this post was submitted on 16 Apr 2026
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Goodbye device ownership, and the last vestiges of free speech will die with this bill as well. (www.govtrack.us)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by DFX4509B@lemmy.wtf to c/technology@lemmy.world
306 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

So, OS-level age-gating is going federal, which will effectively kill your rights to device ownership and what's left of free speech and expression.

Enjoy your free speech while you still have it because this is a clear attempt to erase that right.

SOPA never died, it just went into hiding until time to reemerge, and now's that time, this is basically SOPA in a save the kids trenchcoat.

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[โ€“] someone@lemmy.today 1 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

That's the real question: is coding protected speech?

Tornado cash started this. A fucking github repo was criminalized for just being code that wasn't executed. This is what happens from not fighting that.

If we can criminalize code or legislate what code is allowed and what code isn't, than computer code is not protected speech. And that's a horrible situation.

[โ€“] DFX4509B@lemmy.wtf 2 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 6 hours ago)

There was precedent a while back for code being protected speech, but recent laws in certain states attacking 3D printing and now this law are trying to reverse that.

Loyal Moses covers the law making certain 3D-printing code illegal and I highly suspect it could be applied beyond that. This bill is probably going to apply that logic more generally assuming it passes.