A new red army is here: Widespread secret suppression scales thought police to levels not seen since the days of Nazis and Communists, and it is time to speak up about it.
Today I discovered by accident that I was automatically unsubscribed from a bunch of Substacks that I had subscribed to recently, including yours. Not sure if it was a glitch, but I'm glad to be following your research and anti-censorship work again. Thanks for writing this.
NATO – an anti-white and anti-family institution . . .
After the apocalypse of 1945, a number of global organizations have been formed with the aim of maintaining and expanding totalitarian liberalism. One of the earliest organizations formed for this purpose was the war alliance "North Atlantic Treaty Organization", or NATO, which can be seen as the military wing of globalism.
In addition to ensuring that Washington always has international support for its military campaigns, NATO as an institution is explicitly anti-white and explicitly dedicated to "racial justice" for racial aliens living in white countries. As early as 1999, NATO authored reports blaming nationalists for a number of modern problems and warning against the influence of nationalism.
In 2023, the war alliance held a summit at its headquarters in Brussels on race where the alliance's leaders pledged to fight "homogeneous attitudes" and to use NATO's "collective intelligence" for the purpose.
In fact, NATO is so dedicated to its anti-white agenda that it openly advocates that institutions must be reshaped to be "inclusive," in other words, restructured to be more anti-white, and consist of fewer white employees and executives.
By the way, shining a spotlight on these comments is good practice for arguing against them. Further, I'm not the only one who thinks this, as I shared here:
This guy just started spamming me again, on my blog this time -- I guess he followed the trail from this post over to my blog. I reported it to Substack (to complain that they "accidentally" classified me as spam but somehow this person gets to actually keep spamming without any repercussion). Doing so made his comment disappear. But after coming back here and reading your comment, you present a really valid point. You handled him better than me -- I appreciate your more rational, less reactive approach.
Oh, sorry to hear that Erin, but glad you found this helpful.
I agree with the platforms on one point— getting people together is hard! Sometimes people don't "behave" as everyone would like. But you have to be prepared for any behavior. That does not mean endless compassion. It means, don't keep removals and demotions secret from authors. Everything else is fair game in my opinion (provided you're not working with the government). Your house, your rules.
Reddit has a decent motto "remember the human." Reddit clearly does not follow this, but I like the phrase. A human exists somewhere on the other end of whatever comment appeared on your blog/Facebook/Reddit. It might be a bot, but bots are also coded by humans. If the bot's author reviews its interactions, then responding thoughtfully is worthwhile. If he doesn't and the bot persists, then you certainly don't need a shadow ban. Just ban it.
I didn't see any updates yet from Substack about your situation. I wonder if they would like a consultation on the issue, like a risk assessment. My guess is they're largely concerned about the potential harms of not using shadow moderation. But there are more harms, I think, from using it.
Same thing happened to me. I was unsubscribed to blogs.
Substack is just like twitter .
But Substack specializes in catering to the " controlled opposition " narratives ( still fear) , they work on derailments of truth here at Substack . Its just a big AI platform where some blogs are even AI written and many comments also . Shadow posting etc all here while they talk about internet non censorship.
But its nice to find people that are not stuck in the grip of the narrative( and the controlled op narrative)which is essentially fear.
That's bonkers that it happened to you also! I'm able to see your profile, so you seem to be restored. May I ask how long it took to regain your visibility?
And I've come across a few blogs here that I'm almost certain are AI, too. I honestly still have a hard time trusting Substack after my experience. It's definitely a different kind of platform. Truly miss the days of paper and ink. :/
And I agree, I'm tired of the fear-based narratives and control cycles as well. I'm really hoping better days and brighter narratives are in our collective future!
I do not know how long it took I did not contact Substack about it
and It seems havent got my subscriptions back I have a second email where I have resubscribed to a couple.
Here's to better days where the fear narrative turns into a love dialog( a mono-log haha) and this can only happen in the current moment. Where we choose something new and yet something older than dirt, our very being . We were not created to teach fear . That is all the corporate media does amplify human unconsciousness - spread fear. We have humans stuck in the past media narrative or stuck imagining a virtual future made up by " AI" . Its the movent back to Reality=the here and now that we need.
That is so strange!! I wonder what the subscription removals are all about. Definitely not a great thing to have happen when writers are here to build a following under the assumption that they can make an income from their writing.
Was there a common thematic thread between any of the publications you were unsubscribed from, by any chance?
Huh, that's really weird. My unsubscriptions were a literal hodgepodge of pretty uncontroversial topics like wine and art, mixed in with international politics and independent journalists. It makes me nervous -- I'm wondering if it's a test of some sort of new detection technology that went awry, or if a rogue employee is doing it, or if it's something else that I'm not thinking of? It's just very bizarre and feels eerie.
I'm glad to hear people talking about this, I thought I was crazy the first time I noticed on Reddit that some comments I could see were invisible to everyone else. Since then I've been shouting into the void for the past year looking for someone else who is concerned.
Invisible moderation removes the possibility of accountability. Removing accountability makes abuse inevitable.
Worse, since humans are social creatures we are strongly influenced by our communities. If everyone around you believes something happened & no-one disputes it (except maybe one crazy who is easily disputed) you will believe it too. Shadow moderation allows people to craft this artificial consensus & can absolutely be used to manipulate individuals & groups.
Moderators & tech companies absolutely have the power to shape your experience of an issue, which will shape your understanding of said issue, which will shape your opinion of said issue & finally your actions, from voting to terrorism.
I have not blocked you, click on the link next to my name >>> 'Writes Nordic Pagan Soldier'
Here's something interesting from people I don't really like (they have banned me), or agree with a lot of times . . . but, they are dead on here . . .
❝The entire right side of the conservative political punditry are pretending they have no idea what is happening in the 2024 election, as if they are still pretending Ron DeSantis was on a “book tour.” Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Glenn Beck, National Review, Ben Shapiro, Dave Ruben, The Blaze, The Daily Wire, TownHall, The Washington Free Beacon, Clay Travis, Western Journal, Newsmax, Buck Sexton, Legal Insurrection, the entire network of right-side alternative media, all of them, acting as ushers toward a grand pretending performance that is built around bulls**t.
When the internet shadow-banning system is triggered later this year, all of the above will remain visible and supported by the regime. Remember that; these outlets/voices are deemed not a threat to ‘national security.’ Only the non-pretending outlets, platforms and voices are going to be targeted. More on that later.❞
Nothing like the good ol' red scare switcheroo in an article delivered straight to the users of a tool combating corporate capitalist censorship. A true classic.
Whoa, that's good to know -- thank you for telling me that! I've been having some pretty bizarre experiences on social media platforms since 2021. I'm a local journalist / frequent FOIA requester. During normal times, that would be nothing unusual, but it seems to have landed me on some sort of digital shit-list in recent years.
This afternoon I noticed my Substack reader had been unusually quiet for about two weeks, except for the five or so paid writers I pay for, and after looking into it, I discovered I'd been unsubscribed from about 15 blogs. I assumed it was a glitch but now I'm not so sure.
Yes it's hard to be sure. If you inquire with Substack, I'll bet they'll say it's a glitch, and who knows if that's true. But at least you can force them to make you whole.
I was just reviewing your website and old posts. You've written quite a bit! Would you have any tips for pitching a story like this? Prior to posting it here, I sent it to one outlet that doesn't have comment sections on their articles. I thought it might be a fit but I never heard back.
Hi! I just wanted to say thank you so much for bringing my shadow ban to my attention yesterday. Substack acknowledged I'd been flagged as spam in their system (I have no idea how that happened, given my very un-spam like use of the platform), but they're apparently in the process of un-shadow banning me.
Well done! And no problem. You're right it is kind of my thing now, but I don't catch it all. Platforms are always inventing new ways to do things like this, but those ways are often also discoverable. My aim is to help more people be on the look out for secret suppression.
Thank you for sharing the details. It appears you had a fruitful back and forth with an employee there! Way to stick to your guns. You definitely should have been notified about the flag, and such flags should be ever-present on all of your impacted content. However, that employee is wrong that secret suppression is not "standard 'best practice' ". It very much is accepted in the world of content moderation!
Cory Doctorow, friend of the EFF, cites the "Santa Clara Principles" in his Medium post "Como is Infosec" while criticizing secrecy. But the SCP endorse secrecy! They just word it carefully by providing "exceptions." So I'm not surprised Substack does it too. But there is no reason for keeping this secret, as you pointed out, not for bots nor trolls nor harassers; it never makes sense.
Everyone deserves consequences, both for their own sanity and others'. If I'm wrong about that, then someone can come debate me on it. I have not seen any public debate on that topic at all, and I've reviewed a lot of conferences, podcasts, and research that discusses content moderation. In other words, the secrecy is a huge secret itself.
It's a huge story, which I am incapable of delivering in whole, but one way to move the needle might be to interview people who've been impacted by censorship over various topics. For example, I've heard from people impacted by secret suppression over video games, ChatGPT (via another commenter on this post), gender, advocacy or criticism of political candidates, etc. Just telling a few of those stories might help more people relate to the issue. These all-encompassing posts I've previously attempted might feel too distant. But you're the writer, you would know more about that than me!
I absolutely think you're correct on all of that, and I agree that telling these stories is important. This issue needs more attention ASAP. If you hadn't noticed my invisibility, I would have just been writing into the void forever and wondering why no one ever interacted with my work. Thank you. 🙏🏼
The ramifications of secretly silencing legitimate speech, whether it's intentional censorship or accidental through automation, are huge and scary.
I think interviews with people that have been silenced would be an incredible way to get the message out there. Would you ever be willing to grant an interview as an expert (developing Reveddit, etc.) in articles by others, as well? I think that could be a good first step too.
Awesome! I'll get in touch if I'm able to find a home for a story about this. You'd be a great person to talk about it -- Reveddit was brilliant. It's mind-blowing how serious this is.
Thank you! I'll definitely reach out to Substack tomorrow and get to the bottom of this. I'm pretty floored by the whole thing; I never expected them to pull this weirdness.
And absolutely! Pitching stories about certain subjects can be super frustrating (for example, covering tech privacy issues has been weirdly challenging since 2020). There's definitely some bizarre warm fuzzy feelings toward government censorship among the media crowd lately, so I think being aware of that will be helpful so you don't take any rejections/silences too personally. If you get rejected a few times, don't lose heart, just keep pitching and keep on writing.
First, I recommend targeting the right publications. OneZero, the Guardian, Motherboard, MIT Technology Review, etc. might be good options to try. (Visit www.wheretopitch.com for more ideas of who to pitch based on your core topic, and resources on how to contact outlets.)
like for you to remove my comment is not censorship, that is your right as the operator of this website. I have no inherent right to have my comments remain visible on your site.
Big AI seems to be on this path as well. Bots are flooding the internet and conversation about it seems to be universally banned. People getting censored and flamed for discussing the idea that GPT4 is dumber than it was at launch.
Lippmann discusses censorship's role in the battle of Verdun just prior to that. It's a pretty interesting read.
Also I used to work in machine learning, so I am familiar with the limitations of AI. I agree it's overhyped online and would not doubt that censorship keeps that propaganda alive.
I worry more that the company that is setup in society to potentially control the common basis of fact has such an adversarial stance on thoughts or feedback for their product. There is a culture of secrecy and control at a company that sells intelligence.
![[Removed]: The Real Censorship is Secret Suppression](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_80,h_80,c_fill,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep,g_auto/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F13b73319-822c-48da-a9ac-1674f4c9a722_127x127.png)
![[Removed]: The Real Censorship is Secret Suppression](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_36,h_36,c_fill,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep,g_auto/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F13b73319-822c-48da-a9ac-1674f4c9a722_127x127.png)
![[Removed]: The Real Censorship is Secret Suppression](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/e_trim:10:white/e_trim:10:transparent/h_72,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4e3bd729-0bba-433a-b935-5a4b52a1ea7b_1278x337.png)
Today I discovered by accident that I was automatically unsubscribed from a bunch of Substacks that I had subscribed to recently, including yours. Not sure if it was a glitch, but I'm glad to be following your research and anti-censorship work again. Thanks for writing this.
Thanks! I appreciate your support, and welcome back. That's odd that you were unsubscribed.
Another strange thing I just noticed is your profile says "Profile not found. We couldn't load this profile." https://i.imgur.com/k93rqUh.png
However, I am able to access your substack via a google search for your name.
NATO – an anti-white and anti-family institution . . .
After the apocalypse of 1945, a number of global organizations have been formed with the aim of maintaining and expanding totalitarian liberalism. One of the earliest organizations formed for this purpose was the war alliance "North Atlantic Treaty Organization", or NATO, which can be seen as the military wing of globalism.
In addition to ensuring that Washington always has international support for its military campaigns, NATO as an institution is explicitly anti-white and explicitly dedicated to "racial justice" for racial aliens living in white countries. As early as 1999, NATO authored reports blaming nationalists for a number of modern problems and warning against the influence of nationalism.
In 2023, the war alliance held a summit at its headquarters in Brussels on race where the alliance's leaders pledged to fight "homogeneous attitudes" and to use NATO's "collective intelligence" for the purpose.
In fact, NATO is so dedicated to its anti-white agenda that it openly advocates that institutions must be reshaped to be "inclusive," in other words, restructured to be more anti-white, and consist of fewer white employees and executives.
https://nordfront.se/nato-en-antivit-och-familjefientlig-institution
Hi, your comments here sound more like a screed than a genuine interest in back-and-forth conversation.
If you're going to rant, do it in your own posts, not in comments.
I removed a few of your comments here. For those interested, they're still visible in this archive: https://archive.is/CaJgF
If you comment here in the future, please do a better job of connecting your points to the parent comment and show an interest to converse.
By the way, shining a spotlight on these comments is good practice for arguing against them. Further, I'm not the only one who thinks this, as I shared here:
https://old.reddit.com/r/FreeSpeech/comments/14qu7kl/crosspost_im_the_creator_of_reveddit_which_shows/jqp3j59/?context=10
This guy just started spamming me again, on my blog this time -- I guess he followed the trail from this post over to my blog. I reported it to Substack (to complain that they "accidentally" classified me as spam but somehow this person gets to actually keep spamming without any repercussion). Doing so made his comment disappear. But after coming back here and reading your comment, you present a really valid point. You handled him better than me -- I appreciate your more rational, less reactive approach.
Oh, sorry to hear that Erin, but glad you found this helpful.
I agree with the platforms on one point— getting people together is hard! Sometimes people don't "behave" as everyone would like. But you have to be prepared for any behavior. That does not mean endless compassion. It means, don't keep removals and demotions secret from authors. Everything else is fair game in my opinion (provided you're not working with the government). Your house, your rules.
Reddit has a decent motto "remember the human." Reddit clearly does not follow this, but I like the phrase. A human exists somewhere on the other end of whatever comment appeared on your blog/Facebook/Reddit. It might be a bot, but bots are also coded by humans. If the bot's author reviews its interactions, then responding thoughtfully is worthwhile. If he doesn't and the bot persists, then you certainly don't need a shadow ban. Just ban it.
I didn't see any updates yet from Substack about your situation. I wonder if they would like a consultation on the issue, like a risk assessment. My guess is they're largely concerned about the potential harms of not using shadow moderation. But there are more harms, I think, from using it.
Same thing happened to me. I was unsubscribed to blogs.
Substack is just like twitter .
But Substack specializes in catering to the " controlled opposition " narratives ( still fear) , they work on derailments of truth here at Substack . Its just a big AI platform where some blogs are even AI written and many comments also . Shadow posting etc all here while they talk about internet non censorship.
But its nice to find people that are not stuck in the grip of the narrative( and the controlled op narrative)which is essentially fear.
That's bonkers that it happened to you also! I'm able to see your profile, so you seem to be restored. May I ask how long it took to regain your visibility?
And I've come across a few blogs here that I'm almost certain are AI, too. I honestly still have a hard time trusting Substack after my experience. It's definitely a different kind of platform. Truly miss the days of paper and ink. :/
And I agree, I'm tired of the fear-based narratives and control cycles as well. I'm really hoping better days and brighter narratives are in our collective future!
I do not know how long it took I did not contact Substack about it
and It seems havent got my subscriptions back I have a second email where I have resubscribed to a couple.
Here's to better days where the fear narrative turns into a love dialog( a mono-log haha) and this can only happen in the current moment. Where we choose something new and yet something older than dirt, our very being . We were not created to teach fear . That is all the corporate media does amplify human unconsciousness - spread fear. We have humans stuck in the past media narrative or stuck imagining a virtual future made up by " AI" . Its the movent back to Reality=the here and now that we need.
That is so strange!! I wonder what the subscription removals are all about. Definitely not a great thing to have happen when writers are here to build a following under the assumption that they can make an income from their writing.
Was there a common thematic thread between any of the publications you were unsubscribed from, by any chance?
The common thread was they were all exposing the psyop covid19, most debunking the 1861 Germ hypothesis .
But could well be that it was after a post called the Substack of Twitter .
But working around the bugs I just go back to the blogs( I resubscribed to a few) and they were free subscriptions.
Huh, that's really weird. My unsubscriptions were a literal hodgepodge of pretty uncontroversial topics like wine and art, mixed in with international politics and independent journalists. It makes me nervous -- I'm wondering if it's a test of some sort of new detection technology that went awry, or if a rogue employee is doing it, or if it's something else that I'm not thinking of? It's just very bizarre and feels eerie.
I'm glad to hear people talking about this, I thought I was crazy the first time I noticed on Reddit that some comments I could see were invisible to everyone else. Since then I've been shouting into the void for the past year looking for someone else who is concerned.
Invisible moderation removes the possibility of accountability. Removing accountability makes abuse inevitable.
Worse, since humans are social creatures we are strongly influenced by our communities. If everyone around you believes something happened & no-one disputes it (except maybe one crazy who is easily disputed) you will believe it too. Shadow moderation allows people to craft this artificial consensus & can absolutely be used to manipulate individuals & groups.
Moderators & tech companies absolutely have the power to shape your experience of an issue, which will shape your understanding of said issue, which will shape your opinion of said issue & finally your actions, from voting to terrorism.
I largely agree, although I think liberty is unalienable: https://twitter.com/rhaksw/status/1685441692705689600
Shadow banning???
I have not blocked you, click on the link next to my name >>> 'Writes Nordic Pagan Soldier'
Here's something interesting from people I don't really like (they have banned me), or agree with a lot of times . . . but, they are dead on here . . .
❝The entire right side of the conservative political punditry are pretending they have no idea what is happening in the 2024 election, as if they are still pretending Ron DeSantis was on a “book tour.” Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Glenn Beck, National Review, Ben Shapiro, Dave Ruben, The Blaze, The Daily Wire, TownHall, The Washington Free Beacon, Clay Travis, Western Journal, Newsmax, Buck Sexton, Legal Insurrection, the entire network of right-side alternative media, all of them, acting as ushers toward a grand pretending performance that is built around bulls**t.
When the internet shadow-banning system is triggered later this year, all of the above will remain visible and supported by the regime. Remember that; these outlets/voices are deemed not a threat to ‘national security.’ Only the non-pretending outlets, platforms and voices are going to be targeted. More on that later.❞
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2023/08/06/we-are-beyond-seeing-the-strings-we-are-looking-at-the-puppeteers-hands/
Nothing like the good ol' red scare switcheroo in an article delivered straight to the users of a tool combating corporate capitalist censorship. A true classic.
If you think only capitalists censor, I've got a bridge to sell you.
Whoa, that's good to know -- thank you for telling me that! I've been having some pretty bizarre experiences on social media platforms since 2021. I'm a local journalist / frequent FOIA requester. During normal times, that would be nothing unusual, but it seems to have landed me on some sort of digital shit-list in recent years.
This afternoon I noticed my Substack reader had been unusually quiet for about two weeks, except for the five or so paid writers I pay for, and after looking into it, I discovered I'd been unsubscribed from about 15 blogs. I assumed it was a glitch but now I'm not so sure.
Yes it's hard to be sure. If you inquire with Substack, I'll bet they'll say it's a glitch, and who knows if that's true. But at least you can force them to make you whole.
I was just reviewing your website and old posts. You've written quite a bit! Would you have any tips for pitching a story like this? Prior to posting it here, I sent it to one outlet that doesn't have comment sections on their articles. I thought it might be a fit but I never heard back.
Hi! I just wanted to say thank you so much for bringing my shadow ban to my attention yesterday. Substack acknowledged I'd been flagged as spam in their system (I have no idea how that happened, given my very un-spam like use of the platform), but they're apparently in the process of un-shadow banning me.
I thought you might like to see their response (and my spirited debate with them), since it's your specialty: https://erinmariemiller.substack.com/p/an-important-note-to-subscribers/comment/21227318?r=3ahc1&utm_medium=ios
Thank you, again!
Sorry, I misread his position. I see he is insisting that secrecy IS best practice. I'll respond over there.
Well done! And no problem. You're right it is kind of my thing now, but I don't catch it all. Platforms are always inventing new ways to do things like this, but those ways are often also discoverable. My aim is to help more people be on the look out for secret suppression.
Thank you for sharing the details. It appears you had a fruitful back and forth with an employee there! Way to stick to your guns. You definitely should have been notified about the flag, and such flags should be ever-present on all of your impacted content. However, that employee is wrong that secret suppression is not "standard 'best practice' ". It very much is accepted in the world of content moderation!
Cory Doctorow, friend of the EFF, cites the "Santa Clara Principles" in his Medium post "Como is Infosec" while criticizing secrecy. But the SCP endorse secrecy! They just word it carefully by providing "exceptions." So I'm not surprised Substack does it too. But there is no reason for keeping this secret, as you pointed out, not for bots nor trolls nor harassers; it never makes sense.
Everyone deserves consequences, both for their own sanity and others'. If I'm wrong about that, then someone can come debate me on it. I have not seen any public debate on that topic at all, and I've reviewed a lot of conferences, podcasts, and research that discusses content moderation. In other words, the secrecy is a huge secret itself.
It's a huge story, which I am incapable of delivering in whole, but one way to move the needle might be to interview people who've been impacted by censorship over various topics. For example, I've heard from people impacted by secret suppression over video games, ChatGPT (via another commenter on this post), gender, advocacy or criticism of political candidates, etc. Just telling a few of those stories might help more people relate to the issue. These all-encompassing posts I've previously attempted might feel too distant. But you're the writer, you would know more about that than me!
I absolutely think you're correct on all of that, and I agree that telling these stories is important. This issue needs more attention ASAP. If you hadn't noticed my invisibility, I would have just been writing into the void forever and wondering why no one ever interacted with my work. Thank you. 🙏🏼
The ramifications of secretly silencing legitimate speech, whether it's intentional censorship or accidental through automation, are huge and scary.
I think interviews with people that have been silenced would be an incredible way to get the message out there. Would you ever be willing to grant an interview as an expert (developing Reveddit, etc.) in articles by others, as well? I think that could be a good first step too.
I sure would, thanks! I once declined to do so in the past, but that was because I wasn't ready. Now I am as ready as I'll ever be before trying.
Awesome! I'll get in touch if I'm able to find a home for a story about this. You'd be a great person to talk about it -- Reveddit was brilliant. It's mind-blowing how serious this is.
Thank you! I'll definitely reach out to Substack tomorrow and get to the bottom of this. I'm pretty floored by the whole thing; I never expected them to pull this weirdness.
And absolutely! Pitching stories about certain subjects can be super frustrating (for example, covering tech privacy issues has been weirdly challenging since 2020). There's definitely some bizarre warm fuzzy feelings toward government censorship among the media crowd lately, so I think being aware of that will be helpful so you don't take any rejections/silences too personally. If you get rejected a few times, don't lose heart, just keep pitching and keep on writing.
First, I recommend targeting the right publications. OneZero, the Guardian, Motherboard, MIT Technology Review, etc. might be good options to try. (Visit www.wheretopitch.com for more ideas of who to pitch based on your core topic, and resources on how to contact outlets.)
Finally, here's an excellent guide to writing a strong pitch, written by a former Nylon editor I freelanced for years ago: https://www.keepcalmandchiffon.com/blog/11/28/how-to-pitch-and-get-published
Wishing you the best of luck!! :)
like for you to remove my comment is not censorship, that is your right as the operator of this website. I have no inherent right to have my comments remain visible on your site.
hope you realize that private companies aren't the same thing as governments lol
Great post Robert.
Big AI seems to be on this path as well. Bots are flooding the internet and conversation about it seems to be universally banned. People getting censored and flamed for discussing the idea that GPT4 is dumber than it was at launch.
I bet! "Without some form of censorship, propaganda in the strict sense of the word is impossible." - Walter Lippmann, Public Opinion, 1922 https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/6456/pg6456.html
Lippmann discusses censorship's role in the battle of Verdun just prior to that. It's a pretty interesting read.
Also I used to work in machine learning, so I am familiar with the limitations of AI. I agree it's overhyped online and would not doubt that censorship keeps that propaganda alive.
I worry more that the company that is setup in society to potentially control the common basis of fact has such an adversarial stance on thoughts or feedback for their product. There is a culture of secrecy and control at a company that sells intelligence.
Someone asked me the other day, "How do we, as pro-freedom individuals, pragmatically rebut these gross affronts?"
My experience is that speaking the truth does make a difference.
https://www.reddit.com/r/DeclineIntoCensorship/comments/15617sd/hate_online_censorship_its_way_worse_than_you/jsz6t52/