Probably the same stick all admins have: the threat of letting the DOJ pursue anti-monopolistic behavior. If they "behave" the DOJ lets them continue in their ways. If they don't they allow the possibility of getting the giants split up.
No, compelled speech falls under free speech. You can kick people off a platform because you disagree with them. They can even demonetize people for perfectly legal activities.
So, legally YouTube is fine, politically things are different.
Precisely, these platforms are settling specifically because this president openly looks to punish and hold grudges and have vendettas against whom he sees, and describes, as his enemies.
This is a matter of Google saying "he can do more than $25M of damage to us if we keep fighting this".
You mean the one in which there were 275 federal agents - some of which who were extremely fit and masked people who broke open windows, urging people to get in. Also hit and shoved away the unmasked protestors who asked them what the hell they were doing ?
People are really living in their own reality these days. Don't know how we get back to any level of sanity when a non-trivial portion of the population is this detached from reality.
Sadly this is also why no matter how corrupt Trump gets, his base won't abandon him. The God Emperor can do no wrong.
"caves" is an odd word choice. The platform banned the president of the united states, libeling him in the process, which feels like a pretty big and harmful deal. I don't want big tech regulating which politicians we're allowed to know about, and I would imagine most people would agree whether it's about a Republican or Democrat.
> If it were true, Google, Meta, and X wouldn't have paid out ~60 million so far.
They paid because they fear that not caving would be worse for them. Lawsuits aren’t cheap, and it’s a common tactic to sue someone to burden them with the costs of fighting it, thus getting them to shut up.
In this case, they also have to feat the possibility of legal repercussions in other ways, such as having business deals deliberately stalled or denied in retaliation, something the Trump administration has made very clear is something they are OK with doing.
Many people have difficulty understanding the difference between a belief and a fact. I.e, you are talking about a belief but talking like it is a fact.
I mean Meta, X, and Google have all paid him out so far.
Why would you think he tried to steal the election? What lead you to this belief? I don't think I know anyone in real life who holds this belief, I genuinely don't know why someone would think this.
I don't want to get too political on HN, but you should know according to the article essentially all of the money went to the government or lawyers, not Trump.
Yeah because we have a fascist fucking government and they are more interested in money than principle.
The effort to have false electors vote for Trump as president in 2020 is extremely documented. What exactly would you call that if not stealing the election?
How do you feel about Google's settlement being a donation to a Trust that's building the "Trump Ballroom"? Helpfully, Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law, has formed a company that handles construction management for event spaces...
