The problem is in concentration of power: gov't and companies. When you have independent printing presses in every town, gov't should let them print (and refuse to print) whatever they like. If one org buys up all the newspapers and puts them under one corporate umbrella, their corp policies determine what the electorate gets to hear. Not acceptable.

The difference is not ownership but concentration, and on the network you have network effects on a scale never before seen. We have no problem with people not being able to say or read what they want in email because it is a federated system that anyone can join through any provider. If Facebook or Twitter were just an open protocol, the users could decide for themselves who to subscribe to, managing their own "safety". But instead, we have giant, centralized organizations being accused of bias from every side because they wield so much centralized control over information.

So, when companies are small, they should be able to say or not say whatever they want. As they get larger, they gradually surrender the power to regulate their own users. They can stay small, or they can release control--their choice. The can open the protocol and become just one provider in an open protocol (like email), and if they have fewer than, say, 10M users, they can totally offer the "service" of blocking incoming and outgoing info for those users who want it done for them, and those who think "no, thanks, I'll decide for myself whose feed to subscribe to" will be able to do so via other providers.

Hm a lot of good points for me to think about here.