We wrote earlier how Twitter censoring some tweets based on requests by Governments is detrimental to social communication as a medium. This caused an outrage on the social network and Tweeps protested this announcement with #TwitterBlackout. Twitter CEO, Dick Costolo has argued that Twitter is still transparent and the current policies are for the good for the communications platform.
Costolo argued that Twitter’s new policy is in fact helping freedom of speech. He said that earlier if a Government demanded that Twitter remove a tweet or block a user, they had to comply. Now with the new policies the content will be censored but only in the country that has demanded it. Twitter will try its best that they do not go ahead with this but if the demands are rigid then they will only censor the content in that country. This is actually a very good thing. If you tweet something considered to be against the law, your tweet will still be visible to the world even though it may be blocked in your own country. This may actually give rise to better journalism and reporting. Behind the closed walls of a country, we could still get a glimpse of the situation or breaking news in that country.
“There’s been no change in our stance or attitude or policy with respect to content on Twitter,” Costolo said. “What we announced is a greater capability we now have. Now, when we are issued a valid legal order in a country in which we operate, such as a DMCA takedown notice, we are able to leave the content up for as many people around the world as possible, while still operating within the local law. You can’t operate in these countries and choose the laws you want to abide by.”
In my previous blog post, I was very harsh on this new policy because Censorship of any kind is absolutely intolerable, but considering the various nuances of this policy has made me believe that this may indeed be one of the best loop-holes discovered to aid Freedom of Speech. There however remains the aspect of people in the blocked country not being able to view any content. Well,
Proxy Servers and
anonymous routers might be able to do the trick for them.
What do you think about Twitter’s new policy? Do let us know.
Denzil
I grok Technology and Digital Media.
http://gravatar.com/blindpixel
