jsm - Slashdot User

UK Culture Secretary Wants Website Ratings, Censorship 377

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday December 27, 2008 @10:37AM from the since-the-aussies-seem-so-excited-about-it dept.

kaufmanmoore writes "UK culture secretary Andy Burnham calls for a website rating system similar to the one used for movies in an interview with the Daily Telegraph. He also calls for censorship of the internet, saying, 'There is content that should just not be available to be viewed.' Other proposals he mentions in his wide-ranging calls for internet regulation are 'family-friendly' services from ISPs, and requiring takedown notices to be enforced within a specific time for sites that host content. Mr. Burnham wants to extend his proposals across the pond and seeks meetings with the Obama administration."

Vietnam Imposes New Blogging Restrictions 206

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Friday December 26, 2008 @05:12PM from the people-never-learn dept.

GMAW is one of many to mention that the Vietnam government has approved a new set of regulations aimed at bloggers. The new restrictions ban bloggers from discussing certain subjects that the government deems sensitive or inappropriate. Not only are the topics limited, but bloggers are being directed to only write about issues that directly impact their personal lives. "The rules, which were approved Dec. 18, attempt to rein in Vietnam's booming blogosphere. It has become an alternative source of news for many in the communist country, where the media is state-controlled. The new rules require Internet companies that provide blogging platforms to report to the government every six months and provide information about bloggers on request."

Australian Government Censorship 'Worse Than Iran' 516

Posted by timothy on Thursday October 23, 2008 @11:20PM from the but-the-people-there-are-so-nice dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The Australian Government's plan to Censor the Internet is producing problems for ISPs, with filters causing speeds to drop by up to 86% and falsely blocking 10% of safe sites. The Government Minister in charge of the censorship plan, Conservative Stephen Conroy, has been accused of bullying ISP employees critical of his plan: 'If people equate freedom of speech with watching child pornography, then the Rudd Labor Government is going to disagree.'" Read on for more, including an interesting approach to demonstrating the inevitable collision of automated censorship with common sense.

Comment Re:Silver lining... (Score 1) 148

by jsm on Friday June 06, 2008 @03:26PM (#23686077) Attached to: Behind China's Great Firewall

If that news report was the recent article on PBS' News Hour, then don't forget that those students they interviewed were hand-picked by the Chinese authorities for the interview.

Not that it wasn't informative. Maybe there are many who share their view. One interesting thing the students said was that non-Chinese people don't appreciate how much change the Chinese government *has* allowed, how much different it is now than it was. While I hope that's true, I'd counter that the Chinese government hasn't changed voluntarily, they've been forced to by modern global changes, or else they'd miss out on the huge benefits of e.g. the Internet.

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