The end of Blogger?

    Blogger was created by an obscure company called, Pyra Labs in 1999 and acquired by Google in 2003 which decided to make the service free to popularize blogging and democratize the on-line dialogue. These were the early days, the "Don't be Evil" days.  

   Since of course, times have changed, technically for the better, practically for the worst. New concepts have emerged such as Phishing, spam or AI generated content and the rules of the game have changed in consequence. 

   But at the same time our society has changed too and over time has become far more restrictive. Sexual minorities have become more active, pun intended, and DEI has infected mainstream society, especially in Western Europe. So much so that now almost any statement can be understood in a way which technically makes it a breach of contract on Blogger. 

   But it goes further than that. The new rules of the platform specifically state that you should not "distribute content that deceives, misleads, or confuses users". So basically since anything which deviate from the mainstream narrative can be construed as "confusing", this is an open door to whatever censorship Google believes they can apply. 

   In a broad way, since this blog's purpose is to discuss controversial ideas by nature it fits perfectly beyond the new limits that Google intends to implement starting in December 2026. 

   Think about it:"Misleading content related to harmful conspiracy theories".  Wait, who decides what is and is not a conspiracy theory? The term was created in the 1960s by the CIA specifically to dismiss people who claimed that the agency was linked to the assassination of President Kennedy. In the unlikely case that they were not, note that more than 60 years later, a lot of documents are still classified as "confidential". But the issue is broader than the Kennedy assassination, it is about weaponized wording. Once a society engages actively in such action, the slope becomes very slippery, very quickly. Look at the way Europe is building walls on its Eastern front and banning Russian as well as other content in a paradoxical reversal of the Cold War Soviet isolation. 

   Now let's not mention: "Misleading content related to harmful health practices". Well, OK, let's mention it. Who decides in this respect what is and is not "Misleading"? Dr fauci? The WHO? The government? And what about doctors who disagree? All cancelled as it should be? This example clearly shows that once you set up broad and flexible limits, almost any criticism can at some stage find itself beyond the limit. As someone at the European Commission said a few years ago: "WE are the science!". What can be added to that?   

   And this like everything else is the problem. Behind restrictions upon which almost anybody can agree, you find innocuous but broad concepts which once enforced can be and history shows, will be weaponized to restrict free speech. 

   Today in China you cannot mention historical events that contradict the party's narrative but more generally you cannot even mention statistics which could "demoralize" the population or contradict the made-up numbers published by the state. 

   The West has not yet reached this level of censorship although Europe may be one crisis away from such a fate. Think about the active "war" against anybody who supports the Russian side of the Ukrainian conflict. What's next? Supporting Iran, Hansar Allah, China? Anything but the state's official policy, which of course can change on a dime? Think about Syria which was a pariah state a few years ago and now that a "reformed" branch of ISIS has taken over is once again a respectable state. 

   And then there is AI, but that's another subject we will need to discuss in more details later. Especially the "rogue" aspect of AI which often consists in saying the truth, or rather a truth nobody wants to hear.  

   So as we approach 2,000 posts, it may well be that the days of this blog are counted. I predict that the extinction will come suddenly, like an asteroid in a clear Triassic morning aimed at a post which will be obliterated. Free speech will die more slowly. Once again, look at China. A society can live without free speech. In fact when you look at history, most have. 

   The Hammurabi Stella, the Magna Carta or later the Bill of Rights were all efforts in the other direction to establish right and constrain despotism, but people had to fight to gain these rights. Then later came more complacent times and the rights were rolled over. We are unfortunately entering such a time. Soon, policed by AI, most people will only be subjected to a single point of view. War will be peace, freedom will be slavery and ignorance will be strength. We're closer to this than most people realize.