Headline, January 28 2022/ STUDENTS : ''' '' ONLINE SPEECH ONLIST '' '''

STUDENTS : 

''' '' ONLINE SPEECH

 ONLIST '' '''

ENGINEER SALAR KHAN YUSUFZAI : ' Amongst the Global Founder Framers of !WOW! ' , Salar,  should roll up his sleeves, and begin burning the midnight oil and formulating an Operational Plan for Global Elections.

''The Global Election issue is the most important issue for the immediate present and the future of !WOW!. This issue should be the one that must have our highest priority and our laser focus.'' The World Students Society is the most democratic organization in the world.

FOR YEARS - GIANT SOCIAL NETWORKS LIKE Facebook, Twitter and Instagram have operated under two crucial tenets.

The first is that the platforms have the power to decide what content to keep online and what to take down, free from government oversight.

The second is that the websites cannot be held responsible for most of what their users post online, shielding the companies from lawsuits over libelous speech, extremist content and real-world harm linked to their platforms.

NOW THE U.S. Supreme Court is poised to reconsider those rules, potentially leading to the most significant reset of the doctrines governing online speech since the U.S. officials and courts decided to apply few regulations to the web in 1990s.

Just last Friday, the Supreme Court was expected to discuss whether to hear two cases that challenge laws in Texas and Florida barring online platforms from taking down certain political content. Very soon, the court is scheduled to hear a case that questions Section 230, a 1996 statute that protects the platforms from liability for the content posted by their users.

The cases could eventually alter the hands-off legal position that the United States has largely taken toward online speech, upending the businesses of TikTok, Twitter, Snap and Meta, which own Facebook and Instagram.

''It's a moment when everything might change,'' said Daphne Keller, a former Lawyer for Google who directs a program at the Cyber Policy Center at Stanford University in California.

The cases are part of a growing battle over how to handle harmful speech online. In recent years, as Facebook and other sites attracted billions of users and became influential communications conduits, the power they wielded came under increasing scrutiny. Questions arose over how the social networks might have unduly affected elections, genocides, wars and political debates.

In some parts of the world, lawmakers have moved to rein in the platforms' influence over speech. Last year, European legislators approved rules that require internet companies to carry out procedures for taking down illicit content and to be more transparent about how they recommend content to people.

IN THE UNITED STATES, where freedom of speech is enshrined in the First Amendment, there has been less legislative action. While lawmakers in Washington have grilled the chief executives of the tech giants over the past three years about the content they take down, proposals to regulate harmful content haven't gotten traction.

Partisanship has made the logjam worse. Republicans, some of who have accused Facebook, Twitter and other sites of censoring them, have pressed the platforms to leave more content up. In contrast, Democrats have said the platforms should remove more content, like health misinformation.

The Supreme Court case that challenges Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act is likely to have many ripple effects. While newspapers and magazines can be sued over what they publish, Section 230 shields online platforms from lawsuits over most content posted by their users. It also protects platforms from lawsuits when they take down posts.

For years, judges cited the law in dismissing claims against Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, ensuring that the companies did not take on new legal liability with each status update, post and viral video. Critics said the law was Get Out of Jail Free card for the tech giants.

''If they don't have any liability at the back end for any of the harms that are facilitated, they have basically a mandate to be as reckless as possible,'' said Mary Anne Franks, a University of Miami law professor.

The Supreme Court previously declined to hear several cases challenging the statute. In 2020, the court turned down a lawsuit, by the families of the individuals killed in terrorist attacks, that said Facebook was responsible for promoting extremist content.

So, as sites have become influential communications conduits, the power they wield has come under increasing scrutiny.

The Honour and Serving of the Latest Global Operational Research on Freedom, Online Speech, Content and Laws, continues. The World Students Society thanks author David Mccabe.

With respectful dedication to the Global Founder Framers of The World Students Society - the exclusive ownership of every student in the world : wssciw.blogspot.com and Twitter - !E-WOW! - The Ecosystem 2011 :

Good Night and God Bless

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