China rolling back on net freedoms

[Riddil]

Sorry, no real deep meaning to this post. It's just to give a little room for a exasperated mental sigh.

It's no surprise, but that doesn't make it less frustrating, but after enjoying a year of progress as China slowly opened up bit-by-bit to allow more free net access, the wall is locking down again.

2 years ago internet from within China was horrendous. It got slowly better as the Olympics were coming into town. (I laughed when the Olympic reporters in Beijing complained about open internet... the restrictions on net access were vastly improved over historical levels).

Well, those golden days are over. I noticed in a lot of the Chinese media that many traditional Chinese news outlets were also taking advantage of the idea about open media, and were publishing some stories I was shocked they would try to release. (There was one paper that had a huge 4-page spread explaining how in Chairman Mao's original plan, the country would be socialist, but built in a multi-party system).

And now the vice is starting to tighten. Those papers have been "cleaned up", and the internet is tightening down again. I don't know HOW they were cleaned.... but it seems all the papers are back to praising the "glorious party" once again.

*sigh*

It was fun while it lasted.