@HOA_KSOP If you will humour me. Your comment got me thinking about how that now appears to be what is gradually been transpiring in our societies, be it admittedly in a slightly different fashion.Well maybe not that much, because how many people could read, besides nobles and church officials. Maybe merchants, but I suspect the majority of folks couldn't read.
Are we not seeing how increasingly today, the general publics access to and required acquiescence to whatever arbitrary constraints are placed on one's discourse, simply so as to allow you to gain to various social media sites i.e. for permission to access for what is today the equivalent our nations public square, our voice in our respective societies, is being concentrated in the hands of still fewer and fewer entities of immense private power?
All of which, would it not of having the same effect as potentially greatly narrowing what is now permitted to be 'broadcast' as approved or appropriate social discourse, and placing those subjective decisions in the hands of todays version of ..."nobles, church officials and merchants"
In effect, don't we now increasingly have a situation where while virtually everybody can 'read', it is what we will be allowed access to 'read', that has become the issue.
Couple this with persistent calls in some circles for still yet more increased censorship of social media sites, throw in a push for and in fact actual legislation in some jurisdictions for some forms of digital social credit passports, mix with ever-growing installations of improved facial recognition technology, and viola!
May as well pass along the Soma, for we have arrived...
Cheers!
Or am I just being a cynic...