Do Governments Actually Think Banning Flickr Is Effective?

from the nice-try dept

Thu, Jun 14th 2007 2:24pm — Mike Masnick

The news that the Chinese government is banning access to Flickr spread pretty quickly, and wasn't all that surprising, given China's constant internet filtering. However, it's a bit more surprising to hear rumors that Germany is limiting access to Flickr as well (right after Flickr launched a German version as well). It's unclear what various government think they're accomplishing when they try to ban or limit a site like Flickr. It's just images -- and those images can (and will) be posted in many different places. Blocking this one site won't stop images from becoming available on other sites, and constantly trying to ban or limit each and every site the government doesn't like isn't going to be possible. It's just going to make more people wonder what the governments are afraid of.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

8 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

John, 14 Jun 2007 @ 2:43pm

Massacre on Flickr
You can see the banned photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/purgatorius/tags/tiananmensquaremassacre/
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Charles Griswold, 14 Jun 2007 @ 3:58pm

The answer to the question
Do Governments Actually Think Banning Flickr Is Effective?
Apparently they do. Otherwise, why would they do it?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
billg, 14 Jun 2007 @ 4:55pm

China Blocks Flickr...
...because it doesn't want its citizens to post images the rest of the world can see, not necessarily because its citizens will see images from elsewhere.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 14 Jun 2007 @ 7:27pm

Well for the German site aren't they blocking the Nazi era pictures? I believe it is still illegal to have any Nazi eblems ect there, or on websites there. Even authentic historical artifacts have the swastikas and eagles removed there.

As for China well... yea. Love the censorship.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Overcast, 14 Jun 2007 @ 8:40pm

Yep, let's just forget about the lessons history should teach us, huh?

Good idea...

Or wait, Government does not = good ideas
[ link to this | view in thread ]
mr_spuck, 14 Jun 2007 @ 11:15pm

FYI in Germany Flickr wasn't blocked by the government as you sugested. Flickr did the blockeing themselves by not showing any pictures to german users that are categorized as moderate or restricted and it isn't possible for a german yahoo account to switch safe search off ...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
ReallyEvilCanine, 14 Jun 2007 @ 11:48pm

German law
As mp_spuck wrote, this is being done by Yahoo, I assume preemptively in order not to find themselves in yet another stupid case brought by an overly eager prosecutor. One problem is that here in Germany, tits are fine; it's violence that's evil and hardcore sex which is restricted. Films with excessive, gratuitous violence get censored. Films with full frontal nudity are shown on TV.
As to the displaying of Nazi symbols, that restriction is limited to "promoting Nazism". When shown in the context of scholarly or historical works, films, photos, etc., any and all icons, symbols and emblems can be displayed. Hell, even Hogan's Heroes has run here, though they changed the opening and closing music to a no-drum, non-marching and non-militaristic style.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
GoblinJuice, 15 Jun 2007 @ 12:52pm

Ban MySpace, too! :-)
[ link to this | view in thread ]