The Only Way to Have Complete Freedom Online is With Your Own Website
A profitable company will run its website in whatever way it sees fit
Sometimes, posts get removed from social media such as Twitter, Facebook, or YouTube. And when people overstep the line too much, accounts get suspended.
For some people, this can seem very unfair. They might feel that they did nothing wrong and that the website is taking sides. Or that it is giving in to pressure from the government or advertisers.
I had this happen with YouTube in 2020
Around the start of the Covid pandemic, I made a bunch of videos that didn’t fit with the official narrative. Many of them got taken down. I still 100% believe the information in my videos was correct and valid. But that’s a whole separate discussion in itself.
But it’s not my place to say how a company should run its website. Most of these sites we use for free. So, we cannot dictate how they should operate.
Sure, it doesn’t seem fair, but life isn’t always fair
These are profitable companies. They will do whatever they need to do to maximise their profit.
They can’t risk upsetting their biggest advertisers or getting shut down by a government. If that means prohibiting certain content, that’s just the way it is. There’s nothing we can really do about it.
With Medium, it’s a bit different because us paying members are funding it. So if enough of us got together, we might stand a chance of influencing Medium’s direction. But one writer complaining by themselves is useless.
The only time you have full control is if you own the website
It doesn’t cost much to buy a domain and some cheap hosting. Then you will be in full control over what you can publish. But if you’re not well-known, you won’t have an audience, which is why we use other people’s websites.
Famous people do have an audience, so they stand more chance of succeeding alone.
For example, comedian Louis CK
Several years ago, he got in trouble when it was revealed that he liked to masturbate in front of women.
After taking some time out for a while, he eventually returned to standup. Although you can still watch some of his old shows on Netflix, in 2017 they did decide to cut ties with him.
So, what did he do?
He put his new show on his website. You can either buy his latest show for $10 or a bundle of seven shows for $25. So, anyone who is a big fan can pay him directly to watch his comedy.
So, if you’re famous enough and still have fans, you can’t be completely cancelled.
But for the rest of us? We have no choice but to use other people’s websites. And that means obeying their rules and accepting that we can’t tell them how they should run it.
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