The Number that Newsvine Censored

Come on Newsvine, censorship is worse than crabs.

Photo by Jessica Merz. (License: Creative Commons Attribution)

Yesterday I wrote a quick column explaining how DRM in HD-DVD's had been compromised. I posted a number which may possibly have been illegal. Within a few hours, the article was censored.

This is a huge blow to the quality and trust level of Newsvine.

If news articles are already being censored because of influence from companies, then what about later? What if someone wanted to blow a whistle on Newsvine? Nothing. Because Newsvine refused to take a stand for an f*ing number.

So now we know Newsvine has no backbone to protect its users. It yields to the influence of potential advertisers, and only lets the group discuss things that don't threaten their companies. Is this not the most perverted thing you've seen? Give the power to the crowds, and then censor it as soon as they have a chance to say something meaningful.

For anyone who's interested, I highly recommend downloading a piece of anti-censorware I wrote a few months ago. It's free and open source, but it only runs on windows. Check it out here, and then think before you post sensitive information to Newsvine.

Then think twice about posting to a "news" site that censors the real stories as soon as they threaten an advertiser.

EDIT: Seems article was censored by users, and not by administrators. Administrators have yet to take a stance. What does this say for the power of crowds? Was removing my article in the crowd's best interests?

EDIT: My formal response to everyone's arguments is here.

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