Once again there is war on the internet. A little less than two weeks
after our battle against SOPA, we need to get geared up again because Twitter
like so many other companies, has chosen to go back on their word. On
Thursday, Twitter announced that they now reserve the right to censor tweets on
a country to country basis. This would allow them to comply to local government
laws pertaining to information censorship.
The details of Twitter's censorship plan can be found in their blog
post, Tweets Still Must Flow which bears a
strikingly similar title to a post from last year entitled, The Tweets Must Flow. The original
post appeared the day after Twitter announced it would become available in
Arabic, Farsi and Hebrew, languages associated with countries that
have strict media restrictions. In this post, Twitter stated that "Freedom
of speech is essential." However their new post shares a different
message.
"Until now, the only way we could take account of those countries' limits was to remove content globally. Starting today, we give ourselves the ability to reactively withhold content from users in a specific country -- while keeping it available in the rest of the world,"
This message has Twitter users all over the world fuming! The hashtag
#TwitterBlackout can be seen trending as users rally together to boycott
Twitter tomorrow (January 28th). The blackout has quickly gained supporters as
it is reported that #TwitterBlackout tweets rolling in at about 12 per minute.
Among its supports is the infamous group, Anonymous.
This new plan may never directly affect us in Jamaica but just imagine a
world where we can never get or tell the full story. Twitter may not be
completely responsible for tweet censorships but they are the ones allowing
governments to impose. Tell Twitter that censorship is never right! Join the
#TwitterBlackout and don't tweet tomorrow!
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