Lately, there’s been a rumor floating around that the Internet Archive has somehow been swallowed up by the federal government. Some people are saying it’s become federal property, part of the bureaucracy. That’s not true. What is true is that in July 2025, Senator Alex Padilla of California pushed for the Internet Archive to be designated as part of the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP). That means the Archive is now an official partner in preserving and distributing U.S. government documents. But it didn’t lose its independence. It’s still a private, non-profit organization. (Internet Archive Blog)

So why does this rumor matter? Because the Archive has been in rough shape lately. Crashes, interruptions, and even a rumored data breach have put its future into question. And when people see instability, they start whispering about government takeovers. That’s how you end up with half-baked conspiracies about federal property.

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What the FDLP Designation Really Means

Here’s the straight version:

• The FDLP was created in 1813 to make sure the public has free access to government documents. Today, over 1,100 libraries are part of it. (SPARC)
• By joining, the Internet Archive becomes a federally recognized repository. That means it’ll officially house digital government records and make them publicly accessible. (Internet Archive Blog)
• The Archive doesn’t become federal property. It doesn’t suddenly answer to bureaucrats in D.C. It’s a partner, not an agency. (KQED)

Think of it like this: if you let your neighbor store a few boxes in your garage, it doesn’t mean he owns your house. Same thing here.

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Why the Archive is Struggling

The warning lights are flashing, and they’ve been for some time:

• In October 2024, the Wayback Machine, a part of the Internet Archive, was hit by a data breach. About 31 million user accounts were compromised. That included email addresses, usernames, bcrypt-hashed passwords, and other internal data. (Wired)
• At the same time, there were DDoS attacks and site outages that made large parts of the service go offline or only accessible in a limited/read-only fashion. (The Verge)
• Users have reported crashes, failures to load archived pages or collections, search features breaking, etc. These kinds of stability problems weaken trust.

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What Needs to Happen

The Archive needs three things right now: funding, security, and stability.

1. Funding:
   • Private sector donations (foundations, tech companies)
   • Civilian / individual donations; crowd-support
   • Grants from philanthropic orgs or possibly government grants, though those often bring oversight and conditions
2. Technical Infrastructure:
   • More robust, scalable architecture that can handle traffic spikes without crashing
   • Redundant backups; geographically distributed storage
   • Better error recovery; systems that degrade gracefully
3. Security:
   • Full security audit
   • Hardened authentication systems, rotating credentials and API keys regularly
   • Encryption in transit & at rest, updated dependencies, proactive threat monitoring

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A Rare Case for Optimism

Here’s the hopeful side:

• The FDLP designation shows even some in government recognize that the Archive has value. Senator Padilla called it “digital-first,” emphasizing its fit for a modern public access role. (KQED)
• That recognition could pave the way for new funding sources. If private donors or foundation grants step up, the Archive could stabilize without giving up its independence.
• Worst-case scenario, a grant (even from government) may be better than nothing—but we should aim for support that preserves autonomy and mission.

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Why We Should Care

When the Archive goes down, we lose more than just old websites. We lose cultural memory. We lose evidence. We lose transparency.

If the rumor about becoming federal property sticks, it distracts from what actually needs fixing: funding, infrastructure, security. The Archive is still ours. It’s still independent—but it won’t stay that way if it doesn’t get help soon.

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Sources

• Internet Archive Blog
• SPARC
• KQED
• Wired
• The Verge
• BleepingComputer

Donate to the internet archive

Most of us have been there. You pour your time and energy into writing something that matters—an article, a milestone, a truth that cuts through the noise—and then one day, it’s gone.

A moderator buries it. A platform changes its rules. A domain expires because someone forgot to renew it. Years of words can disappear overnight, like they never happened.

That’s why I built Spun Web Archive Pro, a free, open-source WordPress plugin that keeps your words alive on the one place the censors can’t reach: the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine.

Tagline: Preserve your words. Publish with receipts. Decentralize your content for free.

👉 Download it here
👉 GitHub repo

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Why this exists

Censorship today doesn’t always look like book burnings or government bans. Most of the time, it’s quieter and faster. A post flagged. A rule changed. A memory “disappeared” into a 404 page.

Your work shouldn’t vanish because a gatekeeper or a glitch says so.

Spun Web Archive Pro makes sure it doesn’t. Every time you publish, it sends your page to the Wayback Machine. That means you get a verifiable, time-stamped copy of what you said and when you said it.

And it’s not just about censorship. It’s about memory. Domains lapse, sites go down, migrations break links. With this plugin, your words outlive the tech stack they sit on.

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What the plugin does

• Submits WordPress URLs to the Internet Archive
• Auto-submit on publish (set it and forget it)
• Per-post “Submit to Archive” links inside All Posts and All Pages
• Keeps a submission history with timestamps and archive links
• Supports two methods:
  • Simple “Save Now” (no keys required, instant snapshot)
  • Archive.org S3 API (with keys, more control, item-level saving)
• Includes error logs, retry logic, and a one-click “Test Connection” for S3

What you’ll see in WordPress:

• A row action under each post and page: “Submit to Archive”
• A status column so you know if something is pending, archived, or failed
• An editor meta box showing the last result and history of snapshots
• A Submission History table with timestamps, local links, and archive URLs

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Why this matters

You know what? History isn’t written by the winners anymore. It’s written by the platforms. When Facebook decides your post breaks “community standards,” it’s erased. When Google tweaks its index, something vanishes. When Twitter rebrands itself into chaos, years of links rot away.

This plugin is my small contribution to fighting back.

• Anti-censorship: keep a public, timestamped copy outside rented platforms
• Domain safety net: prove content existed even if your renewal gets missed
• Milestones: lock in launches, prices, policies, releases
• Backlink recovery: when third-party links break, you’ve got a stable snapshot

Think of it like buying insurance for your ideas. Cheap insurance too—it’s free.

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Setup in minutes

1. Install and activate Spun Web Archive Pro
2. Choose your method:
   • Save Now with no keys, fastest way to snapshot
   • S3 API if you want item-level control with an Archive.org account
3. Turn on auto-submit if you want every new post archived
4. Or use Submit to Archive anytime you need a snapshot right away

Requirements are simple:

• WordPress 5.0+
• PHP 8.1+
• cURL enabled
• Archive.org account only if you use the S3 method

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Free. Open source. Yours to use.

This isn’t a paid plugin. It’s not a lead magnet. It’s just a tool I built because I got tired of watching history get memory-holed.

It’s free, open source, and up on GitHub. You can fork it, improve it, or just use it as-is.

👉 Plugin page
👉 GitHub repo
👉 Support: [email protected]

If you care about decentralization, censorship resistance, and owning your digital life, this plugin belongs in your WordPress stack.

Because your words matter. And they should outlive the platform you publish them on.

Sources

• Spun Web Archive Pro official page
• GitHub repository
• Disruptarian.com posts about archive.org
• Ryan “Dickie” Thompson’s internet archive “Veracity Life”

On September 9th, 2025, my Facebook group Business For Sale By Owner was suspended for violating “community standards.”

This was not some small side project. It was one of the fastest growing business groups on Facebook, with 190,200 members at the time of suspension. It was growing by over 2,500 members a week. Members posted and commented more than 10,000 times each month.

And then it was gone.

No vote by the community. No serious explanation. Just one click from Meta’s “community standards” branch, and years of work disappeared overnight.

For a moment, the group was restored and I got a few notices that Facebook admitted to making a mistake. But then less than 2 hours later it was gone again, citing “multiple violations” and yet they only list one.

And they even suspended my personal account, with over a decade of photos and videos of my children: https://www.facebook.com/Rev.Ryan.Thompson

The Post That Triggered It

Here is what happened.

On August 31st, a member posted something that looked like a scam. It had the flavor of a get rich quick pitch. My first reaction was to delete it.

But then the author of that post contacted me. He explained that it was not a scam, and that he wanted to sponsor the post. So I looked again.

It turned out he was right. The post was about arbitrage sports betting. That is when you take advantage of odds differences between sportsbooks to guarantee a profit. It is obscure and clever, but it is not a scam.

I even wrote an article explaining it: Arbitrage Sports Betting: The Loophole in the House’s Game.

Not long after, Facebook struck down the entire group.

A Pattern of Silencing

This is not the first time I have had a group suspended.

• My Dublin Buy/Sell/Trade group, with over 10,000 members, was deleted with no explanation.
• My Athy Town “Athy Community Information” group, with over 6,500 members, was also deleted with no warning or reason given.

This time, at least, I was given a reason. That does not make it better, but it is different.

For years, I coped with this nonsense by creating ten new groups for every one that got killed. It was my way of fighting back. But looking back, that feels like digital Stockholm syndrome.

Think about it. I am not paid to manage these groups. I spend hundreds, sometimes thousands, of hours curating content and moderating discussions. Meanwhile, Facebook makes piles of money from my labor.

It is exploitation dressed up as “community.”

The Big Lie of “Community Standards”

Let’s cut through the language. These are not “community standards.”

A community sets its own rules. A community is accountable to its members. A community is made of equals.

Facebook’s rules are not written by communities. They are written by lawyers, executives, and politicians who pressure the company behind closed doors. They are enforced by algorithms and low paid contractors. And if you think this is paranoia, remember when Mark Zuckerberg admitted publicly that Facebook censored content at the direction of the Biden Administration? Here is the clip.

So when a group of nearly 200,000 people disappears, it is not because “the community” decided it was harmful. It is because the company, acting under political pressure, flipped a switch.

That is not community. That is a cartel.

And sometimes, it is not even intentional censorship. On June 24th, 2025, thousands of groups were suspended by a “glitch.” Entire communities were erased in hours. TechTimes covered it here.

One bug in their system, and years of human connection vanish.

Building Outside the Walled Garden

After this last suspension, I made a decision. I am done rebuilding inside Facebook’s walls.

If they want to treat creators and moderators like disposable labor, fine. But I will not keep feeding the machine.

Instead, I am moving everything to my own platforms, where I set the rules and own the content.

• TheGreenStarLine.com will replace the Facebook group Business For Sale By Owner
• SLU2.com will replace the Facebook group
• TPNetworks.net will replace Thompson Professional Networks
• SpunWebTechnology.com will replace the Facebook page
• Disruptarian.com will replace the Facebook page

I have around 500 other groups and pages that I will consolidate into my own web properties. It is a massive project, but it is worth it.

Because this is about more than strategy. It is about freedom.

The Case for Decentralization

If your online presence matters to you, you cannot trust it to one company.

Think about it like land. Would you build your dream home on rented property if the landlord could bulldoze it at any time? That is what we are doing on Facebook.

Years ago, I warned about this when Twitter (before Elon Musk) was shadow banning conservatives and Trump supporters. My advice was simple. Spread your content.

Use services like Hootsuite or the SLU2.com tools I built to post across platforms. Build your own websites with WordPress. Publish on Medium. Back everything up with the Wayback Machine.

Even if Meta, Google, or YouTube come for you, your work survives somewhere else.

Yes, even the Wayback Machine has had problems recently. It has been offline more than online when I have tried to use it. But the principle remains. Do not put all your eggs in Big Tech’s basket.

Big Tech and the Memory Hole

This is not just about Facebook.

Last year, YouTube deleted my travel channel. Those videos were memories of my children and me traveling the world together. Gone. No explanation. No appeal.

If not for the Internet Archive, those moments would have been lost forever.

This is the real danger of centralization. One faceless corporation holds the keys to your memories, your work, and your community. With one click, they can erase it.

It is like putting duct tape over a smoke alarm. The fire is still burning, you just cannot hear the warning.

Who Really Benefits

Let’s not forget, Facebook makes money off this arrangement.

You do the labor. You moderate, manage, and grow the group. They sell ads against that activity. Then, when it suits them, they pull the plug.

It is like hiring the fire department to mow your lawn. Expensive, slow, and you will probably lose your house in the process.

The “community standards” branch of Meta is not about safety. It is about liability protection, political compliance, and corporate control.

What We Can Do

We cannot rely on politicians to fix this. New regulations will not solve it. Electing different faces in Washington will not solve it.

The only fix is decentralization.

• Build your own websites.
• Host your own content.
• Back up everything.
• Use Big Tech as a distribution channel, not as your foundation.

If you do not own the platform, you are just a tenant. And Meta is a landlord that does not care how long you have lived there or how much you have invested.

Final Thoughts

The suspension of Business For Sale By Owner hurt. It represented years of work and a thriving community of nearly 200,000 people. But in a way, it also clarified things.

Facebook’s “community standards” are not about community at all. They are about control.

So the question is, do you want to keep building your life’s work on someone else’s property? Or do you want to build something you truly own?

For me, the answer is clear. I am done being a tenant in Zuckerberg’s digital empire. It is time to build my own land.

Sources

• Arbitrage Sports Betting: The Loophole in the House’s Game
• Zuckerberg admitting to censorship
• Zuckerberg on ending fact checkers
• Facebook Groups suspended June 24, 2025
• Facebook Help: Appealing Group Suspension

[aidolons_login_button theme=”light”]

By Ryan “Dickie” Thompson

There’s a dangerous quiet that creeps in when censorship doesn’t announce itself. No warning. No justification. No red flags waved or buttons clicked. Just silence.

That’s the silence I noticed recently when more than half of my released songs disappeared from YouTube without a single explanation. One day, my track “Echoes of Power” was streaming on YouTube Music alongside 80 others. The next, it was gone. Along with more than 40 other songs. Not a flag. Not a takedown notice. Not even a bot-generated email. Just a silent purge.

And this isn’t just a YouTube problem. It’s not isolated. It’s systemic. I’ve seen it happen on Facebook, Google, and across the digital empire ruled by Big Tech—an empire that once postured as a digital town square, but now functions more like a digital prison yard with invisible walls.

The Illusion of Transparency

Remember when Mark Zuckerberg told us Facebook would no longer be the Thought Police? When he told the world that the “fact-checkers” were stepping back? That they were simply giving context, not censorship? That promise rang hollow the moment my community groups vanished.

Gone.

My Dublin Buy Sell and Trade group. My Athy Ireland Community page. Pages with thousands of members—16,000 lives connected through content, commerce, conversation. Erased. No notification. No violation flagged. No recourse.

This isn’t just a minor inconvenience. This is digital land seizure. It’s like having your home leveled overnight and being told it never existed.

You can read the details of these disappearances in my blog post on archiving digital services:
/blog/the-unreliability-of-digital-services-reflections-on-archiving-time-and-consistency/

Or see the full inventory here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11oWwb9evH37vWxIKqZxaupqQFV5naIVLhgcIj0YWZSE/edit?usp=drive_link

The Music Blacklist

Let’s go back to the music.

In the last 9 months, I’ve produced 128 songs. That’s not a typo. One hundred and twenty-eight. All independently released. All original content. Hosted on:

• LANDR Music Network
• Spotify
• Apple Music
• Amazon Music

And, until recently, most of them were available on YouTube as well:

• YouTube Channel

But today, only 38 remain. Not demonetized. Not age-restricted. Just removed. Quietly. Completely.

This is algorithmic erasure. Censorship without flags, leaving no fingerprints. And that’s far more dangerous than the censorship of the past.

No Crime, Just Wrongthink

What do these songs contain that warranted deletion?

No hate speech. No violence. No copyright strikes. Just messages that challenge systems. Songs that question narratives. Tracks like “Echoes of Power,” which call out the machinery of control, of compliance, of fake consensus. And that seems to be the real crime in today’s digital dystopia: refusing to pick a side.

I don’t lean left. I don’t lean right. I lean into truth. Into principle. Into reality.

One side wants me to call a man a woman on command, under penalty of deplatforming. The other side wants to shove me into religious doctrine as state policy. And I say no to both.

Show me. Don’t tell me. Let truth speak for itself, and let the audience decide. That’s how civilization works. Or how it used to.

Inspiration from the Dissidents

This censorship only fuels my fire. Because I’ve read Orwell. I’ve devoured Bradbury. I’ve walked alongside the ghosts of Huxley, Rand, and Solzhenitsyn. These weren’t just authors. They were oracles.

George Orwell showed us how truth can be erased and rewritten by those who control the present.
Ray Bradbury warned us how censorship wouldn’t need firemen—just enough distraction.
Aldous Huxley predicted a future where people wouldn’t fight censorship, because they’d be too drugged by comfort and entertainment to notice.
Ayn Rand showed us the soul-deadening effect of collectivism disguised as moral certainty.

These were not just works of fiction. They were battle manuals for what we are living through right now.

And I am not just a commentator. I’m a witness. I was there in Seattle when mobs set my building on fire. When ideology became a weapon and truth was collateral damage.

Out of those flames, I wrote two books:

• The Transparent Future
• Echoes of Power

These books aren’t manifestos. They’re journals of resistance. An honest reckoning with wrongthink—past, present, and future.

The Solitary Path

That’s the hardest part. When you refuse to join the mob, you walk alone. When you refuse to chant slogans, both sides hate you. When you seek truth instead of tribe, you don’t get protection. You get silence.

But I’m fine with that. Because the truth doesn’t need to go viral. It just needs to be heard by those ready to hear it.

I don’t care if Facebook deplatforms me. I don’t care if YouTube shadowbans my songs. I will keep creating, keep publishing, keep broadcasting. Not because I expect approval—but because I demand reality.

Censorship without warning is the soft tyranny of our age. It’s the algorithmic execution of inconvenient voices. And the only antidote is to keep speaking, especially when they want you silent.

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References and Sources:

• LANDR Music Archive of DJ Disruptarian
• Spotify Playlist – DJ Disruptarian
• Apple Music – DJ Disruptarian
• Amazon Music – Ryan Richard Thompson
• YouTube Channel – DJ Disruptarian
• Post: The Unreliability of Digital Services
• Spreadsheet Inventory of Platforms & Groups

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Stay dangerous,

Ryan “Dickie” Thompson
Founder, Disruptarian Radio
Author: The Transparent Future | Echoes of Power

On May 28, 2025, Tulsi Gabbard, the current Director of National Intelligence, sat down for an interview that peeled back the curtain on a chilling reality: the Biden administration’s surveillance and censorship apparatus was far more expansive—and politically motivated—than most Americans realized. What Gabbard revealed wasn’t just another partisan squabble; it was a damning exposé of how dissent was systematically rebranded as extremism, and how federal power was weaponized against citizens under the guise of national security.

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The Biden Blueprint: Dissent as Domestic Terrorism

According to declassified documents released by Gabbard, the Biden administration’s 2021 counterterrorism strategy painted a broad and dangerous picture. The plan identified individuals who opposed COVID-19 mandates, questioned vaccine safety, or criticized immigration policies as potential domestic violent extremists. This wasn’t based on actions or credible threats, but on the mere expression of dissenting opinions.

Gabbard emphasized that the administration’s approach created a continuum of suspicion. Holding certain views didn’t automatically label someone as a terrorist, but it placed them under increased scrutiny. This framework allowed for the monitoring of individuals who were simply exercising their First Amendment rights, effectively chilling free speech and political discourse.

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The “Quiet Skies” Program: Surveillance Without Oversight

One of the most alarming revelations was the use of the TSA’s “Quiet Skies” program to surveil American citizens. Gabbard disclosed that she was placed on this watchlist the day after publicly criticizing then-Vice President Kamala Harris. She wasn’t alone; other members of Congress reported similar experiences, indicating a pattern of targeting political opponents.Yahoo

The program, designed to monitor travelers who might pose a threat, was repurposed to keep tabs on individuals based on their political views. This misuse of surveillance tools underscores a broader trend of eroding civil liberties in the name of security.Yahoo

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Outsourcing Surveillance: Collaborating with Foreign Governments

Perhaps most disturbing was the administration’s strategy to involve foreign partners in domestic surveillance efforts. The declassified documents revealed plans to obtain intelligence on U.S. citizens from foreign governments, effectively outsourcing the monitoring of Americans to entities beyond our legal jurisdiction.America First Legal

This approach not only circumvented constitutional protections but also set a dangerous precedent for international interference in domestic affairs. By blurring the lines between foreign and domestic intelligence operations, the administration compromised the privacy and rights of its citizens.

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The Role of Big Tech: Censorship and Information Control

Gabbard’s disclosures also highlighted the administration’s collaboration with social media companies to suppress dissenting viewpoints. By directing these platforms to censor content deemed as “misinformation,” the government effectively controlled the narrative and silenced opposition.

This partnership between the state and private corporations created a modern-day censorship regime, where unpopular opinions could be labeled as dangerous and removed from public discourse. Such actions not only violate free speech principles but also undermine the democratic process by restricting the flow of information.

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A Call to Action: Restoring Constitutional Protections

Gabbard’s revelations serve as a stark reminder of the importance of vigilance in protecting civil liberties. The use of surveillance and censorship to suppress political dissent is antithetical to the values enshrined in the Constitution.

As citizens, it’s imperative to demand transparency and accountability from our government. We must advocate for policies that uphold individual rights and challenge those that seek to erode them under the guise of security.

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References

ODNI Newsroom – Declassified Biden Administration Documents

Tulsi Gabbard On New Declassified Biden Documents – YouTube

Gabbard declassifies Biden counterterrorism strategy – Fox News

Gabbard slams ‘politically motivated’ surveillance – Yahoo News

Biden Labeled COVID-19 Opposition ‘Domestic Violent Extremists’ – Talk 99.5