MC Weekly Update 4/10: Leopards Eat Faces
Alex and Evelyn discuss what was a ridiculous week for Twitter, even by its new standards: Germany is threatening to fine it over poor content moderation of illegal content; it made a hash of state-affiliated media labelling; and got into a fight with Substack. Meanwhile, India continues its forward march in cracking down on the internet; everything is a content moderation story, including the recently leaked US intelligence documents; and Arkansas is the latest state to join the "won't you think of the children" bandwagon.
Moderated Content · Evelyn Douek, Alex Stamos
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Show Notes
Stanford’s Evelyn Douek and Alex Stamos weigh in on the latest online trust and safety news and developments:
- Twitter had a ridiculous week, even by Twitter's new standards.
- A senior lawyer working on FTC compliance issues resigned. We can't imagine why. - Ryan Mac, Kate Conger/ The New York Times
- Germany is gearing up to fine Twitter under its NetzDG law for a systemic failure to remove illegal hate speech. Fines could exceed €50 million, but it’s the first Musk heard of this. - Natasha Lomas/ TechCrunch, @elonmusk
- Musk also didn’t understand what “state-affiliated media” means, picking a fight with NPR over the new label and then changing it to “government funded media.” - Bobby Allyn/ NPR, Shelly Hagan/ Bloomberg News
- Meanwhile, Twitter is no longer taking steps to limit the reach of Chinese and Russian state-controlled media outlets. - Wenhao Ma/ Wenhao’s Newsletter, Louise Matsakis, Bradley Saacks/ Semafor
- And this week's “but I never thought the leopards would eat MY face” update is about Substack:
- Twitter took a bunch of steps to reduce engagement with Substack links this week, but ultimately reversed most of those limits. - Mitchell Clark, Jay Peters/ The Verge, Igor Bonifacic/ Engadget, Timothy B. Lee/ Ars Technica
- Musk said he took action because “Substack was trying to download a massive portion of the Twitter database to bootstrap their Twitter clone, so their IP address is obviously untrusted.” - @elonmusk
- One thing not reversed? Twitter Files author Matt Taibbi was “disappeared.” Taibbi announced he had quit the platform and Musk unfollowed him for opposing the limits on Substack. - Robby Soave/ Reason, Taylor Lorenz/ The Washington Post
- Poor Matt! He tried so hard to stay on Elon's good side last week during a viral MSNBC segment. - Mike Masnick/ Techdirt, Marcy Wheeler/ emptywheel, @MehdiHasanShow
- India amended its IT law to prohibit social media companies from publishing false or misleading information about the government — as determined by the government’s own fact checking unit. Violations can strip platforms of safe harbor protections for user content. - Manish Singh/ TechCrunch, Sarvesh Mathi/ MediaNama
- Everything is a content moderation problem, including the massive intelligence documents leak this week which seem to have first been posted on Discord gaming channels. - Aric Toler/ Bellingcat, Idrees Ali/ Reuters, Shane Harris, Dan Lamothe/ The Washington Post
- Arkansas is the latest state to join the “won't you think of the children” bandwagon with a new age verification and parental consent law heading to the governor’s desk. - Lindsey Millar/ Arkansas Times, Daniel Breen/ KUAR, Michael R. Wickline/ Northwest Arkansas Gazette
Join the conversation and connect with Evelyn and Alex on Twitter at @evelyndouek and @alexstamos.
Moderated Content is produced in partnership by Stanford Law School and the Cyber Policy Center. Special thanks to John Perrino for research and editorial assistance.
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