Internet Association Endorses Internet Censorship Bill

I've stopped using reddit because so much of the "community" is so extreme now. They are even demanding that pro-Trump subs be banned from reddit and even calling for twitter to ban Trump's twitter account.

What's going to be interesting is what these people will think when people start demanding atheist, lgbt, leftist, etc content be censored.

That wasn't clear at all.

As for the rest of what you wrote: It is something we need to keep in the back of our mind, but I am not afraid of that doom-scenario. I've been on the Internet long enough to know that it isn't the end of the world if a few large ISPs stop carrying [certain] information. Even if the whole USA would be forced to do that under this law it wouldn't be the end of the world. If anything, it provides a business opportunity for competitors (akin to the problem of tax evasion). It'd be great for ISPs in the EU, to name an example who'd benefit. OVH in Europe wouldn't mind such a bill. My point is that the Internet will work around it if a large enough group of people support it. A large enough group of people (in relevant positions) support tax evasion as well, so that's gonna stay existent for the time being.

There are also documented examples of ISPs as well as darknets which don't or would not censor (you'll find most ISPs operate like that unless it clearly is against the law). Although there's also grey area. It is one of the reasons why a website like TPB existed for so long.

The same with 8.8.8.8. Its in Google's interest to handle the vast majority of DNS requests. Why? It allows them to do better profiling. Why would they without a court order actively hamper their business interest? If a company like Google wants to it becomes a cat and mouse game. People swap to a different DNS such as a root-server, or a proper DNS server supporting DNSCurve (a much more secure option than Google DNS). I'm from a country where two large ISPs had to block TPB on DNS layer. Do you think it was effective? Later on, they had to filter certain IPs (also causing other websites to be unreachable). That was slightly more effective, but to this day the darknet, VPNs, and proxies still work both for TPB as well for piracy.

BTW, I find the example of Daily Stormer particularly weak. There's far more controversial as well as earlier documented examples related to piracy, terrorism, and CP. The question becomes: where do you draw the line? Because even in darknets, people draw lines. IPFS has a function to blacklist content.

What you can observe is that something like CP is difficult (virtually impossible) to obtain because the general public doesn't support it. Whereas piracy, is supported by a vast large group of people. Result: 1) If someone does have a significant amount of it they actively searched for it which severely weakens their legal defense 2) The darknet (and clearnet till some extend) carries piracy, but not so much CP. Supply & demand works even with moderate amounts of censorship because a large enough group of people agree (or disagree) with the cause. And, since I like that CP isn't easily available, it seems the system works, even on the darknet (note I've only verified it on Tor btw). Because CP is where I draw the line regarding freedom of speech; I want the people who produce and knowingly spread that busted. The vast majority of our civilisation as well as the vast majority of people who hold relevant positions at ISPs agree with that.

Yet, if freedom of speech was the holy grail, then it'd be available on the Internet. The elephant in the room is that freedom of speech both is not and was not the holy grail to begin with. There's nuances to such extreme ideal. I went into detail about 2 of these examples, but there are more available.

> What if the CEO of a single Tier 1 peering provider suddenly found some content so much in conflict with his values that they refuse to route the whole IP block?

This could already happen in the case of abuse, or lack of good peering agreement, but it did not happen in the case of spam. Instead we used blacklists like Spamhaus.

So is archive.org, but it's not the Internet. They deliberately decided to give it the misleading name of "Internet.org" --- no doubt there would be far less outcry if it was named something else.[1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwangmyong_(network)

It's to TALK BACK.

The thing about speech is it's only a paper trail of sorts. Sounds or printed symbols are not bullets being shot. But what they do is connect and mobilize minds and ideas, and hence the fear.

But since they are only a paper trail, censorship never solves the cause. It's like burying it. Silencing does have an impact... in that we no longer hear those words. But where they came from - unless they're funded by the speech itself (like a newspaper or something) - are still live and kicking. You have to kill the people that spoke those words, or else they'll continue to influence (hence the assassination of MLK, and so on). It's the equivalent of putting a silencer on a gun.

The point is, we need to engage the cause. The "gun" needs to be made the issue, not the sound of bullets firing. And not fight as in war, because that would lead to justifying offensive tactics that lower our moral standards. Censorship in media is the equivalent of murder on the battlefield.

Engaging is to connect. It is diplomacy. And for engagement, SPEECH IS THE ONLY WAY. So silencing goes against the cause. It makes things worse.

When we bury what cannot be buried, we get Silk Road and the drug war and the political backlash which is Mr. T. Instead, if we engage these PEOPLE as non-criminals for who they truly are - people just like you or I with different ideas - then we might actually get somewhere.

They are here to teach us what we needed to know, and vice versa. We must talk back, and not silence or punish or annihilate. That is the only civil and progressive solution.

That link is absurd hyperbole.