I was doing a little browsing and I saw this in the Sci/Tech section of Google News. <br><br>An apparent Internet crackdown in India. Just another ratcheting up of control. Coming soon: "Internet Free Speech Zones," just like the ones Bush uses in the United States, only virtual. You'll be able to say whatever the hell you want, just so long as its far away from everybody else. <br><br>What's free speech when you're only able to shout into the wind?<br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.ndtv.com/morenews/showmorestory.asp?slug=Bloggers+criticise+jamming+of+blog+sites&id=90335&category=National">New Dehli TV</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>NDTV Correspondent<br><br>Tuesday, July 18, 2006 (New Delhi):<br><br>The major blog sites including blogspot.com, a site meant to set up new blogs, have been jammed in the last couple of days.<br><br>It isn't clear who has blocked these popular sites but unconfirmed reports say the Department of Telecom has issued orders to Internet service providers to block the websites.<br><br>and<br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.ndtv.com/morenews/showmorestory.asp?category=National&slug=Thousands+of+bloggers+blocked+out&id=90350">New Dehli TV 2</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>Tuesday, July 18, 2006 (New Delhi):<br><br>The Ministry of Information Technology has asked Internet service providers or ISPs to block at least 18 sites.<br><br>The directive issued by the licensing and registration cell of the ministry on July 13 says: "Request you to kindly initiate blocking of the following websites/blogspot immediately."<br><br>It does not mention any reason for the request.<br><br>Highly placed sources in the ministry, however, clarified that the decision had nothing to do with the Mumbai blasts, but was an attempt to curb religious extremism on the web.<br><br>Within days, major ISPs like Tata Indicom, Sify, Reliance and BSNL complied, blocking at least 22 websites until further notice from the government.<br><br>Technical error<br><br>But instead of just those websites, thousands of bloggers could not access their blogs, especially on blogspot.com, the mother site for bloggers like Ishita Ahirwal.<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>The avid blogger has not been able to get into her blog for the past three days. She could post her blogs, but couldn't view it.<br></strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br>Experts say this could be a technical error caused when some blog sites were blocked.<br><br>"It's frustrating because it's my personal space. I wrote about my life, my son. How can they just block it? But e-mails are flowing in on PK blogs and I can view my blog," says Ishita.<br><br>The government's move may not effectively block these sites, as internet users are among the most tech savvy people and are finding other ways to access their blogs and re-create their networks. <br><br>There have been angry responses to the blocking of several blogs in India.<br><br>The order came from the Department of Information Technology, which handles cyber security reportedly on the advice of intelligence agencies.<br><br>Angry response<br><br>"All blogs on blogspot.com have been blocked by our Ministry of Communication. All of our blogs are visible to people outside India, but we can't view our own blogs or other blogs at blogspot.com from within India," said Aparna Muralidhar, Bangalore.<br><br>"It is not ok. Personal sites should not be stopped. It doesn't make sense," said Ishita from Delhi.<br><br>"There is a lot of propaganda about blogs being used for spreading political views but for people who are not part of it, it is very frustrating to not get through to sites that are private," she added.<br><br>However, there's yet no official word from either the telecom minister or the home ministry on the order which was apparently passed on Friday.<br><br><br>The story from Business Standard:<br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage.php?autono=98680&leftnm=8&subLeft=0&chkFlg=">Business Standard</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>Blogs blocked<br>Nilanjana S Roy / New Delhi July 19, 2006<br>INTERNET: Blog censorship, as the government is trying, is a lousy idea.<br> <br>It started on Friday, when some Indian bloggers discovered that we couldn’t access blogs on the popular Blogspot domain.<br> <br>Along with Rediff blogs, Blogspot is a key hosting site for Indian and international bloggers. At last count, more than 40,000 bloggers who identified themselves as Indian were hosted on Blogspot.<br> <br>Initially, the block was limited to a few Indian ISPs, but it spread. Readers couldn’t access any blogs on Blogspot — Indian, American or, come to that, Ukrainian.<br> <br>Mridula blew the whistle on her blog; then bloggers from Dina Mehta to Shivam Vij and Desipundit began to post. At Within/ Without, Neha Viswanathan hosted a running update.<br> <br>The ban was clumsy. We could still post from Blogger — but if you were located in India on specific ISPs, you couldn’t see your blog or other blogs. Experienced Net users offered easy ways to bypass the block. (Use sites like
www.pkblogs.com, anonymizer services, or RSS feeds to read blocked pages;
www.boingboing.net has tips on how to handle Net censorship.)<br> <br>Indian government departments refused to confirm, deny or offer any information on the block. Over the weekend, the block spread to Typepad and Geocities.<br> <br>It made no sense. Blogs on the equally popular Rediff and Wordpress are accessible; the block could be bypassed; and we still didn’t know the reason behind the ban.<br> <br>The blogger community in India has joined forces before — after the tsunami, after Mumbai’s rains, after the Mumbai blasts. Now it had to defend its own territory.<br> <br>Within 24 hours, Peter Griffin, Amit Varma, Saket Vaidya and others had set up the Bloggers Collective Against Censorship, which offered updates, ways around the block, and lists of government officials to call.<br> <br>Conspiracy theorists were dumped in a separate thread. Slowly, as we received no responses, rude or inadequate, the anger grew.<br> <br>This is not just a blogger issue. Countries that practice Internet censorship include Korea, Zimbabwe, Burma and Iran — not a club any government would be proud to belong to.<br> <br>Bloggers are affected. But so are ordinary Netizens who like the conversations that many blogs and homepages enable; their freedom of speech has been abruptly curtailed.<br> <br>By Monday, the Indian government’s block on domains was news on the big sites—Google, Technorati, Digg, Boing Boing, Michelle Malkin. By trying to shut down the innocuous along with the potentially threatening, the Indian government looks like a bully.<br> <br>By refusing to explain its actions, the Indian government looks like a particularly inept bully. I’d prefer a higher opinion of my country than this. I hope the Indian state will prove us wrong by explaining itself and lifting this block. <p></p><i></i>
by Mentalgongfu » Wed Jul 19, 2006 12:55 am 
