Brian
06-11-2007, 06:20 PM
China Begins Blocking Flickr (http://www.thetechlounge.com/news/11641/China+Begins+Blocking+Flickr/)
"The blocking, which began Thursday, is keeping Internet users across a large part of China from viewing photos on Flickr, home to millions of snapshots of everything from birthday parties to beach vacations to nudes.
The Web site also hosts a smattering of images that may be frowned upon by Chinese censors, including student protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989, which includes the famous photo of a man blocking the progress of Chinese army tanks, and bodies of students who were killed in the streets as part of a government crackdown.
On the one hand, it doesn't seem part of the Chinese culture to censor and limit--and I'm working off my admittedly limited knowledge of China, and will grant that the most insightful reading I've taken to heart, outside of frequent Atlantic Monthly articles, has been <em><a target="_blank" href="http://www.amazon.com/Diamond-Age-Illustrated-Primer-Spectra/dp/0553380966/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/105-5824919-3590007?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181548907&sr=8-1">The Diamond Age</a></em>--self-awareness, knowledge, and history are all fundamental in and outside of the Northern Capital. So why does it happen? Shame?
It's easy to rail against that kind of censorship in the West, but on the other hand, it's illegal to display and sometimes even own Nazi relics in many places, let alone endorse any of it. Is that different?"
Read full story here (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/09/BUG9VQC8QE1.DTL)
"The blocking, which began Thursday, is keeping Internet users across a large part of China from viewing photos on Flickr, home to millions of snapshots of everything from birthday parties to beach vacations to nudes.
The Web site also hosts a smattering of images that may be frowned upon by Chinese censors, including student protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989, which includes the famous photo of a man blocking the progress of Chinese army tanks, and bodies of students who were killed in the streets as part of a government crackdown.
On the one hand, it doesn't seem part of the Chinese culture to censor and limit--and I'm working off my admittedly limited knowledge of China, and will grant that the most insightful reading I've taken to heart, outside of frequent Atlantic Monthly articles, has been <em><a target="_blank" href="http://www.amazon.com/Diamond-Age-Illustrated-Primer-Spectra/dp/0553380966/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/105-5824919-3590007?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181548907&sr=8-1">The Diamond Age</a></em>--self-awareness, knowledge, and history are all fundamental in and outside of the Northern Capital. So why does it happen? Shame?
It's easy to rail against that kind of censorship in the West, but on the other hand, it's illegal to display and sometimes even own Nazi relics in many places, let alone endorse any of it. Is that different?"
Read full story here (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/09/BUG9VQC8QE1.DTL)