http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/china-cracks-down-further-on-control-of-internet-20121228-2byeu.html
China?s new communist leaders are increasing already tight controls on internet use and electronic publishing following a spate of embarrassing online reports about official abuses.
The measures suggest China?s new leader, Xi Jinping, and others who took power in November share their predecessors? anxiety about the internet?s potential to spread opposition to one-party rule and their insistence on controlling information despite promises of more economic reforms.
?They are still very paranoid about the potentially destabilising effect of the internet,? said Willy Lam, a politics specialist at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. ?They are on the point of losing a monopoly on information, but they still are very eager to control the dissemination of views.?
This week, China?s legislature took up a measure to require internet users to register their real names, a move that would curtail the web?s status as a freewheeling forum to complain, often anonymously, about corruption and official abuses. The legislature scheduled a news conference on Friday to discuss the measure, suggesting it was expected to be approved.
That comes amid reports Beijing might be disrupting use of software that allows web surfers to see sites abroad that are blocked by its extensive internet filters. At the same time, regulators have proposed rules that would bar foreign companies from distributing books, news, music and other material online in China.
Beijing promotes internet use for business and education but bans material deemed subversive or obscene and blocks access to foreign websites run by human rights and Tibet activists and some news outlets. Controls were tightened after social media played a role in protests that brought down governments in Egypt and Tunisia.
In a reminder of the web?s role as a political forum, a group of 70 prominent Chinese scholars and lawyers circulated an online petition this week appealing for free speech, independent courts and for the ruling party to encourage private enterprise.
Xi and others on the party?s ruling seven-member Standing Committee have tried to promote an image of themselves as men of the people who care about China?s poor majority. They have promised to press ahead with market-oriented reforms and to support entrepreneurs but have given no sign of support for political reform.
Communist leaders who see the internet as a source of economic growth and better-paid jobs were slow to enforce the same level of control they impose on movies, books and other media, apparently for fear of hurting fledgling entertainment, shopping and other online businesses.
Until recently, web surfers could post comments online or on microblog services without leaving their names.
That gave ordinary Chinese a unique opportunity to express themselves to a public audience in a society where newspapers, television and other media are state-controlled. The most popular microblog services say they have more than 300 million users and some users have millions of followers reading their comments.
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pays to watch china?because?its like an elites blueprint for all of us..in many ways..there will be no anonymity on the net in china..this way when you say?something?they dont like you can be found and re-educated..
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