Congress Pats Itself On The Back Via Social Media For Its Opportunity To Slam Social Media

As you may have heard, this week there were three Congressional hearings in two days, allowing various Congressional committees to drag out officials from Facebook, Twitter and Google and slap them around for the fact that some bad things happen on those platforms. The general sentiment appeared to be sputtering anger that social media companies haven't magically figured out how to "stop bad stuff" on these platforms.

Perhaps the strongest statement came from Senator Dianne Feinstein during one of the hearings, in which she stated:

I must say, I don't think you get it. You're general counsels, you defend your company. What we're talking about is a cataclysmic change. What we're talking about is the beginning of cyber warfare. What we're talking about is a major foreing power with the sophistication and ability to involve themselves in a presidential election and sow conflict and discontent all over this country. We are not going to go away, gentlemen. And this is a very big deal. I went home last night with profound disappointment. I asked specific questions, I got vague answers. And that just won't do. You have a huge problem on your hands. And the US is going to be the first of the countries to bring it to your attention, and other countries are going to follow, I'm sure. Because you bear this responsibility. You created these platforms, and now they're being misused. And you have to be the ones who do something about it... or we will.

We've gone over this before, because it's one of those things that everyone seems to think is easy to solve, when the reality is that most attempts to solve the "problem" of "bad stuff" results in a bigger problem. Yes, it's probably true that these companies could be more forthcoming and transparent, but part of the problem is not that these companies just want to hold their cards close, it's that (1) there are no easy answers and (2) almost any "solution" is fraught with even more problems that will almost certainly make the problem worse. At the very same time that tons of people are complaining about these platforms failing to stop loosely defined "bad speech," you have another group that is complaining about bad/bogus takedowns/censorship. How do you balance those two things? If you think there's an easy way, you're wrong.

On top of that, the idea that "bad" content is obvious is ludicrous on multiple levels. First, the scale of this issue is massive. And that impacts things in multiple ways. It means it's impossible to carefully review every piece of content, meaning that a ton of "bad" stuff will always slip through and people will complain that the platform is failing or not taking the issue seriously. At the same time, a bunch of errors in the other direction will be made (taking down stuff that should be left up). It's the classic issue of Type I and Type II errors -- and at the scale these platforms operate, you will inevitably have so many of both as to make the entire effort appear completely ineffective.

And, to make the situation even more ridiculous, even if there were some regulatory regime that could accurately manage the issues discussed above, they would almost certainly be cost prohibitive for all but the largest of players. And thus, the end result of this regulatory "attack" on Facebook, Google, and Twitter may be to lock in those three companies as the dominant players and lock out any innovative startups.

And then there's this: While these Senators were attacking these three companies, they were relying heavily on Twitter and Facebook to talk up and promote the fact that they were in a hearing bashing Twitter and Facebook. While the article linked here suggests that this isn't ironic because it just demonstrates the power imbalance, there's a more subtle issue at play. These platforms became so useful in large part because they were free to innovate and to experiment and to allow for lots of different uses. And, sure, some of those uses are ones that many of us find distasteful, offensive, or even potentially dangerous. But before we leap in with wild abandon with Congress mandating solutions that will be policed by these very same platforms, shouldn't we be at least a little careful that the end result will create a lot more problems than it's supposedly solving? And, yet, so far, there has been little indication of what exactly Congress (or anyone with the anti-tech pitchforks) have in mind other than "take responsibility" or "stop the bad stuff." And that's not even remotely productive, and has a high likelihood of being harmful.