THE FLASH BLOGGED 'ROUND THE WORLD
via Yan at Glutter, who writes:
All typepad.com and blogs.com hosted sites are banned in China starting this morning (8.45pm Beijing time on the 24th March), a week after China has agreed to amend its constitution to respect human rights. This is another move by the Central government to curb free speech and freedom of information on the Internet. This is the first time in two years that China has blocked access to foreign servers that host personal sites.
Last week saw two hosting services within China, blogbus and blogscn banned. After shutting down forums and message boards within the country, it’s 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. So far sites in Hong Kong, US, Canada, and the Netherlands has done so.
Single Planet writes:
I will keep my blogs black for 40 days in mourning for the suffocation of a concept, rather than for the death of Typepad in China. The Typepad ban started at 8.45pm Beijing time on the 24th March, and so I will revert to colour 40 days later, on 3rd May. By a curious quirk of fate that is World Press Freedom Day. To conclude the mourning, I will post nothing on that day.
image via Glutter
Freedom of speech cannot be taken for granted anywhere on Earth. Use it or lose it.
3:19:07 PM 
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