Let's talk about the tech stack.

That's the set of layers, such as the hardware, the network, and the software applications.

That combined to show you the picture on your smartphone of what your friend ate for lunch.

If you're a normie, you probably don't think about the tech stack much.

If you're a geek, maybe you think about it a lot, in which case you've come to the right place.

Of course, that stack can send around a lot more than lunch photos.

People use the internet to create, store, and send a lot of disgusting, hateful, and illegal content.

And we as a society are having fraught debates about which

actors, if any, which layers in the stack, if any, are responsible for policing this content

or filtering it for you. It's intuitive for many people that the deeper down the stack you go, the stronger the argument becomes for imposing common carrier rules.

If you think a company is providing key infrastructure, the thinking runs, there's a stronger case for pressing that company to accept, more or less, all comers

or all content.

But that intuition does not take into account the culture wars.

These days, the common carrier label is getting flung around all over the place.

It's getting used at the Federal Communications Commission, in state legislatures, and in the Supreme Court. It's being applied

to internet service providers, to email providers, and to social media platforms. It's made

its way up and down the stack. Even weirder, some are arguing that the

imposition of common carrier rules is these days a uniquely top of stack imperative.

This is the Tech Policy Podcast.

I'm Corvin Barthold.

Was all that a bit fuzzy?

Fear not.

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