Twitter blocks neo-Nazi account to users in Germany
bbc.co.ukWell, what I really hate about this is the 'local' filtering. Please bear with me while I sidestep into a short one paragraph rant.
Every. Single. Use. Of. Geolocation - is either useless, hindering, infuriating or all of that. Google redirecting to a local domain, blogger (a trend, right? Google?) showing all UI in a language that you cannot read unless it guesses your location right. I could go on, but based on my usage I'd mostly bash Google again and again for doing that (their openid implementation used to helpfully ask me for consent in Hebrew while I was in Israel. etc.). This ban is insane on the same level.
What other commenter lament about is 'free speech' - which is a concept that isn't absolute in the country in question and this particular citizen of that country is happy about it. I think most here don't get the 'I don't agree with what you're saying, but I'd defend your ...' quote. It doesn't make sense here, it just doesn't apply.
Now how do we handle these differences in culture on an international level? Twitter is a US company and might stand for the US values. Here in Germany you're limited by law in your expression in certain ways and the government has the power to punish you for things that might be considered 'free speech' elsewhere.
And from what I understand this is what happened, locally. The organization is totally insane (incidently we have a bunch of nutjobs like that. 'Pro NRW' and 'Pro Koeln', are playing the same game). The German media presents them as assholes, their values are crazy and their methods and goals illegal. They should be forbidden/dismantled, just as happened on Tuesday, because that's what this country agrees on. Comments about 'free speech' just really don't apply on this local level.
But why oh why would you now filter access to a feed based on a limited, useless technology? IF there's a case to be made that Germany has a right to 'ban' social media accounts (I'm .. not sure.. Locally I'm 100% behind every sanction against these .. idiots. Online? Not so much), then accounts should be deleted or hellbanned globally.
This particular 'solution' is just bullshit, neither refusing the request nor fulfilling it.
https://support.twitter.com/articles/20169222-country-withhe...
"With hundreds of millions of Tweets posted every day around the world, our goal is to respect our users' expression, while also taking into consideration applicable local laws."
No more twitter revolutions?
How about deleting the account instead? How is promoting hate speech not a ToS violation?
Are they promoting hate speech on Twitter? The article doesn't say that, and a cursory read of their feed (through Google Translate) doesn't show anything I'd consider "hate speech" either.
Personally, I'm always sad when they ban these neo-nazi feeds and such. It's hilarious to read their complaints on the "intolerance" of current western governments, or calls to "ban repression".
(Well, it's hilarious because I'm fairly confident they won't regain power any time soon)
It's equally hilarious that the western governments use terms like free speech in the same sentence that they announce censorship. I'd lump them in the same category as far as contradictions go.