[unityByFreedom]

I always thought it was interesting that the governments of Cambodia and Vietnam allowed Facebook where the media is tightly controlled. Cambodia used to have a couple independent papers. The Post became state-controlled-by-proxy [1] and the Daily was shut down by the government [2]. The existence and popularity of Facebook basically allowed them to shut down the older independent outlets without significant outcry from the public.

Maybe there is some calculus that shows it's better to get people online through access to Facebook, I just hope there's more journalistic competition and/or transparency in the future. Giving in to autocrats seems dangerous.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Phnom_Penh_Post#cite_ref-3...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cambodia_Daily#cite_ref-1:...

[tim333]

I guess facebook tends to be cat pics and wackiness rather than deep analysis of government corruption. Also in Vietnam they lock up the individual blogger if you go to far. eg https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/1947372/vietnam-jails-face...

[unityByFreedom]

Locking someone up for disagreeing with you just highlights your insecurity. And I think the point here is that Facebook is a primary news source for many people. It may be enabling government censorship due to the company's monopolistic status.

[tim333]

Though I'd say the governments there are fairly secure. The Vietnamese communist party has been in power since 1945, China's since '49 and the Cambodian lot only got kicked out when Pol Pot, after having genocided a third of the population, attacked Vietnam who then invaded and got rid of him, and the new lot have been in power since 1984. Sadly throwing opponents in jail seems to kind of work. This of course predates facebook.

[unityByFreedom]

That remains to be seen. The world has been trending towards democracy for a few hundred years.

[orestarod]

Bold statement. Power however is still not trending towards the people's hands in any case.

[unityByFreedom]

Not so bold, see this chart [1]

Do you have a better system in mind for trending power towards people's hands?

[1] https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/world-pop-by-political-re...