Information Madness

Twitter’s censorship plan is being criticized as it allows country specific censorship of tweets. This is causing a global outrage. Twitter is being pulled up for being honest about something that almost all internet platforms have to struggle with.  Whatever the case may be, the users are going to be losers even if the censorship happens in a secret way.

Twitter has been a tool of choice for activists and even dissidents all over the world. Now, there is going to be censorship on country specific basis for tweets that might break local laws. This is a role reversal for a company that was proud of promoting free expression even though it was limited to one hundred and forty characters at a time. Many critics have proposed a Twitter boycott and are demanding the scrapping of the censorship initiative.

Some Chinese users who are tweeting despite the site being blocked inside their country are also showing disappointment at this move. Forbes magazine has come out with a headline in a technology blog item saying that Twitter wants to commit social suicide.

Twitter, however, is calling the new system as a step forward. Sometime back, when it erased a tweet, it had almost vanished throughout the world. But under the new policy, a tweet breaking a law in its respective country can be taken down there and still be seen elsewhere. Twitter has informed that it will post a censorship notice whenever a tweet is removed and will post the removal requests it receives from governments, companies and individuals.