Ask HN: Now more than ever, is there need to support alternative open platforms? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Now more than ever, is there need to support alternative open platforms?

4 pointsElectronShak2 comments

Not just support but also create. And they might not necessarily need to be decentralised, or self hosted, good if they are so, but just platforms that respect free speech.

RumbleVideo vs YouTube

GiveAndSendGo vs GoFundMe

Getter vs Twitter

To mention but a few. I believe that that which you compromise to keep, you eventually lose, and most companies have lost user trust for compromising on free speech. And it's an overall net good for society if such platforms exist.

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The current wave of censorship, banning books and podcasts, is politically driven. I understand the itch to try to route around the damage it causes, and take back control via technical means. That requires the mass of users to shift platforms, and once they do, the political will to censor will follow them there, digging as deep into the infrastructure as is required to re-assert control.

Going down this path will eventually result in a war against general purpose computing itself. Let's not go there.

A political problem (the rich want to keep getting richer, so they promote efforts to censor podcasts, books, and the questioning of authority), is best met with a political answer. Reject the false choice the 2 parties, and 2 thought bubbles give you. Think outside their boxes. What policies do you want from your government? Ignore the wedge issues, push for the changes you want, and think are reasonably agreeable with most of the rest of us.

To some extent yes; but with limits. If you look at each of these alternatives you mentioned, they have a Terms of Service which they will take down any content that is illegal in the country where it is hosted. The same is also somewhat 'true' with the mainstream platforms. Thus, there is no freedom of consequences either.

If you truly want a truly secure neutral, free speech, private communications platform with freedom of consequences - use Signal. No de-platformings there.

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