Cross posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/13351707
Australia’s prime minister has labelled X’s owner, Elon Musk, an “arrogant billionaire who thinks he is above the law” as the rift deepens between Australia and the tech platform over the removal of videos of a violent stabbing in a Sydney church.
On Monday evening in an urgent last-minute federal court hearing, the court ordered a two-day injunction against X to hide posts globally containing the footage of the alleged stabbing of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel on 15 April. The eSafety commissioner had previously directed X to remove the posts, but X had only blocked them from access in Australia pending a legal challenge.
Anthony Albanese on Tuesday said Musk was “a bloke who’s chosen ego and showing violence over common sense”.
“Australians will shake their head when they think that this billionaire is prepared to go to court fighting for the right to sow division and to show violent videos,” he told Sky News. “He is in social media, but he has a social responsibility in order to have that social licence.”
“What the eSafety commissioner is doing is doing her job to protect the interests of Australians. And the idea that someone would go to court for the right to put up violent content on a platform shows how out of touch Mr Musk is,” he said.
X (twitter) is a signatory to the Christchurch Call set-up by Jacinda Ardern. Signatories agree among other things to suppress the dissemination of terrorism. Nobody is talking about this.
Signatories: https://www.christchurchcall.com/our-community
I checked the Christchurch Call website which clearly shows Xitter as a member of the community that agreed to:
“Take transparent, specific measures seeking to prevent the upload of terrorist and violent extremist content and to prevent its dissemination on social media and similar content-sharing services, including its immediate and permanent removal, without prejudice to law enforcement and user appeals requirements, in a manner consistent with human rights and fundamental freedoms. Cooperative measures to achieve these outcomes may include technology development, the expansion and use of shared databases of hashes and URLs, and effective notice and takedown procedures.”
Full text: https://www.christchurchcall.com/about/christchurch-call-text
What’s the relevance?
I agree with the Christchurch Call, that platforms, media and govts should avoid disseminating and giving publicity to terrorists and their causes. If Xitter were to take down content for that reason, I’d applaud them. However, that is a voluntary agreement that should be self-enforced by the signatories upon themselves. Nothing there gives Australia the right to determine for the rest of the world what content may or may not be shared online.
If a company signs a public pledge and then breaks it, that’s worth knowing about.