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[–]Canbot 23 insightful - 1 fun23 insightful - 0 fun24 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

"free speech" was more of an assumption on my part than a fundamental tenant of their platform

No, it was explicitly stated by the founder that free speech was a tenant of the site. He was philosophically opposed to censorship he saw on other websites. They really did turn it into everything it was never supposed to be.

[–]neovulcan[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

Thank you. Either I never knew where to look or it was removed before I started looking, but good to know just how good Aaron Swartz really was.

[–]Aureus 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Btw, check out this response to the xkcd comic you posted. Randall has a fundamentally flawed view of free speech

[–]neovulcan[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

People were citing free speech when Google wouldn't run ads for, I think it was a car company or something. The thing is, what you permit says a little bit about your company as well. That car company probably wouldn't have been significant, but what if Google allowed porn ads? It'd be "free speech", and the industry would certainly pay, but it wouldn't be in Google's best interest.