I'm very sympathetic to looking at social media as a public utility (like broadband). And I'm normally a filthy "yay big government do all the things" social democrat. But, you know, maybe we should consider what happens if that government becomes authoritarian?

@nev I grew up in the era when telecoms companies in Europe were nearly all nationalised.

Although major restriction/censorship was rare, there was stronger control over all comms/broadcasting, acceptable content varied wildly across countries, what litle "social media" existed (Viewdata) was often premium priced and highly controlled (other than Minitel France, an outlier)

Attempts to unite the networks Europe wide in 1980s were abandoned due to differing priorities of nation states.

@nev
It's like: You're so concerned about FSB manipulation of Facebook that you want to turn Facebook into VKontakte? That's like the opposite of the solution to that problem.

(On the other hand, I am totally in favor of forcing social network sites to be registered non-profits and put their IP in the public domain, as though they were part of the state.)

@enkiv2 I think the non-profit sector has its own problems too...but for-profit is far worse

@nev This is exactly why I've felt more friendly to community or cooperative solutions to these problems than solutions that involve nationalization. I mean, I was generally pro- cooperative and federated bottom-up community councils to begin with, but this is an area where this seems ESPECIALLY crucial. Since we're fleshy and have basic material requirements, we sometimes forget but INFORMATION is just as if not more important. That's how you KNOW how to get what you need.

@nev

I'm a member of social democratic party, I share the concern. Few thoughts on it:

DEMOCRATIC ACCOUNTABILITY

EU didn't continue to expand democracy beyond European parliament. Social democrats should push for:
* Local participatory budgeting in areas hurt by globalization.
* Have elected president of EU.

TRANSPARENCY

Social democrats in EU have enacted whistle-blower protection and pharma research transparency. More needs to be done, especially with:
* Open source.
* Tax avoidance.

@LeoSammallahti @nev
> More needs to be done, especially with:
* Open source.

- THIS! There should be an continent-wide effort to bring open source to the wider public (I mean, Linux is a European product, after all...)

@nev
I don’t understand why that line of reasoning isn’t applied to all government services. An authoritarian govt running health care can literally kill people ( see the recent events in the U.K.) Why is a theorized national social network where this starts to become a problem?

@sailor_andy that's a good question! I would say that the difference is that if we nationalized a social media platform now, we can be fairly sure the US government would immediately use it to oppress and control people, that the president would use the opportunity to enrich his own companies or cronies, etc. This has not been the case with socialized medicine, generally.

Healthcare is also a basic human right, like clean water and housing. I'm not sure social media is quite as fundamental.

@sailor_andy (I wouldn't call the UK authoritarian either. Both there and here in Ontario, healthcare crises are more likely to be the result of the government getting *out* of health, or reducing public benefits.)

@nev The UK has had two very recent high profile cases of letting children die. And it has certainly been the case that socialized medicine has been used to enrich cronies.

It seems odd to me to say that there is a line of decency about which authoritarians refuse to cross when it comes to abusing power. History tells us no such line exists.

@sailor_andy I guess...I've been thinking about this off and on today!

I guess everyone has to find a middle ground between "I will do whatever the government says they are always right" and "paranoid prepper living in the woods".

For me, as a Canadian, I think the benefits of socialized medicine substantially outweigh the risks that it could be used for evil in the future. The American system is infinitely more cruel

@nev

No doubt the American system is broken, but it is increasingly evident that is because of govt and not in spite of govt.

I am somewhat confused by the notion coming from the center-left that to shun govt means to be an isolated hermit. Cities and society existed long before the rise of big govt. Is it really that hard to imagine a more self-organizing society?

@sailor_andy I think we might be on somewhat different pages

@nev

Also... thanks for the honest discussion.

@dtluna no just canada

@dtluna a majority of my fellow Canadians feel that people being able to easily buy and carry around guns makes it extremely likely our right to be alive will be violated, which seems to be borne out by statistics

I don't know much about political science but I mean "authoritarian" in the sense of "all-powerful, unaccountable, undemocratic regime". Like countries where there are "elections" where the ruling party always gets 99% of the vote and journalists get disappeared.

@dtluna I support disarming and hopefully dismantling the police one day, have a nice day buddy

@dtluna (I'm also not a "bro", the Mountie death squads are now coming for you, hope you have a machine gun)

@nev Let’s *socialize* them instead. Ownership by the users, not the state.

@nev Where are all these progressives calling to nationalize Facebook and Twitter?