YouTube made me. The vast reach of this video-sharing website ensured my message about the perils of the EU became mainstream and, in turn, helped to secure Brexit. Twitter gave rise to Donald Trump. His eye-catching tweets propelled this unorthodox businessman to the White House, despite him having no serious political experience whatsoever. And Facebook was instrumental in turning the Five Star Movement into Italy’s biggest political party in just a few years.

These three examples of anti-establishment triumph prove the supremacy of digital platforms today. Google is now the preferred gateway to information for most people, with 3.5 billion Google searches made in any 24-hour period. Similarly, almost 1.5 billion people log onto Facebook daily and in the same time frame 500 million tweets are sent.

It’s easy to see why politicians and activists have taken to cyberspace so enthusiastically. Online, they can present ideas quickly and without fear of being edited. Individual viewers and readers can then choose who or what to support without influence from the biased liberal media.

The upshot of this, however, is that power now rests with just a handful of conglomerates. This has had some deeply troubling consequences. Free speech is under threat as never before.