I can't reply to the other responder, but even if these are shopping malls... Those are already acknowledged as common spaces at least in California where most of them are headquartered. Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins, it was held that a shopping mall was not allowed to remove students asking for signatures on a motion.
PruneYards was found not to be significantly harmed by the expressive activity, because the goal of the commercial activity is to sell stuff. But the goal of an online social media platform is to curate a coherent speech product, and allowing people to insert themselves unwanted into that product is a very significant imposition on the platform.
Also no one lives or eats or breathes on Twitter so the notion that they are exercising an online platform the same way they would exercise the park on Main Street does not follow.
Not to mention the fact that the entire point of the town square is that it is a place for discussion of the function of the polis with the citizenry of the polis. Online social media is a place to consume garbage from foreign actors and influencers.
>PruneYards was found not to be significantly harmed by the expressive activity, because the goal of the commercial activity is to sell stuff. But the goal of an online social media platform is to curate a coherent speech product, and allowing people to insert themselves unwanted into that product is a very significant imposition on the platform.
That is true but unrelated to the DeSantis law. The social media companies obviously don't want to kick kids off their platform considering they are a significant portion of their audience.
The DeSantis law states the government is mandating that social media companies ID everybody. This does have precedent though because governments require bars and food marts to ID young people for cigarettes, but it's different because they are not required to ID everybody. I'm not sure they are even required to ID people, they can just be prosecuted for selling cigarettes and alcohol to minors. I think the ID part was just the most convenient way to not get prosecuted.
Of course requiring social media companies to ID everybody will have a massive chilling effect on political discourse. That might be part of the objective or at least a convenient side effect.
It is related. One poster suggested that the online platforms (which are, for a number of reasons previously noted, not town squares) are actually more like shopping malls. Another post noted that shopping malls (in California) can be subject to requirements to allow someone else’s speech in their area of commerce.
But online platforms are not like shopping malls, because online platforms sell advertiser access to a coherent speech product, which is distinct from the sale of goods in ways that profoundly affect first amendment protection of their business.
>But online platforms are not like shopping malls, because online platforms sell advertiser access to a coherent speech product, which is distinct from the sale of goods in ways that profoundly affect first amendment protection of their business.
But the social media companies aren't the ones who want age verification and to kick people off their platforms, the government is. The companies want kids in their audience, kids want to be in their audience, many parents are fine with kids in their audience, it's the government of Florida who wants to ban kids.
Correct me if I'm misunderstanding but you seem to be arguing that social media companies should be allowed to kick people off their platforms, which would trump the individual's free speech. That isn't the issue here.
This discussion has gotten a bit convoluted. I apologize for not being clear. Original idea was that the government can’t kick every kid off social media because social media is the public square and kicking people out of the public square is wrong.
The reason why this argument is bad is that online social media platforms aren’t the public square. They’re not the public square because they are something else: a coherent speech product.
They are allowed to kick people off because they produce a coherent speech product.
But you are right, the fact that they are allowed to kick people off is not directly related to the fact the government wants to bar kids from using these sites.
Are you and I in full agreement now? I think we might be.
>the government can’t kick every kid off social media because social media is the public square and kicking people out of the public square is wrong.
I think kicking kids off isn't the primary complaint. I think that to enforce kicking kids off requires social media platforms to ID everyone to ensure they aren't kids. That's the chilling effect. Fewer people will post their true feelings (good or bad), which lessens citizen discourse (which IMO is bad).
>They’re not the public square because they are something else: a coherent speech product.
How do you define a coherent speech product and what makes it unable to also be a public square?
