The Layer between our individual agency and reality is a digital one where someone else is in control

Welcome to a new era where speech is filtered through a layer of online software and where censorship is celebrated.

How many of you accept the opening statement as the truth about the state of existence we all find ourselves living in? Your answer may depend on how well informed you are on past and current events to some degree.

Platform De.Central covers tech in a broad sense, but with a focus on market choice. Market choice for us is defined by, can each and every one of us as individuals, freely choose the hardware, operating system & apps without artificial barriers in our way. Our choices will be come from a number of factors that we value individually like, price, availability, privacy, security and more.

The Layer between our individual agency and reality is a digital one where someone else is in control.

Does the product limit you or get out of the way of your limitless potential or even amplify it? Are there means of controlling the level of privacy exposure online with any and all parties? Is there an acceptable level of risk vs reward to your privacy exposure and the means to control it?

The Layer between our individual agency and reality is a digital one where someone else is in control. This statement is true today now more than ever. We now have platforms for everything we watch and read. Platforms that are populated by user generated content, platforms that are populated by journalistic content, “professional” content. As people spend more and more time swimming through this content, their reality is literally shaped by it.

In our daily lives we receive claims about truth all the time. Like if you live any other place other than Africa and someone tells you “there is a drought in Africa” how do you know for certain that there is in fact a drought. Did you just visit Africa and witness the drought first hand? Most people would say no, I did not witness the drought first hand. You would have to trust the source of the statement and often if enough sources are saying something is true, it may be more believed to be true, even if it is a lie.

Companies like Google, Apple, Microsoft and Facebook. Are literally censoring information on their platforms. These companies represent a narrow perspective of the world and yet they get to censor it.

We are living in a world where very few organizations are in control of what is allowed to be said online. Companies like Google, Apple, Microsoft and Facebook. Are literally censoring information on their platforms. These companies represent a narrow perspective of the world and yet they get to censor it. For example if someone posts a statement on Facebook about something, that post can be censored (deleted) for any number of reasons that Facebook chooses. What’s worse is that people are accepting censorship today in the name of safety. Why is it that we are always making choices between safety and our liberty, in this case the right to free speech.

I think we can all agree that the internet is where free speech lives today weather it is a video of someone making a statement or a website where someone has written a statement, it is still speech. In the United States we have a hard-lined view of free speech but some of us in this country too easily give away bits and pieces of it away under the guise of safety. So many tech publications celebrate companies who censor unpopular speech on their platforms, but isn’t unpopular speech the only kind that needs to be protected? Why are some tech publications promoting market choice on one hand and censorship on the other ? That isn’t even intellectually consistent is it? Here on Platform De.Central we are intellectually consistent. We promote your individual agency and the your right to choose the products, app and services you want without barriers. In order for individuals to have true agency with out barriers they first must be aware the barriers are there.

If our access to all information is obfuscated and filtered, doesn’t that limit choice because won’t we make choices based on limited information. So if you are like many average Facebook users and basically live in your news feed, won’t you have a limited view of reality especially now that censorship is acceptable?