I came across this writeup on a recent case of censorship on the web over supposed nudity.

You can read the article to get more of the details, but what gets me is that a users entire account on flickr gets blocked because of one count of nudity (and it sort of looks artistic anyway), a poster in Hong Kong gets prosecuted. There is the question of where do you draw the line? What happens if someone posts something political, would it be ruled indecent on the count of violence and other type of subversive activity?

Hong Kong is becoming more and more like Singapore! As a matter of fact, Singapore is trying to loosen up in comparison to what I read here, there must be something else up or am I missing something? As Ying points out, the newspaper stands in Hong Kong are full of far more suggestive sexuality and nudity than this art picture, what is the big deal?

Or perhaps, the big deal is that the source actually posted the picture in protest against the posting of pornography links? Then that would even be worse, it would be going after protesters and is a case in point of practising censorship in the name of indecency.

Internet Radio is under siege, the greedy music companies are at it again to try to profit only for themselves, what was now known before is that an organization known as SoundExchange, controlled by the big music labels has been collecting royalties for radio for artists but likely never paid them a cent. This is despicable and it’s this kind of greed that explains why nobody minds if the record labels go away.

This is a Cartel and it’s racketeering in an official way. Save Net Radio, let your congressmen know that this is wrong and spread the message.

More on Ying’s blog.

"TorrentSpy, one of the world’s largest BitTorrent sites, has been ordered by a federal judge to monitor its users. They are asked to keep detailed logs of their activities which must then be handed over to the MPAA. Ira Rothken, TorrentSpy’s attorney responded to the news by stating: ‘It is likely that TorrentSpy would turn off access to the U.S. before tracking its users. If this order were allowed to stand, it would mean that Web sites can be required by discovery judges to track what their users do even if their privacy policy says otherwise.’"

Isn’t this a case for the EFF? Why haven’t they looked into this?

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This message is to inform you about recent efforts by the motion picture studios to shut down TorrentSpy. As you may know, in February 2006 the major movie studios and their Washington lobby, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), filed a lawsuit against TorrentSpy and other search engines.

We guess that hiring hackers and turning a blind eye to identity theft is not enough for the movie studios and the MPAA. Now they want to know who you are, what you search for, and what you download. In short, it is the view of the movie studios that websites should not allow anonymous use and your activity on the Internet - anywhere - is their business.

The really scarry thing is that if we lose this court battle, the movie studios will be able to go after any search engine or website and force them to collect data about YOU. It is not an exaggeration to say that losing this fight is a nail in the Internet’s coffin.

We have spent the last year challenging their relentless campaign against the 1st Amendment and personal privacy laws Worldwide. We have succeeded in delaying the court order to turn on logs while we appeal it. TorrentSpy will not create logs of what you do on the site without your consent.

While we use Google Analytics for website statistics, TorrentSpy servers have never tracked your IP Address, the searches you make, or how you use the site. We are dedicated to your privacy and we are fighting for your rights!