We keep hearing about huge tech giants like Apple, Google, Instagram, and Facebook crushing
our freedoms by censoring sexually explicit material.
And my first reaction was, yes!
That is bullshit.
This is the internet, not 1950's television.
Why are they censoring anything?
Then, I started looking in to it.
And getting past all the paranoid theories about how iPhones are the new big brother,
and how Google is just a government pawn,
And the armchair anthropological analysis on how Silicon Valley is a culture crushing,
puritanical, old world model for what's right and wrong...
And what happened was, I started looking at real tangible business reasons for why these
companies would want to censor pornography, and an easy answer
came to mind immediately.
Business partners.
Apple, for example, has made deals with Verizon, GM, Disney,
and a ton of other major corporations.
So burning bridges with any of those companies probably isn't worth the risk.
It makes sense, right?
But, it also ignores the fact that porn itself is a huge industry and by censoring them these
companies are cutting off business opportunities with those companies as well.
Plus, what's Disney gonna do, just not sell iPhone games?
Is Intel gonna stop making computer parts?
Business partners probably have a lot to do with it, but it just seems like too simple
a solution.
So, maybe it's not about companies.
Maybe it's about customers.
Apple needs everybody to buy their stuff...moms, kids, Mormons, Methodists, Satanists, Stalinists,
soup lovers... everyone.
And they need those people to feel safe using their products without the fear of running
into material that they'd find offensive.
So in that regard, censoring sexually explicit material is a
no brainer.
But I still don't think that's the reason.
Companies could easily make it so that the user themselves can censor whatever they want.
Just like Google does with SafeSearch.
Or, they could create a dedicated section of their content for adults only, like how
video stores used to have that creepy room in the back for porn enthusiasts?
Again, all of this likely contributes - but it's not the only reason.
So, why are these innovative cutting edge tech companies censoring content?
It could be all of those things I listed earlier, or it could be because they are cutting edge
and innovative.
They're creating new things, and in extreme cases like Google Glass, they're creating
new, strange, misunderstood, and potentially terrible things.
11.
And that means convincing the general public to buy into using, owning and loving something
they know nothing about and are naturally suspicious of.
You're asking the world to learn something new and you've got to do whatever you can
to make that learning process as simple as possible.
Letting porn apps and topless girls into the conversation can make it really hard for the
general public to concentrate.
So I say, censor away technology!
As long as you keep coming up with new and exciting ways to make our lives a little bit
better.
I'll just look at porn the old fashioned way, by opening up
a web browser.
Wear condoms everybody.