here's an odd thing: US Government fighting Internet censorship

news.com.com...

Bill aims to curb Net censorship
By Declan McCullagh
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
July 17, 2003, 7:37 AM PT

Would-be Internet censors in places such as China and Myanmar could have a tougher time restricting the free flow of information, according to a measure that the U.S. House of Representatives approved on Wednesday.

The legislation aims to create a federal Office of Global Internet Freedom and gives it $16 million to spend over the next two years. The office would be tasked with an unusual mission for a government agency: devising technical methods to prevent other nations from censoring the Internet.

Damn!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Safeweb, which used to be an free, anonymous proxy service was given seed money by the cia, if I am not mistaken.

It's also unfortunate that American companies assist countries such as China in censoring web content

Anyway, great move on the governments part here, me thinks.

[Edited on 19-7-2003 by Bob88]

Dont be fooled. Our government would not do such a thing if it werent for a good reason.

Think of it this way: The internet is one of the worlds largest mediums of information exchange today. I believe the only reason they are against censorship is because the internet allows people to say anything is true. Web pages with how the government is evil, or how aliens exist, are all over, not to mention porn sites and the like. If the government took that away, people would question more with "If they took down that alien site, they must not want people to know" and also hate them more because of less freedom.

Its like a game of chess... they make themselves look like the good guys by fighting against censorship, while also allowing people to throw up whatever they want online to screw up the truth.

This is all good, so long as the same standards of freedom of speech and circulation of information are maintained in the U.S.A.

As Maniac rightly said, it also proliferates a lot of junk amongst the propaganda and few gems of truth. It is increasingly difficult for most people to be able to judge truth, until finally they give up. The King piece (their brain) is laid to rest on one side, and they proceed to engage in apathy and nonsense, never returning to the chessboard again, and being mindless automatons - being silent, consuming, and dying.

Maniac is no Maniac.

Kind of odd that the government tries to censor anyone that dare make an anti-government remark, but when it comes to the internet, it's a-okay. Probably because they don't see the internet as a threat...

Stupid double post...

[Edited on 28-7-2003 by Thorfinn Skullsplitter]

The internet is used for communication, just like what we are doing now.

The only reason why the USA is doing this,is so it can get it's grubby paws into everyline of communication there is.

If the net went down for good, how would the government profile people?..by word of mouth?..that takes to much resources and time, but if you have monitoring software and laws which you can get records on peoples ISP accounts, email contacts, forums visiteds, view on governments...that makes their jobs
%100 easier.

The government is'nt a supreme entity..its run by humans..humans who can have their own agendas, why would anyone care about the chinese peoples rights to the net?. The US and other governmnents arn't blessed white angels here to help us, their in there posittion to help themselves.

Originally posted by William

Bill aims to curb Net censorship

Hell yeah! *Goes and downloads more porn*

This is absurdly arrogant of the Americans. I don't want to sound like I am for Internet censorship because I am not. As a Canadian I believe in all the same rights and freedoms, including freedom of speech that Americans do. However, what makes the American government think that they have the rigth to tell other governments how to run their countries. In fact, I don't blame some countries for blockign things because they don't want nosey Americans to get their hands on every little secret.

Teh American government is one of the worst for censoring anyway. This is just anothe pseudo-altruistic plot with a nasty underbelly.

Originally posted by Lukefj
what makes the American government think that they have the rigth to tell other governments how to run their countries.

Although I don't agree with the other stuff you said, I do agree with this, because I know if I was another country, I wouldn't like some other country to be telling me how to run myself. I totally agree with that.....

Well, one man's censorship is another man's fight for truth. Odd that it's only in other countries....