********** Date: Wed, 05 Sep 2001 15:46:45 +0800 From: John Tanner <tannerat_private> To: declanat_private, politechbotat_private Subject: Re: FC: Singapore may block overseas political sites that don'tregister Hi Declan, This is just my two bits worth for Politech [Re: FC: Singapore may block overseas political sites that don't register]: I'm not at all interested in defending any government's weird censorship policies, but while this raises some interesting legal issues, particularly in the wake of precedents like Yahoo!'s experience in France, I don't think government blocking of non-registered foreign sites will be that huge of a problem either way. Not to say that the government won't try, but we've heard that one before. Five years ago, the government required Singapore's ISPs (there were only three at the time) to use proxy servers to block "undesirable" overseas Web pages, such as anything having to do with drugs and porn (the latter being so comprehensively illegal as to include Cosmopolitan, and the former including any Web page that even suggests that some drugs might not be as harmful or addictive as previously claimed), as well as racism (a very sensitive subject in Singapore) and, of course, government criticism. But, as many predicted, the proxy servers proved ineffective as more people went online and by 1999, the government pretty much gave up trying to enforce the requirement, settling instead for policing domestic sites for the same content. (Try using a Singapore-hosted search engine to find any Web site mentioning the word "sex" or "porn" -- the results list will be slim pickings.) It's probably asking too much to expect the Singapore government -- or any government, really -- to learn from its past blunders, and its domestic censhorship efforts are, in my opinion, just as evil as their attempts to cut Singaporeans off from "harmful" information overseas. On the other hand, one potential cause for hope is that Singapore is frantically trying to build itself up as THE financial, telecoms and IT hub of southeast Asia in direct competition with Hong Kong, and the government has already admitted indirectly that it can't go on with its current media control policies and hope to be the truly international cosmopolitan hub it aspires to be. A year ago, the government announced it would no longer hold hosting providers liable for their clients' content, in hopes of boosting Singapore's appeal as a data hubbing center. A small step, perhaps, but an important one nevertheless. It's difficult to see how blocking foreign-hosted political sites will play well with Singapore's international ambitions. But then, who ever said that nitwit censorship rationales had to make sense? (Sigh...) Regards, John C. Tanner -- John C. Tanner Global Technology Editor Telecom Asia/Wireless Asia Advanstar Telecoms Group Tel: +852 2589 1328 Fax: +852 2559 7002 Email: tannerat_private URL: www.telecomasia.net ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice. Declan McCullagh's photographs are at http://www.mccullagh.org/ To subscribe to Politech: http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
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