8 votes

Who has your back? Censorship edition 2019 - Report by the EFF that assesses major tech companies' content moderation policies

2 comments

  1. [2]
    alyaza
    Link
    the fact that reddit is the only service or corporation listed here which satisfactorily hits all six points with respect to content moderation that the EFF lists has no business being as amusing...

    the fact that reddit is the only service or corporation listed here which satisfactorily hits all six points with respect to content moderation that the EFF lists has no business being as amusing to me as it is, honestly. (i also would not have expected that, had you asked me before reading this!)

    3 votes
    1. nacho
      Link Parent
      Well it does seem like a joke that Reddit apparently wants to follow the Santa Clara principles There's just no way Reddit legitimately has any plans of following through with any of that. Just...

      Well it does seem like a joke that Reddit apparently wants to follow the Santa Clara principles

      To earn a star in this category, the service provider must publicly support the Santa Clara Principles. This does not require the service provider to meet the principles, but rather to indicate their endorsement of them. While the previous four criteria reflect a service provider’s current implementation, this one indicates their commitment to support content moderation best practices moving forward.

      There's just no way Reddit legitimately has any plans of following through with any of that. Just having a peek at the actual principles:

      At a minimum, this information should be broken down along each of these dimensions:

      • Total number of discrete posts and accounts flagged.
      • Total number of discrete posts removed and accounts suspended.
      • Number of discrete posts and accounts flagged, and number of discrete posts removed and accounts suspended, by category of rule violated.
      • Number of discrete posts and accounts flagged, and number of discrete posts removed and accounts suspended, by format of content at issue (e.g., text, audio, image, video, live stream).
      • Number of discrete posts and accounts flagged, and number of discrete posts removed and accounts suspended, by source of flag (e.g., governments, trusted flaggers, users, different types of automated detection).
      • Number of discrete posts and accounts flagged, and number of discrete posts removed and accounts suspended, by locations of flaggers and impacted users (where apparent).
        This data should be provided in a regular report, ideally quarterly, in an openly licensed, machine-readable format.

      How on Earth reddit supposedly complies with that is... yeah.

      And then the whole idea that if Reddit as a corporation does this, and their volunteer moderators don't, that's somehow okay.

      Then again, I'm not surprised the EFF have completely bought into the Santa Clara principles of "moderation at scale". The whole premise of that platform is that code will solve these issues so we don't need human moderators. It all happens automatically, with a very few exceptions.

      Of all organizations, the EFF should recognize that will never, ever work. For sensible and reasonable moderation of online platforms, these companies will need to mass-hire people to moderate for them, and recognize the responsibility publicists have (and that platforms are publicists and share those responsibilities).

      The EFF show again that they're a joke when it comes to social media. They've jumped the shark long ago.

      1 vote