How is failing to send private messages which contains ideas you disagree with not censorship? You've limited the definition to "taking down the originate reference" but that's too limited.

Because they weren't private messages. Private messages are between two parties. Instead, these were messages on a platform which is owned by Twitter between two users where these users have agreed to restrictions. You can read about those restrictions here:

https://twitter.com/en/tos

HN is no different. I know this because I've been dinged by dang.

Direct Message is 1-to-1 private message. DM is banned.

But that standard has never been used before and was manually engaged here.

Trump's taxes were repeatedly shared and there are photos of the content (not to mention the content itself, which is far more private than an email address).

This standard has never been applied like this, and you can still link to the Web Archive version without limitation - same content.

It's also not "limitation of deliberate misinformation" - that has never once been used on deliberate misinformation like the Steele dossier.

Ahmari of the NYP had a reasonably good counter: https://nypost.com/2020/10/14/if-unreliable-is-the-issue-why...

The selective application of their terms is precisely the problem. It renders their policies essentially meaningless when certain groups are given preferential treatment.

The thing is, I would have thought by now that these companies would have learned from the past. The more you try to censor information on the internet, the more attention you draw to it.

My editorialization aside, Twitters stated reason is that the images contained in the articles include personal and private information (email addresses and phone numbers) which violate our rules.

That (to me) is valid in itself. I do wonder, had they redacted things properly then this would all be a non-issue.

To your example; my understanding is that Trump's taxes did not in the same way (by this I mean things like Trump org address etc isn't a private address). I have not dug deep into those articles to say that with 100% certainty.

I would say that content of my tax return is much more private information than my home address.

That may be true but that was a reason they used later, as an excuse.

Hence they don't ban the Web Archive mirror (which has a static URL), and they don't ban any of the previous leaks about Trump taxes, health records, etc.

Not to mention Wikileaks - by definition that is a trove of email addresses and completely uncensored private information that you can tweet with impunity right now.

Re: "Trump's taxes were repeatedly shared..."

That's kind of comparing apples to oranges. One is a public figure, the other not. And is tax info comparable to email addresses? I'm not saying whether or not it's fair, only that it's very different kinds of personal information being compared here. Equivalency is hard to establish.

Being a public figure doesn't mean your rights don't exist.

I actually abhor that the photos of Hunter were shared, but he's a public figure too. As this (and other recent reporting) has shown, he was using his father's name and implied access thereto for personal profit.

Note that there is no evidence Hunter ever actually got Joe to do anything for him. What is a matter of record is that Hunter was IMPLYING he could do so, which is scummy but probably not illegal. Johnson-Grassley investigation found no evidence of wrongdoing by Joe and I want to stress I'm not alleging otherwise.

Hunter sounds like a jerk; I'm not voting for him.