22 Mar 2010 | Uncategorized
Google has announced that it is to redirect all Chinese users to its uncensored Hong Kong service, in a move to circumvent the Beijing government’s attempt to control the Internet.
Peter Barron, Google’s Communications & Public Affairs Director for North and Central Europe, told Index on Censorship: “It was clear that if we stopped censorship on Google.cn we wouldn’t be operating within Chinese law — so we redirected to our Hong Kong servers which are not subject to Chinese censorship law.”
Writing on the official Google blog, David Drummond, Google’s Senior Vice-President for Corporate development and Chief Legal Officer commented:
Figuring out how to make good on our promise to stop censoring search on Google.cn has been hard. We want as many people in the world as possible to have access to our services, including users in mainland China, yet the Chinese government has been crystal clear throughout our discussions that self-censorship is a non-negotiable legal requirement. We believe this new approach of providing uncensored search in simplified Chinese from Google.com.hk is a sensible solution to the challenges we’ve faced — it’s entirely legal and will meaningfully increase access to information for people in China. We very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision, though we are well aware that it could at any time block access to our services. We will therefore be carefully monitoring access issues, and have created this new web page, which we will update regularly each day, so that everyone can see which Google services are available in China.
22 Mar 2010 | Digital Freedom, Uncategorized
Lord Clement-Jones and Lord Razzal introduced a controversial clause in the already controversial Digital Economy Bill earlier this month, which Google, Facebook, BT, among many others, have claimed will “threaten freedom of speech and open internet” in the UK.
Clause 18 (amendment 120A), ostensibly to introduce judicial oversight to the legislation, allows copyright holders to demand ISPs block web sites which may contain copyrighted material. Sites like Youtube and Wikileaks come to mind.
Jim Killock, of the Open Rights Group (ORG), notes this will curb freedom of expression in the same way British libel law currently does: “Individuals and small businesses would be open to massive ‘copyright attacks’ that could shut them <> down, just by the threat of action.”
The BPI, which lobbies for multinational music corporations in the UK, however, claimed the clause was a “clear and sensible” mechanism in a letter to the Financial Times.
No wonder: the ORG revealed last week that clause 18 was copied almost word for word from the BPI’s draft!
Fears are now, because of the coming general election, the bill will be passed through the “wash up” procedure, where the government and opposition make deals behind closed doors, bypassing parliamentary debate.
BPI lobbyist, and prospective MP, Richard Mollet, said in a leaked memo that if the parliament does its job and forces a debate the bill may not have time to be passed before the general election. Despite this, Richard notes MPs will likely have “minimum input” from this point on.
The ORG and 38 Degrees are urging citizens to lobby their MPs on this, and the “three strikes” disconnection policy which threatens to deny citizens the use of what is increasingly a vital service for work, education and social life: the internet. Over 10,000 have already taken up the call .
In a letter to the Guardian on 19 March, Jo Glanville of Index on Censorship and others demanded that the bill be scrapped or properly debated in parliament.
22 Mar 2010 | Events
The Times Stephen Spender Prize for poetry in translation is open for entries to all, with sections for young people, the challenge: to translate a poem from any language, classical or modern, into English.
The Stephen Spender Memorial Trust was set up in 1997 to honour Spender’s achievements as poet and translator of poetry, and as champion of the rights of creative artists and writers to free expression. He was the inspiration behind the founding of Index on Censorship in 1974.
All winning entries will be published, with cash prizes and selected winning translations published in The Times. Last posting date for entries is Friday 28 May 2010. Three categories: Open, 18-and-under and 14-and-under.
Read 2009’s winning entries at www.stephen-spender.org and details of this year’s entry rules. You can also write to the Stephen Spender Memorial Trust, 3 Old Wish Road, Eastbourne, East Sussex, BN21 4JX or email [email protected].
22 Mar 2010 | News and features, United Kingdom
On 23rd March there will be a mass lobby of MPs for libel law reform at the House of Commons from 2pm. Some of the parties are wavering — they don’t want to commit to reforms unless they are under pressure to. We need everyone to help to bring that about before manifestos are published and Parliament rises for the election. Can you come to a mass lobby in the House of Commons on Tuesday 23rd at 2pm? This is the closest we’ve been to fundamental libel law reform in a century, but we need everyone to help it succeed.
(more…)
