The OSA is finally here, my notes on Community Notes and Terrorgram explained
Hello and welcome to Everything in Moderation's Week in Review, your need-to-know news and analysis about platform policy, content moderation and internet regulation. It's written by me, Ben Whitelaw and supported by members like you.
It’s not every week that a long-awaited, much-criticised, heavily-lobbied piece of legislation becomes law — but here we are. The Online Safety Act is finally in effect, and like someone who shows up late to their own party, it’s making quite the entrance. Mike and I delve into the specifics in this week's Ctrl-Alt-Speech.
Lots of new subscribers this week including from Thorn, Ofcom, Kroll, Milltown Partners, Inflect, Hertie School, Etsy, Gifct, KFF, Newsguard and elsewhere.
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Here's your Week in Review for Friday 21st March 2025 — BW
Today’s edition is in partnership with Resolver Trust & Safety - proudly attending the Trust & Safety Summit 2025
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Policies
New and emerging internet policy and online speech regulation
The Online Safety Act — which, in various guises, has outlived four UK Prime Ministers — finally took effect this week. An estimated 100,000 services and sites fall under its remit, with fines of £18m or 10% of global revenue if companies are found to be in breach of the codes (EiM #258).
One law firm told the Financial Times that they “suspect there may well be some companies in scope who haven’t done much at all”. I suspect this could lead to some early enforcement notices as Ofcom, the Act’s appointed regulator, tries to show everyone who’s boss.
Form an orderly queue: Despite being in the works since 2019, the Act continues to face criticism for both leaving too many gaps and being too stringent (which some of my former newsroom colleagues said was a sign that they were in the right ballpark). This week has been no exception: