The Facebook Oversight Board Issued Its First Decisions. Here’s How We’re Tracking Them.

A chalkboard wall at Facebook's headquarters in California. (Flickr/Isriya Paireepairit, https://flic.kr/p/sV3ZSK; CC BY-NC 2.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/) This morning, Jan. 28, the Facebook Oversight Board—the company’s experiment in independent platform governance— released its first batch of opinions reviewing Facebook’s takedown of a variety of posts. It’s not exactly comparable to the Supreme Court’s first-ever ruling in West v. Barnes , let alone Marbury v. Madison . The Facebook Oversight Board is not a real court, after all.  But this may turn out to be a comparable milestone, given how rapidly actual public squares are ceding ground to virtual ones owned by private social media companies.  At any rate, today is the coming out party.  And unlike the Supreme Court, the board is coming out swinging, with Facebook losing “on the merits” in most of the cases. Welcome to the new age of speech regulation, where the government lurks in the background but all the action is in private hands, at least for now. The ride promises to be bumpy, and increasingly consequential.  Which is why Lawfare has decided to launch a dedicated feature—a blog within a blog—to help you all stay on top of things: the Facebook Oversight Board Blog, to be known evermore simply as FOB Blog . Check it out here !  Consider this our soft launch, and a promise of much more to come. You can access the page under our “resource pages” link on the menu bar at the top of the site.  On the page, you’ll find all the essentials: timely updates on the pending cases, the FOB rulings, the responses from Facebook (expected within seven days for today’s ruling, by the way), and of course written analysis and the Arbiters of Truth podcast .  It’s a whole new ballgame… Topics:  Social Media Tags:  Facebook , Facebook Oversight Board Bobby Chesney is the Charles I. Francis Professor in Law and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the University of Texas School of Law. He also serves as the Director of UT-Austin's interdisciplinary research center the Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law. His scholarship encompasses a wide range of issues relating to national security and the law, including detention, targeting, prosecution, covert action, and the state secrets privilege; most of it is posted here . Along with Ben Wittes and Jack Goldsmith, he is one of the co-founders of the blog. @bobbychesney More Articles Evelyn Douek is a Lecturer on Law and S.J.D. candidate at Harvard Law School, and Affiliate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society. She studies online speech regulation and platform governance. Before coming to Harvard to complete a Master of Laws, Evelyn clerked for the Chief Justice of the High Court of Australia, the Hon. Justice Susan Kiefel, and worked as a corporate litigator. She received her LL.B. from UNSW Sydney, where she was Executive Editor of the UNSW Law Journal. More Articles Quinta Jurecic is the Managing Editor of Lawfare . She previously served as an editorial writer for the Washington Post and as Lawfare 's associate editor. @qjurecic More Articles Jacob Schulz is the deputy managing editor of Lawfare. @jacob_r_schulz More Articles Elliot Setzer is an MPhil candidate at the University of Cambridge. He is a former research intern at Lawfare and the Brookings Institution. More Articles Tia Sewell is a junior at Stanford University studying international relations and economics. She is an intern at Lawfare. @tia_sewell More Articles Display Facebook comments:  1 Custom Tweet Message:  "!title," the latest from Bobby Chesney, Evelyn Douek, Quinta Jurecic, Jacob Schulz, Elliot Setzer and Tia Sewell: !tinyurl FB Author Image URL:  https://www.lawfareblog.com/sites/default/files/styles/facebook_post/public/pictures/picture-15-1493909375.jpg?itok=BR7ePswk Publish Date:  Thursday, January 28, 2021, 10:42 AM Show Secondary Ad: 
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