Censorship of a small number of Blogs, including American Conservative sites with small traffic numbers, by the Indian Government has consequences that are affecting thousands of Indian Bloggers ability to accress their own blogs to post.
Lots of protests, and Blogger organizing, has ensued. ;-D
India's burgeoning blogging community is up in arms against a government directive that they say has led to the blocking of their web logs.
The country's 153 internet service providers (ISP) have blocked 17 websites since last week on federal government orders.
Some of these sites belong to Google's Blogspot, a leading international web log hosting service.
Indian bloggers say that the decision is an attack on freedom of speech.
A number of them have started filing petitions under the country's new landmark freedom of information law which gives citizens the right to access information held by the government.
Bloggers say the ban has meant that people do not even have access to blogs like the one set up to help the relatives of the victims of the recent train bombings in Mumbai (Bombay) .
The government is not saying why it has banned each of the sites in its latest notification.
This has incensed bloggers in India, which has about 40,000 blog sites, even more.
Read the full piece by the BBC.
Up in the Sillicon Valley, in Northern California, Bloggers are wondering, like all of us, "What the ?".
"A lot of people are saying, `Wait a minute. This can't be happening in India. China, yes. Pakistan, understandable','' said Fremont blogger Sabahat Ashraf, who has several blogs that attract readers from India but now can't be read in India. "People are startled and distressed.''
Other Silicon Valley bloggers are baffled and angry over India's ban in recent days of blogs hosted by popular services used by Americans. The ban of 17 blogs and Web sites, which the government claimed fanned religious hatred, was unintentionally extended to millions of blogs when some of India's Internet service providers blocked entire domain names, instead of just the specific sites. Banned domains include Google's Blogger, Yahoo's GeoCities and Six Apart's TypePad services.
Surprisingly, almost half of the original sites the Indian government ordered blocked are operated by conservative American bloggers who write about the Mideast and the Iraq war but who don't get much readership in India.
Banned site Pirate's Cove written by Porter Good from Raleigh, N.C., doesn't feature any entries about Hindus or India, Good said. He mostly blogs about American politics, while about 10 percent of his postings are commentary on Muslim extremists. His blog is visited by 400 viewers a day at most.
"I find it amusing they're blocking my site,'' he said. "If anything, they've probably bumped my readership.''
Read the full piece in the San Jose Mercury News.
One of the banned sites, Opini Pundit, has been doing a great job with updates:
OpiniPundit Banned in India (UPDATED).
Coverage From another banned site Pirate's Cove:
Banned, Part Deux: Stand With Us
Damn. Unbanned In India ( Includes a link to the damning document authorizing the dastardly deed. )
Here is the link to a list of Indian bloggers comprising the Bloggers Collective Group. Check some of them out.
Is they is, or is they ain't still banned?
That seems to still be the question.
If the Govt. is smart it will back down.
They have stirred up their own Pajama Brigade, and the attention this will get if it continues will rouse PJ Pundits around the world. ;-D
A Tip of the Hat to Instapundit.
Comments