Social media platforms allow us to interact with our next door neighbor and strangers throughout the world. What makes social media so unique, intimate and compelling is the lack of censored images and speech. It is a place where people can share everything and almost anything. These platforms are defined as a place where sites and services host public expression. They are a place to share opinions and represent who a person is. With this being said, people grow this sense of comfortability with these platforms and can sometimes behave differently and more liberated online than in person. Social media has become a communication ritual for many people. With the growth of technology ever so powerful, especially with the impact of Covid-19, the amount of time people are spending on social media has increased as the world shifts to a more virtually safe lifestyle. The impact of social media platforms on society is immense and with the fast-moving growth of users on apps such as instagram, tik-tok, snapchat and twitter, what is communicated on these platforms can have detrimental effects on citizens and be threatening and futile. Having regulations on these social media platforms is extremely significant however, the platforms should not be responsible because the purpose is for the public to share their own content.
Currently, platforms are not legally responsible for speech that they carry on their platform. Based on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, platforms have this idea of self-regulation. There appears to be this pattern that there is more hate speech than love speech on platforms. Although we live in a country where we have the Freedom of Speech, not all of it is free. There are regulations that have been historically put in place to regulate speech. For example, the time, manner, place standard allows the states to intervene on speech. The designers of social media are to remain neutral when the public puts out their perspectives. The idea of context collapse helps the audience decide what “authenticity” means so people must tailor their identity presentations to that imagined audience. People create their own content and have their own standards of what and what not should be shared and the designers of these platforms are the people who carry the standard and other peoples voices to control the circulation of the media. During this era where most things are controversial, platforms have all the power and created these algorithms that help detect forms of hate speech to keep the “acceptable” behavior of social media sustained. Opinions on social media have been recently propelling the divide of the country. Therefore, if platforms were created to be a place where sites and services host public expression, then designers should not be responsible for the expression being shared.
These platforms do not want to be a place where they promote death and destruction. Because these platforms are a space where one can be themselves, there of course has to be a certain extent as to what can be shared. Social media platforms need to have regulations in place but do not need to be responsible for the people that do not decide to follow them. There are algorithms and commercial content moderators who work to make sure everyone is interacting in a safe virtual environment. The consequences of being responsible for the speech that appears on them can actually hurt the platform itself. Since people are looking for a place where there are not so many harsh regulations, getting suspended and having content deleted can cause a pushback for these platforms and social media can eventually die out. Social media platforms do their part when regulating speech that occurs on their platform but it is impossible to take responsibility and control everyone persons posts and content.
I have found this post extremely interesting to read and I think it offers some great insight. I personally have found it hard to put my phone down, especially when I wake up and the first thing I reach for is my phone. The precedent set is the initial reaction made when a person makes the first connection with social media. I think having access to social media could potentially be toxic for young children and have found it even dangerous for myself at times. Overall, this is a great post, thank you for bringing it up!
There are so many people on social media and so much content being put out in the world it is hard for it to be regulated especially by the platform itself. People should be free to post the content they wish to represent themselves but obviously, there needs to be a limit and regulation by a higher power. People should not have the fear of running into something unwarranted, unwanted, and harmful on social media because people are free to post what they want with little regulation. Also, with kids growing access to social media at a younger and younger age there should be regulations, and they should not have such easy access to the vulgar and explicit content that…
This is something I've been trying to do for a while now. I often find productive stretches of my day come to a halt at the hands of Instagram reels which are now forced upon me by the app. I often delete instagram to eliminate the distraction and it really helps. As publicly traded companies, social media companies are doing whatever they can to make their apps addictive to gain more ad revenue because they must grow to be sustainable businesses.