Balancing Freedom of Speech with User Safety on Social Media

1. Ethical Principles

1.1. ACM Code 1.1: Contribute to society and to human well-being,all people are stakeholders.

1.2. ACS Code 1.2.1: The Primacy of the Public Interest

2. The Dilemma

2.1. Safeguarding freedom of speech

2.1.1. Following guidelines provided by the government

2.2. Protecting users from hate speech & misinformation

2.2.1. Collecting the information from trusted articles and websites

3. Effects of Misinformation

3.1. Media Biases and Influences

3.1.1. Geopolitical Media Biases

3.1.1.1. Palestine-Israel conflict

3.1.1.2. Cold War

3.1.1.3. Depictions of Africa

3.1.2. Economic Influences

3.1.2.1. Stock market manipulation

3.1.2.2. Business owner censorship

3.2. Information Control

3.2.1. Censorship vs. Moderation

3.2.1.1. Donald Trump's Ban on Social Media

3.2.1.2. China's "Great Firewall"

3.2.1.3. Alex Jones and InfoWars Ban

3.2.2. Echo Chambers and Filter Bubbles

3.2.2.1. Echochambering

3.2.2.2. Propaganding

3.3. Misinformation and Fake News

3.3.1. COVID-19 Misinformation

3.3.2. Climate Change Denial

3.3.3. Terra Nullius

4. Stakeholders

4.1. Social Media Platforms

4.1.1. company owner

4.1.2. Content Moderator

4.1.3. IT team

4.2. Users

4.2.1. Content Creator

4.2.2. General User

4.3. Government and regulatory

4.3.1. Government

4.3.2. Court and legal system

5. Ethical Concerns

5.1. Profit over Safety

5.1.1. Facebook sells data to Cambridge for political gambling

5.2. Tech companies shaping the public sphere

5.2.1. Instagram,Tiktok,Twitter...addicting more public than ever

5.3. Regulatory scrutiny

5.3.1. Constant attention to privacy policies and upgrades are required

5.4. Real-world implications of online content

5.4.1. Social and Psychological effects on users

6. Content Moderation

6.1. Community guidelines

6.1.1. Defining Acceptable content

6.1.2. Promot Safety

6.1.3. Consequences for Violations

6.2. Efficacy

6.2.1. Maintain user safety

6.2.2. Prevent disinformation

6.2.3. Protect User

6.2.4. Enhance user experience

6.3. Challenges

6.3.1. Bias and Discrimination

6.3.2. User-Generated Workarounds

6.3.3. Resource Constraints

6.4. User reports

6.4.1. Human Judgement

6.4.2. Contextual understanding

6.5. Automated system

6.5.1. 24/7 Availability

6.5.2. Rapid Response

7. Social Media and Freedom of Speech

8. Solutions & Recommendations

8.1. Stricter content moderation

8.2. User education

8.3. Transparency reports

8.4. Community Rules & Member Responsibilities Announcement

8.5. Users Reporting Mechainsm

8.6. Penalty Mechanism

8.6.1. Muting & Blacklist