[thomassmith65]

  The old tech/nerd crowd I remember was very strongly against censorship of any kind. 

That was me, once! I thought the people of the world would use the internet to enlighten themselves. After social media exploded, I had to face the fact that I was wrong.

  Everyone used to talk about how bad it is to see the great firewall of China 

That was back when it was laughable to suggest a firewall might be a preventative measure against an authoritarian government (and subsequent higher firewall). I no longer trust the public to think critically about online information. You can bet plenty of Americans crying this week over Roe v Wade voted Republican.

  Also the idea of companies controlling what music everyone had access to was appalling 

I was appalled back then, but I was also high on internet utopianism. In retrospect, I'd be less dogmatic. Today, artists still don't profit from recorded music, only now the labels also take a cut of their live performances too.

  Most everyone was also very liberal. 

I consider myself as liberal as a person can be after waking up in a world full of illiberal lunatics.

  It seemed to really start when all the tech companies decided to control what 
  they deemed COVID misinformation. 

Well, I've never been quite that liberal. If there's a war, natural disaster, or a dangerous pandemic, I don't demand the same freedoms (even if we're talking about government)

  it's no wonder many people are losing all trust in tech platforms. I miss the old open internet when most people seemed to be against such things.

I miss the old people on the internet, who were just barely civilized enough to make me think it would all work out in the end :(

[horns4lyfe]

Being willing to give up freedoms to the government whenever disasters occur is highly illiberal. After all that talk of how little you trust people with the internet, you’re telling me you trust the people in power to take your freedom and then give it back? Cmon

[thomassmith65]

If my comment seems to approve of a government reaching for emergency powers 'whenever' then I worded it poorly.

There needs to be an actual, dire emergency, and the law should lay out what the extra powers are, the process by which a government obtains them, and their duration.