On social media, veryone’s sharing, no one is taking responsibility
In writing the law, Congress wisely decided to intrude as little as possible on the new blooming world of internet communication and commerce and revisit the issue later. So far, Section 230 has granted more immunity protection to social media companies than to any other medium.
That’s an excellent reason for the Big Tech giants to show up when they’re summoned to Capitol Hill. That’s OK. Companies with so much impact need to be held accountable.
But unfortunately in this hearing, as in earlier ones, the galaxy of serious questions being raised in society about the tech industries’ vast power and influence kept getting elbowed aside by allegations of liberal bias and censorship of conservative views.
Four years ago, it was Democrats who came in to Big Tech hearings fired up by Hillary Clinton’s hacked emails and intrusions by Russian trolls of her election campaign. This time Republicans were triggered by Facebook and Twitter interfering with tweets that spread the New York Post’s questionable Hunter Biden scoop in October.
Cruz and other conservatives were furious that the story about a cache of documents allegedly found on a laptop belonging to candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter was not picked up by mainstream media outside of Fox News and other conservative outlets.
But journalistically, the story raised more questions than it answered with its speculations about a possible contact between foreign influences and Joe Biden himself.
The story was so questionable, the rival New York Times reported, that the article’s writers asked to have their names removed from the byline.
But in today’s world of dueling political realities, helped along by new media and “alternative facts,” stories take on a life of their own in alternative communities.
Judging by the polls, there’s little evidence that the Biden fuss had a measurable impact on public opinion amid the pandemic, the national racial reckoning and other timely issues.
And the social networks have been making various attempts at reform, including tagging some of Trump’s tweets with fact-checking tags — a move that infuriates him.
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