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"Censorship is the suppression of speech or other public communication which may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient to the general body of people as determined by a government, media outlet, or other controlling body." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship

I think the key word here is Suppression which doesn't have to be as extreme as in your example. Censorship is not a binary thing, it's on a scale. Simply using tactics to discourage something can be considered suppression in my view.



When a government institution or another controlling body yielding great influence coerces a media outlet into censoring something, even though that's not required by law, then I also consider that censorship. As such, I clearly consider the case of Wikileaks to be an example of a modern censorship attempt.

However, I also believe that the liberty of the press has to go both ways. A company should be free to deny the publishing of something, after all you can just start your own newspaper, or your own web engine that indexes content in this case, or whatever. It's not like your life is threatened, you just have to move your ass off your couch.


I think the issue in this thread is that you seem to only view something as censorship if the law/influence/whatever comes from the government.




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