Heated, biased revamps of Big Tech won’t silence the echo chambers
In “Move quickly and split things” (Editorial, Jan. 11), the Globe presents a knee-jerk reaction to the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol and implies a remedy that could be summarized as: Break up Massive Tech since we don’t like the messages they have, and develop a new entitlement program. Fund a nebulous new nonprofit social media platform that will someway get over society’s problems.
Recreating a little something like Countrywide Community Radio in the social media room is the completely wrong design, with all of NPR’s apparent political bias. Breaking up tech sounds good and feels good, and would be admirable, if it also curtailed unrestricted cancel-culture speech and violence-encouraging antifa protest speech on the still left as well. But it won’t. Unwinding Fb, YouTube, Instagram, and other platforms would only make much more, independent echo chambers from which folks get their “curated” news. Permitting “mission-driven platforms” to in some way arise would lead to far more chambers, not extra open dialogue.
Two challenges: 1st, Facebook and its ilk have amassed much too significantly electricity by way of management of our personalized facts with no effective antitrust oversight appropriate to the 21st century, and second, society has progressively sought out distinct, basically opposed echo chambers as its source of “news.”
Congress can handle the first difficulty but not with politically biased, heat-of-the-second solutions. It demands all the creative imagination and invention that has enabled Significant Tech in the to start with place, adapting to new buildings and communications platforms, and a eager appreciation of the 2nd trouble, which includes the humble realization of how difficult it will be to address.
In fact, “the destiny of democracy and the basic safety of the community and public officers really should not hinge on a person Harvard dropout’s emotions.” Nor must it hinge on the Globe’s very own editorial partisan peeves.
Ted Everett
Newton
It’s all in how you frame it
In “Speech has consequences” (Belief, Jan. 12), Edward F. Davis III mentions that social media platforms’ new bans of President Trump “were satisfied with cries of censorship and major-corporation totalitarianism.” These media platforms should body their bans in terms that quite a few suitable-wingers can fully grasp and agree with. They must merely condition that it is in opposition to their spiritual beliefs to let messaging that consists of lies, detest speech, or implied or explicit threats of violence.
Michael Biales
Acton
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