Well, we know which side the government is on then.

"You're censoring our billionaires' freedom to addict your people, psychologically damage your children, promote climate skepticism, spread lies, motivate people to lynch others"

Serious violation!

Yes.

Most Australians dislike social media. We are underrepresented on it, and it shovels the US’s issues down our throat. The current algorithms mainly send us US political propaganda and things that are supposed to make us hate nearby Asian powers like China.

It’s a good question, and it’s not well defined. I am hoping that it allows us to customise feeds more. If I have problems with body image, don’t show me topless photos. Same goes with alcohol and gambling, which some platforms do have. The answer must not be either be subjected to content you don’t want to see or don’t use social media at all.

I think the line for algorithms is anything machine learning or neural network based, not simple ordering.

Side note: When iterating on male avatars, ChatGPT incrementally increases muscular features without being prompted to do so. There are biases in these machine-learned algorithms.

What about an algorithm that was optimized the present the user with content they would find interesting? That doesn't sound so bad on the surface.

If only we had 20+ years of scientific and societal evidence to show that regardless of what you think is "on the surface", the effects are catastrophic to mental health, democracy, the concept of truth, and everything else.

What is an "algorithm"?

To you and me it's a very wide category, and there may be hundreds or thousands or even millions involved in me simply typing this, it being saved somewhere and the served back to you.

For lay-people though, it's become a term which means "The thing which measures your preferences and usage patterns then decides what to show you". So for lay-people to want to turn off the algorithm, they tend to mean going back to "just what your friends posted, in order"

When does an algorithm become harmful?

I think this is a research subject. AFAICT it's pretty certain now that social media 'algorithms' have been optimised for addictiveness, which is likely to overlap somewhat with what users find interesting, but also cover things they find mildly titillating and/or outrageous.

The harms come in a bunch of forms. The never-ending scrolling of bite-sized videos seems massively destructive to attention span, and people seem to get addicted to it and may neglect other parts of their life. The platforms also seem really keen to send men and boys off to pretty hateful 'manosphere' content which is apparently making life hell for women (including teachers of teenage boys). Then we have all the body-image and anxiety issues caused in teenagers constantly exposed to influencers showing off their (faked) wealth, beauty etc.

Switching off the "shoving this all in your face" part of social media seems to me to be a win. When it was actually a way to keep in touch with friends and family it was a different game.

I'm sure the final law will outline the specific details. But the intent of the law is not algorithms in a computer science definition, but modern recommendation engines.

Showing a chronological feed of accounts you have followed in this case would be non algorithmic. This is how all social media worked before the modern hellscape we are in.

Wonder if they'll ever stop to take a look in the mirror every once in a while

Country that is the reason that globally we can't have breasts on social media, even in completely non-sexual contexts, complains about "censorship" from a country that wants to avoid melting its childrens' brains.

From my cursory look at this last night, the US doesn't like that the definition of "harm" is so poorly defined. They either don't care about the broader concept of opting out of an algorithmic feed or aren't willing to criticise it.

I've been disappointed by the coverage because none of it has helped me understand the legal context behind why they don't like this one specific thing.

The Right/Republicans have always touted free speech.

The Left have always been a bit more 'censory'

Not "always", and not even now. It's always contingent and situational. Same goes for nearly every clause in the Bill of Rights.

At various points the left has been associated with the fights against obscenity laws, against Cold War loyalty oaths, against blacklisting, against bans of books.

At various points the right has been associated with the fights against desecration of the American flag, against the teaching of human evolution in schools, against depictions of sex in media, against anti-war demonstrations.

I don't think moving them would be necessary, but moving them 30 miles into what is currently Israel proper is far from a genocide.

Unless you think all of Israel would cease to exist or something, but that's not the stakes here at all.

... right wing freedom of speech is defined with a simple rule.

you're allowed to say anything you want as long as bari weiss determines that you are sufficiently zionist and wont say anything that isnt zionist enough

What on earth is centre-right about the ALP? Its essentally Fabian at this point.

I think you meant to say: We intended on electing a central-left government, and got a far-left Fabian government.

You got exactly what you voted for. The left is pro censorship now. From political correctness to deplatforming, to right speech to labeling things misinformation to forgetting my body my choice when Covid came along. This is the natural end of wokism.

Thanks. Reading it at first seemed like “the people” here is you know, end users, people toggle some settings on their devices, not a government employee deciding. It turns out a government employee doing it. Yeah, just because US government is goofy doesn’t somehow make others sane or good.

Can you elaborate how this might be different than laws in Germany that disallow certain speech around white supremacy? Or laws that disallow violent rhetoric?

So, would you then have to submit to forced breeding programs?

Which would play into all sorts of agendas.

Brilliant move by the Australian Government to combine the algorithm opt-out with other restrictions. All the headlines are just about opt-out, and the assumption is the US is complaining about opt-out and claiming it is censorship. I suspect the actual claim of censorship is about putting the "onus on platforms to stop harmful content, such as illegal pornography and videos promoting disordered eating, from being shared" (from another BBC article, and similar in AU news sources). I expect manosphere stuff and maybe Nazi will end up in there too, or added later once laws are in place.

As an Australian, I disagree and look forward to opting out.

Also, I’m not proud of this but Australia has no explicit constitutional right to free speech, and no bill of rights at the federal level AFAIK.

This article is conflating two things. The US response to the Digital Duty of Care law and the US response to the algorithm opt-out provision.

The US did criticize the opt out provision.

But when the US says this, its about a different provision in DDC, which says platforms need to proactively remove harmful content.

"We ask that Australia clarify how exactly 'harm' and 'risks' shall be determined... ensuring these definitions do not encroach on protected speech," the US said in its submission.

I'm sure the Australian people will be devastated at the loss of the Instagram algorithmic feed.

Isn't it all? But oh it's the greatest show on Earth.

The other day I opened my instagram and was presented with a few frames of a big hairy vagina in my explore feed.

I don’t find this “harmful” but it’s not what I expect the algorithm to show me when I literally open instagram to find out about local events and sudden changes in cafe open hours in my area.

I really hate the way meta and other social media companies have injected themselves into our communities and then sent us all insane and set us against each other using algorithms.

By government curated, you mean business curated, no doubt.

Some doubt, actually. From the Guardian's reporting:

Under the plan – dubbed “my feed, my way” – users opting out of the algorithm will see content only from individuals and groups they have actively chosen to follow.

Users would be asked what they want their default feed to be through a pop-up message provided on their platform of choice.

Freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom of reach. It never meant you got to commandeer someone else’s printing press, TV network, or website.

Australia doesn't have protected speech. We're starting to see the dam break where rules that were left unexplored because it would go against the US driven view of globalization is starting to wane due to the US's loss (self destruction?) of its soft power.

In a rare submission to the proposed laws, the US embassy in Canberra said it had "serious concerns[...] "We ask that Australia clarify how exactly 'harm' and 'risks' shall be determined"

is this like one of those "isn't there someone you forgot to ask" memes? Why is the US embassy making submissions to proposed laws in Australia? The day cannot come soon enough when the last country tells the US to voice its concerns somewhere else

US bloviates - world shrugs.