Two Supreme Court cases that could break the internet
Two cases that could break Big Tech&#x27;s hold on the internet.<p>These cases are not going to stop anyone from publishing their own content via internet, but they might affect Big Tech intermediaries that publish only other people&#x27;s content and produce no content themselves.<p>These cases will not stop traditional media organisations that employ journalists from fact-checking and publishing the content they produce.<p>Even if these cases are decided favourably to the defendants, &quot;tech&quot; companies will continue to publish low quality, low-brow, incendiary, false, &quot;clickbait&quot; content.  That is what gets eyeballs.  Section 230 is not incentivising them to moderate, as it was intended.  Advertising is incentivising them to allow anything that garners more views and &quot;engagement&quot;.  Section 230 is only providing them with immunity from all manner of litigation around <i>any</i> moderation.  There is no incentive to fact-check anything.  Even &quot;recommending&quot; terrorrist group videos is apprently fair game.<p>If they have zero obligation to moderate and no incentive to fact-check, because they have immunity under 230, i.e., Google wins against Gonzalez, then they can grow their once modest websites to gigantic, overpowering size, with a disproportionate amount of influence on the open web.^1<p>Reframing the situation, the gigantic websites now call themselves &quot;platforms&quot;, sharecroppers and serfs are &quot;publishers&quot; and &quot;creators&quot;.<p>Grab a stake in the &quot;Metaverse&quot;.<p>You cannot break something that is already broken.<p>1.  For Big Tech this web feudalism is the Holy Grail.  Grow the audience size and reap the advertising revenue.  Obviously any proposed change, an improved interpretation of Section 230, that could threaten this status quo is unacceptable to them.  But they are not the majority of web users.  Was the web created so that a few websites could control the majority of traffic.  In their view, yes.  That is the only way the web can operate. How convenient.