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  1. #1
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    Far left friendly hosting options

    Several people within my party as well as some friends of mine who are not member of the party (and not even necessarily left wing) are encouraging me to start a communist journal online ; not a propaganda magazine or such but a simple look on current events discussed from the far left angle.

    While I am not sure if I want to do this (I have other activities already when it comes to my political idealism) I have given the idea a thought. One of the things that immediately makes me doubt though is where to host such blog.

    Blogger is a "no" for sure due to its ownership by Google, which is definitely a capitalist enterprise and thus probably opposing the far left. I would even say by extention it would not be wise to host any such initiative in the US since the country has no background or tradition when it comes to the far left (a country believing Obama is left wing clearly has no experience with the REAL left, let alone the far left)

    In theory Europe is an OK place for this, should I decide to really consider this idea (I am unsure of it although I've given it some thought) : we have communist parties in most European countries (I'm member of one of them) and it's fully legal to vote for them or affiliate. However, this is legally speaking. The fact they're fully allowed doesn't mean they're popular. In many EU nations, the far left parties struggle to get above the 2 or 3% of votes (some exceptions where they score quite well exist though) and in some EU nations there exists a large anti-leftwing bias. This doesn't change anything to the fact that communist and far left parties are fully legal here, however I can imagine it may be a struggle to find hosts who --keeping their image in mind-- don't mind to host a site that is quite explicit in its far left orientation.

    I'm quite sure legally speaking even the US would not be an issue, there is a Communist Party of the USA (based in New York) and some far left websites are hosted in the States. However, the Communist US party is extremely small and the bias against the left wing is even bigger in the US than in Europe, so I doubt the US is a good place for such initiatives. Heck, my lack of laws is too limited to know if acts such as the Patriot Act and other similar laws would not stand in the way of explicitly left-wing websites. But even in Europe I'm not entirely sure how to trace a host that is openminded enough to not care about the political orientation of the sites they host.

    Again, I'm not sure yet if I'll be going to do this anyway, maybe just posting some articles in the party magazine is sufficient enough to keep busy when it comes to my political ideals. However, while I give the idea of a political blog a thought, I immediately bounced on the question mark where to even start it.

    PS 1: in theory there is blogactiv.eu but they are very EU orientated. Now me too obviously as a European, however if there is a minority of issues related to non-EU politics I'd want to share an opinion about, I'd not like to be restricted from doing so.

    PS 2: LiveJournal is now owned by a Russian organisation and Russia obviously is quite open to left wing ideals. However, the site seems to be quite comatose with popularity fading more and more as we speak.

  2. #2
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    prq.se comes to mind when you ask for freedom of speech. But they are obviously capitalist, profit making company and will not host you for free or for cheap. Not sure how this works for you and your ideals, but i doubt anyone would host you for free anyway.

  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gerrit View Post
    he fact they're fully allowed doesn't mean they're popular. In many EU nations, the far left parties struggle to get above the 2 or 3% of votes (some exceptions where they score quite well exist though) and in some EU nations there exists a large anti-leftwing bias.
    german pirate party is #3 strongest party in germany now.

  4. #4
    There are communist parties in most countries. I don't see why left/right is an issue on where to host if it's not illegal. If it gets shut down, open it again somewhere else and go to the (non-mainstream) news with a nice headline. Now you got more traffic. lol

    I'm assuming mainstream media won't even talk to you. lol
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  5. #5
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    I don't specify the hosting has to be free. If a paid offer is the best one, so it be. Fine with me.

    Communist parties exist all over Europe and (although very small) in the US. I am member of one of the European ones. We have a site, several members have blogs. The thing is: it is legal to be communist, but a host decides if he wishes to host any specific site or not. That is their decision to refuse a certain site, even if the site is not illegal. Some webhosts refuse political websites overall to keep their image neutral or non-political. So while communist believes are legal, not every webhost will want to be associated with it ; some hosts refuse political sites alltogether because they wish to keep a neutral image. So you need a site host where you know they don't mind to host a site which has outspoken far left political content ; it is legal to publish such content, obviously, but not every host will be enthousiast for it. So you need to know a host for whom political websites are no issue and who don't feel the need to keep their image non-political.

  6. #6
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    Just open a dialogue with the host, honestly a smaller company might be better. My company isn't off the ground yet, but I think I speak for a good fraction of people that I will host anything that isn't going to get me DMCAed or my servers seized. OVH has a rep for hosting anything that isn't blatantly illegal, but OVH has a lot of other rep too...
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  7. #7
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    If you're looking for a host that lives off of the communism model, I don't think such a thing exists in a capitalist society. Somewhere, someone is making a profit even if you have to trace it back to their bandwidth providers. Personally I would never use my political ideology as a basis for what I would host. The freedom to disagree is a big deal to me. I'm not saying that to advertise myself, I'm more concerned with why this would be a problem for any host. I really don't think it would. It is not illegal in the U.S. to support communism. If your efforts directly support illegal activity such as violently overthrowing governments rather than using the democratic process, that is the only way I could see any issues arising.
    Ain't here to spam my signature, I'm not desperate for sales.

  8. #8
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    Let me make it clear I would only write opinion pieces looking at social events and issues from the communist angle. Obviously I would like to see capitalism disappear, but not if it happens in a violent way. I do not support violence by any means and would never call for violence.

    I also do not look for a host that is communist or socialist or that does not want to make profit. The thing is: with the many misunderstandings and wrong stereotypes about left wing politics, some hosts would not like to host content promoting the far left ideology. I am well aware it's not illegal, but some hosts prefer to abstain from political content for the sake of their image.

    I don't mind if a host is profit-making, we live in a capitalist society as we speak and us leftists have to just survive in it and hope for a peaceful change to come. But this won't happen overnight, that would be very unrealistic. We can only hope it happens at some point, but until then we just have to survive within the capitalist society we're in and just spread our ideals (in a peaceful way!) hoping the change will occur at some point. So no, I don't mind if a host makes profit or so, that is not an issue. The one issue is : I would dislike putting my efford in writing opinion pieces, organising a site (and if needed pay for the webspace), then to see the host decide they don't like the content and remove it. I am not looking for a host who would offer some webspace out of idealism or agreeing with the left wing idealists ; I would only expect they'd not just remove the website and offer the freedom to publish opinion pieces from the leftist point of view without self-censorship or worries to see the site offline suddenly. Hence if I would decide to give this idea a try (at this point it's an idea I am thinking about...) I'm happy to see the webhost being a profit-making company, as long as I can rely on the peace of mind that they welcome and won't suddenly delete opinion pieces that promote the left wing ideals.

    PS I very much agree that dialogue has to exist and the freedom to disagree has to exist. But I can assure that none of the opinion pieces I have published on different sites have claimed to hold the only truth, they are opinion pieces = explaining or promoting an opinion, leaving the reader the room to give it a thought and decide to agree or disagree.

  9. #9
    I'm quite sure legally speaking even the US would not be an issue, there is a Communist Party of the USA (based in New York) and some far left websites are hosted in the States. However, the Communist US party is extremely small and the bias against the left wing is even bigger in the US than in Europe, so I doubt the US is a good place for such initiatives. Heck, my lack of laws is too limited to know if acts such as the Patriot Act and other similar laws would not stand in the way of explicitly left-wing websites. But even in Europe I'm not entirely sure how to trace a host that is openminded enough to not care about the political orientation of the sites they host.
    Say what you will about the US, I have never seen a "left wing" agenda be silenced. The Patriot Act is something different altogether. Now, Im Canadian, and we strongly promote the "left wing", but, end of the day, one of the best things about America (and Canada), is freedom of speach. You will have less issues with this in the US or Canada then you would in many other countries in the world - and frankly, as long as its not illegal, you would have no issue in the US or CAD or any other G7 nation..
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  10. #10
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    You will typically not be removed, or blocked in the U.S. for voicing an opinion. In fact, in most cases, it's illegal to do, however you're at the will of the business, which is how it should be.

    Now, if your site is pulling in millions of hits a day, and a threat to the network (or server) you're on, then yeah, you'll get blocked and removed, as you should.
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  11. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by linux-tech View Post
    You will typically not be removed, or blocked in the U.S. for voicing an opinion. In fact, in most cases, it's illegal to do, however you're at the will of the business, which is how it should be.

    Now, if your site is pulling in millions of hits a day, and a threat to the network (or server) you're on, then yeah, you'll get blocked and removed, as you should.
    Spot on. I was about to say the same thing. I would be shocked if Google pulled your content for expressing socialist-style ideas.

    That said, "controversial" materials - of any nature - can and do attract DDoS attacks at times, and such attacks can be problematic.

    Many years ago, I did DoS-protected hosting for chat servers. Here in the U.S., I found that both my far-left and far-right clients were attacked to a high degree.

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  12. #12
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    The latter is exactly my worry: hosts refusing political content for the sake of their reputation or for the fear of problems with attacks. And obviously there's no fun neither in putting your energy and time in article writing and then see the site messed up because someone found the article offensive (although a host who makes updates each day should be able to restore the regular site immediately)

    I do think (but may be wrong) that far right content is now less problematic than communist or socialist opinions. In Europe for sure, right wing is on the rise and the left wing has a very negative image in the media (although exceptions exist, for example France just elected a socialist as president, in Greece the communist party did very well, in Russia the communist party is still the second biggest in the country, Denmark has a left-wing government, several former East Bloc countries still have a communist party ranking in the top-3 of elections)

    The negative media attention to the left wing can contribute to a host prefering not to host it for the sake of their image. This is sort of what I'd want to avoid before giving the idea of starting the blog more thought. It makes no sense even getting started into something which will not last more than a very limited amount of weeks ...

  13. #13
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    Get a hosting in germany. like hetzner's vpses or something. or shared.

    youre overthinking this. germany, belgium, switzerland, sweden, norway. any of these places would work well for you.

    wsws.org - ask them who their host is.

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gerrit View Post
    The latter is exactly my worry: hosts refusing political content for the sake of their reputation or for the fear of problems with attacks. And obviously there's no fun neither in putting your energy and time in article writing and then see the site messed up because someone found the article offensive (although a host who makes updates each day should be able to restore the regular site immediately)

    I do think (but may be wrong) that far right content is now less problematic than communist or socialist opinions. In Europe for sure, right wing is on the rise and the left wing has a very negative image in the media (although exceptions exist, for example France just elected a socialist as president, in Greece the communist party did very well, in Russia the communist party is still the second biggest in the country, Denmark has a left-wing government, several former East Bloc countries still have a communist party ranking in the top-3 of elections)

    The negative media attention to the left wing can contribute to a host prefering not to host it for the sake of their image. This is sort of what I'd want to avoid before giving the idea of starting the blog more thought. It makes no sense even getting started into something which will not last more than a very limited amount of weeks ...
    It's always going to be a pendulum swinging back and forth until the day we all die. You can't accurately assume the risks based on personal observation of popularity of the content. Most web hosts would treat your content like any other. Whether viewers with malicious intent would do the same is a valid question of any type of content. Someone, somewhere hates you and what you do, no matter who you are or what you do.
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