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Google Sets Censorship Precedent In India
eldavojohn writes "Censorship varies from country to country but India, home to a sixth of the world's population, appears to be shaping up much like China. Not far behind everyone else, Google has increasingly censored websites with an incident where a very popular politician died and Google forcibly deleted and dissolved a group on Orkut where offensive comments about the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh were posted. An official from India's Ministry of Communications and Information Technology said, 'If you are doing business here, you should follow the local law, the sentiments of the people, the culture of the country. If somebody starts abusing Lord Rama on a Web site, that could start riots.' The lengthy opinion piece calls attention to the beginnings of a definitive lack of free speech online for Indian citizens. A spokeswoman for the 'Do No Evil' company explained, 'India does value free speech and political speech. But they are weighing the harm of free speech against violence in their streets.'"
Fuck the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh
Free Trade doesn't seem to be doing much for freedom around the world.
"We have now recognised the necessity to the mental well-being of mankind (on which all their other well-being depends) of freedom of opinion, and freedom of the expression of opinion, on four distinct grounds; which we will now briefly recapitulate.
First, if any opinion is compelled to silence, that opinion may, for aught we can certainly know, be true. To deny this is to assume our own infallibility.
Secondly, though the silenced opinion be an error, it may, and very commonly does, contain a portion of truth; and since the general or prevailing opinion on any subject is rarely or never the whole truth, it is only by the collision of adverse opinions that the remainder of the truth has any chance of being supplied.
Thirdly, even if the received opinion be not only true, but the whole truth; unless it is suffered to be, and actually is, vigorously and earnestly contested, it will, by most of those who receive it, be held in the manner of a prejudice, with little comprehension or feeling of its rational grounds. And not only this, but, fourthly, the meaning of the doctrine itself will be in danger of being lost, or enfeebled, and deprived of its vital effect on the character and conduct: the dogma becoming a mere formal profession, inefficacious for good, but cumbering the ground, and preventing the growth of any real and heartfelt conviction, from reason or personal experience."
Local custom or not, silencing speech is harmful to society.
If somebody starts abusing Lord Rama on a Web site, that could start riots.
Sounds like more of a culture problem than a Google problem there. I mean, is the west the only place where people can say "offensive" things without riots? And even then Islamic idiots try to kill them (look at the Danish cartoonist issue) when free speech is protected by law.
India needs to address this problem themselves by increasing free speech, not by trying to shut it down.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Seems to me that Google and others are correct in following local law. This is not the same, however, as following the dictates of local advocates of political correctness. Doing that is simply a recipe for increasing the level of local corruption.
Google cares now, ad revenue down, don't piss off governments with freedom or speech, just fall in line and sell more ads. This is exactly why I won't use and don't encourage others to use anything related to Google, and turn off all adverts with FireFox popup and ad blocking plugins. Freedoms are only things we give up, we already have them inherently, and a love for tech device addictions and quick search results gives Google and companies like them power. There are always better choices/alternatives.
Except when emerging markets subtly demand it.
Translation: you can say *anything* you want as long as we approve of it. Censoring speech with which the government does not agree is completely incompatible with free speech.
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
So would I be correct in asserting that the cowardly douchebags would rather stifle something as central to democracy as free speech than put up with a few rioting morons?
Or is it that the people who get to make such assertions fear free speech because it would expose them for the money-grubbing, honourless thieves that they are?
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Google is and has been an American corporation. They started here and grew up here. And it's time they stopped making excuses.
When they agreed to censor the internet in China, their excuse was "If we don't do this, somebody else will." Translation: "The dollar is more important than principle." That pretty much puts the lie to their "Do No Evil" motto.
Google needs to decide whether they really want to "do no evil" or whether they just want to make a profit. They really can't have it both ways. And by traditional Western ethical standards, censorship is EVIL.
Seriously, I'm beginning to question the value of completely free speech. I've spent my entire life so far in support of it, and the free marketplace, but I'm finding more and more, that both are a fiction and always have been!
The "free" marketplace isn't free, it's a highly unstable situation that's carefully protected by a government that's surprisingly willing to impose on the "freedome" of the marketplace. Until the 1980s, government stepped in many times, repeatedly, over the years, to limit the power of the monopolies in the United States. But after about 1981 or so, we simply stopped caring. And the result has decimated our marketplace! In becoming more "free", we've simply become more monopolistic, where Wal-Mart now delivers some 30% to 50% of the consumed goods in the USA.
This was unheard of before then, but only because the gubbmint stepped in repeatedly to limit the power of (among others) A&P, the mid-20th century equivalent of Wal-Mart. As a percentage of population, Wal-Mart is now at least 5x as big as A&P ever was at its height. Yet Wal-Mart is just one of many vertical monopolies now rearing, to the deafening roar of untrained people who rally and cry for speech and marketplaces free from the controls of the government that was otherwise busy serving their own interests. It's a sad, sad state of affairs.
In a similar vein, I'm finding that "free speech" never existed. For over a century, there were strict controls on news organizations and reporting agencies - strict policies on libel and a general expectation of truth. This was easily enforced, because there were so few news agencies with the ability to reach a significant percentage of the population. And the result was filtered news and information of generally high-quality.
But the Internet has changed all that. Even if strict news reporting standards were still in effect, the news organizations would have to compete with the deafening roar of blogs and other "almost news" sites (Slashdot being one of them!) and so the standards would lose all their teeth anyway.
What journalistic standards is my completely private post written from my armchair going to be held to?
But the end result is that any whining idiot with an opinion that sounds nice gets lots of play, and real information gets lost in the din of noise and misinformation. Without any expectation of accountability, idiots like Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly are free to spread their bile and intellectual filth to unwashed masses who haven't developed the means to filter them out, partly due to the falling standards and expectations from our public school system, which has gotten so bad that no schooling at all is often an improvement.
Free speech is just noise without a bullshit filter. Look in your spam box for 99.97% "free speech". If society is to save itself, it will need to learn the difference between speech and honest-to-god information.
Right now, it's not looking so good.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
I hardly doubt it that if someone posted such stuff on the Internet, it could start riots. I have never seen anything like this happen (at least in India), but then I live in a peaceful state. By far, the people who engage in such riots are illiterate to the core and don't bother about what is posted on the Internet. The politicians spread more hatred than these online groups can. Behind all such decisions of censorship are the politicians who want votes. If they publicly come out against any such group, their vote banks are favored.
Trying to accommodate the demands of each foreign country's governments on a case-by-case basis in order to do business in their countries is an extremely dangerous game to play. You can rationalize away small losses of freedom as "fitting in with national conditions", but there is nothing to stop "fitting in" going all the way to directly supporting dictatorships and the worst kind of abuses of human rights.
When you don't have fixed principles, you have no principles at all.
Some will say "Google does have a fixed principle: to make money." The trouble is, that is not a principle about human rights, it's a principle that expressly allows human rights to be negotiated away. In effect, it's a principle to do evil against people in order to do well for profits.
Google needs to get its head sorted out before this starts to go really bad. Because it will.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
And not just because he doesn't exist. ;-)
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I think that's how I remembered the quote from one of those "bug" movies, where the evil dicator bug was trying to explain almost exactly the same topic.
There is an important distinction between falsely crying "Fire" in a crowded movie house and exposing a corrupted government and potentially causing mass riots. Both involve possible harm, one is definitely not protected free speech and the other should always be. The difference seems to follow whether the statements are actually true or not.
Google, Bing, Yahoo, and the other corps seem to only be interested in protecting their profits. If they cared about the truth, the Tiananmen square would be available for computer users in China and censorship wouldn't exist on the web. The idea that we could/should create "protected" internet by censoring disturbing content, where only "good" ideas are allowed to remain is to keep ideas away from everyone. If you really want to "think of the children," you'll protect their right to say or write anything they choose into the internet. If you don't like what you see, turn off your compter or go somewhere else. Remember, you chose to read Slashdot, you chose to read this! (Uncle Malchick excluded, I've chained him to a chair and I show him Slashdot content as part of his treatment)
I'm not quite sure how I come down on the Indian instance. I don't know if it was true or slander, or even what the authors wrote. If it was even partially true, Google should be ashamed. If it wasn't true, who cares... it will prob. get picked up over on DrudgeReport and onto Fox News.
If we start down this road, the next stop is censoring the 9/11 conspiricy folks, because they're ideas are disturbing people, and so on and so on...
Hmmm.. On second though, I think I'd better get my attitude straightened out...
...where information passes freely from one person to another without the constant threat of jackboots and lawyers?
...do business that would advance any removal of the capitalist system of profit.
But any other kind of evil is A-OK!!! Its just following the local laws, you know.
If your nation is so on the verge of rioting that some commentary on a website is all that is required as a trigger, further removal of civil liberties may not be the best course of action.
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Sounds like more of a culture problem than a Google problem there. I mean, is the west the only place where people can say "offensive" things without riots?
Walk into a biker bar and loudly and proudly proclaim that their favourite brand of motorcycle stinks. See how long you last. The only difference is there won't be a full scale riot because they'll make pretty short work of you.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Well, at least they're being honest enough to admit that this is a violation of free speech. (As opposed to those spineless cowards who think that 'free speech' means 'free speech ... as long as I agree with it'.)
This is a huge problem. Any country in which people will riot because someone criticizes their religion, political party, or favorite celebrity is a country in which people don't understand the notion of a civil society.
What? Do you think censorship and other oppressions steal theatrically onto the scene in the guise of an Snidely Whiplash or some other obvious villain?
No, no, a thousand times no. Very earnest and well intentioned men promulgate evil most often in the guise of preventing greater evil. Harm to children, innocents or other spectres are proffered. These spectacular horrors are given to distract you and "justify" far more pervasive oppressions. Searching your underwear so an airplane does not crash. Using the spectacular size difference to hide an even more enormous frequency difference.
Even if the "riots" are not exaggerated hyperbole (which would not surprise me), then the serious question is why such people have been so stressed they have only rioting as an outlet. Because if it is not one trigger, it will be some other. Simple disagreeing, disagreeable or even insulting information does not drive normal people to violence. That is way up the ladder of provocation.
By definition whatever they were censoring had been on the internet and didn't cause riots, so what's their excuse again?
Play Command HQ online
I don't think it's only about the money here. Having been through a mini-riot in India, when public goes beserk on the streets it's not a pretty sight, people die. Whoever incited the riots, whatever the rioters' reasons, right or wrong, I feel the government's aim here is to quell dissent that can bring life to a standstill or worse, lead of loss of life. There's not much cops can do when 1000s of mindless drones hit the street with the single-minded objective of practicing acupuncture with knives on anything that breathes. During such sprees, cows are spared, but I digress. Psychological trauma on society following such incidents, predominantly religion-related, last for decades. In certain regions in India, there is an uneasy peace between people of different faiths and taboo (read religious) topics have the potential to rip that apart. From this perspective, I understand Google/government insight into local behavior and respect their decision to respect local sentiments in spirit and act.
'If you are doing business here, you should follow the local law, the sentiments of the people, the culture of the country.
Of course they do not want to be educated about slightly more modern values and norms w.r.t. freedoms and rights.
So why is it that these USA based companies, VERY much unlike their military actions, appear to do not so much about this freedoms situation when it is internet-related?
The problem in India is not of religion but the deadly cocktail that religion and politics create. I do support free speech and honestly think it's wrong [and a tad bit retarded] for the government to ask Google to shut down an Orkut group because of hate speech. The problem with riots in India is often due to politically motivated goals. A politician can polarise the public one way or another and thus sway the polls in his favour. This is the thing that pisses me off the most over here. People here are really intelligent, educated, compassionate, considerate, but if you drop the R-Bomb on them, they'll start acting like crazy lunatics the next second.
Censorship has always existed in India in a big way. You know, Fahrenheit 9/11 released here much later than in the rest of the world. But that's just the tip of the ice berg. The law and order situation prevents folks from using "free-speech" as a defence. If you DO say something against someone powerful and influential and said person finds out [and is affected], he'll surely send his goons to even the score. Sure, you won't get imprisoned for 'free-speech' but you might get worse.
This is certainly not the "END" of free-speech. And no, India is nothing like China at this point of time. Hell, I went to China and the folks there on the streets didn't know that something big had happened in Tienanmen Square. Now THAT IS CENSORSHIP!
Indians in general don't value free speech. We're a culture of followers [follow religion, follow elders, follow leaders, follow everyone] and any deviant (free-speech dude, atheist, etc. etc...) will probably get shut down. In all practicality, you can criticise religion, politics, people, the prime minister, policies and even the pope. Just be careful of who you do it in front of. You can be atheist but don't try and explain it to someone who is religious because you'll explain your beliefs much better than them and just end up confused as to why the other person still follows whatever they do. But that's probably just the same anywhere in the world. "A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything" - Nietzsche
And so what if they shut down an orkut group ? You think people can't express themselves any other place on the internet ? Basically, the Indian government just likes to exercise it's power where it can. Those are very few places.
Oh but as far as western hypocrisy is concerned. Come on guys, don't tell me about free-speech in your countries. Sure, I know that the new 'politically correct' USA has many issues with using certain words, phrases, etc. But look at how Switzerland banned the construction of Minarets as they are a symbol of Islam inspite of having a decent Muslim population. Things aren't as rosy in the west as they're made out to be. France banned the wearing of headgear for muslim women. That's religious expression. What about those dudes in the US who were "investigated" by the FBI for posting some random stuff online post 9/11 ?
Basically, everywhere sucks. Just relatively more or less. India is pretty free by most standards.
Sure, we have a problem in India. It's not as bad as China [not even comparable], and it'll never be, as long as we are allowed the free speech to admit to it. I hope though that the censorship folks realise that this is an exercise in futility. They never achieve any real censorship in India anyway. All our networks (Radio, tv, news, internet, word of mouth..) are way too out of control anyhow.
Besides, just chalk this one up to the Indian government being retarded as usual. Just add it to the list that already has the shutting down of public Wi-Fi after the Mumbai attacks [no coffee shop Wi-Fi anymore :(], requiring 10 verification documents to get a mobile sim, requiring to fill up a piece of paper everytime when entering the country and giving it with your passport and don't even get me started on the swine-flu line at the airports, plus all the other bizarre things that they think actually achieve something. These aren't leaders, these are politicians pretending to lead.
How come when some other country forces Google, Apple, whatever, to do something and they trot out the "we're just following the laws of the land" excuse, yet when they have to follow some law here they have no problem fighting it legally? Why don't they just "follow the laws of the USA" as blindly as they do in Yellow China, etc.?
she says india 'values free speech', but they are 'weighing' the 'harm of free speech' against ..... well the rest is not important.
hey, google spokeswoman. next time you say something like 'harm of free speech', dont continue the sentence. shut the fuck up. because when you say 'harm of free speech', it means you totally screwed up.
your shitty polished words made your company lose more pr than if anything wasnt said. next time, either shut the fuck up, or tell your company to make someone else but you speak about it.
Read radical news here
Here we have an official who is in essence shifting blame to the unwashed masses. If he does not censor then the wretches will riot. History teaches the opposite. When censorship exists the masses may very well go into total riot and revolt.
I do wonder if people in the US knew a few things that are hushed up if they would not riot in the streets.
Every time Google does this I lose respect for them. Shame on Google.
So what will we do about it? Can we lobby for legislation? Or perhaps we can enhance existing legislation that prohibits bribery and other corrupt practices by U.S. companies in other countries?
Or maybe we can go about this another way -- convince everyone that money interests are more important that human interests? The evidence for this is widely abundant. We accept that life-saving drugs are only for those who can afford it. We accept that food and clean water is never free.
I remember a story I heard as a child... about a repressed people under a tyrannical and unreasonable government. Some people got together to free themselves from it and created a government with a constitution that guaranteed certain rights. I'm not sure that new nation exists any longer because it has been long forgotten, but the idea seemed like a good one at the time.
The "do no evil" company is a marketing and advertising company. "Do no evil" is a slogan and its meaning is subject to wide, varied and seasonal interpretation. I have never expected Google to behave any better than any other company.
despite not being kept poor, at least 30 to 40% of people in turkey are striving for a strict islamic society. another 20 to 30% of them are looking for a stricter, conservative society. dont need to tell you that all these come with considerably less freedoms. these people are making heaps of money via 'islamic' corporations engaging in manufacturing and trade. yet, they are still striving for such a hardliner life.
the most ironic part is that what fuels and enables their enrichment and radicalism has been the unregulated free market conditions pressured onto turkey by the united states republican governments through supporting right wing political parties here.
Read radical news here
What you are saying is dogma. A statement that explains nothing, has no examples, no reasoning, just a statement presented as fact and if you disagree, you are wrong or worse, stupid.
It doesn't matter if it is "jews are 2nd rate humans" or "god loves everyone" or "evolution is responsible for all development of life". Without reasoning, any statement becomes dogma.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
India does value free speech and political speech. But they are weighing the harm of free speech against violence in their streets.
Sorry, you cant have it both ways.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
'India does value free speech and political speech. But they are weighing the harm of free speech against violence in their streets.' Governments have been using that sort of argument for thousands of years. All speech is just data, and our knowledge, wisdom, and moral sense are the filters we use to weigh that data. We don't need nor do we desire governments to filter the data for us, or only allow us access to a subset of data that they deem appropriate. Indeed, only having access to all the data allows us to see the big picture, and thus make wise decisions. The 'climategate' scandal is a good example. When some views are suppressed, and some data is 'tweaked', the whole model becomes suspect. The wise say, "Give us all the data. Let all voices be heard. Only then can we begin to approach the truth that we are seeking." The google spokesperson could have said "India is weighing the good of free speech against the harm of violence in their streets.", but they chose to phrase it as: 'the harm of free speech'. Think about that mindset the next time you need to trust any authority, whether it be government, google, or carbon-taxing zealots.
You mean like the LA riots? Or the ones in Paris? Or the ones in Holland. Or the ones in...
Riots are nothing new. And they are always invariably sparked by what someone said about something.
Free speech is easy when discussed in a class room, a lot harder when applied to the real world.
Take Slashdot itself, free speech is constantly censored here by being labeled as hate speech (flamebait/troll) which makes it disappear from normal view.
And Slashdot uses moderation to keep the site functioning. So censorship does work... or does it? Because it is also well known that the moderation system is abused to silence those moderators disagree with.
So unless you can come up with a solution to the moderation system on Slashdot, I wouldn't suggest how a government of 1 billion should do it.
I think India has a near impossible task. Part of the problem currently is that the "lesser" developed cultures (cue flamebait/troll mod) have become rich enough to have time to waste but not so rich they have become afraid to loose.
Please allow me to explain. If you watch the known terrorists, then you notice that a lot of them (especially the western attacks) are made by people who are NOT poor. The crotch-bomber's family is very rich, Osama is a member of one of the richest family on the planet, the 9/11 attackers were all middle class.
The idea behind it is very simple and has been used by politicians in the west. Houses for voters (british scandal), or re-arrangement of voting districts in the US. The idea is that home-owners tend to vote more conservative. If you own your home, then (the logic goes) you care what happens to it, its value. If your area declines, you will fight it because you could loose the value of your house. The theory works, up to a point. People care about their house... when it is worth caring about. If you are forced to buy a cheap house in a bad area because their are no rented houses available, all that happens is that people resent having to pay high mortage for living in a bad area. It is no magic bullet.
SO, what does this mean for India? You got 3 groups of people.
If you take note, the crotch-bomber comes from a wealthy family, but he has contributed nothing. The rioters in the suburbs of paris are unwanted immigrants who work the jobs no-one wants or exist on goverment handouts, and their parents working the jobs nobody wants. Same in LA. It was the blacks who rioted, not the other immigrant groups.
And this isn't about race but about position in society. If you got nothing (or feel you got nothing) then it easy to start rioting.
And India got to balance all of this in a society that is being torn in all directions. You got areas were people are near starving and areas where its wealth is exploding. Space age nation with hunger probems. It is exploring the moon in a country where people fear a solar eclipse. And everywhere there are people who are rich enough not to worry about starving but to poor to want to keep what they got and feeling disconnected from their society.
And then it becomes very easy for resentment to form. India has been one of the most tolerant societies throughout its history. It is one of the few (if not only) country that
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Yep... because, as everybody knows, when you deny citizens the right to free speech that never results in violence in the streets, right?
Here is an interview of Prof. Stanley Fish, author of There's No Such Thing As Free Speech: And It's a Good Thing, Too . I hope this brings something new to the discussion here.
Okay, free speech means you can pretty much say whatever the heck you want.
What it does NOT guarantee is that you will be immune to the consequences of your free speech.
If you're going to be proverbial and scream "Fire" in the ubiquitous crowded theater, cause a stampede and someone gets injured or killed, you're liable for that.
Also, the freedom of speech in the US only extends to the government's ability to censor your speech.
Private entities (like Google) can and DO censor your speech. You're free to try and say whatever you want, but they are under NO obligation to provide you with a forum from which to do so. They can do it for any reason (good/bad/indifferent) or for no reason.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
It's all about the numbers. India's population is so huge that the ends of the intelligence curve are significant.
At one end, India has more super-programmers than the US has programmers.
At the other end, India has more homicidal morons than the US has morons.
Say something someone takes offense to and in the US you'll get picketted. In India someone will burn your house down.
You can't much blame the Indian government for worrying.
I'm a Programmer. That's one level above Software Engineer and one level below Engineer.
As much as we want everyone to be of the same color, believe the same god, follow the same culture and hold similar ideals, its never going to happen in the real world. Curtailing certain hate-speech to limit the number of people murdered in riots is better than allowing free speech and having a civil war in your hands. We do want immigrants to americanize when they land here don't we? I find nothing wrong in an american firm following local laws in order to harvest a profit from the second most populous country in the world. Thinking that our way of life is the most superior of them all is the biggest mistake we could make. Many civilizations that tried to act on this and tried to "civilize" the rest of the world have ended up collapsing.
Heck, it is still banned for large parts of the population, and during certain times of the day.
this thing doesnt just stay the place you leave it. fundamentalism is something restless. once they take over, they increasingly radicalize everyone, eliminate anyone they cant, and then look outside their borders. just like what happened, and what is happening in iran.
even before they reached their goal in turkey, they have been saying that their real target was europe, and then the world.
Read radical news here
'India does value free speech and political speech. But they are weighing the harm of free speech against violence in their streets.'" In other words India is really concerned about how the outside world, which supplies an untold percentage of it's Gross National Product, perceives the actions of it's government but in truth will do what it wants to do anyway. Whenever you here the word "BUT" you can assume that everything you just heard before "BUT" is bullshit and everything you hear after is what the speaker truly believes
If Google and the government don't want us to see something, we Indians will say "Fuck them" and look elsewhere. For us, this is a non-issue. In India, if you want some information which is censored, there will be a hundred people around you who already have it. All you have to do is to pick up your 500 dollar cellphone and the call them. Q&A: In India, only about a tenth (or less) of the population have access to the Internet. Yet, the government is worried about Internet censorship. Why? ANS: In India, without Internet, television, radio, print media and cellphone, a piece of information still travels quickly through what we call the human network. And along with the information, individual perspective headers are added and agreed upon, which creates mass opinions and ruins the government's intentions in a few hours.
Within the last few days, slashdot has published internet censorship stories from all these countries.
All of those countries may have differernt motovations, and use different tactics, but the results are similar.
January 01, 2010
China Reaffirms Plans to "Purify" the Internet
> Says crackdown on online pornography is part of overall effort to preserve "national long-term stability," build a "harmonious socialist society," and prevent the "poisoning of young people's physical and mental health," but most likely is all about strengthening its grip on the what could be a dangerous conduit for threatening images and ideas.
http://www.zeropaid.com/news/87485/china-reaffirms-plans-to-purify-the-internet/
January 03, 2010
Your Rights Online: Google Sets Censorship Precedent In India
> "Censorship varies from country to country but India, home to a sixth of the world's population, appears to be shaping up much like China. Not far behind everyone else, Google has increasingly censored websites with an incident where a very popular politician died and Google forcibly deleted and dissolved a group on Orkut where offensive comments about the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh were posted. An official from India's Ministry of Communications and Information Technology said, 'If you are doing business here, you should follow the local law, the sentiments of the people, the culture of the country. If somebody starts abusing Lord Rama on a Web site, that could start riots.' The lengthy opinion piece calls attention to the beginnings of a definitive lack of free speech online for Indian citizens. A spokeswoman for the 'Do No Evil' company explained, 'India does value free speech and political speech. But they are weighing the harm of free speech against violence in their streets.'"
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/01/03/0123216/Google-Sets-Censorship-Precedent-In-India
In the USA, I think corporations are behind the censorship. Unethical corporations, and sometimes individuals (possibly backed by corporations), use various legal tricks, and harassment techniques, to remove websites that are not favorable to the interests of those corporations. Sometimes the same corporations have methods of flooding the media with propaganda that is favorable to their interests, or lanching smear campaigns against competiors.
For example, I seem to remember somebody with the initials JVM getting a certain blog removed, and possible arranging a major whitewash on wikipedia. And of course we all remember the harassment of PJ.
Then there was the case of the judge that had three websites removed. I may not care for him personally, but I think the APEX v. tunnelrat case raises some serious issues:
1) When is it right for a judge to expose an anonymous blogger?
2) When is it right for a judge to order a website to be taken down, and personal property (domain name) to be compensated?'
3) Is it illegal to publicly display legal contracts?
4) Does a judge in NJ have jurisdiction over of website that is not hosted in NJ, or owned by a NJ resident?
I don't care what APEX is telling us, or what the court is telling us. The APEX scam is clearly a case of a company bullying a blogger in order to hide information that company finds embarrassing, and maybe even illegal.
The case has been covered on several other sites.
Court orders three H-1B sites disabled
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9142806/Court_orders_three_H_1B_sites_disabled
Legal action PR nightmare
http://www.techgoss.com/Story/2109S14-Legal-action-PR-nightmare.aspx
Your Rights Online: Court Orde
observe iran. how they are increasingly radicalizing and suppressing any kind of modern thought or movement and also arming themselves.
turkey is a much more established and technological country. in case of a radicalization, its harmful effect to entire world would be much more greater, multitudes of iran.
no you dont need strict islamic countries. but, they just wont stay where they are. islamic radicalism is not something self contained. its contagious AND aggressive.
entire islamism needs to be stopped. fast.
Read radical news here
Indian Police has a deal with Google by which Google supplies IP addresses of bloggers.
[citation needed]
'India does value free speech and political speech. But they are weighing the harm of free speech against violence in their streets.'
That, of course, makes no sense. Since the violence on the streets is partially a direct result of a lack of free/political speech. Because that freedom would result in changes. And those changes would result in less bad things happening, because people would get more of what they actually want.
I wonder how hard it is, to become a citizen of Switzerland... :)
(...to me it shouldn’t be that hard.
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.