Censoring Or Deleting Lies?

There’s been a debate rumbling on for some time regarding the major social media platforms. It seems that they’re wrong if they do and wrong if they don’t.

I’m talking about removing posts that are not considered truthful. The problem with social media is that we can all be journalists but without doing any investigative work or research.

Users can, and do, repost articles from both within these platforms and from outside sources without checking if they’re actually factual. We’ve all got a built-in bias and tend to echo material that fits our own ideology – that applies to many areas of life, not just politics.

Since the US election there’s been something of an exodus from the two major platforms – Facebook and Twitter – by right-leaning folks who feel that these platforms are censoring conservative material unfairly. The networks respond by saying that they’re just removing material that is clearly false.

Are they removing any left-leaning posts in the same way? If not, why not? Perhaps there are more dubious conservative postings than liberal ones? Either way, the arguments are not going to stop anytime soon.

It’s the problem that arises when everyone can be their own journalist and publisher, and it’s probably here to stay. My view is that with freedom of speech, surely comes the responsibility to be truthful. The issue there is that everyone’s version of the truth can be different.

A Number Of Blogging Options

Just this evening I was thinking how much the WordPress system has come along since its inception in 2003. (Has it really been around THAT long).  I guess so, as I started up my first blog about then, and I quickly decided on WordPress. Back then, it was pretty much just blogging software, but it’s matured into a full featured CMS since then.

Now, when it comes to actually writing a blog, I truly have a number of options. I can, of course, blog via the built-in interface of the blog.  I can also blog third party software, such as MarsEdit on my Mac; from the iOS WordPress app on my iPhone or iPad; from the WordPress.com site (the option I am using right now). What this means is that I can pretty much blog from anywhere, although I have to admit that for a longer post with plenty of text, I would rather be at a desktop or laptop machine with a regular keyboard than trying to type several hundred words on a phone keyboard, even with Swype style input installed.

Shopping Online
Still best for blogging.

I realise that for many people having a personal blog has fallen by the wayside, with the advent of social media. After all, you can interact with friends and family using Facebook, and pretty much everyone know where to find it, and it’s easy to use, even for the dedicated NON-Geeks out there.

Still, I do enjoy blogging on my own site, and I can pretty much input whatever I want without any censorship if I so desire; not that I really output anything particularly controversial. Well, not yet anyway.

img_2113I can, and do, link my posts to Social Media, and chances are that you’re reading this having come from Facebook or Twitter. If you have, or even if you haven’t, please consider leaving a comment here before you go. I’ll even reply to you if you wish. Thanks for dropping by, and do come back again soon!