The 1996 Communications Decency Act’s Section 230(c), otherwise known as the Good Samaritan act, says, “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” In other words, “media companies are considered more directly responsible for their content.” Avoiding the overt title of “media company,” says TechCrunch, helps protect the company from more liability.
The Guardian quotes Zuckerberg as going farther than ever before in acknowledging Facebook’s role. “We don’t write the news that people read on the platform,” he said. “But at the same time we also know that we do a lot more than just distribute news, and we’re an important part of the public discourse.”
SiliconBeat suggests that, by not calling itself a media company, Facebook has avoided creating consistent policies related to media. It noted that, in the past year, the company “struggled with how it handled content.”
See the full post here: http://www.etcentric.org/zuckerberg-says-facebook-not-a-traditional-media-company/