Monday, August 27, 2007

Wordpress Blocked in Thailand, Turkey

According to the watchdog website Don't Block This Blog (DBTB.org), the nations of Thailand and Turkey just recently blocked the entire Wordpress.com domain for all Internet users.

In Thailand, visitors to the blocked websites will see a message in Thai which translates as follows.
"Sorry. TOT Plc., as an organization of Thai people, has restrained the access to this website as it contains content, text, and/or picture that is unappropriated which affects the mind of Thai people all over the country and cannot be accepted."
Therefore, the government has determined that the "mind of Thai people" is affected by "unappropriated" material at Wordpress.com. It's not clear what "unappropriated" means.

Regarding Wordpress being blocked in Turkey, it appears that one blog owned by a proponent of creationism prompted a court order to block the entire Wordpress domain. However, an effort has been launched to collect signature on a petition to unblock blogs in Turkey.

Meanwhile, it appears that all Blogspot blogs are still banned in Pakistan. The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority initially instituted the ban in March 2006 on Blogspot as a result of one blog carrying the infamous cartoons of Muhammad. However, a savvy blogger block workaround for determined bloggers has been developed using Google Docs.

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