Lol...not public.
'Who owns the Internet?'
Great question, do we know? Second, do you have a right to the internet?
I've read your stuff, you've put in the effort. But, we disagree. I believe in private property, and the idea of that said owner in control and censoring the content allowed there if needed. In a market economy, another owner will provided service to people like yourself or others. There is already enough laws and such that .gov can intervene if there is fraud.
'But back in the real world, some of us just want our fundamental freedoms protected'
Sure, you can have all of those freedoms on your property and in the public eye. Try going to walmart and handing out religious material. While your at it you can hoard all you want at your house. But, if you choose to download vast amounts of material, your provider can limit that.
'They should be able to decide what’s allowed and not allowed, right?'
That's correct. They are allowed to limit the flow of material if they so choose. But, that is also on the uaction rights of the service when they applied for the sale of the spectrum from .gov. Second, you shouldn't be a subscriber of a service that would do that. It's your stake in the market to look at what the provider would do. Just as in the past people would actually be interested in Banks and their prospectives. This was all before FDIC.
“Lol... [Gmail and Yahoo email is] not public.”
Yes, it is. This is common nomenclature to describe the “free” email accounts most of the general public uses:
https://www.everycloudtech.com/dangers-using-public-email-address-business
https://www.utdallas.edu/~bxt043000/Motivational-Articles/Secure-Email-Discussion.pdf
https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-pros-and-cons-of-hosting-email-privately-versus-at-Google-Apps
https://inboxpros.com/does-a-private-or-public-whois-effect-seo-email-deliverability/
“Great question, do we know? Second, do you have a right to the internet?”
The idea is for YOU to consider and giver YOUR opinion. But you have wisely avoided staking a very definitive position, if you are unsure. But it is a fundamental question YOU should have the answer to before defending Zuckerberg’s unlimited control of everything Facebook.
The Internet is a collective platform in which people and companies share and pool resources which are owned by those parties. Most of the protocols used to make the Internet work are open source. If you care to explore the property rights concepts I’ve posted earlier, natural law dictates that some things cannot be owned. Not everything that exists is owned. Legal ownership implies exclusive right to something which is way of prohibiting others access or the usefulness of something. For example, no one owns Mars. No one has the right to demand payment for accessing Mars. Now, if a company provides transportation to Mars, they can charge for that. But until someone builds an outpost on Mars, it is a frontier that anyone can stake a claim to.
What we have with the Internet is communication. People and companies and other entities communicate. Some of the infrastructure belongs to the government. We certainly pay for some of the costs for the Internet to run via government regulation and oversight, i.e. tax dollars. So we all have a stake in it, so to speak.
“I believe in private property, and the idea of that said owner in control and censoring the content allowed there if needed... Try going to walmart and handing out religious material. “
Property rights and the right to free speech are BOTH fundamental rights. And sometimes they come into conflict. So your assertions are not completely invalid. But the question comes down to which takes precedence in various cases.
So our debate comes down to which of us has the better and more accurate analogy in comparison to Facebook. Is Facebook more like Walmart, or is it more like phone carriers?
“They are allowed to limit the flow of material if they so choose. But, that is also on the uaction rights of the service when they applied for the sale of the spectrum from .gov. Second, you shouldn’t be a subscriber of a service that would do that. It’s your stake in the market to look at what the provider would do. Just as in the past people would actually be interested in Banks and their prospectives. This was all before FDIC.”
I cannot tell from your answer if you are referring to phone carriers, email providers, banks, etc. when saying property owners have the right to control speech. If you are saying that phone carriers should be able to censor the content of text messages based on the political ideology of the executives or employees, then you are pretty much going out on a limb and sawing it off. If every contract, service, relationship, entity has the power to regulate speech, then there is no free speech.
It is very ironic that you cite the purchase of spectrums from the government. How exactly did the government get to own spectrums? For someone who has staked a position entirely on the principle of property ownership, you’ve sure gummed up your own argument.
We have a lot of law dedicated to real property, for example. Most real property has easements to allow access to utilities. This is an infringement on your property rights. But it a legal infringement because the government sanctions it, because it is necessary in order to make utilities available to the public. You are supposed to be fairly compensated for this infringement on your property rights. In the 80s Congress added cable television to the list of those who could come on your private property to install cable lines. In exchange for taking some of your property rights they gave you... Public Access TV stations, which the cable companies must make available.
If you own real property, you have the right to the airwaves on and above your property. The problem is that using these airwaves for most frequencies and power levels will necessarily spill over onto other people’s property. So Congress taking “ownership” of the airwaves is depriving you of some of your natural rights as a property owner. What do you get in return?
When you drill down and explore the issue we are debating, you will find that Congress ALREADY regulates sites like Facebook. It ALREADY has Constitutional authority to do so. But you say we have too many laws, but whatever laws we have are sufficient, so just sue if any are broken. Sorry, but your easy answers do not resolve a real world problem.
Facebook and other Internet giants are engaging in political censorship. They are doing it in a dishonest, though possibly not illegal manner. Your solution is essentially to take your marbles and go home. I say we must fight. Facebook should not have the right to market itself as a means of connecting and communicating with everyone, solicit personal information, and then sell access to that information as a commodity, and then limit free speech on their platform.
The thing you are failing to grasp is that we are discussing the regulation of a multi-billion-dollar multi-national corporation. This is more akin to making foreign policy and negotiating international treaties than it is regulating small businesses. Facebook has a larger trade volume than the GDP of many nations.
The protection of free speech AND the protection of property rights (especially real property and possessions, as opposed to intellectual property which is arbitrary) are both essential. But protecting and preserving them does not allow us to stick our heads in the sand, retreat to an Amish lifestyle, or apply cookie cutter formulas to complex situations.
I do not disagree with your concern for protecting property rights or the right of Jimrob to control the content of the website he owns.
What I disagree with is treating this as the ONLY concern. Free speech is being trampled upon. It is the duty of our federal government to adjust federal laws and regulations, and use its enforcement powers, to be sure this situation is remedied.
This is not a “big government” solution. It is the practical reality that some government is necessary and has a job to do. I believe in the conservative principle of limited government. But the “property” rights you are defending are ones arbitrarily created by our government. It is up to our government to address the situation.