US Declines in Internet Freedom Rankings (techcrunch.com) 153
If you need a safe haven on the internet, where the pipes are open and the freedoms are plentiful -- you might want to move to Estonia or Iceland. From a report: The latest "internet freedoms" rankings are out, courtesy of Freedom House's annual report into the state of internet freedoms and personal liberties, based on rankings of 65 countries that represent the vast majority of the world's internet users. Although the U.S. remains firmly in the top 10, it dropped a point on the year earlier after a recent rash of changes to internet regulation and a lack of in the realm of surveillance. Last year, the U.S. was 21 in the global internet freedom ranking -- the lower number, the better a country ranks. That was behind Estonia, Iceland, Canada, Germany and Australia. This year the U.S. is at 22 -- thanks to the repeal of net neutrality and the renewal of U.S. spy powers. The report also cited "disinformation and hyperpartisan content" -- or fake news -- as a "pressing concern."
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Freedom means content you don't like (Score:5, Insightful)
Their concerns over "fake news" seems contrary to the notion of "freedom". Freedom means the ability for anyone, anywhere, to do what they will regardless of your opinions.
Their concerns undermine their credibility, although I do agree that the lack of net neutrality and continued surveillance are concerning.
RTFS (Score:1)
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Their concerns over "fake news" seems contrary to the notion of "freedom"
None of that was cited as a reason.
Are you pretending you actually read this work? Because if you had you might have noticed that "Fake news" is cited IN THE FUCKING SUBTITLE where even groupthinkers like yourself can be expected to spot it.
Re: RTFS (Score:2, Informative)
Net neutrality going away has nothing to do with personal freedom. It does mean Netflix is going to have to charge more and give cable companies a cut. And it means YouTube may be totally broken and hopefully Google can put the pieces back together into a new business model.
Re:RTFS (Score:4, Insightful)
> Facebook bans aren't the risk to your freedom. Losing Net Neutrality OTOH is.
Your total lack of self-awareness here is hilarious.
Corporate censorship is as much a threat to your freedom as government surveillance.
You are quite literally manning the barricades on behalf of Robber Barons.
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And in North Korea, you fucking moron, you'll be SHOT for attempting to buy that airtime. Not in Freemerica.
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Perhaps I was too generous before.
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You are quite literally manning the barricades on behalf of Robber Barons.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jh4Mpgbi4A [youtube.com]
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I agree net neutrality is the only solution on the table, but it's a terrible solution to the problem. What we need is for "internet" service providers to stop lying to customers about the services that they offer. If you censor, manipulate, block ports, nating traffic, or otherwise fuck with the traffic in some other way (like bandwidth limits, throttling or shaping) that isn't providing users access to the internet. It's better described as an intranet more akin to AOL or Comuserv back in the day connecte
Re: RTFS (Score:3)
Disagree. Corporate censorship is a direct affront to personal freedom of speech and conscience. Lack of net neutrality is a financial threat to web publishers, and therefore an indirect threat to freedom of speech.
Both are important. But our first priority must be reducing censorship on the de facto public squares of the internet.
Re:Freedom means content you don't like (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Freedom means content you don't like (Score:5, Insightful)
> You shouldn't have the right to offend others.
Bullshit.
That's how you end with idiotic Political Correctness (aka Censorship) which to quote George Carlin "is Fascidm pretending to be manners."
Only cowards censor.
Re:Freedom means content you don't like (Score:4, Insightful)
Censorship advocacy is either logical inconsistent, or openly unethical. Pick one.
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But unless you limit freedom of speech, you don't have it. It's like with tolerance. You have to be intolerant of intolerance in order to be tolerant.
You shouldn't have the right to offend others.
Well, since you're obviously so good at doublethink, I suspect that you'll completely miss the point when I mention that I find this post offensive.
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I absolutely should have the right to offend others. If you don't have the right to offend others then you don't really have freedom of speech.
It's easy to defend the speech rights of people with whom you agree, but unless you defend the right of free speech of people with whom you don't agree then you really don't believe in freedom of speech.
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They were looking at things like net neutrality and private companies obtaining censorship orders to protect their copyrights. Governments upholding local laws didn't factor very highly (why would it, when most reasonable definitions of freedom include the rule of law as a protection for that right) although things like blocking VPN services are a big issue for privacy reasons.
propaganda does not encourage freedom (Score:2)
Restricting speech is bad. Restricting a company's ability to purchase media like Fox, Sinclair, and Clear Channel is good. The consolidation of media in the US is making propaganda very effective and good government harder.
Re:Freedom means content you don't like (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not what it means. That's never been what it means.
The philosopher Rudolph Steiner had the most comprehensive discourse on freedom in his book from the late 1800s, The Philosophy of Freedom. He wrote that any definition of human freedom required an "ethical individualism", that required a level of consciousness of self and one's motivations. In other words, taking a shit on the living room floor just because you need to take a shit and happen to be standing in the living room at the time, is not freedom. Your "freedom" in absence of an ethical framework is basically just trolling.
And if you need to ask, "Well derp, who gets to make up what is ethical?" then you're in luck, because this was also pretty well established by about 300 B.C., and the answer is, "We all do, based upon reason and moral behavior".
Now, if you need to ask, "Why should we be moral at all?", then you need more help than I can provide in one Slashdot comment.
This has been another edition of, "Why you should have taken a few Humanities classes when you were working on your Associates degree in Computer Science."
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Well, ok, "Freedom" as a concept is quite a bit more complex than that, and something I was trying to avoid in making my point that "concern" over trolling is contrary to freedom in this context.
We all give up measures of our freedom to participate in society; that's the cover charge, as it were. At it's most basic, this can be considered a viable definition of "evil" btw; the deprivation of freedom. No one would argue that we should all have absolute freedom, of course, which is where the notion of "nece
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Oh, come one. Here is what you said, in a direct quote:
If you were trying to avoid the complex concept of freedom, trying to simplify it to, "the ability for anyone, anywhere, to do what they want" was not the way to
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Ah, we're playing semantics now are we? Count me out. The moment we start playing the semantics game the conversation is over; it's now a game of egos.
I've got better things to do with my time.
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Semantics is the branch of linguistics and logic concerned with meaning. Semantics is at the heart of every philosophical discussion, and critical to developing understanding.
If you're "out" every time semantics enter into a discussion, then you're going to have trouble using logic and language. Don't be that guy. You have a strongly-held position, you should be prepared to defend it using your words.
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Is censorship the opposite of free speech?
Is shouting down your opponent a form of censorship?
Does censoring such shouting down make speech more free or less free?
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Simply horse kaka
No one man defined the moral compass for the planet.If it is your room you are free to shit in the middle of it
That is freedom. Your freedoms end where others begins.
Problem being other people want their freedoms to invade your space
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I want you to really think about this. Yes, you are free to shit on the floor in your own room, but that does not mean you shitting on the floor in your own room is the same thing as being free.
You mistake the ability to do something with human freedom. They are not the same thing. They're not even in the same realm.
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Does restricting someone from shitting in their own room have a zero-effect on their freedom? I don't understand the point you're trying to make, and I have a minor in philosophy.
For example, if someone wanted to stay cooped up in their basement all day and read books, are you saying locking said person in a basement and forcing them to read books would not be a restriction on their freedom? Or are you saying actions as a result of unexamined motivations are not a question of "freedom"? Are you saying anima
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I understand your confusion. The concept of human freedom is distinct from whether or not you are "free" to do something (they spring fro
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Simply horse kaka
No one man defined the moral compass for the planet.If it is your room you are free to shit in the middle of it
That is freedom. Your freedoms end where others begins.
Problem being other people want their freedoms to invade your space
No you are not free to shit in your room. I used to live in a house where there was a hoarder who actually did shit on the floor in the middle of his apartment, at least judging by the smell. That and the files and the maggots crawling out from under his door and out the windows, up the walls of the house and into our apartments. It took quite a bit of doing but eventually we managed to make an intervention happen with the help of county social worker some bailiffs and the cooperation of his family. They ha
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Freedom to do what you like is one type of freedom. But the guy bleeding to death in the gutter is free to do what he likes, so there is another type of freedom - the opportunity to be free.
An example of the latter would be education. Without education you have fewer opportunities to exercise your freedom to act how you like, because the range of actions you are able to take is more limited. So education enhances you freedom.
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And if you need to ask, "Well derp, who gets to make up what is ethical?" then you're in luck, because this was also pretty well established by about 300 B.C., and the answer is, "We all do, based upon reason and moral behavior".
Good morning. Ethics professor here. Let's unpack that statement.
Moral behavior is ethical. What is ethical? Moral behavior. Remember, from your humanities classes, that ethics and morals are greek and latin words with the same meaning from "about 300 B.C."
Steiner's rationalization is that freedom is a subset of ethics, which clearly is political science, not an ethical concept. He confused prescription for description. Which is the reason why no professional philosopher takes Steiner's freedoms as anything
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Not always. This is why reason and self-awareness are important.
Not at all. He posited that freedom required ethics. It would be like you're saying, "a hot dog is a subset of relish".
I did not demean or insu
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In other words, taking a shit on the living room floor just because you need to take a shit and happen to be standing in the living room at the time, is not freedom
Yes it is. If you are unable to perform certain bodily functions in certain areas you are restricted in your freedom. I don't care if Rudolph Steiner would disagree with me or not. We sacrifice freedoms to live in a society but pretending that curtailing freedom is not restricting freedom because someone deemed the curtailment necessary strikes me as complete nonsense.
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That's not what it means. That's never been what it means.
Yes. Yes it is. On one end you have freedom, and on the other, you have security. There're trade-offs. We never want pure freedom; you can end up with the Wild West if so. You don't want pure security, because then you get Big Brother.
And if you need to ask, "Well derp, who gets to make up what is ethical?" then you're in luck, because this was also pretty well established by about 300 B.C., and the answer is, "We all do, based upon reason and moral behavior".
That's not a very good answer, since while most people agree on certain moral behaviors (don't murder, don't steal), there are others that are vastly controversial (homosexuality, drug use). A lot of Christians decided that homosexuality isn't moral, but by your logic, it is
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Considering the totality of human history, neither of those is particularly controversial.
On the Contrary (Score:4, Interesting)
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People can create their own websites but it is a bit like shouting in an empty room, you have free speech but no one can hear you.
This is a feature, not a bug. If you want to talk to people, you have to go where the people are.
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Not every statement is an opinion.
If the only factual statements you have are incorrect you cannot make any valid decisions.
If you cannot make any decisions you are not free.
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You people make me sick. You co-opt words and act as if you have a right to control other peaceful people. You are the crazy nutter. And while there are crazy nutters on the opposite side of the spectrum as well it doesn't change the fact you're a fucking nut job.
Few people want to hear what you are talking about, but no government has the right to deprive another of speech or a general right to communicate whatever they want. It's up to each individual to listen to or not or access the so-called 'disinform
Re: Freedom means content you don't like (Score:5, Insightful)
...freedom in the rest of the world includes freedom from disinformation and freedom from propaganda.
Perhaps if the disinformation and propaganda comes from your own government.
But defining freedom as only hearing things from other people that you believe to be true?
That is the exact opposite of freedom.
Re: Freedom means content you don't like (Score:5, Insightful)
Freedom “to” vs. Freedom “from” -
https://www.open.edu/openlearn... [open.edu]
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Negative vs Positive Liberties.
Negative Liberties are those things that can only be taken away, such as speech.
Positive Liberties can only be given, usually by taking something from another person. Such as health care.
"Freedom to" and "freedom from" follow the same pattern.
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And - should have read your link before making my answer - thought it was a sig at first... ;-)
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Freedom “to” vs. Freedom “from” -
https://www.open.edu/openlearn... [open.edu]
Good article, The problem is to an extremist "freedom" means the ability to spew whatever bile they like and shout "FREEZE PEACH" when ever someone criticises them or dares to point out the flaws in their argument, this is the favoured tactic of the so-called "alt-right", they don't want free and open discourse, they want their point of view to be the only accepted one. This is the kind of thing that is actually killing freedom of expression in western countries across the globe. If we lose the right to cr
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unless all the channels are in control of a wealthy few of course - like in the us.
I'd say more but... (Score:5, Interesting)
With shadow banning, FB jail, twitter censorship, deleted accounts due any number of excuses. And lets not forget the spy vs spy MAD Mag comic of the deep state. Julian Assange last interview he talked about those being born today will be the last generation to be free... I'm trying to get a head start of my unfreedom. May I be marked a troll for this.
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The whole shadow banning thing highlights the problem with private enterprise and capitalism. We are quickly depending on these corporations to serve the needs of our society, but they have no transparency in the process and there is little recourse when we disagree with their behavior.
The right to petition is fundamental in all free societies, and is the fundamental basis of the 1st Amendment. But we have ruled that corporations are not subject to review and do not have to abide by petition. The EULA is th
Re:I'd say more but... (Score:5, Insightful)
We've handed the Town Square to a few powerful individuals and corporations.
And the denizens that are allowed to live in said Town Square loves their unilaterally declared regulation and iron fisted control.
What that those inside the town square should be wondering about is what is going to happen when there are more that have been pushed out of the town square than are allowed into the echo chamber it is becoming.
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We've handed the Town Square to a few powerful individuals and corporations.
The trick is recognizing the cause and what to do about it. Mostly-one-way-tubes is what caused that precondition. The average internet subscriber's *right-to-publish* must be taken back from ISPs.
Huh? (Score:1)
How is the US behind countries that have actual laws on the books that jail you for saying offensive things? Germany and Canada BOTH have âoeanti-hate,â where hate is as liberally defined as using the wrong pronouns for someone, laws in place.
Also, how is censoring âoefake newsâ increasing freedom of speech? Doesnâ(TM)t matter whether itâ(TM)s crap or not. Censorship is censorship.
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Informative)
There's a law against speech that incites the masses called "Volksverhetzung", which is usually applied when speech contains calls for violence and or other arbitrary actions against groups of people. You can read about it accurately enough on Wikipedia [wikipedia.org].
Then there's laws against slander, which exist in pretty much any civilized nations, of course including the US. Cases rarely hold up in court, because of their difficult nature.
Germany (Score:2)
What a crock (Score:1)
Australia has ISPs filtering out websites at the behest of copyright owners. How are they better than the USA?
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Any place with koala bears is by definition better.
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Any place with koala bears is by definition better.
But they also have drop bears.
Not sure how "More Freedom" is "Less Freedom" (Score:1)
How does the U.S. drop a rank after REMOVING regulation that made the internet less Free?
If the U.S. is at 22, who is higher - Germany or the UK where you can be arrested [businessinsider.com] for tweeting the wrong thing?
What does "internet freedom" even mean if not that you can say what you want online?
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Freedom is slavery...
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True, now your ISP has the freedom to censor your speech, to limit which sites you go to, and limit who you associate with over their network. Definitely a move to more freedom for the ISP and that is what is important.
In my crappy country, my ISP got in shit for blocking sites it didn't like, such as the unions site during a strike. Imagine that, stopping a business from blocking sites it has decided its customers shouldn't see.
Numbers, how do they work? (Score:1)
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It makes as much sense as "a lack of in the realm of surveillance". TechCrunch apparently uses the same editors as Slashdot. If you want sense, you'll probably have to read the actual report.
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Lots of ties? 5 countries are tied for 1st, likewise for second and third, then the 22nd is at #10.
What about "hate speech"? (Score:3, Interesting)
Freedom of speech must — in a society without the Ministry of Truth — include the freedom to lie.
But the targeting of "hate speech" ought to be a "pressing concern" — and for the same reasons. No one lamenting the demise of the "Net Neutrality" would agree, that the regulation would've prevented the persecution of Gab.com [slashdot.org], for example. On the contrary, these same people claim [slashdot.org] "free speech" has become a very lazy excuse to tolerate hatred and the ignorance".
It immediately follows, US still has "too much" freedom — unlike the enlightened and sophisticated Europeans [reason.com].
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On the other hand, no one has to pay for the bits which make up your speech, and the government isn't involved, so I'm not sure this is the exact hill on which to die.
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Gab.com pays its own bills. They get persecuted anyway...
No government is involved in Net Neutrality either — not any more, much to the chagrin of the folks pretending to be concerned for the "Internet freedom". And yet, they cite this withdrawal of government as a concern.
Can't have it both ways, can they?
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
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What I was saying is that a private entity which does not support Gab does not support the principles of free speech. That is, as you say, having it both ways.
However, preventing a private entity from terminating business arrangements or not entering into them does not strike me as a remedy. The current cycle of shaming and nam
Re:What about "hate speech"? (Score:4, Informative)
Exactly! And yet, Germany is rated higher than the United States in that report... According to the report-publishers, TFA, and the other so-called "Liberals", America's freedom of speech — what's left of it — is detrimental to "Internet freedom". Which tells you all you need to know about this report...
The report — and TFA — both mention pure-private concerns like "fake news" and absence of "net neutrality" as valid. That means, they disagree with you regarding the role of private entities — and what can and cannot be done with them by government to improve "Internet freedom" (as they define it).
As I argue elsewhere, providing a forum for the despicables is not — should not be — any more toxic, than defending same in court. If a private Internet-company is toxic over allowing Robert Bowers to speak his mind before he committed his atrocity, a private law-firm defending him in front of a jury after it ought to be toxic as well — their bank-accounts closed (Paypal did stop accepting Gab's payments), the lawyers involved disbarred (GoDaddy not hosting their domain-name).
Heck, the private doctors treating him for wounds sustained in a firefight with police must be toxic too, by the same logic... Would you have approved of such boycotts too? Probably not...
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As I argue elsewhere, providing a forum for the despicables is not — should not be — any more toxic, than defending same in court.
Here, we are in complete agreement. People who are crying for Gab's deplatforming are ignorant, short-sighted, slope-slippers. If you believe in free speech only for some, you don't believe in it at all.
That being said, you don't have to enable anyone else's speech. That is freedom, as well.
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Absolutely, yes. Which means — must mean — that the abolition of "net neutrality" rules is a good thing, improving freedom. If Verizon can be compelled — by government — to treat Netflix, Russia Today, and Yahoo! the same, then GoDaddy can be compelled to continue hosting Gab.com too.
But the report's authors, TFA, and the majority of /. disagree — counting the demise of the neutrality rules
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the report's authors
Europeans often smell themselves when it comes to the abstract idea of Liberty; in the concrete I prefer America's.
the abolition of "net neutrality" rules is a good thing, improving freedom.
Here though, we part company. Why is it Verizon's business that I have requested HTTP from Gab.com? Verizon and I have a contract to fulfill my HTTP requests for a certain charge per month. They have no business with Gab.com that I care about when making an HTTP request, and throttling my request makes the business relationship with Verizon much less worthwhile.
GoDaddy is not involved in Net
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Still, this is market forces saying that something is toxic. I don't for a second believe that there won't be a successor to Gab soon.
In fact, I'm looking forward to trolling nazis on it very soon.
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Net neutrality is about stopping your ISP from routing gab.com to /dev/nul. Freedom of association is about not having to deal with gab.com if you don't want to.
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No one is forced to read Gab's content, if they don't want to. Its users, whatever you think of them, are no no longer free to associate with the site. That ought to concern anyone claiming to worry about "Internet freedom"...
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Are they too stupid to set up a web server? is their ISP blocking them from serving content? Is the American government refusing them a domain name? I haven't really been paying attention, but it seems that a bunch of people are trying to get others to host their content whether they want to or not.
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Are they too stupid to set up a web server?
That's not the problem.
is their ISP blocking them from serving content?
Basically, yes.
Is the American government refusing them a domain name?
That's not how domain name distribution works.
I haven't really been paying attention,
Yea that's pretty obvious.
but it seems that a bunch of people are trying to get others to host their content whether they want to or not.
Well then, by all means point us to the US government-run web hosting service that's available to all Americans, regardless of what opinions we hold. I can wait.
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I have been paying a bit of attention. Help me out. GoDaddy was providing which service for them, and why can't they just hop on CrisisHost or something?
Because CrisisHost is another private company that has no more legal compulsion to honor the First Amendment rights of it's customers than GoDaddy? Private platforms are private platforms.
Why can't they sign up with the Government-provided domain hosting service, that would guarantee the right to free expression? Because nobody has that option.
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Are they too stupid to set up a web server?
That's not the problem.
Well whatever type of server they use.
is their ISP blocking them from serving content?
Basically, yes.
Well with no net neutrality, ISP's can route anyone they don't like to /dev/nul. I'd be pissed if I payed for a business connection and my ISP blocked my content, which is illegal here.
Is the American government refusing them a domain name?
That's not how domain name distribution works.
Well whoever is in charge of the .us domain. What I really meant is, has the US government confiscated their domain, something they're known to do if they don't like someones content, usually because some business doesn't like it.
I haven't really been paying attention,
Yea that's pretty obvious.
but it seems that a bunch of people are trying to get others to host their content whether they want to or not.
Well then, by all means point us to the US government-run web hosting service that's available to all Americans, regardless of what opinions we hold. I can wait.
Up to you to tell your government how to run things. Seems
"you might want to move to Estonia or Iceland" (Score:2)
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I live in Estonia; I quite like it here.
I have had colleagues from all over the world, from Australia to Brazil to USA, all major European countries included. They have also liked it here.
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Iceland, ranked #2 in the Democracy Index. [wikipedia.org]
I hear they get a lot of sex.
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Iceland is beautiful. Good beer, too.
Flawed democracy (Score:2)
Land of the free not so much. [wikipedia.org]
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Democracy is not freedom; democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for dinner.
Freedom is a properly-armed sheep contesting the vote.