Fixing our broken internet

Posted Oct 8, 2020 17:43 UTC (Thu) by ecree (guest, #95790)
In reply to: Fixing our broken internet by kleptog
Parent article: Fixing our broken internet

> Child labour wasn't abolished because people grew a conscience, it was because the government said children should go to school and enforced it.

That's historically inaccurate. Legislating against child labour only became politically possible once it had already become rare for economic reasons.

Similarly, if given the power to regulate the web, governments will use it to benefit their cronies, not the people.

So while a perfect unincentivised philosopher-king might be able to enforce the changes you desire, 'real existing government' won't.

Fixing our broken internet

Posted Oct 9, 2020 7:52 UTC (Fri) by nilsmeyer (guest, #122604) [Link]

> That's historically inaccurate. Legislating against child labour only became politically possible once it had already become rare for economic reasons.

Also children who acquired disabilities from factory labor didn't make for good soldiers when conscripted...

> Similarly, if given the power to regulate the web, governments will use it to benefit their cronies, not the people.

The cynic in me would agree. If Facebook or Google were European companies we probably wouldn't have as stringent privacy laws.