No current networks are "censoring" anything. They have policies against certain types of content. If I run a printing press for anyone to use but won't let peo

No current networks are "censoring" anything. They have policies against certain types of content. If I run a printing press for anyone to use but won't let people use it for what I consider to be harassment, am I "censoring" those people? Mostly, we're talking about social norms that cover behavior and speech. These get called "censorship" to form a negative connotation, but literally zero people are consistently against them. For example, there's a norm against child pornography (this one actually is government censorship). NDAs are a form of government censorship too, but people are generally okay with it because you opt into it explicitly. What if you continually insult your boss? There's no law against it, but you'll probably get fired. If you divulge all your family secrets, are you being "censored" if you no longer get invited to the holidays? Behavior that violates norms gets pushed to the margins. That's how society works. Centralized networks are making people uncomfortable because it's centering behavior that people want marginalized; that's a bug, not a feature. And when we do force them to marginalize it, they'll do it badly. Because we're placing a lot of power and responsibility in a few giant corporations, accountable to their shareholders and clumsily coerced by voters. Which is why the article supports breaking up the networks: the best way to ensure everyone has a voice is to distribute power to them. Re: Federated networks, people don't care whether their networks are centralized. Email has existed federated for decades! People care that they can easily talk to the people they want; the ability to do this is orthogonal to how centralized the network is.