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Comment by llamataboot | Hacker News Reader

New tweet: https://twitter.com/riseupnet/status/800815181190217729

Confusing update IMHO. Could be read as reassurance. Could also be read as being threatened with incarceration and being forced to keep the site up. or a reminder to archive stuff immediately because of impending shutdown.

Not really sure what to make of it, other than they have obviously heard the concerns and /not/ updated the canary.

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Not really my area of expertise, but it strikes me as completely clear.

The canary hasn't been updated and the tweet implicitly acknowledges that they are aware of the concerns that people have about the overdue update. I can only think of two reasons to do this. 1. get some publicity or 2. for whatever reason they are unable to update the canary and are unable to say why. Personally, I doubt it's reason 1.

But why say they have no plans to shut down and link directly to the part of their FAQ where they say they will shut down if they are under government surveillance? Why not just tweet something like "We have heard your concerns" or something similar

Maybe they lost access to their infrastructure and twitter account. Who posted this (to-date) last message? Better be cautious, activists.

You might not be able to shutdown if you have been forced to keep the service running.

The purpose of the hyperbole, I'd assume, is to make one ask the same questions you're asking. In the philosophical sense: if we have to ask, we already have our answer.

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