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China Blocks Typepad, Prompts Weblog Blackout
dcm writes "As U.S. Ambassador Richard Williamson prepares to introduce a resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Commission to censure the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) government for increasing 'repression of its people using the Internet, democratic dialogue, religious expression,' the regime continues to block discourse.On Friday, China began blocking access to Typepad, a paid weblog hosting service in San Mateo, California. The communist regime previously blocked access to BlogSpot, Blogger's free hosting site. Yan Sham-Shackleton filed a report on the Glutter weblog, mentioning China is '...now using blocking software to stop information from leaking into the county via personal sites, an increasingly vibrant China Internet community, and a place where users are slipping in banned information. Some sites in the blogging community are turning black in protest of this event while others are reporting the incident.'"
Q: Why are the chinese communists so afraid of free exchange of ideas and criticism?
A: They're afraid they'll have to give up power and find real jobs.
It's not the security of the country tyrants desire, it's their own security. It's unfair to call them leaders.
The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I've got to think that anyone with the will and some time would easily be able to bypass the blockage, either by using underground ISPs, satellite, or other means.
It is technically very hard to block information on the net, without dropping connectivity. Of course, attempting it might provide a major impulse to AI research :)
This is not a signature.
Sadly, the gap is closing from the US side, for the good of the country and all that rot.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
women's nipples.
Which society would you rather live in?
I suppose someone could just ban any and all downloads of Freenet-related software so that's not going to solve anything. For anyone who ever said the mantra "Information Wants To Be Free" -- THIS is what it is meant to be.
Government-sanctioned censorship isn't anything new, though. We try to protect children with things like CIPA and the like. We've got watchdogs all over that won't allow us (folks in the US) to hear foul language over public airwaves, are looking to restrain violent video games, and in general trying to police what we do.
I'm not saying we're communistic, by any means. Just saying that censorship is censorship. Not as extreme, but the seeds are there.
In the end, it unfortunately comes down to "censorship is only bad when they're censoring something I believe in."
I disagree. At least the American people can change things, the fact that the people want to be ignorant and not change things is their choice.
As U.S. Ambassador Richard Williamson prepares to introduce a resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Commission to censure the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) government for increasing 'repression of its people using the Internet
Somewhat ironic given that U.S. companies are profiting by selling censorship software to China. And of course, the U.S. requiring (or trying to require) libraries to censor the Internet, for the children, of course.
Here come da fudge!
these are the perpetrators of the Tiananmen massacre. do you really think they would hesitate to block a few websites?
sulli
RTFJ.
Just other day the WTO said that USA had to allow on line gambling. China has just joined the WTO. Typepad is an for profit company, why not they also can't make WTO force them to allow access to Typepad? At least this shitty globalization would give a little help to free speech. At least by now USA and Britain aren't trying to make WTO become irrelevant as they did with ONU.
Wireless blogging is going to be a way to get around many restrictions. Of course this doesn't help if they are blocking the servers. Fortunately these days there are a vast number of hosting companies which provide blog hosting. And wireless net is huge in China, with hundreds of millions of WAP-enabled phones. I think that the government will at some point just give up on this and realize that free expression is not that much of a threat. They should look over at the example of Singapore, where the government is very strict, but it tolerates a little joking commentary. The PRC will realize that people complaining is not the same thing as a real challenge.
That's not really the point, however. The point is, everyone claiming that information = insta-revolution well...I seriously doubt it. A lot of people left Hong Kong before PRC took it over...and then moved back when they saw that PRC didn't really change the system at all, and things were peaceful.
Seriously, they didn't really keep out outside information before; that fully explains the Tiananmen Square protests, as people knew that Communist leaderships everywere were falling appart so they wanted to try in China too. If people wanted a protest/revolution it would happen; I honestly don't think they do, and I don't think the internet will change that, blocked or unblocked.
U.S. news agencies stopped broadcasting Bin Laden's speeches at the request of the U.S. government.
The U.S. government made the absurd claim that Bin Laden was "sending secret messages to his supporters" through his speeches, when it was blatantly obvious that the U.S. was simply interested in suppressing him.
Understandably in fact. Bin Laden was making a whole lot of sense and sounded extremely reasonable when compared to Bush.
The U.S. does not have the moral standing to criticise other nations. To do so is the height of hypocrisy.
I don't know which is more mind-boggling - the fact that this was seriously posed as a question or the fact that it was modded insightful.
Kindly go to a strip club, get HBO, google for "nipple", or buy a magazine in a brown wrapper ALL LEGALLY and THEN tell me how terrible the US is just because most people who live here think it might be smart to not allow nudity during the Superbowl.
the gap is closing from the US side,
It's occurred to me, too, that the government/corporate system of the United States and of China are a lot closer in practice than people might think.
Yes, in China you get these weird laws where "slander of the state" and "revealing state secrets" put people in jail for expressing dissent.
But, in the US, if you criticize a business, eg, make disparaging comments about the healthiness of eating beef or provide a web link to a DeCSS site, you can get slammed with heavy legal action.
In China, the government powers have become corrupt as they hand out valuable contracts to cronies and have tolerated cheating bosses not paying their workers.
In the US, the government powers have become corrupt as they accept money from special interests to craft legislation favorable to those interests. Substantial growth in non-unionized workforce has meant stagnation in wage growth for blue collar workers in the US.
Government policies are not far apart between the US and China; corporate influence will tend to drive them even closer together.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
First of all I find it very unusual any US politician would have anything to do with the UN.
I remember on CNN after two planes, of the anti-Castro group, were shot down by Cuba, a US polictican ( Helms...Burton? ) said that all the more reason to continue the economic boycott of Cuba.
The next story was on China and another politician speaking about China said that keeping dialogue open with China was the only way to make progress.
If the Internet in China, and also keeping dialogue open, is so important, why not do that for every enemy or the US?
China is so huge I wouldn't worry about the government controlling the Internet. They seem to be where the USSR was in the late 80's just before Communism fell.
As long as China supplies lots of cheap labor and plays ball with the world's corporations nobody's going to impose anything on them. The world's governments could care less about human rights and all that. They just want cheap stuff and big profits.
What?
A properly constructed communist state would only require the dictatorship of the proletariat for a generation or so. After this time, no one would own any goods any more, and the only formalized government required would be for lawmaking and policing. The "communist" societies of the former Soviet Union and China are not really communist at all, as the parent poster said. They're really just state sponsored capitalism, and there are still people hoarding the wealth.