China blocks the word 'Egypt' on (the country’s wildly popular) microblogging service

[Turborama]

Source: AP

BEIJING, CHINA—China has blocked the word “Egypt” from the country’s wildly popular Twitter-like service, while coverage of the political turmoil has been tightly restricted in state media.

China’s ruling Communist Party is sensitive to any potential source of social unrest. A search for “Egypt” on the Sina microblogging service brings up a message saying, “According to relevant laws, regulations and policies, the search results are not shown.” The service has more than 50 million users.

News on the Egypt protests has been limited to a few paragraphs and photos buried inside major news websites, but China Central Television had a report on its midday broadcast.

China’s Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment Saturday on the events in Egypt.

Read more: http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/930284--china-blocks-egypt-on-microblogging-service

[denbot]

1. The writing is on the walls.

Digital and otherwise.

[Mojeoux]

2. I guess they don't want the people of China getting any ideas about another Tienanmen Square.

So pitiful. Like trying to pretend that sunshine doesn't exist.

[Enthusiast]

3. The Chinese authorities should recognize

that suppressing information about Egypt is only going to arouse suspicion on the part of their citizens -the Chinese people will eventually know all about this uprising.

[madrchsod]

4. remember china is our best friend....

[nc4bo]

5. BFF and ever and ever. **smooches** nt

[isgaard]

6. Liars.

Too bad AP is lying their ass off.

Here's the supposed site that's censoring Egypt.
http://slide.news.sina.com.cn/w/slide_1_17837_15128.html
http://video.sina.com.cn/p/news/w/v/2011-01-29/232061250303.html

[Turborama]

7. How do you spell Egypt in Chinese?

BTW your sites aren't loading.

[isgaard]

8. .

Egypt is 埃及 in Chinese.

Let's try the link again.

http://slide.news.sina.com.cn/w/slide_1_17837_15128.html
http://news.sohu.com/20110130/n279153574.shtml

Rest assured, it isn't censored, it's on the news in China. On Middle East and China, the Western media (like AP/AFP) is the equivalent of a tabloid in terms of accuracy and truth. A bunch of liars is what they are. Most of their claims (especially censorship) is rather preposterous.

[Turborama]

9. Too late

That news is all over the internet: http://www.google.com/search?q=china+censors+egypt&sourceid=ie7&rls=com.microsoft:en-US&ie=utf8&oe=utf8

[isgaard]

11. .

And most of them are parroting AP. State-owned TV and media like China Daily and CCTV are covering the Egyptian crisis, and SINA is showing the crisis in pictures. What more do you need to convince yourself AP is playing the propaganda bullshit?

[Turborama]

12. I put the simplified Han characters for Egypt you gave me into Google News

I don't know if it's just Chrome that translates it, but the results show the news about the protests themselves is very limited: http://www.google.com/search?q=%E5%9F%83%E5%8F%8A&num=100&hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-US&tbs=nws:1,sbd:1&source=lnt&sa=X&ei=vclETbLbLY-IrAfnka1D&ved=0CBgQpwUoAQ

I get CCTV where I live, the English language version, and will check it out once my wife's TV show has finished.

Please copy and paste the links to the photos on SINA, they will be visible here.

[isgaard]

13. .

For Chinese search, you shouldn't be using google (cause google is only good for roman alpha-numeration search, now you know why most Chinese use Baidu instead of Google).

http://slide.news.sina.com.cn/w/slide_1_2841_15092.html#p=5
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/hqgj/2011-01/29/content_11936259.htm
http://news.qq.com/a/20110129/000768.htm
http://www.cnr.cn/gundong/201101/t20110129_507637636.html

Despite the claims of AP, Egypt is not censored in Chinese media.

[Turborama]

14. I put the characters you gave into Google News and 13,700 results came up in Chinese

Your 1st links takes forever to load, if you copy and paste the urls of the photos from Sina and paste them in the reply box they will be visible here.

Like this:



Are you saying China doesn't censor the internet? What happens if you Google Tiananmen Square in China?

[isgaard]

15. .

Are you saying China doesn't censor the internet?

I wouldn't make such claim ever, just saying that the whole censorship thing in China is overblown and the Western media uses every opportunity (even non-factual ones) to reinforce this image of brainwashed Chinese due to censorship.

Facebook, Youtube, Blogspot, and host of other sites are banned in China, they are however accessible in China if you use proxy servers, the Chinese people know these sites are blocked but most of them just go download a proxy server software and get around it, minor inconvenience.

[Turborama]

18. Well, in that case it's good to hear

That Chinese people aren't totally cut off from what's happening in other countries, like the North Koreans are.

[boppers]

16. Currently the 9th story on the home page of sina.com.cn

Which links to: http://news.sina.com.cn/w/p/2011-01-30/035121897829.shtml

Of course, the claim wasn't a total lack of coverage, but that a *search query* was throwing a blocking notice... but they didn't indicate how to replicate it (a query to where/what?)

[bemildred]

10. Nothing is more dangerous than a good example. nt

[Posteritatis]

17. That won't do much about talking about the ongoing political turmoil in Kemet

or Aeygptus, or...