Highlighting obscure and censored journalism Free speech is controversial speech. Without free speech, there is no truth, no disinformation, because only one narrative is permitted with no critical analysis.
News & Opinion Network was first published in 2000 as a user-based news lead journal relating primarily to investments. We started in the mid 1990's on a CompuServe server, but I soon realized that free speech (i.e., controversial speech) was subject to intimidation and censorship. So our group built our own data center and backend technology. About 99% of the posts were relating to financial topics, particularly regarding SEC filings and publicly traded companies in the news. NewsOp was a space where shareholders could speak anonymously about the company's they owned and could not be censored or blocked by the tech companies of the day. After 2000, we were financially supported by johndoes.org (John Does Anonymous Foundation), one of the early advocates of anonymous free speech on the Internet. Political topics were rarely discussed when I founded the original posting platform.
In those days we were protected by Section 230 as a publishing platform. Section 230, which we worked hard to get legislated through Congress, was intended to protect unmoderated platforms from liability from statements made from users. It allowed platforms to remove inappropriate posts which could be harmful to the web site, without being classified as a "moderator". Section 230 was not intended to filter one point of view in favor of promoting the opposing point of view. Section 230 was not intended to provide free political support to one candidate while silencing views supporting the other. But here we are in 2019 with just that scenario.
In the environment of the 2020's, corporations, including news organizations, have become publicly political, including the Internet Behemeths, and have once again began censoring common public interest topics, the news leads have shifted. In the early days, topic threads were posted proifically, and readers could post comments, thoughts, reactions, etc. Everyone could leave comments. Today, my strategy is that since there are thousands of outlets where readers are welcome to comment to their heart's desire, there is no reason to indulge in interacitivity here. We will link to your story lead and most likely the content provider will trail the story with a comments section (which is most likely being data-mined).
The other change I have made to update the news journal is to cull out submissions so the site is not carrying more than a couple hundred news leads at a time. For our stated purpose, that is to highlight news and opinion items which have been largely shadow-banned or censored on content media sources, I don't want the site to turn into another boneyard archive. I think the news lead format is perfect for this purpose.
If you want a newsfeed, you can follow our account on Facebook, Twitter, and other platforms where you can get our feed of new article leads.
We rely entirely on submissions and volunteer editors. If you are interested in volunteering to edit, let me know and I will set you up with a portal account. Otherwise, anyone is welcome to send submissions via email or through Substack subscription. For details, please review the Submissions page.
If you like the concept here, you are welcome help this Journal to grow with fresh uncensored. There is no political agenda as long as your topic is sincere. Contact me for more information. And God bless!
