The "idea that these providers are simply neutral carriers of content" is a false premise, isn't it?
The piece you link is ... weird. First, it doesn't really describe the problem it's trying to solve. Then it presents some very vague policy prescriptions like "site[s] should be regulated by sector-specific rules that apply to that particular line of business".
There’s probably better writing on this by Matt Stoller that’s just the first thing I found.
A core premise of this argument is that 230 is bizzare exception to pretty clear core rules that we typically have on things like libel and product liability.
There’s just absolutely no argument at this point that these platforms are fundamentally consequential commercial enterprises. The create products, and profit from them, and those products and and do hurt people and cause horrible effects, but this law designed to preserve free speech utterly insulates them from any consequences of their profit making enterprise.
It’s just bizarre. Like the Washington Post can be sued for publishing content that’s harming people and wrong, but Google can’t?
If my kids are exposed to pedophiles every time they go to Chuck E Cheese, and they know about it and don’t do anything I can sure as hell can sue them. But not if it happens on Instagram? Why?
Any article published by the Washington Post is written by agents of their company, and that's why they are the responsible entity. Should you be able to sue every newsstand in your local city if they are selling a newspaper that defames you? After all, those newsstands are profiting from the sale of libelous content...
Is this person a lawful agent of a legitimate government? Is the ice cream policy reasonably connected to some compelling government interest, like public health?
I don't think that's a fair reading. At most, the piece describes a common political rant, and then says "Phrased that way, it sounds almost fantastically unjust. And… it’s complicated."
Your comment, in contrast, strikes me as being much closer to a reflexive political rant than the essay.
The article does acknowledge the existence of real fraud. It distinguishes it from honest errors. It goes on to point out that sometimes institutions (financial and state) sometimes fail to adequately distinguish the two.
Maybe it could have included more on bona fide fraud. But it doesn't contain an assumption that true check fraud is non existent. And it certainly doesn't devolve into any sort of rant.
That's not true. As far as the law is concerned, users/providers are shielded so long as they don't take part in authorship. You be as despotic or biased as you want, and you're still not considered the publisher of content provided by another user/provider.
Further to that, the idea that "if you take moderation far enough you become a publisher" is the situation prior to §230, that §230 was enacted in order to get rid of (so that there would no longer be a disincentive for intermediaries to choose to moderate!).
The piece you link is ... weird. First, it doesn't really describe the problem it's trying to solve. Then it presents some very vague policy prescriptions like "site[s] should be regulated by sector-specific rules that apply to that particular line of business".