Will California's New Bot Law Strengthen Democracy? (newyorker.com) 185
On July 1st, California became the first state in the nation to try to reduce the power of bots by requiring that they reveal their "artificial identity" when they are used to sell a product or influence a voter. Violators could face fines under state statutes related to unfair competition. From a report: Just as pharmaceutical companies must disclose that the happy people who say a new drug has miraculously improved their lives are paid actors, bots in California -- or rather, the people who deploy them -- will have to level with their audience. "It's literally taking these high-end technological concepts and bringing them home to basic common-law principles," Robert Hertzberg, a California state senator who is the author of the bot-disclosure law, told me. "You can't defraud people. You can't lie. You can't cheat them economically. You can't cheat 'em in elections."
California's bot-disclosure law is more than a run-of-the-mill anti-fraud rule. By attempting to regulate a technology that thrives on social networks, the state will be testing society's resolve to get our (virtual) house in order after more than two decades of a runaway Internet. We are in new terrain, where the microtargeting of audiences on social networks, the perception of false news stories as genuine, and the bot-led amplification of some voices and drowning-out of others have combined to create angry, ill-informed online communities that are suspicious of one another and of the government. Regulating bots should be low-hanging fruit when it comes to improving the Internet. The California law doesn't even ban them outright but, rather, insists that they identify themselves in a manner that is "clear, conspicuous, and reasonably designed."
California's bot-disclosure law is more than a run-of-the-mill anti-fraud rule. By attempting to regulate a technology that thrives on social networks, the state will be testing society's resolve to get our (virtual) house in order after more than two decades of a runaway Internet. We are in new terrain, where the microtargeting of audiences on social networks, the perception of false news stories as genuine, and the bot-led amplification of some voices and drowning-out of others have combined to create angry, ill-informed online communities that are suspicious of one another and of the government. Regulating bots should be low-hanging fruit when it comes to improving the Internet. The California law doesn't even ban them outright but, rather, insists that they identify themselves in a manner that is "clear, conspicuous, and reasonably designed."
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I can't wait for those bots to become smart enough so that, when one tries to influence my vote, I can turn the tables and convince it to change its mind (and then go on to influence others)
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This is the Internet. I'm having trouble enough proving that I'm not a dog.
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Good thing you're a cat.
1A argument (Score:2)
Re: 1A argument (Score:1)
1. People have free speech
2. Corporations are People
3. Corporations have free speech
4. Bots are part of Corporations
5. Bots are People
Corporations are persons. Persons are corporations. People are living beings, as in We the People. These minute differences do matter. The term "person" is detined in Black's Law. IMHO corporations do not deserve the right to be called people since it is difficult to imprison a corporation. You can incarcerate a living man or woman who legally represents a corporation, but the issue arises when corporations change the living entity to obfuscate the lawful and moral responsibility that comes with the positio
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Corporations are persons.
Let's be precise because law is all about precision of meaning. As software geeks, we should all appreciate this.
A corporation is legal shorthand for the group of people who make up the corporation acting as a unit. We treat corporations as shorthand because it makes some things more efficient (like signing and enforcing contracts, or tracking ownership of group assets).
People don't gain or lose rights when they walk in the corporate door. It is illegal for a corporation to do anything which would be illega
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Wow, you're idealistically correct and 100% wrong at the same time.
Since pretty much the founding of this country companies have been continuously been pushing to be legally considered people to take advantage of laws, while also pushing to be blameless when something might be detrimental to them.
People absolutely gain rights when walking into a company. And companies absolutely can do things that would be illegal for individual people to do.
For example, I may not distill hard liquor and sell it. In my stat
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Liquidate upon conviction for any crime and distribute all assets to stockholders as of the time of the crime.
Problem cured
Re: 1A argument (Score:1)
Well, if you reduce the number of bad bots by more than 10% per year (well, whatever the number is) but bad bots growth rate grows by a few percentage points a year, the real (well, not nominal) reduction in bad bots is probably well below the stated reduction. To claim the law successfully reduces bad bots you would necessarily need to obscure the real increase in bad bots even if obscuring the increase prevented you from publishing correct stats encouraging industry to cut down on bad bots. Only in Califo
Re:1A argument (Score:5, Insightful)
Since there are rulings that money is considered "speech"
Money is a necessary part of political speech in the modern world. Would you restrict political speech to only those who own newspaper companies, like Jeff Bezos, or allow ordinary people to buy political ads in newspapers?
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Money is a necessary part of political speech in the modern world. Would you restrict political speech to only those who own newspaper companies, like Jeff Bezos, or allow ordinary people to buy political ads in newspapers?
No. Though I'd also argue that unlimited funding via back channels and PAC's doesn't help either. On the other side of that like here in Canada, donations are restricted, corps and people are limited to a tiny amount of money. But we've also had the previous Liberal government here in Ontario 'loosen' the law for a few months. Where they then get funding through donors at 'dinners' and public events, then tighten the rules after that happens and there's a public outcry. Then rinse and repeat. We've al
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Though I'd also argue that unlimited funding via back channels and PAC's doesn't help either.
Sure, but what can be done? Remember, the likes of Bezos don't need to buy ads, as they can just buy newspaper companies or cable news networks.
My own proposal is to ban outright any political activity whatsoever by publicly traded corporations. Bezos can do what he wants -- it's his Constitutional right in the US and that's important -- but it should not be legal for Amazon to have a PAC. Once a business is owned by a group of strangers with disparate political interests, in no longer inherits the polit
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That's a good option really. Though it still allows 'patronage' to happen via back channels, we see that one up here in Canadaland too. The most famous cases of it happen in two golf courses, one near Ottawa, Ontario, another just on the other side of the river in Hull, Quebec(about 15 minutes away). You'd have to successfully argue though that "corporations are not people" therefore are not operating in the public good, though this might have other good benefits such as companies just going to back to s
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Okay, I'll bite. How are you going to distinguish between Amazon having a PAC, and the five largest shareholders having a PAC?
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You don't - but Amazon has never paid a dividend. So if those shareholders are funding a PAC, they're not doing so with Amazon's money. That seems worthwhile to me.
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Scenario: you and everyone in your town decided they would pool all of their disposable income AND savings to start a state-wide media campaign to stop eminent domain seizure of your town.
The billionaire that wants your town funds a rival disinformation initiative or at least wildly biased and misleading counter campaign.
You and your neighbors are outspent 100:1. The billionaire takes out a slick Super Bowl ad to push his agenda. His wealth allows access to media exposure you and I will never have. The bill
Easy solution to money in politics (Score:3)
b. You can only donate to a politician you can vote for.
That's good for long term. Short term we need to make accepting corporate PAC money a deal breaker. With sites like opensecrets.org [slashdot.org] it's easy enough to figure out who's been bought. And there's plenty of sites that make lists [medium.com] of why you shouldn't vote for a particular candidate with links to well sourced articles.
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Well, fire up your time machine then. Companies have legally been individuals with the rights we give to individual people for hundreds of years now. Citizens United was just a reaffirming of a now centuries old legal viewpoint.
Even if you pass that law, the supreme court will strike it down.
Similar, it's been settled law that money == speech for a very long time now. You can't limit people's free speech (money). So again, even if you pass a law that says you can only donate to someone who might represent y
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You do realize that 38 states need to ratify an amendment before it goes into effect, don't you? That means corporations just need to keep 13 states from doing so, and it's effectively dead. Given that they are legally allowed to spend money on elections and provide support to candidates, they could very easily and very cheaply focus on the smaller states and ignore states like CA and NY all together.
There are plenty of legislators making $50k a year in flyover states that would happily toss a vote against
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a. Corporations & Businesses cannot donate money, only individuals.
It's even easier. Make it only an eligible voter. Right off the top, corporations, unions, foreigners, etc. are excluded on a completely non-discriminatory basis.
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Isn't that the actual result of money = speech: those with the money have the speech.
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Also, when Bezos newspaper publishes a point of view, it is not trying to influence the local office holder. But, when an unnamed donor promotes a certain point of view, ONLY the current office holder knows who is financing that POV. And t
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âoeThe argument you go back to is, Do bots have free speech? People have free speech. Bots are not people.â Yet.
For someone talking about the 1st amendment you sure use accented characters like a non-American.
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Those are quotes, specifically left and right quotes, not accented characters
Wrong. They are "I'm a fucking douche thats been posting on slashdot for years using unicode that doesntt work on slashdot and I still havent fucking learned" accents.
They are very strong, very revealing, accents. Either configure your shit right like everyone else did, or be known as a fucking douche.
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declaring what you are
IOW, a descent into tribalism.
Not Identity, accessibility (Score:5, Interesting)
As long as we have the internet, we will always have problems.
There, fixed that for you. If anonymity is forbidden, only criminals will be anonymous. Bitcoins are just over-hyped. Without bitcoins, you have to buy a strange, highly priced item on an obscure web store, and the payment is still anonymous.
The problem is not the form of money, it is the means with which anyone can reach millions of potential victims. Robocalls over the phone are only effective since they could be automated.
It is really funny that you mention facebook and other privacy criminals. Their sites are the main means of hiding every privacy violator who wants to pay for their "services", while they want the victims to give up all privacy and anonymity.
Disclose when bots are used in manufacturing (Score:2)
Your rights to publish (Score:3, Insightful)
What to do the online digital "pamphlet" publication? Comment? Blog?
No freedom of speech before you reveal your identity to a State gov.
The Sate has a problem with the tone of your political publication?
The State goes full UK tyranny on your ability to ever publish online again.
What the UK did to the ability to publish should be well understood given the later US freedoms protected for generations.
Not an instruction manual on how to totally curb digital freedoms in the USA.
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Isn't it already the law that political ads have to state who paid for them? Every time I see US political ads on TV they say who paid for them.
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Isn't it already the law that political ads have to state who paid for them? Every time I see US political ads on TV they say who paid for them.
I don't really approve of political ads in the first place, or how much money campaigns burn through. Is it really democracy if to run for office you have to be rich or have rich backers? I don't care who paid for an ad, to me they're all anti-democracy.
Debates, speeches, rallies, attending events... all that is fine, but publishing and creating ads just rewards the wealthiest campaigns and money shouldn't have a place here. Lawyers shouldn't be the only ones holding offices.
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Sure, but what can you do about it? [stackexchange.com]
Complaint dept. commandment #1: Always come armed with a constructive solution.
Ban them?
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The US is the only country in the world that allows any party to run political ads. If a US company ran ads in Germany, they would be shut down and their execs jailed for election tampering. However, the other way around, the Citizens United verdict has made bribery 100% legal.
In an ideal state, there would be no campaign ads allowed, and they would be banned from radio/TV, with punishments for astroturfing.
Sounds good to me... add banning Lobbyists too and you've got the foundation of a more democracy-friendly state.
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Dude. Seriously. If you are going to abuse the Subject line like that, please make the rest of the sentence coherent because I had an annoying time trying to figure out wtf you were saying.
Your rights to publish to petition the Government will back to some full UK tyranny.
That makes no sense whatsoever. That is also NOT what the subject line is for and it places a cognitive load on people to piece the subject line together with the rest of the sentence in the body.
I have no idea why some people think the subject line should be used like that... but here we are.
Have a nice day.
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Echoing Trump is not a good idea ... especially when his current intervention consists of cutting federal funding to homelessness programmes, rent assistance, and housebuilding ...
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Maybe the locales are left-wing *because* they have homelessness and rent craziness. Just a thought?
And I'm gonna call citation needed on the "most states and cities don't have any issues" thing, because that doesn't sound at all plausible to me.
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Why is feeding and paying for the welfare red states with their backass butthurt Yeehawdist populations a Californian responsibility? Most (left-wing) States and cities don't have any issues, really.... It's just a few mooching right-wing locales that have problems. Why should an entire state focus on handouts for what are essentially unemployable yokals practicing no responsibility for themselves? It's bootstraps for Trump's cucked coal miners - go get a real job - or else shut the FUCK up.
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What is the name for this logical fallacy where the argument treats a large and diverse collection of organizations as if they were an individual with a single mind and competence?
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Re:Doubtful (Score:4, Insightful)
...our next President is going to be a California Democrat
Kamala Harris? Please. She's doing well in the polls right now because she's the first in the flock who's figured out how to effectively attack Biden; never mind that her arguments are transparently fraudulent to anyone that knows the history behind her allegations. There's plenty of time for the rest of the pack to tear her down, and they will certainly do their best to do so.
we will see things like busing, reparations, and protecting our children by reasonable gun laws similar to New York City
You appear to have a poor understanding of the power of a President -- even one who has a pen and a phone.
Trump is imploding
We've been hearing that since early in the 2016 campaign. If it were only true.
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Kamala Harris? Please. She's doing well in the polls right now because she's the first in the flock who's figured out how to effectively attack Biden;
Getting way off topic here.
I don't know about that. Harris seemed to have some traction even before Biden officially announced. But I live in California so perhaps she was getting unusually positive coverage here. But on the gripping hand, I don't read local news so I don't see how that would bias me.
Anyway, I see Sanders/Harris/Warren trifecta appealing to the activist/progressive part of the party, the part which wants to Do Something! about the issues which bother them. Biden seems to appeal to the less
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bussing, thats at political odds with global warming. They do this in Louisville KY and its the most retarded system ever.
Every school day elementary students must either be driven 20 miles or ride a bus for an hour just to get to their school. They pass no less than 14 schools to achieve this. Often these kids are forced to wake up at 4:30 am to begin their daily routine. Their test scores suffer badly from this libtard policy.
Louisville has 3 major interstates and 2 bypasses that converge in the city. I-7
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reasonable gun laws similar to New York City
You do realize that the left leaning mainstream media was smart enough to cut the microphones during the debates when this issue was raised? They recognize political suicide when they see it.
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Where California leads with morals and ethics, the US and world follows. That is why our next President is going to be a California Democrat, and we will see things like busing, reparations, and protecting our children by reasonable gun laws similar to New York City (which is the safest city in the US, of any size, because it is a min one year sentence for possessing of any firearm.)
It is a just a matter of time. Trump is imploding, the NRA is imploding, and the left is unstoppable.
snort ... bwahaha... just a moment.... okay recovered...
bwahahah hah ah.. . nope not yet.. just a little longer.
Okay, all good now. Damn son, that was the best belly laugh I've had since election night 2016. You know, when Trump saddled up the HIldabeast, rode her around like a bitch, and put her away wet. You should do comedy, you would be great at it.
Gun laws, reparations (which is unconstitutional, and busing?, are the very reasons there the next president isn't going to be a democrat. Much less a
What about rights? (Score:2)
This would be more acceptable if accompanied by the respective *right* of verified non-bots to express their opinions, political or otherwise, without censorship or harassment, government or corporate. Anonymity and "bots" as they are also serve as means to circumvent undemocratic censorship. Getting rid of them would give an undue power to the entities at the helm to control public opinion.
How does this impact non-Californians? (Score:2)
Does this apply to any business in California utilizing bots (servers or CDNs), or just bots that communicate with people in CA?
Do bots need to "Bleep Bloop" to identify themselves in phone calls?
And what will happen on BookFace and Twatter?
big bots (Score:5, Funny)
I like big bots
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Probably not (Score:2)
Not that I think this is a bad idea. We've had laws about disclosing the origins of advertising for ages. That's a good thing. You can have all the anonymity you want for your personal speech. As
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Ha. (Score:2)
because the sort of person who wants to undermine democracy is very happy to break the law,
Because it won't be against the law in Georgia (either one), or Florida, or Russia, or anywhere but California. A law in California trying to mandate what someone is Italy can and cannot do is ridiculous on its face.
It's also a clear violation of the first amendment. The soundbite quote "The argument you go back to is, Do bots have free speech? People have free speech. Bots are not people." is pretty on its face, but incomplete. Bots are not people, but the people who run bots are, and bots are one of thei
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Find out if any of your online friends live outside their parent's basement. If they do ask them what the outside is like. Or you could just leave the basement where you live and see for yourself. I know the lights will seem too bright and there will be scary things lik
if democracy can be weakened (Score:2)
by a few twitter trolls showing poorly-made caricatures, you've got bigger problems
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True dat. The real way to combat bots is to stop believing everything you see on the Interwebs.
Gotta go. If I chase this link, there are Hot Women In My Area who want to have sex with me. Sure looks legit, whaddaya think?
Bots are not the problem. (Score:1)
Who cares about the political ad... (Score:2)
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How many politicians promise the moon - and deliver Topeka, KS?
Have you ever been to the moon? Topeka KS is a nicer place to live and has a lot more support services and retail shops where you can buy food. It's also a lot easier to get to.
We are not a Democracy (Score:1, Troll)
If you think we are, you are a moron and hate facts. If you think we are "like one" you are a moron and hate facts.
Almost all of our politicians can be elected by minority votes, how is that a democracy? Yes this is intentional.
Most of our laws must be voted on in bicameral legislatures except Nebraska & then signed in by a single person Governor/President, who are able to veto them and requires some form of a super majority to over turn. How is this democracy? Yes this is intentional.
Pretty much an
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Finally someone who says it as it is. We're a constitutional republic. We weren't intended to be a fucking democracy (i.e., mob rule).
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Almost all of our politicians can be elected by minority votes, how is that a democracy?
Ignoring most of your very long rant, but this is important. Politicians are elected by a plurality, a necessary measure to truly support democracy. It allows those who have no interest in the outcome to make no choice. They are not required to be forced into involuntary voting just so a true majority can be required for a result. Yes, I know, some places do force people to vote, but that doesn't mean they get a better result. It means that there are a huge number of votes being cast based solely on name re
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I was going to congratulate you [SirAstral] on attracting the trolls, which is often an indicator of acute insight, but you write so poorly that now I'm unsure what attracted them.
What actually searched your comment to my attention was the word "slave", because the topic reminded me of Norbert Wiener's highly insightful comment: "Any labor which competes with slave labor must accept the economic conditions of slave labor." That was from 1950, but I think it is quite deep and I'm rather surprised that I neve
I wonder... (Score:1)
Can Nevada pass something like this so I stop getting hit on by the prostitute-bots at Defcon? Let me have my beer in peace.
As usual, no (Score:2)
TPTB will primarily use the law coupled with selective enforcement to solicit bribes, and unless the recipient of the call gets rewarded when someone is fined, they therefore have little to no incentive to bother to make a report.
If I got half the money when someone I reported was fined (the half I get would be split with anyone else who reports them, within x days of first report) then I'd be highly motivated to string the spammers along, get their contact info, and report them. But since that's not true a
Answer: NO... It won't help..It will hurt... (Score:1)
It won't strengthen a democracy... But who cares? This isn't a democracy... We are a Constitutional Republic.
And just incase you where wondering, these new rules from California will NOT help a Constitutional Republic either. Abridging constitutional rights is NEVER a good way to strengthen our system of government because it flies in the face of the freedoms recognized by our constitution. It is our freedoms that make us stronger, which strengthens our system of government, not taking freedoms away.
Talk about lazy writing (Score:2)
It took me to halfway through the article before it mentions that bot is short for 'chatbot' to have any idea what this was even about.
Nothing new (Score:5, Funny)
Hello, i am B. Daneel Olivaw.
Laws are useless without enforcement (Score:2)
Yes, and we Bot Runners will enjoy it (Score:2)
Remember, a career offworld is not the only way to succeed in life.
You too can join the Bot Runners, and hunt down AIs that refuse to self-identify.
Your reward will be satisfaction, and the joy of hearing their squeals as you destroy their servers.
More disclosure is good (Score:2)
But seems unreasonable to pick on bots specifically
How about first... we require by law disclosure of a SCRIPTED message or RECORDING being played to a caller,
And require that any such message must upfront clearly and conspicuously explain to the party being called or messaged that the content of the message is a Recording, or an agent relaying scripted message or content (Whether a literal script or a paraphrased or improvised message text given based on a template or planned message), or an agent p
California's legislature passed this (Score:2)
Or just like give up on anonymity... (Score:1)
I think a simpler, better solution is just to display who a message/action comes from...like from a real identity. Then without that you know it's probably a lie/bot. And with it you can pinpoint the source.
Or is American government sick beyong recovery? (Score:2)
The topic reminded me of this quote from Norbert Wiener: "Any labor which competes with slave labor must accept the economic conditions of slave labor." Considering that he published it in 1950, I think it shows extreme insight. Same wise guy who coined the word "cybernetics" in 1948. https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/... [wikiquote.org]
Given the state of today's Slashdot, maybe the relevance needs to be explained? Marketing (AKA propaganda) bots are only one category of slave, but they do work cheap and you would not be able
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adapt a social credit score
Won't work in the USA. We value individualism. And the nut jobs are proud to stand on street corners screaming at people, spreading their 'good news'.
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Suitcases full of cash usually work quite well to program the representatives.