Youtube in China

China Blocks YouTube, Google Tries to Reinstate Access Wired — On Monday, traffic from China to YouTube began dwindling until it dried up nearly completely today, due to a site-wide block of the popular video sharing site in that country. Google says it has no idea why it's being blocked. China has demonstrated the ability to block access only to certain YouTube URLs as part of its ongoing censorship of the internet, so this site-wide ban represents a significant change in strategy. click to read complete article

China Blocks Access to YouTube -- But Why? PC World — China appears to be blocking all access to YouTube. Now, why in the world would it do something like that? I've got some theories. First, though, the facts: YouTube use from China started dropping off the map sometime Monday night, with traffic nearly reaching a standstill by Tuesday morning. Google (which owns YouTube) has confirmed the apparent ban, though its staff is not certain of the cause. click to read complete article

Chinese Internet is 'open enough,' says foreign minister Beta News — Yesterday evening, YouTube reportedly became inaccessible in most of China, possibly due to the presence of graphic videos of violence against Tibetan separatists in Lhasa. The site is normally filtered for content, not only for intellectual property violations, but also for videos deemed subversive or critical of the Communist Party. Last week, in the Vatican's continuing efforts to utilize the Internet to spread the Catholic church's message, it released a Chinese site, which many expected will be blocked, since observation of the Pope as an authority figure defies Communist rule. click to read complete article