this post was submitted on 11 Feb 2026
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I’m just going to repeat myself for the hundredth time here. This is exactly what happens when you define words in such broad terms. Social media does not include things like discord. It doesn’t include Reddit, it doesn’t include Lemmy. But because so many damn people just refer to any site that they can talk with other people on as social media, it became enshrined in law and now literally every service you touch is legally defined as social media.
This is not hyperbole; with the current definitions across numerous countries, Amazon (the place where you buy things, not other services like games) is legally defined as social media.
Words mean things and when words are hijacked for other purposes it allows governments to strip away your rights without you realizing.
I define my dick to be broad. I declared it, and thus have manifested it into reality.
What other things should I will into existence with my new found powers?
So I kinda walked away from this to think about what's being said a bit and I just kinda have to disagree? Like, being clear and concise and accurate in defining something is hella important.... to the people that care about those things. The thing we see though isn't lacking definitions, especially in a legal sense, but people not pushing back enough whenever bad actors start bringing up terrible arguments. There are people out there that you can bring up the best, most logical points in the world and they will still twist and twist and twist until your original point is lost. We can make the most robust, perfect definitions and some people will STILL either find ways around it or completely ignore what was rationally established. The definition doesn't matter, the problem is fascists want to monitor the world and make whoever they want disappear and people kinda just let it happen.
And to be clear, I'm trying to say you're completely wrong. Defining things is important to establish a shared common framework of understanding and policy making and regulations are SO SO SO IMPORTANT cause they save lives in more than just one way, but problem isn't clear cut to be solved with "we need to define things better." We have a culture issue. Culture issues need more than one approach to resolve.
Okay, I'm gonna ask: why is reddit not social media?
It’s a forum. Just like all the other forums before it. It just happened to get very popular. To be clearer: if you define Reddit as social media then you are including almost every single website on the planet. It makes the definition completely pointless.
Regulations shouldn’t be defined in this way.
Words don't have meanings. Meanings have words.
Amazon the internet megastore allows non-employees of Amazon to add content to their store. Both as supposed vendors offering goods for services and as customers giving reviews and ratings to such store listings. And Amazon chooses what listings to show to users through opaque algorithms.
Can you give an example of the sort of regulation a social media site should need to follow which Amazon should be exempt from? Or the sort of rule that should bind reddit and Facebook but not Amazon?
A better question is what sort of legislation should apply to every website on the planet, without exception. Because that’s what the current definition does, makes the law so broad as to be pointless. Why are laws being passed that affect every website, when the problem is a few very massive websites.
Off the top of my head:
I vote for this guy for president.
I grew up with certain words meaning certain things. Then I get older, and suddenly, those words are gone, new words exist, old words mean new things, medical terms are now no longer medical terms and just purely an insult derived from a definition that didn't used to define the root word. Pluto isn't a planet. Instead of 9 planets, there are now an unknown number at least in the thousands. There's like 4 other Earths.
Language shouldn't change over time. It can adapt, but I should know that grass is green. Not grass is plubertatude. A word I just made up for the demonstration of absurdity. Nothing wrong with grass being green.
Language drifts over time, that's normal, always has been. Stay on target soldier. FORMAL language however needs very strict definitions or it just stops working. Words mean things is true. That still doesn't mean you get to say the "R" word.