DailyPost 902
ONE OF ITS KIND IMMUNITY!
”You really need to do more@YouTube@facebook @Twitter to stop violent extremism being promoted on your platforms,” Home Secretary, UK, wrote on Twitter. ”Take some ownership. Enough is enough.” The all comprehensive immunity of these mediums has happened for long. ISIS usage of social media was better than that of US companies, to the extent that is was being called as ”The Digital Caliphate,” producing 25,000+ pieces of social media per day. Social Media Cleansing Battle began.
Live streaming has been central to the social media companies growth story. Facebook Live had earlier also live streamed sinister videos, one in 2017, which was removed after more than a day and 370,000 views. There was another such video from Cleveland in the same year. The alleged manipulation of US elections by Facebook / Cambridge Analytica ended with few Congressional hearings. One offensive cartoon, poster or book has been sufficient to put the writer, publication and city/ country in serious jeopardy. Culture / Ethics and Law are all up in arms. Why totally new response here; legal and otherwise for these mediums.
Zuckerberg plans to unify Instagram, Messenger, WhatsApp and Facebook itself has led to top Executives exit. Better commercial exploitation of data can be the only reason. The less said about data protection the better. The more it is debated and discussed the more they strengthen their octopus type stranglehold over it. Privacy seems to be in the dustbin of history even before getting properly enshrined. Live streaming, hate content, data manipulation and trampling privacy goes on unabated goes on, for crash commercial gains. The immunity emanates from being free service & laws not reflecting the changed Digital Reality.
No battle can be won today without factoring in social media. The physical world laws should apply unequivocally. The make believe distinction of the medium and the content cannot continue. The innovative streak used by these companies using cutting edge tech put them in this position, are the same behavioural traits / tech required to curb this evil. Effort would be humungous and there is no free lunch.
LEGALLY MANDATED ZERO TOLERANCE TO HATE CONTENT ON SOCIAL MEDIA IS A MUST.
Sanjay Sahay