Originally from Chilling Effects Clearinghouse Notices reBlogged on Jul 23, 2008, 12:00AM

Originally from Chilling Effects Clearinghouse Notices reBlogged on Jul 23, 2008, 12:00AM

Originally from Chilling Effects Clearinghouse Notices reBlogged on Jul 19, 2008, 12:00AM

Originally from Chilling Effects Clearinghouse Notices reBlogged on Jul 16, 2008, 12:00AM

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Originally from Slashdot: Your Rights Online by ScuttleMonkey reBlogged

Originally from internet censorship - Google News reBlogged on Jul 23, 2008, 3:27PM

Originally from del.icio.us/tag/for-oni-news by jilliancyork reBlogged

Pedro Dória [pt] reports that a contestant in the local elections for Porto Alegre, Brazil, was forced to close down her Orkut account and suspend her videos on YouTube. “They are being censored: they can't express themselves using all the resources allowed by the Internet allows. They can not use the Web to communicate in complete freedom with their supporters”. Read more about elections regulations in Brazil.

Originally from Global Voices Online » Freedom of Speech by Paula Góes reBlogged on Jul 22, 2008, 6:56PM

“Never having become citizens in the real world, it is hard for us to behave as citizens on the web”: Yoani Sanchez at Generation Y shares her thoughts about the virtual Cuba.

Originally from Global Voices Online » Freedom of Speech by Janine Mendes-Franco reBlogged on Jul 22, 2008, 8:14AM

Originally from Reporters sans frontières - INTERNET reBlogged

Originally from BBC News | Technology | UK Edition reBlogged on Jul 15, 2008, 6:45AM

Usenet, one of the first internet discussion systems, is coming under fire from New York Attorney General, Andrew Cuomo, who has convinced several major ISPs to close down access to dozens of newsgroups containing child pornography – and many more that don’t.

Of Friday, Cuomo announced that AT&T and AOL had agreed to eliminate access to 88 newsgroups. This follows similar promises from Time Warner Cable, Sprint, and Verizon. All five of these mega-ISPs have also agreed to rid their web servers of child pornography, as identified by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC).

It all sounds reasonable enough so far, but some of these ISPs have gone a lot further. Time Warner, AT&T and AOL have all decided to extend their Usenet crackdowns well beyond the 88 groups flagged by the Cuomo.

AT&T will eliminate direct access to all binary newsgroups - that’s all groups that serve up full-blown data files and AOL have gone even further, announcing that they will block access to every newsgroup there is.

Yes, US lawmakers and ISPs must work to eliminate online child pornography. According the Internet Watch Foundation, an organization that fights the good fight in the UK, nearly 80 per cent of the world’s commercial child pornography is hosted on US servers.

But blocking access to large swathes of Usenet is hardly the right way to go. The pornography will only turn up elsewhere. And these ISPs - strong-armed by the New York AG - are bagging tens of thousands of newsgroups that contain nothing but perfectly legal content.

Originally from GagWatch by Paul reBlogged

On July 7, Savva Terentyev, 22, a Russian blogger and musician from Syktyvkar, received a one-year suspended jail sentence for a comment (RUS) he posted on Feb. 15, 2007, on the blog of a local journalist Boris Suranov.

Here is a rough translation of the comment:

I hate cops [menty], [swear word omitted]

I don't agree with the thesis that “policemen still have the mentality of a repressive stick in the hands of the powers that be.” First, they are cops [menty, not militsionery, a less respectful way to refer to police]. Second, their mentality isn't still here. It's simply ineradicable. Once a musor [a synonym for ment; non-slang meaning of the word is “trash”], always a musor, even in Africa. Those who become cops [menty] - rednecks and thugs - are the dumbest and least educated representatives of the live/animal world. Would be great if there was an oven, similar to those in Auschwitz, in the center of every Russian city, at the main square (in Syktyvkar, right in the center of Stefanovskaya, where the New Year's tree stands, so that everyone could see), and there'd be a daily ceremony - or, even better, twice a day (at noon and midnight, for example) - of burning a dishonest cop [ment] there. The people would be doing the burning. This would be the first step towards cleansing the society of the dirt that the thuggish cops are.

The court found Terentyev guilty of inciting enmity and publicly humiliating representatives of a social group (Article 282, part 1 of the Russian Federation's Criminal Code).

Here is a rough translation of a tiny part of the 12-page “guilty” verdict (RUS), posted by one of the defense witnesses, LJ user mezak, on his blog (the original of the passage below is on p. 11; the post also has photos of Terentyev, his defense team, and the judge reading the verdict; there are 376 comments to the post so far):

[…] Defendant Terentyev S.S. [Savva Sergeyevich], by means of the language, by having a negative impact on the public opinion and mood, and by aiming to incite social enmity and hatred, to escalate social conflict, to sharpen social contradictions, to awaken base instincts in people, contrasted the people and police officers, calling to [their] physical annihilation by the people. The text does not allow for ambiguous understanding and interpretation of [its] content and meaning, because it should be understandable to any average native speaker of Russian who has basic oral and written language skills. […]

LJ user sholademi re-posted the verdict on his blog and added this note (RUS) at the end of his entry:

Hmm, it has to be noted that the court's verdict contains many orthographic mistakes. This, in addition to the legal side of the case (namely, the questionable linguistic analysis). In short, it's getting crazier and crazier.

In another post, LJ user sholademi posted a 5-question survey (RUS), explaining that Terentyev's defense team was planning to appeal the blogger's sentence and, among other things, would like to “find out how Savva Terentyev's case is going to affect the discussion environment in the Russian blogosphere.” Below are the survey's results so far:

1. Before Savva Terentyev's case, were there many LJ bloggers who allowed themselves to speak harshly of law enforcement and other state institutions and officials?

a. Many bloggers made such statements - 842 (75.4%)

b. Only some bloggers made such statements - 233 (20.9%)

c. I've never encountered such statements on blogs - 41 (3.7%)

2. Before the verdict on Savva Terentyev's case, how often did you encounter harsh statements about law enforcement and other state institutions and officials on your friends feed?

?. Such statements were pretty frequent on my friends feed - 664 (59.7%)

b. Such statements were pretty rare on my friends feed - 347 (31.2%)

c. Such statements were never present on my friends feed - 102 (9.2%)

3. If the verdict on Savva Terentyev's case comes into force, how will it affect the number of bloggers who would allow themselves to make harsh statements about law enforcement and other state institutions and officials in open posts and comments?

a. Their numbers will grow significantly - 193 (17.4%)

b. Their numbers will grow, but not significantly - 239 (21.6%)

c. Their numbers will decrease, but not significantly - 550 (49.6%)

d. Their numbers will decrease significantly - 126 (11.4%)

4. If the verdict on Savva Terentyev's case comes into force, how will it affect the number of bloggers who would allow themselves to make harsh statements about law enforcement and other state institutions and officials in locked (friends-only) posts?

a. Their numbers will grow significantly - 386 (34.9%)

b. Their numbers will grow, but not significantly - 470 (42.5%)

c. Their numbers will decrease, but not significantly - 219 (19.8%)

d. Their numbers will decrease significantly - 31 (2.8%)

5. Do you consider Savva Terentyev's sentence fair?

a. I consider it fair - 73 (6.5%)

b. I consider it unfair, as it is too soft - 12 (1.1%)

c. I consider it unfair, as it is too harsh - 71 (6.3%)

d. I consider it unfair in principle, because, in my opinion, Savva did not commit a crime - 963 (86.1%)

On July 14, Savva Terentyev and his lawyer held a press conference in Moscow (see photo of Terentyev at LJ user mezak's blog). LJ user dolboeb - Anton Nossik, the self-described “Social Media Evangelist at SUP,” the online media company that owns LiveJournal.com - announced the event on his blog and added this note (RUS) at the end of his post:

[…] Each month, 10-12 million comments appear in the Cyrillic LJ (10.5 million in June, 130.5 million in the past 12 months). On the average, every post gets 3.7 comments. [The police unit that initiated Savva Terentyev's case] has plenty of work ahead (unless, of course, they've got nothing else to busy themselves with).

At the press conference, LJ user dolboeb reiterated his point (RUS, link to an article in Novaya Gazeta, the newspaper for which Anna Politkovskaya used to write):

[…] Of course, spending 15 minutes on the web and finding a criminal is a lot more convenient than running around the dark, narrow streets with a gun. As a taxpayer, I'm not satisfied with this situation. […]

Originally from Global Voices Online » Freedom of Speech by Veronica Khokhlova reBlogged on Jul 15, 2008, 11:10AM

The second part in China Digital Times‘ series of interviews with Chinese journalists is now up. First question: “How do you feel about the Olympics being in Beijing? What does that mean for the Chinese people?”

Originally from Global Voices Online » Freedom of Speech by John Kennedy reBlogged on Jul 16, 2008, 5:09AM

Originally from Wired: Threat Level by Sarah Lai Stirland reBlogged

Originally from Wired: Threat Level by Ryan Singel reBlogged

Originally from Wired: Threat Level by Ryan Singel reBlogged

Will consumer pressure for a safer net mean the end of open platforms and rapid innovation? And should the geeks who “get” the net care if the rest of the world prefer TiVos and iPhones?

On Wednesday of this week we co-hosted an event at the British Computer Society to discuss the problems raised by Jonathan Zittrain’s new book, The Future of the Internet and How to Stop It. Professor Zittrain was joined by technology journalist Bill Thompson and our Executive Director, Becky Hogge, to discuss the threat that insecurity and “tethered appliances” pose to the generative Internet. We were also fortunate enough to have an expert and lively audience.

The recording (thanks to Felix) of this 90 minute event shows there is both plenty of middle ground and a broad range of views held within our community. We’d love to see your comments on the merits of Jonathan’s arguments, particularly his point that online communities should develop self-regulatory mechanisms rather than rely on Government measures to ensure the net flourishes.

Originally from The Open Rights Group by Michael reBlogged on Jun 6, 2008, 9:52AM