COMMENTARY | In another blow to internet freedom, Twitter has decided that it is going to start reactively censoring tweets in specific countries for any number of reasons they see fit.
If you see a grayed-out tweet in your timeline or someone else’s that’s a sign that the tweet has been withheld in your country. It’s not just tweets that will be withheld, but it’s even possible for accounts to be withheld in different countries as well.
At the moment, the decision to censor tweets is only going to be for cultural reasons, as Engadget points out. For example, pro-Nazi content is banned in Germany and France, so tweets and accounts supporting such things would not be viewable in those countries, but would remain viewable in countries who don’t have a strong legal stance on the issue.
China may also have a role in the decision to censor Twitter. Back at AsiaD in October 2011, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey talked to Engadget about how they and China could not come to an agreement to allow Twitter there. In his words, courtesy of Engadget, “The unfortunate fact is we’re just not allowed to compete in this market, and that’s not up to us to change. The person to ask is trade experts between both governments, but at the end of the day we can’t compete. They (Chinese microblogging platforms) can compete in our markets, and we’re certainly interested in what that means for us… We would love to have a strong Twitter in China, but we’d need to be allowed to do that.”
Now that Twitter accounts and tweets can be censored by country, there’s a strong possibly that China will now agree to support the world’s most popular microblogging site since this decision abides by its strict Internet monitoring policy.
It’s unknown at this time how Twitter’s decision to censor tweets will effect us in America. With the way the internet is currently heading thanks to SOPA, PIPA, and ACTA, I think this is going to make the bumpy road ahead of us even harder to navigate. I think it’s time to start looking into microblogging alternatives that refuse to actively censor their content.