X protests forced suspension of accounts on orders of India's government The global government affairs team at X (née Twitter) has suspended some accounts and posts in India after receiving executive orders to do so from the country's government, backed by threat of penalties including significant fines and imprisonment. The team revealed its actions on Thursday, writing "In compliance with the …
Yep. Hit a firm with a fine, even a big one, and the senior folk will shrug, moan about changing things being impossible, and put it down to the costs of business... Threaten to throw the higher level employees in prison, and suddenly the impossible becomes possible, and the implementation will happen so fast, it's a surprise the developers dont get whiplash...
I'm... actually wondering how this is even possible, though. Does the Birds-Aren't-Real App even actually have employees physically located in India, let alone C-levels? If not, then... how does their government plan to put people in jail that are literally not physically present in the country? No country has the ability to tell another, "hey, these people that are your citizens and have never set foot in our land, we're arresting them and throwing them in our jail just because", not even the EU has "never been to this country" extradition abilities...
"No country has the ability to tell another, "hey, these people that are your citizens and have never set foot in our land, we're arresting them and throwing them in our jail just because""
They can if there's an extradition treaty and the crime they committed falls under the treaty. The fact that the perp might never have set foot in the country doesn't matter. Gary McKinnon appealed his extradition all the way to the ECHR and lost at every stage. His extradtion was only blocked by the government on the grounds that he might kill himself if incarcerated in the US.
The US isn't going to extradite anybody to India for something that would be a 1st amendment violation here.
I'm not sure if Xitter has employees in India. They don't have a call center at all, so that's not going to be there. I'm guessing they probably have a few servers to handle the local traffic.
“The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) under the central government has finalised its emergency order directing top social media companies like Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, X (formerly Twitter) and Snap to block 177 accounts and links related to the farmers' protest in order to maintain 'public order'.”
This is why we need distributed social media services. Fairly simple to fork an e-mail client, allow it to move rich media between users, e2e encrypted, via the e-mail protocol, and display it in social media format. You can even monetise it with directed advertising and discounts, ideally based upon users' stated preferences. Minimal overheads and no state censorship possible as no content passes through central servers or unencrypted. Users can individually choose to filter whatever they want from their feeds to avoid what they personally do not wish to see. That is how we should have done social media from day one.
If people want free speech and protest they will have to find alternate or old methods to speak and organise. Freedom really is under threat. Governments will retain access to mass media tools and shut them down for the populace under the lie of "safety". Folks it really is heading to a global China style system. It is not theory, just conspiracy. The evidence is in your face if you have the balls to see it and have your belief in state shook. Time democratic governments to become servants of the people not rulers.
Freedom of speech, expression and movement applies to EVERYONE.
These fat, privileged absentee landlords repeatedly threatening the government in order to retain their privileged benefits, are a nuisance.
They speak for no one but themselves.
If they want to protest, fine. Get a damn permit. Book and pay for a park or other public open space for a limited time, and hold your gathering there, requesting the press tand public to come listen to you if they care.
If no one listens to you, that means you failed.
Protesters whose modus operandi is to modify tractors with barrier desrtunction lances and tear gas protection compartments to ram their way into the national capital ? Blocking a major arterial expressway for weeks ?
I don't care about their 'freedom of speech' one bit. They're a bunch of goons trying to get their way through violence. Throw the entire lot of them in prison and throw away the keys.
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