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Why French Govt's Attempt to Censor Wikipedia Matters

Posted by timothy on from the signal-to-noise dept.

In the end, the Streisand Effect prevailed, as you might expect, when a French domestic intelligence agency apparently browbeat a French citizen into removing content from Wikipedia. The attention caused the Wikipedia entry on a formerly obscure military radio site (English version) to leap in popularity not only in French, but in languages where it was formerly far less likely to have been noticed at all. Lauren Weinstein makes the case, though, that this sort of move isn't just something to shrug at or assume will always end so nicely. "Even though attempts at Internet censorship will almost all fail in the end, governments and authorities have the capability to make groups' and individuals' lives extremely uncomfortable, painful, or even terminated — in the process of attempts at censorship, and equally important, by instilling fear to encourage self-censorship in the first place."

8 of 104 comments (clear)

  1. Response by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Interesting

    It doesn't. Wikipedia is located in the US. When the US government decides to censor Wikipedia, then it will matter (and Wikipedia will move someplace else).

    1. Re:Response by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Interesting

      There was this boat in New Zealand that pissed the French off that one time...

    2. Re: Response by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Wikipedia is almost nothing without contributors, and french government can put a heavy presure on french contributors.
      What wil be the result if each government acts the same way ?

      Anonymity. Wikipedia simply needs to do more to protect the identities of its contributors. If necessary, enable Tor edits. Vandalism is a small price to pay compared to censorship.

    3. Re: Response by flyneye · · Score: 3, Interesting

      But, governments DO act that way. Show me one government that; if it doesn't do it's dirty work openly, doesn't have a "secret" agency of some other advertised value, that handles it's hoodlum urges. Governments do as they please, because once in power, they find that those they are to serve are more valuable as an asset to their aspirations as a crop, or commodity , if you will, than a master of their industry. Governments who aren't SPECIFICALLY relegated to sundry maintenance of the peoples general interests and well being,and kept that way, grow corrupt and wild as Kudzu or Ragweed. It then takes bloody revolution to separate their desire for money and power from actual governance, like bombing a field with herbicide.
                Wouldn't it be nice to just have a Worldwide Revolt Day and just turn the whole shithouse upside down, then begin again?

      --
      *Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
    4. Re: Response by moeinvt · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Wealthy political and banking elites are in control right now. Your "partly democratically accountable" governments are just a facade and I think you probably know it.

      Even if rich well-armed people were directly "in control", any acts of aggression, theft, kidnapping and murder would be clearly recognized as criminal behavior. Plenty of well armed poor people could put a stop to that. When the same wealthy elites use "government" as their intermediary, the extortion and intimidation of the population is done under the color of "law" and their violence is legitimized.

  2. Ob Pratchett by blarkon · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A lie can make its way around the world before the truth can get its boots on. In our pre-distopia state, we're still dealing with Governments that think that blocking something is the best way to make it disappear. It won't be long though until they figure out that telling people lies that they want to believe is a far more effective way of burying the truth than redacting it. So enjoy the dumb governments, corporations, and political groups for as long as you can - because when your generation gets into the control seat, the bullshit isn't going to smell like bullshit, it's going to look and taste like sugar or bacon (choose appropriate tasty thing)

  3. Similar case in Russia by YurB · · Score: 5, Interesting

    France and Russia are very different states indeed, but it's interesting that Russian Wikipedia had a similar incident recently. The Russian Wikimedia received a request from the government to remove the 'Cannabis smoking' article from Russian Wikipedia (see google-translated version). The request in an ultimate manner states that if the article won't be removed during 24 hours then 'the hosting provider is obliged to limit access to such website' (haha, hosting provider from USA?) and if the hosting provider refuses to do that, then 'the IP address of the website will be listed in a database of addresses to whish ISP's will limit access'. The request PDF is here.

  4. Censorship by roman_mir · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In Russia Wikipedia is giving up to the political pressure to remove or edit a page on Cannabis smoking (Russian version of the page).

    I can't fully understand what exactly on that page provoked the government reaction, but apparently there are a number of pages that the Russian gov't is set against (suicide, methamphetamine, bong, amphetamine, The Complete Manual of Suicide - the page on a Japanese book).

    In any case, the Russian government is engaged in censorship against Internet sites and other "extremist" materials, which include books, articles, music, images, etc.

    Apparently too many people around the world just can't come to grips with the fact that trying to stop proliferation of information on the Net is a stupid idea, but hey, laws don't have to be intelligent. Intelligence is not a prerequisite for survival, apparently it's also not a prerequisite for governing.

    --
    You can't handle the truth.