Turkey Rescinds YouTube Ban

from the smokescreen dept

Fri, Mar 9th 2007 10:27am — Carlo Longino

Earlier in the week, a Turkish court ordered the country's ISPs to block YouTube because users had uploaded videos insulting the country and its founder, which is against Turkish law. The order has now been lifted, but there seems to be some debate over what actually happened to the videos. The order to block the site came in spite of YouTube's apparent offer to remove the video in question, though it would now appear it was removed by the user who uploaded it, but it's still not clear. This whole incident was spawned by an ongoing video flame war between some Turks and Greeks about which country was more gay, and it's pretty unlikely that it's anywhere near over. The ridiculousness of the flame war, and the question over who actually removed the video, still cover the bigger issue: Turkey's laws restricting free expression. And, just to prove the point that these sorts of blocks don't really work, here's a list of ways around the ban, should it happen again.

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6 Comments

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a, 9 Mar 2007 @ 10:33am

There may be ways around a ban, but you better remember that punishment might come from a tip of a sword.
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Morgan, 9 Mar 2007 @ 11:42am

You Just Got Mentioned on Rush
Totally off topic, but a caller just mentioned, and they spelled out, your site domain. They were talking about the 55" Super Bowl story.

Anyway, thought it was vool.
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Joe, 9 Mar 2007 @ 12:09pm

Yeah But....
All of this is really interesting and all, but it still leaves the important question unasked:
Which Country really is more gay?
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Mike, 9 Mar 2007 @ 12:27pm

Yeah But....
Greece, I think their sodomy rate is higher.
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dorpus, 9 Mar 2007 @ 2:18pm

Let them hate each other
A country whose pride is statues of naked men, who burn down their own capital when American presidents visit? When the 376-year Ottoman domination or Nazi invasion didn't kill Greeks, then their own juntas made thousands of Greeks disappear, with tanks running over university students and what not. Basically, Greece today is like China or Albania in the 1970s.
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Ima Pseudonym, 9 Mar 2007 @ 3:54pm

Which Country Is More Gay?
Eh, whatever. I could ask a snarky question about which ocean is more wet, but I won't. It's too much trouble for something of so little import.
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