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| Thursday, July 20, 2006 |
| Ban on blogs lifted in India: TV and mdia coverage on the ban |
Quite a few ISPs have started freeing up the blogs. Mine, Iqara, seems to be a slow one there.
The coverage I have seen on most TV channels and newspapers seemed extremely superficial. No one has bothered to, or managed to, identfy the responsible person, minister or bureaucrat, and question them. All we have are bloggers looking upset, and lawyers talking about some point or the other.
The real issues I feel are:
Who gets to decide such issues, and do we expect the same in the future too?
What is the official policy on this, and how has it been applied in the blog ban?
Who is really to blame for blocking the entire blogspot domain? I think it is unlikely that all ISPs are in the same boat, and made the same mistake.
Show up the fool who did this. I also want to how anti left or anti Islam sites are banned.
I saw a story on the IBN website about govt lifting the ban on blogs Again same old story with no extra information, and no attempt to get at the truth either.
Posted below is a mail I have sent them as a comment on the story:
I am quite surprised by the superficial nature of your coverage of this issue.
True, the government has decided to backtrack. But there are many important issues here.
1. Who was responsible for the ban? Who came up with the list of 22 websites?
2. What was the criteria being applied? I suspect that what had appeared was nothing more than what appears in the newspaper columns and party magazines.
3. If something derogatory to Islam appears on a blog, how is it the government's problem? It was derogatory in what way? Does the govt intend to apply those yardsticks to all writings about Islam, or for every religion?
4. "...ISPs decided to go ahead, do one better and block all blogs." How can you say this? Do you have proof? How come we do not see any representative of any ISP on any channel including yours? It is extremely unlikely that all ISPs in India made the exact error and blocked all blogs on their own.
5. What was the extreme views expressed on princesskimberly.blogspot.com? Are they any different from the extreme views expresssed on defamer.com or wonkette.com?
6. How can blogs fuel communalism any better or worse than the people who go around making inflammatory speeches in the country? How is blocming the blogs a priority?
7. How is exposingtheleft.blogspot.com improper? Is it because the Left supports the govt in India? But that blog is about the American Left. Was it someone's kneejerk reaction without ever reading it?
Too many questions, repeatedly asking the audience and interviewees about comparisons to China is of no use. Someone in the government deserves to hang for this, and you are not even making a serious attempt to fiogure out who it is? |
posted by a correspondent @ 5:28 AM  |
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