When Sir Tim Berners-Lee unleashed the World Wide Web, he was guided by a simple idea: “You can’t propose that something be a universal space and at the same time keep control of it.”  Three decades later, the Sultans of Silicon Valley are determined to prove him wrong.

Last week, GoFundMe, an online fundraising site, unilaterally blocked $10 million donated through its platform to Canada’s “Freedom Convoy.”  GoFundMe allows users to drum up cash for any pet cause or project, from subsidizing an indie flick to retiling a bathroom.  All one needs is a United States social security number, a US bank account, and “dreams, hopes, and wishes.”  GoFundMe guarantees that its teams “work night and day to make sure that funds get to the intended recipient, every time” — that is, unless they don’t like you.

In a move that shocked the dreaming, hoping, and wishing public, GoFundMe announced that the millions of dollars intended for the maple leaf waving, anti-vaccine mandate posse rolling into Ottawa, Canada, on big rigs and freedom would be returned to sender.  Ottawa’s mayor, who has taken particular offense at the bouncy castles and saunas set up to stave off the winter protesting chill, reports that he personally lobbied GoFundMe to block the trucker bound bucks.  Tech titan Elon Musk slammed GoFundMe as “professional thieves.”  Multiple Republican governors vow to investigate the fundraising site for fraud. Meanwhile, another day, another universe of expression shrinks again.