{"id":378436,"date":"2010-03-01T20:35:47","date_gmt":"2010-03-02T01:35:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/censorship_in_china_how_readwriteweb_china_was_closed.php"},"modified":"2010-03-01T20:35:47","modified_gmt":"2010-03-02T01:35:47","slug":"censorship-in-china-how-readwriteweb-china-was-closed-down-for-a-month","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/378436","title":{"rendered":"Censorship in China: How ReadWriteWeb China Was Closed Down For a Month"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/china.png\" \/>In the West, the concept of the &#8216;read\/write Web&#8217; is a relatively easy one to get behind. Everybody can contribute content to the Web (&#8216;write&#8217;), as well as read it &#8211; it&#8217;s a very democratic notion.<\/p>\n<p>However in countries where democracy doesn&#8217;t prevail, the read\/write Web is often subject to censorship rules. <\/p>\n<div style=\"float: right; margin-left: 10px;\"><script type=\"text\/javascript\">tweetmeme_url = 'http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/censorship_in_china_how_readwriteweb_china_was_closed.php';tweetmeme_source = 'rww';<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"http:\/\/tweetmeme.com\/i\/scripts\/button.js\"><\/script><\/div>\n<p>Indeed in December, ReadWriteWeb China was off the air due to the temporary closure of our syndication partners Yeeyan. In this post we look at how and why that happened.<\/p>\n<p align=\"right\"><em>Sponsor<\/em><br \/><a href='http:\/\/d.ads.readwriteweb.com\/ck.php?n=18506&amp;cb=18506' ><img src='http:\/\/d.ads.readwriteweb.com\/avw.php?zoneid=14&amp;cb=18506&amp;n=18506' border='0' alt='' \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Global Times recently published <a href=\"http:\/\/special.globaltimes.cn\/2010-02\/508093.html\">a special report about censorship in China<\/a>. It is an illuminating analysis of a number of publishers who have been censored or who self-censor themselves in order to survive. <\/p>\n<div class=\"super-pullquote\">On March 15, ReadWriteWeb founder Richard MacManus will participate in <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/weiwei\/\">a special event at the Paley Center in New York City<\/a><\/strong>: a conversation with Chinese artist Ai Weiwei and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey about digital activism in China.<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Internet_censorship_in_the_People's_Republic_of_China\">According to Wikipedia<\/a>, Internet censorship in China is &quot;conducted under a wide variety of laws and administrative regulations.&quot; In particular China looks to censor political or social content. In mid-2009 a number of prominent Western social networking sites were blocked in China, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/china_blocks_access_to_twitter_flickr_bing.php\">including Facebook and Twitter<\/a>. Western media speculated that the bans were put in place to prevent activists from using social networks to organize themselves &#8211; which happened in Iran in June of 2009, when <a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/twitter_postpones_maintenance_as_iran_furor_builds.php\">Iranian election protesters used Twitter<\/a> to call attention to their cause.<\/p>\n<h2>Self-censorship<\/h2>\n<p>Inside China, <strong>self-censorship<\/strong> is practiced by many web publishers in order to prevent trouble. &quot;Self-censorship is the rule of survival that prevents popular websites from being shut down,&quot; said veteran web developer Zoe Wang in The Global Times. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/images\/douban_mar10.jpg\" align=\"right\" \/>However, self-censorship is difficult to do in practice &#8211; because it&#8217;s not regulated by a single authority and so there are a lack of clear rules on what to censor. Web publishers in China are never sure what could get their site shut down. <\/p>\n<p>On sites driven by user-generated content, publishers routinely censor political content. But while this may appease the government, it risks upsetting the core users. This has been the case on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.douban.com\/\">Douban<\/a>, a popular social network in China with 33 million registered users. Censorship has recently tightened on Douban, leading to &#8220;veteran members&#8221; protesting about the censorship of certain photos, poetry and book reviews.<\/p>\n<h2>Site Closures, Including RWW China<\/h2>\n<p>The Golbal Times points to three recent examples of sites closed down by authorities: Fanfou, Yeeyan and Blogbus. The latter two were recovered in January. <\/p>\n<p>These site closures directly affected our own company, as Yeeyan is our syndication partner for ReadWriteWeb China. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.yeeyan.org\/\">Yeeyan<\/a> is a community translation website (our <a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/yeeyan_chinese_translation.php\">initial review 3 years ago<\/a>), which publishes some well-known Western news sites such as The Guardian, Time Magazine, the New York Times and of course ReadWriteWeb. In early December, Yeeyan was <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/world\/2009\/dec\/03\/yeeyan-china-guardian-media-mandarin\">forced to shut down<\/a> its site &#8211; including ReadWriteWeb China.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/images\/rww_china_mar10.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>At the time of the closure, the following message was <a href=\"http:\/\/www.danwei.org\/net_nanny_follies\/yeeyancom_stops_publishing_and.php\">posted to the Yeeyan homepage<\/a> by the Yeeyan team:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&quot;Due to our errors in handling some of the articles on the website, we went against the relevant regulations; therefore Yeeyan has to temporarily shut off its server, and adjust the relevant content.&quot;<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Ethan Zuckerman from the <a href=\"http:\/\/cyber.law.harvard.edu\/\">Berkman Center for Internet and Society<\/a> at Harvard Law School <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ethanzuckerman.com\/blog\/2010\/01\/06\/welcome-back-yeeyan\/\">concluded<\/a> that &quot;at least one of the authorities that control the Chinese internet &#8211; which include the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology &#8211; found the prospect of frequent, high-quality translation of US and European media [from Yeeyan] threatening.&quot; <\/p>\n<p>Yeeyan re-opened in January (using .org instead of .com) and we&#8217;re certainly very pleased to see that ReadWriteWeb China is back as a result.<\/p>\n<h2>Free the read\/write Web!<\/h2>\n<p>There&#8217;s no shortage of rhetoric from the West about why China should cease censorship of the Web. Indeed Google made a brave move earlier this year by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/google_still_censoring_in_china.php\">threatening to pull out of China<\/a> if it continued to have to censor search results. While there has been no resolution in the Google-China case as yet, at least the issue is being highlighted and challenged by companies of Google&#8217;s stature in 2010. <\/p>\n<p>I hope that ReadWriteWeb&#8217;s participation in the March 15 event at the Paley Center in New York City, where I will be discussing these and other issues alongside prominent Chinese activist Ai Weiwei and Twitter&#8217;s Jack Dorsey, does its bit to help encourage China to remove censorship on the Web.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Bookmark <a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/weiwei\/\">our special Weiwei webpage<\/a> to track the latest buzz about the March 15 event and view a video about Ai Weiwei&#8217;s art and digital activism.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.readwriteweb.com\/archives\/censorship_in_china_how_readwriteweb_china_was_closed.php#comments-open\">Discuss<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~at\/jN7chmWgGAkTDo7L2PjXwwFfFG8\/0\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~at\/jN7chmWgGAkTDo7L2PjXwwFfFG8\/0\/di\" border=\"0\" ismap=\"true\"><\/img><\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~at\/jN7chmWgGAkTDo7L2PjXwwFfFG8\/1\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~at\/jN7chmWgGAkTDo7L2PjXwwFfFG8\/1\/di\" border=\"0\" ismap=\"true\"><\/img><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"feedflare\">\n<a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:FFnlKYwJmN0\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?d=FFnlKYwJmN0\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:Ij26kaj3iuU\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?d=Ij26kaj3iuU\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:C2pbw5bZMiI\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?d=C2pbw5bZMiI\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:yIl2AUoC8zA\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?d=yIl2AUoC8zA\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:V_sGLiPBpWU\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?i=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:V_sGLiPBpWU\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:gIN9vFwOqvQ\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?i=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:gIN9vFwOqvQ\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:F7zBnMyn0Lo\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?i=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:F7zBnMyn0Lo\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?a=0mOk5RpeskA:CoTxUofMjv8:OqabYuBsmOY\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/readwriteweb?d=OqabYuBsmOY\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a>\n<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/readwriteweb\/~4\/0mOk5RpeskA\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the West, the concept of the &#8216;read\/write Web&#8217; is a relatively easy one to get behind. Everybody can contribute content to the Web (&#8216;write&#8217;), as well as read it &#8211; it&#8217;s a very democratic notion. However in countries where democracy doesn&#8217;t prevail, the read\/write Web is often subject to censorship rules. Indeed in December, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":549,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-378436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/549"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=378436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378436\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=378436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=378436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=378436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}