Techrights Was Always a Community Platform
Techrights is about whistleblowers
Techrights is now 4 months away from its 20th anniversary and it began as a modest little blog in the United States, crafted originally by Shane; yours truly got invited shortly afterwards (same month) and back then - way back in 2006 - we earned many followers via RSS (a concept many people in 2026 do not know, especially younger people who are addicted to "algos" and "skinnerboxes"; they don't read news).
In the older days we attracted Novell whistleblowers - to the point where Novell's CEO lost sleep and tried to get lawyers to shut us up. He had worked for IBM before he ruined Novell, but that's only interesting in hindsight, mostly as some afterthought because IBM is self-detonating these days. It became a parade of disposable losers.
This tradition of giving a voice to whistleblowers lived on; with a perfect track record (100% as far as we are aware) we managed to attract whistleblowers from many other companies and organisations. Sometimes we cover important issues without even saying that information came from whistleblowers or a tip/pointer was supplied by whistleblowers. That's fine. Whatever keeps them safe from reprisal.
To us, whistleblowers are the most important thing. Always.
The second most important thing is the durability of what they want us to publicise - even when there are DDoS attacks like the ones we dealt with days ago.
The safety of my family and I comes third, at best. I would take the hit to protect the whistleblowers and to ensure their revelations cannot be 'vanished' (censored). I've always made many personal compromises to protect the whistleblowers. They know it, they are aware, and they appreciate this.
The whistleblowers are what makes us unique; our community is mostly anonymous (it helps protect us from reprisal; but it still needs a public face for fear it would be mislabeled as "Russian propaganda" or some other ludicrous smear).
In the past, British cops advised me to write anonymously in order to avoid the death threats and hate crimes; I explained to them this would not work because almost everyone eager enough would recognise the writing style and know I edited the publication. I moreover explained to them that "anonymous cowards" tend to be discredited on the basis there's no real person to point at or should at (sometimes dox). They got the point and they marked our home for extra protection, as they recognised we were under real physical threats (I didn't request this; the cops did this on their own, based on evidence I showed them on my screens).
Behind the scenes the platform involves a vast network of people and organisations, which communicate, research, and share findings. It took 20 years to build this network, which was cemented by trust and credible track record.
We now have a very potent legal team working to protect not just us as people but also our lifeblood, which is whistleblowers and volunteers like myself. On top of that we have politicians guarding our interests. We look forward to improvements in press protections. We need to become independent from the US. █