Comment Re:When they come for freedoms (Score 1) 48
The Fed's hands need to be slapped and slapped hard.
Great, but slapping someone else (e.g. Google) for what someone else (ISIS dudes) said, does not help slap the feds at all.
Watch your aim. Slap the feds, not unrelated parties. Make NSLs illegal so that when the feds try to change what a website says (or silence it), not only do they lack the power to compel webmasters, but their attempt can be lawfully exposed.
These companies having this power then open up foreign countries to get in and push agendas...that often are not in our (US) best interest.
Yes, and your website should be able to push whatever agenda you want, too, regardless of whether or not it's what the US Government du jour happens to want. Even Americans can't agree with one another about what our best interests are. See this discussion right here, my fellow American.
Indeed, given how many foreign websites we use, that's a neat check on our government. And every other government. We basically need all the governments of the world to unite behind a single agenda in The Ultimate Grand Conspiracy, in order for things to go badly. We are finally beating them (except for the risk of having to spend money on lawyers, like what happened to Google in this case).
Look at Twitter. It went to shit, so people left. Problem solved. And Facebook is only for old people (though I'm not sure how it compares to Slashdot). Some day, TikTok will be the next MySpace. None of them matter, except for the value they give us in contradicting all the other ones.
The last 20 years have made censorship much harder than it ever was before. We're at maximum freedom compared to any other moment in history. I think that's great.