twitters censorship.... it is tool of State repression?

Ask yourself if the social networks are being moral in allowing blatant violations of country, and government laws to be broken with people's postings? Is it not their responsibility to police their network for illegal material?

Should a government allow the social networks into their country when they violate the country's laws, whether the rest of the world considers those laws right, or not? China required Google to adapt to their country's laws if they wanted to operate within the country. This included the searchable dissemination of subversive material against the government. Google adapted rather than leave. Twitter is doing the same thing.

Twitter is now in negotiations with the Thai government to attempt to block twits that are offensive, and illegal with reference to the monarchy. It does not matter whether the rest of the world thinks the laws are wrong, it is an internal matter, and must be respected by whoever wants to disseminate information in that country.

There is not a single set of moral rights that are universal in all the world. You make fun in print of Mohamed, and you risk your life. Is this morality wrong in the eyes of those that uphold the principle, and should twitter be allowed to violate these beliefs in the countries that make laws protecting this moral thinking?

On this same principle many news agencies in lots of countries blocks, and will not print anything deemed racist, or in violation of legal freedoms against discrimination. This is basically the same thing. You uphold the laws of their country, or do not do business here. It is not a social network's moral job to openly violate the laws they don't think are right. That puts them in criminal violation of the country's laws.

They want to do business in that country then they uphold the laws, not openly violate them with the excuse they have no control. If they have no control then they do not belong in that country having laws in force against what they disseminate. This is why Twitter is in negotiations with the Thai government, so they can be legal, and continue to provide their service in Thailand.

Twitter has found a technical way they can meet these legal, and moral obligations from what I see. Google is still in direct violation of a number of copy write laws in what, and how they make information available. Is this morally right?

Excellent response Steve.

Yes it is a good response.

The problem with the internet and things like goggle, twitter and even Demotix is they make the whole world the same place. However there are different local laws on the ground. AFAIK Google is still having a dispute with the EU laws.

What happens about sites like Demotix that report stories that are not permitted in some countries? I can see a time when the internet will be a lot more regulated than it is now. the question is who is simply enforcing local laws locally and who is censoring?

The problem is (Godwin's Law Alert ) is that people like Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussain, Pol Pot etc were usually acting legally in their own countries at the time (IE they passed the laws to permit what they were doing) So where do you draw the line? Just as importantly HOW do you draw the line?

Will for example Thais be able to make "illegal" comments that are seen outside Thailand where they are "legal" but blocked in Thailand?

Is it OK for the Syrian Government to block things so people can't see reports on the BBC and Demotix?

This would be my counter argument to Steve.

It's all very well to say that every country has the right to its own laws, customs and behaviour. However, there are a number of things that are generally agreed to be the foundation of a democratic, free society, and among them is the right to free speech.

The very fact that we are engaged in journalism means that we probably hold a certain set of beliefs. Among those are ideas like society being more fairly and more effectively governed when its citizens are allowed to criticise and examine those in power (or just the way their society works). Ideas like people being able to say whatever they like without fear of reprisal, even if we disagree with it.

There's a reason why the right to free speech is in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, rather than a right not to be offended.

I don't think we should hold off criticising countries that don't respect their citizens' human rights; I'm quite quick to criticise my own when it's not living up to my expectations, after all.

EDIT: and to get back on topic, I understand why Twitter have been forced to do this as they have expanded, but it still grates. In an ideal world, I'd like to see them encouraging people in countries subject to censorship to find out about secure alternatives for communication, but they're a company with a bottom line to think about.

The problem is what to you restrict/censor? There are no moral absolutes.
At one time hard core porn was legal in continental Europe but not in the UK
However the soft core that was legal in the UK was (is?) not permitted in other countries
Where as in some countries no public images of women are permitted.
That was common decency according to each place and their rules were correct.

In the UK it was (still is?) illegal to name a certain Manchester United footballer who was having an affair with Imogen. though she can be named. Now if some one in another country, who is not bound by the rule, mentions the name on Demotix it will be Demotix who is in trouble as the servers are UK based.

Likewise does this mean that stories on Demotix about the Thai royal family that are not complimentary will mean Demotix will be banned in Thailand?

Steve has already mentioned illegally smuggling film/memory cards out of countries? Why if he respects their laws to censor? It is a difficult issue and I think it "all depends" mainly on which side of a particular fence you are on at the time.

The twitter thing is interesting... are they stopping people in a particular country from posting the wrong thing or just stopping it being seen in that country... IE can you shout out of the window as long as no one in the room hears? Is that hypocrisy?

I think the great thing about the internet is that it's making censorship ridiculous.

You can't censor anything unless you censor EVERYTHING. And that is a massive amount of work and enough of an infringement on civil liberties that a lot of people will sit up and take notice - as we've seen recently in the US, with the preposterous suggestion that ISPs should be forced to check everything passing through their pipes for copyright infringing content.

No-one would be even arguing about this if it was suggested that governments should check all our mail and listen to our telephone conversations "just in case" we were doing or saying something illegal.

Actually internet censorship is real now. governments have realised that whereas the telephone is 1-1 the internet, eg Twitter is 1 to many to very many to 20% of the world in about 20 minutes. This linked to web sites containing images and video is the threat.

When the UK invaded China (and gained Hong Kong) it was 2 years after the incident that sparked it. News traveled slowly. It took Days for film (still and movie) to get home in the middle of the last century When Bolt crossed the 100metre line in Beijing a couple of years ago the images were on the screens of the newspaper layout people in London in less than 15 minutes. And on news programs in 20 minutes.

When the bomb wen off in Oslo (I was on the phone to some one 500meters away at the time) it was on the BBC news in 10 minutes. When Gaddafi was killed the images and video were broadcast (from an iPhone?) within the hour to millions globally

THAT is what frightens governments... ALL governments, to some degree or another. "The Authorities" have lost the authority and control they once had. A "D-Notice" is now irrelevant as it can be bypassed globally in minutes.

So countries like... well most of them really, are trying to temper it. Find ways of being able to do damage limitation. Whilst Demotix is in a free democracy just wait and see what happens should it get a story that is "not in the UK National Interest" or that of one of our close friends.

Look what happened to Wikileaks when the US Government, the home of Freedom and Democracy, got involved.

Sadly I think the internet will get more regulated. There is too much money and power to be lost by the rich and powerful to let it run wild.

Tom I like your optimism and no doubt it will become more difficult to censor the internet especially the more people use it. the question we have to ask ourselves is how many injustices and how many corpses will it take to achieve a bit more respect for personal freedom?

I also couldn't help identify with Chris.s realism, maybe because the two of us have seen many more of these issues in the past. hands up those who remember not buying fruit from south Africa!

Steve no one is suggesting that twitter or Google break the local laws. what most reasonable people would suggest is for these companies not to enter these shady countries and then campaign for more freedom of expression there. but instead of building a relationship with their future customers, they are helping oppress them instead. however the only time one would adopt such policies is when one knows one is going to have a monopoly whatever happens.

I do however disagree with you completely when you say -There is not a single set of moral rights that are universal in all the world. I.m afraid you are wrong here. I can mention dozens of such rights, but let me mention just two that are relevant to what you said. 1-everyone is equal in front of the law. and 2-justice not only needs to be done but also has to be seen being done.

the problem with your argument about local laws in these countries is that they don.t even apply these basic principles to their existing laws.

the problem with us today is that we only speak of rights as if these were sweets we buy from the tuck shop. to start with freedom of speech does not mean incitement to hatred nor to violence.

but we live in the real world, and today 14 Feb, as the Spanish radio put it, when EU members are meeting the Chinese govt , in past during such meeting the Europeans would talk about Tibet, today the are talk about China bailing out Europe. with friends like that who needs twitter or Google.

-apologies for the typos and mobile phone style-

Lawrence there are NO moral absolutes. It is a fact that not everyone is equal in the sight of the law everywhere (or even anywhere). It depends who you are and where you are.
Justice? That is a very movable feast. Some of it summary and fatal. It is not an absolute.
Much less is it seen to be done.

I would remind you that most Dictators have the Law on their side when they kill terrorists (Freedom fighters) Criminals (peaceful protesters). See Syria, Iran, China, etc etc etc

We can argue about it all you like on a philosophical basis but people are dying daily whilst we do.

Does Twitter censor today so they at least have a presence and hope it will get better tomorrow? Though it is more likely to get worse?

Should Google harvest data against your civil rights in Europe? It does but do you still use it?

What do we as reporters do? Accept the reality and go along with it? (as many Germans did living near the camps in WW2) Or stand up to be counted and disappear as many have done in the ME, Africa, S.America, Asia etc

Difficult choices... (please have your 5000 word essay with references for 16:00 Friday

Chris you'll be pleased to learn that I've written more than 5000 words on the subject, but on Demotix I try to stick to photojournalism and not philosophy. Having said that, may I remind you of what Plato (choose your philosopher here) ought to have said: get your philosophy wrong and you'll get everything else wrong.

I grant you that there are no moral absolutes and I even grant you that in the real world "not everyone is equal in the sight of the law" which is why there must be and there are absolute rights. If there weren't such rights -for example the two I mentioned earlier- than we have no right criticizing, let alone condemning, what Hitler did, what Mao did, what Stalin did and what your next door dictator is doing now. Or to use an example closer to home, why shouldn't a mega successful newspaper use our photos without paying for them; after all if their law says - thou shalt not pay poxy little photographers, who are we to argue? Precisely because there are no moral absolutes that we have to invent these absolute rights and apply them correctly, in the way that (we) had to invent the telephone to communicate better and farther, the camera to record visual memories and Demotix to keep people informed of the minor, and not so minor, events that others might feel insignificant in the context of their mega bucks successful operation.

For Demotix this means that those people who are today being sold out can rely on Demotix in the future (and many do now already) to report their stories that others will not or are pressured not to report. And that means bucks away from incumbents to the new comers.

However, this also means that Demotix need to get things right; maybe today the company is still developing and not a perfect operation, and we, as contributors, are a variable quantity with different skills and different journalistic training. For example, Demotix need to organize this anonymity issue, as they have said they will do and we, as contributors, have to stop being used and abused by others with an agenda.

If we look at history we can learn at least one thing; sooner or later the worm will turn.

The chances are that the next time the worm will turn it will be a Demotix photographer who capture the event for posterity.

best

Lawrence

Chris good news about the 5000 words, if Tom will rescue them!! Lawrence

The thing some people fail to realize is the Democracy issue. Not all the countries in the world operate under a Democratic government. The issue of justice, and everyone being equal runs into problems too.

China, Laos, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and a bunch more peaceful countries do not operate under a Democracy, there are no free elections. They grant their people a limited amount of free speech, not total freedom. China is the obvious violator of free speech, but if you are female in Muslim based countries you have more restrictions placed on your freedoms than some of the most restricted dictatorships.

Then there is the notion of justice, and equality. The largest populated country in the world, India, has ingrained in it's Democracy the cast system, where you have your place in society, and you do not go outside your social standing. The lower you are on the social cast the less rights you have.

Thailand, most Asian countries, and most Muslim countries also operate with this social stigma. It is not as spelled out as in India, but it is part of society. You do not want to be a woman in a Muslim country.

It gives you a nice warm fuzzy feeling if you are a Westerner with Democratic ideals thinking the whole world should be Democratic, but in reality there are a number of countries that the majority of their people totally reject the notion of Democracy, and the principles it embraces. Freedom of speech is given, but on a restricted format, and the majority uphold these principles.

You talk about the monarchy disparagingly in Thailand, and you go to jail for decades. You can talk all you want outside the country, but you are violating the law by carrying your conversation across the Thai border, or making defamatory information available in Thailand, and this restriction on your right to free speech is upheld by the majority of the people in the country.

One thing that is interesting is the majority is not usually the ones making the loudest noise on an issue, and this is prevalent the world over. There are currently some exceptions to this in a few of the middle East countries, but those are really exceptions to the norm.

This is not to be confused with Capitalism, which everyone has a justified right to criticize it's exploitative framework that outright corrupts moral behavior. It by itself has lead to the demise of more respected news sources in my opinion than any other contributing factor. The dollar should not come first, and citizen journalists for the most part operate with this in mind.

The thing is, a whole bunch of those countries have constitutions which commit them in theory to holding elections and ending discrimination and equality before the law and everything we've been talking about - China and India are both good examples.

In the Indian example that you give, the caste system may well be institutionalised - but that wasn't the intention of the framers of the constitution:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India#Modern_status_of_the_...

I think I just have a problem with the cultural relativism argument because I think there are some fundamental things that you need for there to be a possibility of happiness and even of progress in a country.

If you carry Steve's argument to an absurd extreme, you end up saying that we should respect the right of the North Korean government to brainwash its entire people, cut them off from the world and tell them that their leader is a god responsible for the weather.

Steve the nuremberg trials have established that it is not enough to say it was the law. and the function of the press is to provide a checks and balance for the power of the state. hence if the press cannot go about doing their work then that.s an indication of abuse of power. which, incidentally, is why I insist that the police -in the UK- have no business getting involved with the recognition of the press card. in the same way that the press have no right to interfere with the functions of the police. but to suggest that we should accept the status quo because it is the status quo has never been accepted by journalists - at least so far. and, moreover, many demotix reporters risk life and limb when they go out reporting because they understand the importance of this principle.

-mobile style in use, sorry-

On paper technically the countries have the freedom of the people in mind, but the reality of the interpretation of what those freedoms mean get distorted. They are not all-encompassing, there are exceptions to the freedom of speech in every country.

During Shakespeare's time there was heavy censorship of anything deemed inappropriate with reference to the government. This was unsettling to those displeased with any aspect of how thing were run. Shakespeare did not take this to mean he quit writing anything displeasing to those in charge, he simply encrypted his writings with double meaning. Using the avenue of communication that reached the most people at the time. He did not quit writing, he simply adjusted his style to meet the requirements the government imposed, with life threatening consequences if they were violated.

Twitter, by adjusting to the exceptions of free speech imposed by certain governments, has kept their avenue of communication open. This is a good thing. They have not closed the channels of communication in those countries because they don't agree with the restrictions, they have adjusted so the people using their communication portal can still disseminate information in any manner not in violation of that governments restrictions. The people using it will create a language adjustment to get their views, and objections heard, and still stay within the boundaries of the law.

If Twitter was to simply quit broadcasting to the countries objecting to their style they would be doing a huge disservice to their users. This way the portal is still left open, and those using it still have their avenue of communication. They will adapt to get around the restrictions.

With Google it is basically the same, they just forced people using text to communicate displeasure to switch to pictures. It is easy to filter communications looking for key wording in the text of any website, but it is extremely difficult to filter the same communication if it is done within a picture, given that very little of the website communications are visually read by an individual. It is automated as much as possible with the volume involved.

By keeping these avenues of communication open, with any means they had to use, they have not cut the people off from communicating, they simply let them adjust to the same restrictions the portals faces. The people will find a common language to still communicate the facts, and will still be able to organize, as is everyone's wish. Just as a way around the censorship was found in Shakespeare's time, there will be ways found now.

If Twitter, and Google had closed operations in those restricted countries (even though their focus was on money), it would have left a void the people need for mass communication. By staying in business the possibility for organizing reform has not been closed. Journalists can adjust to any stumbling block thrown in their way to get the facts out as long as they are left with some means of communication.

Re Nuremberg. (Lovely city by the way I shall be then in 2 weeks time) The trials were by the victors in a war. The winners always get to write the history. The USA IS a "free and democratic society" as long as you were not a Communist in the 60's and 60's .... Most of the world says Guantanamo is illegal. What is legal is determined by who is in power at the time.

As for the UK Police and the UKPCA Press card. That is quite appropriate. If 95% of the professional press have a system and the Police recognise it that is fine. IT is better than the Police not recognising any Press credentials or only the one they issue themselves. The UK Police do not control the UKPCA scheme or who gets a card. BTW the Police do tolerate/recognise the Demotix card a lot of the time... Often it depends how you appear and behave.

IT is a difficult line with twitter and google. Is it better to bend and be there hoping that over time things will change for the better? Of course it could become the norm and the internet gets censored by all governments generally and we all put up with it. Then again TV and newspapers have always had censorship in the form of Editorial (or owners) policy.

I suppose that if the communications channel is there it can be used and people will always find a way around barriers.

Chris, lucky you. indeed nuremberg is a very nice city - enjoy the cakes! yes the principle that I refer to might have been the product of the victors but we can safely say that most reasonable people would accept it as legitimate. even in Spain it is a big issue as recent events have shown. in any case as I have suggested it would have had to be invented if it wasn.t there.

the fact that the police -tolerate/recognise- as you say the demotix card suggest that today they are up to date on the situation and acting accordingly. this is most reassuring. however, I don.t agree with you on the 95% principle. freedom of speech and freedom of the press is like being pregnant - being pregnant is a 100% activity.

but the bottom line must always what you say- Often it depends how you appear and behave. I have no time for people who do not follow this basic rule.

as for twitter and Google being in these places maybe the majority might not have problems with the state but it is people who need protection from the state who are the ones let down by multinational companies - need I mention wikileaks. all I can say is that with power come responsibilities and those responsibilities go far beyond the balance sheet. balance sheets are not rocks to hide under but platforms to create wealth.

Nuremberg is work. No time for anything this trip.

Enough of the theory there is a REAL case to discuss

http://en.rsf.org/saudi-arabia-journalist-prosecuted-for-23-02-2012,41918.html

Saudi has locked up a journalist for three tweets.....

Chris the only luxury big money cannot afford is freedom of expression.