Google technology first envisaged as a video game backdrop has been adapted to raise awareness – and potentially financial support – for the plight of refugees and vulnerable people once far from the public eye. The search engine’s Google Earth platform, a mapping service that allows users to move through three-dimensional satellite images of city…
Showing all posts tagged Google
Dirty work comes cheap
The OpenNet Initative recently reported the following disturbing development in relation to Google: YouTomb, a project of the MIT Free Culture group that studies takedown notices by the video-sharing website YouTube, has identified a mechanism used by Google to restrict video content in specific countries. This appears to be the method YouTube is using to…
Assisting repression
Following allegations that Western web majors such as Yahoo and Microsoft were assisting the Chinese regime in finding Tibetans after the recent violence, Yahoo has denied the allegations: “Contrary to media reports, Yahoo! Inc. is not displaying images on its web sites of individuals wanted by Chinese authorities in connection with the recent unrest in…
The YouTube dilemma
An attempt to curtail freedom of speech or legitimate complaint? Germany’s national Jewish body said Thursday it has filed suit against YouTube and its parent company Google, demanding a court order for the site to be permanently purged of anti-Semitic videos. Stephan Kramer, secretary general of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, said in…
www.censorship.com
My following article appears in today’s ABC Unleashed: Fidel Castro controlled Cuba for nearly half a century. His rule was defined by defiance and dictatorship, brutal repression against dissidents and the management of an immoral American embargo. Free speech has always been the Achilles’ heel of the regime. During my visit to the island last…
The sound of freedom
As China tries to defend its aggressive behaviour against protesting Tibetans – calling them “criminals” and arresting hundreds of people – the regime’s battle against the internet is temporarily successful but ultimately futile. The Times London explains: YouTube, the video-sharing website which has become a home to amateur footage of news events, has been blocked…
The web “threat”
A great blog by American human rights lawyer Jonathan Turley is well worth a read. Two recent highlights: – YouTube has again attracted controversy by pulling a video. This time it has removed the video of Marine David Motari throwing a puppy off a cliff as shown below in a different link. The company appears…
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My latest column for New Matilda is about China’s crackdown on internal dissent and its fear of the internet: Although China is also battling a seemingly unsurmountable pollution problem, the regime appears determined to ignore Western calls for greater openness. “Why can’t China accept that dissent and argument are part of being a normal country?”…