You think you have it bad when you high speed is down for an hour? Try on the Chinese surfing experience on for size.
From CNN:
At first, Liu Xiaoyuan just fumed when his online journal postings disappeared with no explanation. Then he decided to do something few if any of China’s censored bloggers had tried. He sued his service provider.
“Each time I would see one of my entries blocked, I’d feel so furious and indignant,” said Liu, a 43-year-old Beijing lawyer. “It was just so disrespectful.”
Liu’s frustration is hardly unique. For China’s 162 million Web users, surfing the Internet can be like running an obstacle course with blocked Web sites, partial search results, and posts disappearing at every turn.
Blog entries like Liu’s, which mused on sensitive topics such as the death penalty, corruption and legal reform, are often automatically rejected if they trigger a keyword filter. Sometimes, they’re deleted by human censors employed by Internet companies.
In the lead-up to the sensitive Communist Party Congress, which convenes Monday to approve top leaders who will serve under President Hu Jintao through 2012, authorities have been casting an even wider net than usual in their search for Web content they deem to be politically threatening or potentially destabilizing.
Freedom of speech is a bugger that way. (insert sarcastic tone)
Liquidmatrix is already blocked by Chinese censors.
Tags: China Firewall, Chinese Censorship, China Internet Freedom
