On Mark Zuckerberg’s Speech Announcement – by Matt Taibbi

Beyond new laws like Europe s Digital Services Act and Britain s Online Safety Act lay a series of less-well-known agreements and working groups, like Europe s Code of Practice on Disinformation or the Global Risks Initiative. In recent years the United States has been participating in discussions about such agreements, sometimes with the idea of creating analogs to European or global rule systems that could be enforced via Executive Branch authority (say, through the FTC). My own personal time to panic moment came when I learned the U.S. was considering moves to join such international speech codes that wouldn t have required consulting Congress.

Zuckerberg may be referring to such worries when he says that we have an opportunity to restore free expression but it ll take time to get this right, and these are complex systems. More on the topic soon, but Zuckerberg s video is more subtle and meaningful than naysaying reports in places like the New York Times ( Meta Says Fact-Checkers Were the Problem. Fact-Checkers Rule That False ) would have you believe. The Meta CEO is claiming the U.S. and its closest allies are about to have a showdown on speech. If he s right, bring it on. It s overdue.

via www.racket.news

What a long, strange trip it’s been and it’s getting stranger.