We don't need a free speech platform. People need a choice as to how the content they see is moderated. That's what forums used to do, until we collectively decided to just put all the forums on Facebook or Twitter rather than having separate forums for each interest.
Everyone thinking "we need free speech on Twitter" has lost the plot, and, as you mentioned, the revealed preference of people who claim they want free speech is actually toward heavier moderation (but moderation they like).
Most of them go on Twitter for one kind of content, and on Parler or "Truth" Social for another kind, and they don't really want the streams to cross. We used to have this in the 90's and early 2000's. The question is how to get it back.
How about we just go back to not using one big central social communication platform and go back to the spirit of using separate independently owned forums, chatrooms and websites for our little niches and communities to prevent this issue.
Why are we concerned with people saying horrible things per se, and not with the fact that the horrible things are amplified on a Twitter platform? In the conversation above, the smaller forums idea lets people go where they want. If you wander into an offensive place and you get offended, that becomes on-you, and then we do away with the complaint about Twitter promoting the bad and people getting offended inadvertently.
The idea of chasing after evil ideas is flawed from the outset.
It's not new, either, which is why this very long hacker news thread bothers me. I usually like to wade on on these topics more extensively, but here the entirety of the population is applauding free speech being a shitty idea, without any historical conversation.
Oh and it's incredibly US centric. Freedom of speech is a principle that was discussed in the Enlightenment and beyond, and fought for (first against religious authorities in ancient times, then against religious authorities in the 20th century). It happens to exist in the 1st amendment as a government limitation, but as a principle and a moral it is well beyond that.
"How about we just go back to not using one big central social communication platform and go back to the spirit of using separate independently owned forums, chatrooms and websites for our little niches and communities to prevent this issue"
Regardless of what the issue is how would being on a smaller forum prevent this?
And? People are allowed to say horrible things. I can join the forum with none of the stuff I deem "horrible", you join the forum with none of the stuff you deem "horrible", everybody is happy!
The tragedy of the commons happened. The old situation had a few fatal flaws (mostly discoverability) that meant that new entrants could take almost all the oxygen out of forums by having a weird form of "mass appeal." It worked for a while, but the cracks are starting to show.
Unfortunately, I doubt that we can put the cat back in the bag.
Twitter et al should allow users to choose their own third-party moderators and feed sort. Kind of like choosing your preferred ad blocker. That way everyone can see their preferred curation.
Everyone thinking "we need free speech on Twitter" has lost the plot, and, as you mentioned, the revealed preference of people who claim they want free speech is actually toward heavier moderation (but moderation they like).
Most of them go on Twitter for one kind of content, and on Parler or "Truth" Social for another kind, and they don't really want the streams to cross. We used to have this in the 90's and early 2000's. The question is how to get it back.