Every NSFWpocalypse sends users to small, indie platforms, who are threatened by the same factors that make no-platforming practical

Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/12/07/gander-sauce.html

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I keep telling people that ecosystem-level problems are not selectively exploitable, but apparently that’s a naive observation because hey, it seems to work right now!

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This was widely anticipated years ago when the public square became increasingly replaced by private malls resembling “downtown” but without those pesky first amendment rights. The left complained at the time. The right responded with laughter.

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How are Vero.co and Ello.co doing?

Cloudflare seems to understand its currently unique role in the current Internet ecosystem (it’s as much about preventing DDoS attacks and identifying attackers as it is a CDN) and is very hesitant to no-platform even virulent racists – as I recall they didn’t kick out Alex Jones or Gab. The TLD authorities, though concentrated as a matter of necessity, are a mixed bag – there are enough of them now that one is always willing to host a wide variety of unpopular or repulsive sites. Same goes for Web hosting companies.

When it comes to no-platforming, the things that alt-right greedpigs really fear losing most are free marketing and publicity (mainly via Facebook and Twitter), free CDN services (e.g. Infowars’ use of YouTube), and access to payment processing services like Paypal. As it happens, these are also the easiest ones to game, technically and via poorly-enforced or algorithm-driven ToS rules. This is why they’re weaponising these very concentrated and dysfunctional services against sex workers and others they don’t like.

Decentralised and federated FOSS services will go a long way toward making de-platforming work as it should:

[Also, obligatory for topics like this…

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That xkcd does not seem as profound to me as other people seem to think it is.

It’s six panels and a whole lot of words that add up to, “This is private property. Get out.”

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Porhub has actually been openly courting all kinds of NSFW content creators after the Tumblr debacle hit: Writers, artists, etc. Not just video. Friend of mine posted a bunch of tweets from them, i’ll see if i can dig them up

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Well, you understand what the First Amendment actually means. But inevitably in these topics someone who doesn’t shows up to whinge about a violation of Alex Jones’ or Stormfront’s First Amendment rights being violated. The cartoon is a quick way of cutting them off at the pass and avoiding yet another tiresome derail.

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One thing I’ll say about porn sites, they seize an affinity opportunity when they see it. This is going to be a bonanza for Pornhub and the like, especially if they set up a separate brand for this kind of content.

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Where does it say that the thotaudit creeps are a right-wing movement?

Well Pornhub has also been seriously considering challenging Youtube in recent memory because people are upset how Google is running YT to the ground. I’m happy to see a platform challenge established companies in the hopes of being competitive and more inclusive

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I think the “showing them the door” bit at the end is unfortunate. If Randall had gone in a slightly different direction, the argument could have been more relevant to public spaces and to communities with principles beyond “because I said so.”

You’ve all read about those rallies Joey Gibson keeps bringing to Portland, and how anti-fascists are the ones consistently being shown the door by the authorities …

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The same place where every organization that is obsessed with the sex lives of other people come from?

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I found it myself, but thanks for the fact-based, not at all exaggerated response!

No exaggeration whatsoever. Happy to help!

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I just follow it for the drawings

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Too bad some of us can’t figure out that violence is worse than sex.

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This is the first I’m hearing of this particular organisation, but it’s also immediately clear that it emerges from the same misogynist “manosphere” as do MRAs, PUAs, incels, etc. So yeah, a right-wing movement.

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If I was cool I would know what no-platforming is. Kind of like the no-ships in the later Dune books, right?

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“Or banned from an internet community”; communities are free to set standards. The point of the cartoon and Popper’s dictum is that communities set limits based on what they want for themselves. Popper’s formulation tries to take it to the limit of what you can accept. There’s paradox here, and room for people to abuse these ideas, but it’s not about “property” as much as it’s about values.

Sure, it’s hard to use “values” because of the way the right has seized it, but that’s what’s in contention. I read the xkcd’s “our house, our rules” not as an appeal to property but as an appeal to the idea of a living space, even a “safe space.” Again, “safe space” is a term much shat-upon and distorted by the right, but it’s something we all want/need, and something most of us can agree on in the basic terms of “safe from being shoved into a ‘shower’ and subsequently cremated” or “safe from being force-fed castor oil for not voting correctly.”

Sorry for the long post. As the man said, I didn’t have time to be brief. Kids’ get home any second…

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