Earlier this week, the president of the United States signed an order thats meant to cripple many of Americas most powerful internet companies. Or, at the very least, punish them.
So what do Americas most powerful internet companies have to say about that?
Not very much. Or, at least, not much publicly.
Which may mean they dont take Donald Trumps threat very seriously. Or they dont want to anger Donald Trump. Or both.
Yes, Mark Zuckerberg went on Fox News in advance of Donald Trumps executive order to criticize Twitter for fact-checking Trump. It was a gambit to speak directly to Trump, as many Fox News hosts and guests try to do. And Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey currently the focus of Trumps anti-tech focus spoke out on Twitter.
But the rest of Big Tech? Barely a peep.
Yesterday, Google sent out a muted statement to reporters who asked the company for comment: We have clear content policies and we enforce them without regard to political viewpoint. Our platforms have empowered a wide range of people and organizations from across the political spectrum, giving them a voice and new ways to reach their audiences. Undermining Section 230 in this way would hurt Americas economy and its global leadership on internet freedom.
Not a stirring call to arms. But at least it was … something. Other tech giants, including Microsoft, Amazon, and Apple, havent uttered a word about the order.
That order, again, is aimed at neutering or abolishing Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act one of the key legal pillars of the internet as we know it. Tl;dr: Section 230 says tech companies cant be held liable for most things their users put on their platforms.
Section 230 is crucial to your business if youre a platform company like Twitter, Facebook, or Googles YouTube, which all depend on user-generated content. Its also potentially important for Amazon, which effectively runs its own platform that connects buyers and sellers. And its just generally important for anyone who uses the internet to say or find whatever they want. So, everyone.
This weeks order and techs nonreaction to it is a striking change from the early days of the Trump presidency in January 2017, when seemingly every tech company loudly announced their fierce opposition to a Trump executive order that banned travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Tech leaders lined up to denounce the travel ban and promised their employees and customers that theyd fight the ban in court. Google co-founder Sergey Brin even joined anti-ban protestors at the San Francisco airport.
Whats different now?
A few things, according to tech executives Ive talked to. Here are some of the rationales Ive heard, which arent necessarily mutually exclusive:
- The most straightforward explanation: Many big tech companies along with most legal observers think this executive order wont survive the legal challenges it will immediately face. Some of them also think Trump knows this and doesnt really care: He just wants a fight with the tech companies (either because he thinks its a fight a portion of his base wants to see or its a distraction from a pandemic that has killed more than 100,000 Americans, or both).
- Tech executives, like the rest of us, have also picked up on the fact that Trump says all kinds of things he doesnt believe or has no intention of doing. This one is different in that he signed something, but that doesnt mean hes going to expend much effort trying to make it happen. Says one executive I talked to today: Theres a lot of things that when [Trump] started, we believed were real things, with real power behind it. Weve learned.
- The 2017 travel ban had a direct and immediate impact on tech companies, their employees, and their families. This weeks executive order could theoretically do that, but not right away.
- While this weeks order is theoretically aimed at Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube the three platforms at the center of debates about political content and speech many executives think its really aimed at Twitter since thats the platform that started fact-checking and flagging Trumps messages this week. So if youre not Twitter, this reasoning goes, why step into a pointless fight?
One argument I didnt hear but am happy to serve up myself: Tech executives, like other business leaders, have figured out that the best way to get stuff done in the Trump administration or to not have things done to you is to not publicly fight with Trump and then get his ear in private. Apples Tim Cook, for instance, seems to walk that line quite effectively.
But all of this seems to be varying ways of saying the same thing: After three-plus years, tech executives dont take the president of the United States very seriously anymore. And theyre willing to endure Trumps tantrums as long as they dont think theyre going to turn into something more serious.
If youre someone who would still like to see leaders stand up in public and denounce Bad Ideas on the record because its important to oppose Bad Ideas before they become Popular Ideas and Im one of those then this stance is disappointing. And worrisome. Because if weve learned one thing from the Trump era, its that unimaginable things become real things much quicker, and much more often, than we would ever dream of.
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