A Good Morning in Gaza: Israel, Egypt, and Qatar Negotiating a Possible Solution to the Security Problems of the Second Hamas-Israeli Interaction
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Negotiators are inching closer to a deal for another temporary cease-fire in Gaza to allow for an exchange of Israelis held hostage by Hamas and Palestinians detained in Israel. Jake Sullivan, a White House national security adviser, said this week in Paris that a deal had been reached by representatives of Israel, the U.S., Egypt and Qatar. The next stage of negotiations will be held in Qatar. The planned military offensive in Gaza won’t be put on hold despite the U.S. objections, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says.
Tech Sensitivities: Where Do We Stand? When Technology Leaders Learn to Get Their Way During the Deceleration of the Wall
If the Supreme Court endorses the First Amendment arguments presented by the platforms in this case, it could give Meta, X and Google the kind of immunity few businesses have ever had. I can’t say I like the law Texas passed — but that isn’t the point, for the cure is worse than the disease. If the justices strike down the Texas law, they would be jeopardizing our ability to control our own future using democratic means.
Congress is once again going to have a partial government shutdown. The government is supposed to be funded every year by the end of September. But they’re stuck renewing their spending plan. Federal funding for several departments, including the Transportation, Agriculture and Veterans Affairs, runs out at the end of the week. President Joe Biden is expected to host the top 4 Congressional lawmakers tomorrow in order to negotiate a deal before Friday’s deadline.
Morning Edition aired parts of our long conversation. But a few minutes didn’t capture the full flavor. So we have also published a longer version. She talks about her views on the tech world, as well as her disappointment with it.
Swisher’s memoir recounts more than 30 years covering the tech industry as a beat reporter, analyst, columnist, and TV personality. She writes that she went from asking tech leaders what they were thinking to telling them what she thought of their business. Today she is dissatisfied with a lot of them.
The case for social media regulation of the mountain waste repurposed into economic opportunity for the local craftswomen of the Tharu community
The mountain is littered with waste left by the activities of mountaineering over the years. Nepal’s Department of Tourism estimates that there are more than 130,000 tons of waste on Mt. Everest. The government began an initiative in 2019 to clean up the mountains. Some of the material collected from the mountains has found its way to indigenous craftswomen of the Tharu community, who are using their traditional skills to transform the garbage into something entirely new.
See photos of how Sunita Kumari Chaudhary and her fellow crafters change trash into art and read about their fledgling effort to repurpose mountain waste into economic opportunity for their community.
“There is nothing more Orwellian than the government trying to dictate what viewpoints are distributed in the name of free expression,” said Matt Schruers, president of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, a trade group for the social media companies that’s involved in the litigation. That’s what’s at issue here.
The dispute was made worse after the siege on the U.S. Capitol in 2021, when social media sites stopped Donald Trump from using their platforms.
At the bill signing, Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott said freedom of speech was under attack in the state. “There is a dangerous movement by some social media companies to silence conservative ideas and values. This is wrong and we will not allow it in Texas.
“It is necessary to have guidelines and terms of use to make sure that a community isn’t polluted,” Schruers said. Pets, barbeques, and attempts to groom children in a children’s site are some of the more serious things that can be found in the cat forum.
First Amendment Freedom is Preserved in Social Media: a High-Law Court to See Challenges to Texas, Florida Social Media Laws
John Whitehead runs the Rutherford Institute, a conservative-leaning nonprofit group. The big social media sites should not be engaged in censoring because they have become the centers of people’s lives, according to one of the friends of the court briefs.
“It’s out there to make people think,” Whitehead said. You can disagree. People should immediately respond and start a debate if someone puts something foolish on. Debating is the key, not eliminating.”
Other allies of Texas and Florida argue that the sites are simply host content, not making editorial judgments that deserve a lot of First Amendment protection.
“Everyone, left right or center, should oppose government control of speech,” Szabo said. “Because as it may be your person in the White House today, we know that that will not be forever. And that’s why the First Amendment is so important and so paramount.”
Is they similar to bookstores and newspapers where the highest level of First Amendment protection can be found?
The Supreme Court case in which they were relying was called Miami Herald v Tornillo. Florida tried to force the newspaper to carry op-eds it didn’t want to publish. The high court was in agreement with the Herald.
Today, the social media sites said, Florida is trying to make the big social media platforms print every single letter to the editor. They said users and advertisers don’t want that.
Source: Supreme Court to hear challenges to Texas, Florida social media laws
What Do Social Media Platforms Tell Us About The Cyber-Physical Attacks on the 9/11 9/11 Sandy Victims’ Advocateship?
Netchoice and CCIA are supported by groups across political spectrum, from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Americans for Prosperity to the American Civil Liberties Union.
A bipartisan group of national security experts weighed in, too. Rupa Bhattacharyya is a former Justice Department lawyer and special master for the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. She now works at the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection at Georgetown University Law Center.
The moderation of social media content helps to keep some of the worst of the hate and violence off of the Internet.
Home-grown extremists like the Proud Boys and foreign groups like the Islamic State have deployed social media to attract converts and broadcast violence. She said the mosque shooter in New Zealand Live-streamed his activities to try to inspire others.
Consumer Protection and anti-fraud laws should be on social media platforms. The current moderation policies of some of the big sites are not up to date.
Their court papers cited hateful speech and threats against the justices. The people who moderated those things said that they had deleted them. They might be sued if they take awayrolls who flood their chats with offensive and racist posts.
Understanding what the tech companies are asking for is important. Even if it’s just displaying search results or quietly collecting your data, moving and sorting information is still what TikTok does. The tech giants are pushing the simplistic position that any such conduct is “speech” (and any sorting or blocking of that speech is “editing”). If the justices bought the argument, they would give Constitutional protection to almost all of the actions of a social media platform, and make it much harder for lawmakers to control them. That kind of immunity is hard to imagine the framers of the Constitution intended.
