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As Daily Stormer and 8chan have shown, CloudFlare has very few competitors and seemingly none that don't censor. 8chan jumped ship to BitMitigate when CloudFla

by skrowl 7y ago

As Daily Stormer and 8chan have shown, CloudFlare has very few competitors and seemingly none that don't censor. 8chan jumped ship to BitMitigate when CloudFlare dropped them, and then BitMitigate dumped them when they had their backbone link yanked out from under them. Neither site broke any US laws, but they were both controversial.

big_chungus 7y ago
> CloudFlare has very few competitors In the personal/SMB spaces, you're right. Of course, enterprise remains their cash cow, where they compete with the big boys (akamai, incapsula, etc.). > Neither site broke any US laws, but they were both controversial. This is basically why so many are bothered by CloudFlare's decision. Who decides what's controversial? We've seen many examples in the past of normal views being "controversial".
- favorited 7y ago
  > Who decides what's controversial? CloudFlare, in this case.
  - pacoWebConsult 7y ago
    What's the difference between this and choosing not to bake a cake for a gay couple? Plenty of people cheered Cloudflare for taking down TDS and 8Chan, but the same people got up in arms to demand a private business provide service to a protected class. Last time I checked political affiliation was a protected class in CA and political activity was a protected class in CA & NY.
    - big_chungus 7y ago
      > political activity was a protected class in CA & NY. Yes, but cloudflare is not denying a job to any of those people. Not to mention there are certainly threats of violence on those sites, which are technically illegal. That's grounds enough to take the site down. I argued above that cloudflare's actions were concerning, but at the end of the day, it's cloudflare's network. Do you really want the state compelling by force a firm to carry the traffic of any one? I don't, and find it the only option more concerning than a firm arbitrarily refusing to do business. I personally dislike the actions of cloudflare in this case, and am allowed to criticize them. However, I don't think it makes sense to have the state enforce my criticism via compulsion.

by skrowl 7y ago

big_chungus 7y ago

> CloudFlare has very few competitors In the personal/SMB spaces, you're right. Of course, enterprise remains their cash cow, where they compete with the big boys (akamai, incapsula, etc.). > Neither site broke any US laws, but they were both controversial. This is basically why so many are bothered by CloudFlare's decision. Who decides what's controversial? We've seen many examples in the past of normal views being "controversial".

favorited 7y ago
> Who decides what's controversial? CloudFlare, in this case.
- pacoWebConsult 7y ago
  What's the difference between this and choosing not to bake a cake for a gay couple? Plenty of people cheered Cloudflare for taking down TDS and 8Chan, but the same people got up in arms to demand a private business provide service to a protected class. Last time I checked political affiliation was a protected class in CA and political activity was a protected class in CA & NY.
  - big_chungus 7y ago
    > political activity was a protected class in CA & NY. Yes, but cloudflare is not denying a job to any of those people. Not to mention there are certainly threats of violence on those sites, which are technically illegal. That's grounds enough to take the site down. I argued above that cloudflare's actions were concerning, but at the end of the day, it's cloudflare's network. Do you really want the state compelling by force a firm to carry the traffic of any one? I don't, and find it the only option more concerning than a firm arbitrarily refusing to do business. I personally dislike the actions of cloudflare in this case, and am allowed to criticize them. However, I don't think it makes sense to have the state enforce my criticism via compulsion.