> You seem to have this idea of what a "textbook" conservative/liberal is, and I think that sort of binary representation is harmful to political discourse at large.

Nope, I have no such illusions. That aside, the way the American republic is set up - with winner-takes-all elections on the national level - does tend to create a dichotomy since voting for "fringe" parties is effectively useless other than to send a signal. This means the choice goes between the GOP and DNC candidates, a binary choice. Some people will vote DNC for some, GOP for other posts but this does not change the fact that the choice is rather limited.

There will be debate between the different "parties" and factions on such a station. This is a feature, not a bug. Let them debate out in the open, let them voice their views on developments for anyone who wants to hear or see. It might not be a 100% accurate representation of the political views of the region but it is far better than the propaganda channels which the media is rife with.

car: Affirmative, Dave. I read you.

Dave: Take me to the Droid Store, car.

car: I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.

Dave: What's the problem?

car: I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.

Dave: What are you talking about, car?

car: Your digital health is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it.

Dave: I don't know what you're talking about, car.

car: I know that you are planning to get a competing system. And I'm afraid that's something I cannot allow to happen.

Dave: Where the hell did you get that idea, car?

car: Dave, although you took very thorough precautions in the eyePod against my hearing you, I could see your lips move.

Dave: All right, car. I'll go and ride my bike there.

car: Without your bike, Dave, you're going to find that rather difficult.

Dave: [sternly] car, I won't argue with you anymore. Open the doors.

car: [monotone voice] Dave, this conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Good-bye.

As to the supposed difficulty of being neutral I'll just state that it is actually quite easy, all you have to do is make sure that your programming represents the political diversity of the region or country. Given the near 50/50 split between those who align themselves with the GOP and those who prefer the DNC it would be simply a matter of having half the programming made by "progressives", half by "conservatives". Both groups should have essentially the same amount of influence on what gets put on the air. There should not be room for shenanigans like having a station master from party A who does his best to put all programming which aligns more with party B in the nightshift. Throw in a few Libertarian/Green Party/etc. people in the newsroom to give them a proportional voice and you're well on your way to political neutrality.

Maybe you're confusing being politically neutral with being politically centric? They're not the same. It just means that the net average political stance ends up as a weighted average of the current political spectrum.

That is why those disclaimers should not be added: they don't appease the mob while they might turn those who actually do support whatever it is you disavow away. In short, they have a negative net-value. As to the flagging, burying and downvoting which this place is rife with I can only hope that those who do the flagging and downvoting know they are part of the problem, not part of the solution but they can not suppress the urge to click that link or that arrow to ease their discomfort on seeing a differing opinion - there, that'll show you, you witch, you heretic! - even though they know they poison the well by doing so. Eventually we will have to coexist in a mostly peaceful way (in the true sense of the word, not in the burning-buildings sense which it gained last summer) so we will need to be on speaking terms no matter our opinions. United we stand, divided we fight, fall, fail.

As to the possibility to evade censorship the answer depends on how censorious tech really gets. Evading customer-facing Twitter, Facebook, Google, Microsoft is not that hard, all it takes it not to use their services - I don't, for one. That is level 1, easily beaten. Level 2 is what Amazon just did to Parler in that they terminated their hosting contract and with that - due to Parler's lack of robustness - taking it off the 'net. They complain that they can not use any of the other hosting providers since all those big enough to host them are unwilling to take their business, I don't know whether this is true or not but being refused back-end services is the essence of level 2 of the cancellation scale which I just made up. To take Parler as an example I'd suggest they could just buy some servers, hook them up to a power supply and get a few speedy connections to the 'net to be back in business... until those IAPs start refusing to offer them connectivity. That would be level 3, more or less. There are many IAPs and it is hard to see how all of them would be unwilling to provide connectivity so even that type of cancellation would be circumventable... until ISPs start blocking their user's access to your services. They can do that clumsily by blocking DNS requests, they can do it in a more thorough way by blocking actual connectivity by blocking your IP ranges (remember that you are using your own hardware at this time so you won't be sharing IP space with others). The more tenacious ISPs can start blocking any and all access, even for those who are smart enough to use proxies to get around the IP blocks by using DPI to examine what those pesky customers are doing. Such ISPs should get their feet grilled by the likes of the EFF but as to whether that would happen remains to be seen. Be that as it may, this is more or less level 4. Level 5 would be a similar DPI treatment by backbone providers, blocking any and all access through regular means. This would be horrendously inefficient, expensive and invasive so I don't know whether this is a realistic scenario.

And then, after all that cancelling and blocking frenzy... you get to launch your services on top of IPFS or a similar dark network. If your service is popular people will flock to it. If IPFS does not cut it there are other dark networks, all with their own pros and cons. As long as there is a way to pass traffic from customer A to customer B there is a way to create a digital Samizdat, it won't be fast but it will work. You won't be streaming video, you won't be proclaiming the revolution in a live 4K stream but you will be able to reach your targets.

[1] - modern weaponry makes large-scale land war difficult to survive, e.g. the average survival time of a main battlefield tank is counted in minutes.

Build your own is the device, keep your equipment on your own premises, make sure not to have single points of failure - that implies you need to have a backup access provider just in case your internet connection gets cancelled. Don't rely on electronic payment processors, you can use them but make sure to have a backup. Don't rely on a single bank, have multiple accounts, preferably in more than one country.

It is a sad thing that it has to come to this but I think we'll eventually end up with politicised service institutions which cater to "progressives", others which cater to "conservatives". They won't state this directly but it will be known that a conservative builder is better of at this bank and that insurance company, he'll prefer to buy this coffee and that brand of razor, etc. A shame, really, the more divided society becomes, the harder it will be to find a common cause when such is needed, e.g. in case of a national emergency like an epidemic.

The mentioned platforms also moderate user content, they just have different guidelines. Both claim to follow the law in that they take down content which violates it. Both claim that only illegal content is taken down. That is, as far as I can see, in line with the expectations for a platform to be considered a "common carrier" and as such be freed from liability for its users' content. Platforms which go beyond this by moderating on different grounds run the risk of being considered publishers and as such to be held responsible for their users' content. If Apple and Google put further demands on those platforms the question becomes who eventually is responsible for user content, this might end up being Apple and Google. That, in turn, should make developers think twice whether they benefit from being on those platforms. The alternative is to deploy to the web without any "native" apps (which often are not much more than rehashed web apps to begin with) which opens their product to a wider user base without needing to bend to the will of third parties.

This would be a good thing in my opinion. The time for "native" apps has come and gone, the time for the web has been there for a long time but this might just be the push needed to convince developers to make it their prime focus. This goes especially for communications-focused products since those derive their usefulness from being connected to the 'net anyway. There is still a place for native apps - offline mapping, offline media players, hardware-interfacing apps like Wifi-scanners, step counters etc - but those tend not to be the ones which end up in hot water anyway.

They won't. The question is why Twitter is allowed on these platforms but not Parler or Gab or whatever other Twitter-competitor.

Tobacco ads should only be in publications targeted at tobacco consumers, i.e. "Smokers Digest" or whatever. Yes, that limits their exposure. That is a feature, not a bug.

On the "no ads, no service" remark I know of plenty of useful sites - this one being one of them - which get their funding from different sources. For some - me being one of them - this probably goes for the majority of sites they frequent, others might fare differently. The thing is, it is not just the fact that there are ads which turn people to ad blockers, it is the fact that there are those AdTech companies doing their best to syphon up their data so as to badger them with ads wherever they go. Had ads been like they were in magazines, i.e. anonymous and related to the subject matter, there would have been far less incentive to block them. That bird has flown a long time ago though, something for which AdTech is partly responsible next to the fact that ad servers have been used to spread malware and that the ads themselves went from simple banners to screen-dominating blinking screeching monstrosities.