An Immodest Proposal Regarding the Regulation of Social Networks Qua Public Utilities (I)

Once again the prospect of regulating Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Instagram, et al. is being floated.  Are the companies best regarded as privately held entities like newspapers, whose curtailment and/or boosting of speech is protected ultimately by the first amendment?  Or are they, in essence, public utilities, and as such obliged to provide a neutral platform for all users, in much the same way that water, telephone, and electric companies are not supposed to discriminate amongst their customers?

It seems clear as mud to me that social media companies are a relatively new thing under the sun, and lie somewhere between those two characterizations.  It is by no means obvious to me that government regulation will improve the atmosphere on these sites, regardless of whether the perspective of a conservative, a liberal, or a progressive is sought in assessment.

This I do know, however: regulation tends to economically favor the big businesses that are regulated.  Call it crony capitalism, call it regulatory capture—it’s a very real historical problem.

Take an instance from the (sort of) non-profit world of higher education.  Let us say that a big Ivy League school like Schmarvard is not offering to its disabled students the premier software available to give them a good college experience.  And let us say that some advocacy group, with noble intentions, persuades congressmen to create a bill, which is in time duly passed, requiring that private colleges offer disabled students software of such-and-such a level and specifications.  Schmarvard does not really oppose this regulation; and some might suspect it simply does not want to be seen publicly doing something so cold-hearted.  But the fact is that Schmarvard knows that this regulation will make it easier to compete with (say) the small regional school Ptomas Smore—because Ptomas Smore College doesn’t have the deep pockets that Schmarvard has, and will have to shell out considerably more percentagewise of its budget, to fulfill this new regulation.  And furthermore, the regulation will have a dampening effect on any new college considering opening: it will mean one more item to raise money for, one more logistical detail to smooth out, one more software contractor to employ, half an office person in HR to oversee, etc., etc., and so forth.  Schmarvard one, small schools zero.  (Also a win for disabled students—except perhaps those disabled students who would have preferred to go to the small schools which won’t open up now due to the regulatory capture.)

In the same way, while it is tempting to demand that Facebook et al. be punished for their sins, I suspect that overall the regulation of social media companies will actually end up making it harder, not easier, for smaller and newer sites like MeWe, Parler, Gab, Rumble, etc.—or for anything better that might be coming down the pike.

So here is my immodest proposal.  Rather than regulating social media, the government should simply buy a few of the big guys and have done with it.

We have a government-controlled post office—and also the privately run FedEx and DHS.

We have government health care (Medicare, Medicaid)—and also private companies like Kaiser and BlueCross BlueShield.

We have PBS and NPR—and lots of privately owned radio and TV stations as well.

So why not just let the government have a big social media company to play with, to regulate, to make fair and balanced (*cough*), to have its own HHS-style agency in D.C., to stimulate talking points for the presidential primaries every four years—

—and leave room for private companies to grow and do as they please?