SAO PAULO (AP) — Elon Musk’s satellite-based internet service provider Starlink backtracked Tuesday and said it will comply with a Brazilian Supreme Court justice’s order to block the billionaire’s social media platform, X.
Starlink said in a statement posted on X that it will heed Justice Alexandre de Moraes’ order despite him having frozen the company’s assets. Previously, it informally told the telecommunications regulator that it would not comply until de Moraes reversed course.
“Regardless of the illegal treatment of Starlink in freezing our assets, we are complying with the order to block access to X in Brazil,” the company statement said. “We continue to pursue all legal avenues, as are others who agree that @alexandre’s recent order violate the Brazilian constitution.”
Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.
As someone who had a plan until I got hit in the face, I agree.
My plan was to get punched in the face!!! Yet again, I am ahead of the curve!!!
If they swing first, it’s self defense. Good plan.
Great plan, Face McPunchy
But what was your plan after that? Everyone has a plan until the plan is complete.
To get face punched again ofc.
I didn’t even have a plan.
Some people plan to get punched in the face. Don’t kink shame.
We’re supposed to have plans?!
I drew a map of Zelda 1 once. Does that count?
Some footage of me trying to get caught up today
Pussy. Go on, Elon. Make your companies play chicken with a national government. I’m sure every other national government out there will definitely back you up, because making a company above the law (without paying the requisite bribes) is DEFINITELY something that national governments want to normalize!
Starlink satellites are (quite literally) above the law. Until Brazil develops a space force to go seize them out of orbit, it seems like Elon can do whatever the fuck he wants.
You can jam the signal with very little power, and you can prevent people in Brazil from paying for the service.
and you can prevent people in Brazil from paying for the service.
To be fair, Brazil tried that and Elmo just made starlink free for use in Brazil as retaliation. But obviously that’s not something he could do with every country on earth if he wants to make a profit
When was that?
The links require a station on the ground, and services must be paid for monthly. Those are two things a local government can control pretty effectively.
Typical. Send the lawyers first to intimidate. Then get told you have no case. Then walk back tail between legs.
Sounds a bit like how he ended up with twitter in the first place
I love that he is so stupid that he didn’t realize he could back out of a legality by saying, “LOL JK.”
He’s got a huge clean ai dataset
All while loudly mouthing off
Hey happy Lemmy bday! Nice little cake!
Elon Musk is picking fights with everyone these days.
Everyone except fascists
Why would he pick a fight with the only group in the world that currently supports him?
Why would he pick fights with himself?
I wonder when he’ll go to rehab. He’s so unhinged.
He’s testing the limits of “fuck you” money expect “you” are national governments
Glad he got bitch-slapped on this one.
That’s a bummer. I was hoping EU countries would be inspired by Brazil to actually enforce some of their laws and ban Twitter as well.
Edit: as vxx pointed out, there is a positive way to interpret this outcome, and I was probably being needlessly pessimistic.
Am I missing something? twitter is still blocked in brasil. The article is about starlink caving in and blocking it as well for brasilian users.
EU might still block them once they decided he doesn’t comply with the law, and fines didn’t help.
Sorry. To clarify what I meant: the “bummer” is that I want the situation with Starlink, Twitter, and Brazil to result in the permanent downfall of that dogshit site, and severe fines for Starlink so that other countries can look toward Brazil as an example of how to deal with the kinds of social media sites that allow disinformation to propagate.
The fact that Starlink has agreed to comply takes off some of the heat, and therefore leaves some of the territory of fully exploring the legal ramifications of holding reich-wing billionaire freaks somewhat accountable for the shit that their companies do unexplored. Yeah, it’s good that Twitter is still forbidden from operating in Brazil, but I would have liked for Musk to face more repercussions through Starlink as well.
I hope that the EU still takes action against Twitter though, with or without any additional escalation involving Starlink.
I see it as a positive. Elon tried to strong arm the judge but they froze assets to show they’re not to be fucked with. It worked and the billionaire didn’t get away.
Others can still take it as an inspiration or motivation.
Good point. I edited my original comment. Thanks for providing a more positive perspective on this :)
I feel pretty conflicted on this whole thing. Don’t get me wrong, it’s hilarious seeing Elon squirm, but it’s disconcerting to see everyone cheering on government censorship of the internet.
Typically, I would agree. However, what is happening with Twitter and Brazil isn’t censorship; it’s Twitter refusing to appoint legal council to respond to any legal complaints within Brazil’s jurisdiction. Musk has made the conscious decision to have Twitter not be legally-compliant with Brazil’s laws, therefore Brazil doesn’t allow them to operate there.
However, what is happening with Twitter and Brazil isn’t censorship
The Brazilian government is forcing an ISP to block customers’ access to a specific website. Whether it’s right or wrong is up for discussion, but I can’t accept the claim that this is not censorship.
You can’t operate a business that doesn’t comply with the law. They don’t get a free pass just because their business is a communication service.
Yes but it’s a law that is used for internet censorship.
Then argue against the law, not for a company ignoring the law.
Yes, that’s what is happening here.
You can’t open a restaurant that doesn’t comply with food safety law. This is a “skill issue” on Musk’s part. Not censorship.
Nobody here ever said otherwise.
If Chevron were to start drilling in Brazil without any sort of permits or company representative, you might say that Brazil is within its rights to seize that mining equipment. Would that also be censorship?
Do you consider drilling holes in the ground to be a form of speech?
What kind of “gotcha” is this? Nobody here said anything about Musk’s actions being legal and above board, we are complaining that it is concerning that Brazil has internet censorship laws with real teeth.
internet censorship
All countries have internet censorship. Pretty sure the companies in the US block child porn websites (Not going to check and get put on a watch list). The fact that things can be labeled illegal is not new or controversial. If your issue is with what is being labeled illegal you need to focus on that.
All countries have internet censorship.
Agreed.
If your issue is with what is being labeled illegal you need to focus on that.
My issue is not with any content being labeled illegal. I don’t like the government enacting censorship by ordering ISPs to block certain traffic.
I think that Brazil is within their rights to seize property or assets of entities engaging in illegal activity.
It’s the sort of asymmetric power that concerns me, because by ordering the ISPs around, they can block the entire country’s access to information with the flick of a switch. I don’t want my government getting too comfortable with this kind of power because I don’t know who will wield it next year.
I think ISPs should be dumb pipes. They should not be responsible for censoring content. They shouldn’t even know what they’re transporting, ideally.
Because it’s literally what’s happening? X has not named a legal representative in Brazil. Therefore it cannot do business in Brazil. Thus, all ISPs are ordered to block X so that it cannot do business in Brazil. (same link). Starlink, as an ISP, said they would not comply. Now they are complying. This has literally nothing to do with internet speech and everything to do with complying with a country’s laws.
It’s not suppression of speech. It’s the consequence of refusal to even acknowledge the legitimacy of the Courts by refusing to appoint council.
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It’s not just hilarious. Twitter gives him way, way too Mich influence and power. It’s critical that stops.
Starlink to an extent, too.
Agree with you that I am conflicted though.
The censorship you’re talking about, was about 6 or 7 accounts that were instrumental in instigating a January 6 style coup attempt in favour of the previous president who lost the election. Those accounts were causing unrest among the population, and were calling for violence in the streets.
Brazil doesn’t look too kindly to that, given its history. They wanted those accounts banned. And instead of arguing the legality of banning those accounts in court, musk decided to get all of Twitter/X banned in Brazil.
In other words, it’s Twitter/X’s own fault. They could’ve appointed legal representation and tried to argue that banning those accounts amounted to illegal censorship, but instead of trying that they stuck their head in the sand, like an ostrich, hoping it would blow over, by closing the offices in Brazil and refusing to appoint such legal representation. Leaving the courts no choice but to ban all of Twitter/X.
I’m not even that conflicted, those cheering any government censorship are misguided at best.
those cheering any government censorship
Child porn is illegal, that is also government censorship.
Had X wanted to argue this in court, they should’ve appointed legal representation, instead of closing all of their Brazil offices.
They can think it violates the Brazilian constitution all they like, my understanding is that the supreme court already weighed in on the issue and that’s the only opinion that matters in most countries.
What a braindead take.
You’ve never heard of biased, politically motivated supreme court justices? That’s… hard to believe. You should Google “Roe v Wade” and then check back. How can two different versions of a supreme court rule completely differently on the same issue if the underlying constitution hasn’t changed?
Read the relevant parts of their constitution, then check the supreme courts decision, and let me know how you think it makes sense.
What a braindead take
I love when people call out their own stupidity at the top of their comments
You’ve never heard of biased, politically motivated supreme court justices?
And the solution is a billionaire and his vanity project flagrantly ignoring the Supreme Court?
Alright. What is starlink’s legal path to overturn the decision? Whether the decision makes sense or not doesn’t change what the decision was.
Point isn’t whether it’s right or not. The point is that once the supreme court rules, there’s no “higher” court to take it to. The lower courts can’t rule differently on something explicitly ruled on already, and they can’t “overrule” the supreme court since they are explicitly “under” them. So regardless of what Starlink says, they aren’t going to change that, at least not any time soon. And X will either be dead, irrelevant, or significantly modified by the time the court changes enough to get them to change their decision.
I’m not fully in the loop, but wasn’t it just 1 judge and could be challenged to all of them, but then all of them sided with the 1?
The issue is when you refuse to engage in the legal process at all you lose the right to find compromise. It’s the same reason Alex Jones was defaulted.
People keep telling me to go into research but none of them are willing to pay for my time
If musk and X wanted to argue that in court, they could’ve appointed legal representation in Brazil. Instead, ol’ musky closed down the Brazil offices of X, like the braindead weirdo that he is.
As we say in my country, the person who burns his own butt, has to sit on the blisters.
How long until Elon throws a fit and fires people at Starlink until they ignore judge’s orders?
I’m guessing the Starlink investors had a chat with him about a potential breach of fiduciary duty lawsuit. That’s a stupid concept but Musk isn’t going to win if he deep sixes Starlink for his petty vendetta.
Eh, still feels like a good chance he’d let his ego get in the way of sanity
Oh i’m sure he argued with them. Starlink didn’t back down right away, after all…
Couldn’t they have done something similar at Twitter?
Twitter (aka X) probably has a different set of investors who may be happier using it to advance the cause of right wing extremism than the Starlink investors. That said: i thought Starlink was a publicly traded company but it appears it still isn’t so it’s just private investors there, too.
The employees don’t care, it’s the company that will get in trouble.
Dude finally found an immovable object outside of US.
Loser losing again…
Am I the only one surprised by this? The rich bitch didn’t get away with something?
Why? Like, why for real, not just “this is why this is happening based on the law, bla bla bla”. The law doesn’t apply to this prick.
Not every judge can be bought.
No, believe me, they can. Everyone has a price. The question is how much Elon&Co. wants to offer.
I’d agree, everyone has a price; I’d also have to say not everyone’s is monetary.
Divorce :(
#L
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Sorry, I’m out of the loop. Why did Brazil ban Twitter in the first place?
They were asked to remove people from twitter who violated brazil misinformation laws (something they already do for india, saudi arabia, etc) and in response musk shutdown x offices in Brazil and refused to appoint a legal representative. Brazil then court ordered that X would be blocked since there was no legal way to deal with X.
Musk says its about free speech, when - because its something they already do in other countries - its clearly not about free speech at all.
Here’s a pretty good explanation: https://www.engadget.com/social-media/brazil-bans-x-for-refusing-to-comply-with-supreme-court-order-230247980.html
