were just biding their time waiting for Trump to go (and now they decided to act where it is obvious that he's done).
Re:Ron Paul locked out of his Facebook page
by hnlmorg on Tuesday January 12, 2021 @04:46AM
(#25744480)
My interpretation is that isn't that they were fearful of government control but rather welcomed the controversy to their platform as it resulted in more eyeballs on their inlined advertisements.
Trump's departure from office plus the riot was where the balance was tipped (ie Twitter's potential future income from Trump's controversies was no longer greater than the reputational cost in keeping him on the platform).
The ironic thing about this situation is that Twitter exercising their own judgement on what can and cannot be hosted on their platform is actually a good thing for the demonstration of independence of social platforms from government control.