[NicoJuicy]

That's not a 180, but a business decision when going live on stock exchange.

Still doing that would be somewhat controversial and would be a liability for the stock ( + give a wrong impression for normal investors = not in IT)

[stevenicr]

"but a business decision when going live on stock exchange." - I agree - and ain't nothin' wrong with that - be a sell out, and get that paper, lots of it!

But it IS a 180 - at least for those of us who watched the early days of cloudlfare, and how they really championed the whole free speech / we are dumb pipe / we don't block things.. way of pushing back on people and org's who demanded they block and censor things..

a lot of people gave massive goodwill to the brand, and were unaware of the changes (see the other comments here where many here were still under the impression they provided services to these and other sorts of things)

I agree it could be a liability for the stock - sure - so let's just be honest about what they are now - a semi-censor machine, not too different from godaddy - who also became a slave to wall st and those who use it to push agendas - godaddy is no longer the company that Bob (and many other OGs) created, and Cloudflare is no longer the thing it was.

Supporting either of these places today is supporting the censoring of the web by a few, and with consolidated power at this point as well.

If you own stock in it, then I'm sure you'd like it that way - and I don't blame you if you are on that side of the glass.

[NicoJuicy]

I am not really sure how long you think a US company ( or any) can ignore block requests.

Even the most obscure ones are playing wackamole with edge cases in certain countries.

Ps. Yes, I own stock in it. It's not about "I like it that way", it's just that i don't see it as possible in combo with being a big company.

[stevenicr]

"how long you think a US company ( or any) can ignore block requests." - Funny thing is I posted about this issue with cloudflare many moons ago when there quite a few articles boohooing CF - many from euro / uk - protect the children type things.

At the time I suggested that Cf should get ahead of the issue by splitting up the company and the infrastructure - so they could have a CF_UK and a CF_US and CF_Whatever - bifurcating the services as each country and area starts crafting more and more demands.

Big companies often do manage to do business in many parts of the world and have different ways of managing business in one place different than the next.

It's strange how highly controversial web sites can exist with ICAAN not prohibiting domain names, and sites can usually find hosting somewhere - but as soon as you get to DDoS protection, and domain re-registration different places start throwing up morals and panics, refusing services.

Cloudflare got a lot of people using it, and big money investing it by offering to protect the pipes of the net.. they did good for a long time protecting information by staying a neutral pipe.

As I saw the NGO demands that CF grow louder, I assumed legislation would force thier hand to either start blocking when X or Y place asked - not just when DOJ had a court order - and that feild would get murky, meaning they'd have to bifurcate to handle different cultures in different ways eventually..

But it was not courts, it was not new laws. It was the emotions of a single guy that turned big pipes into blockable canals - it was one guy that decided time and time again to start to judge words / pics / information and block things. On a whim, in a knee jerk fashion, without warning - and now no one could know if they are safe when seeking the safety of the open web.

It's a fuzzy needle - what's okay changes on occasion with no fanfare, not committee, no rails. It's their own trivial changes, I assume are controlled by the fbook or twitter feed that CEO gets pushed in his emotes.

So CF is now fair game for all the cancel culture to push around - get the 'right' demanding X thing be blocked - get the left to demand Y thing get blocked - let's enjoy this fun game. Our censor wars got to the point where mural of Washington had to painted over and kids books are banned.

Cf can protect all the PG-13 content of the net from DDoS and be a multi-million dollar company! I guess it could be, there are those who want to remove sesame from the airwaves - it might need protecting.

It can be a big company following all the rules of each country in the world and the extra rules that run the emotions of the main guy and the demands whatever groups that think whatever X should be blocked.