France Censors Internet Bloggers

**Not_Whistlin_Dixie** · 23-11-2005, 18:00

The Internet Service Provider wanadoo.fr is owned by the French government.

It just notified a Mr. Barry Fockler that he is to cease forthwith publication of his blog http://barryshomepageblog.blogspot.com/ or be disconnected.

Wannadoo also informed Mr. Fockler that, should he thus be cut off, no other French ISP will do business with him.

It is also reported that "Bloggers were recently arrested in Paris for daring to write that they were sympathetic with the social plight of the young people who were rioting at that time. The last I heard they were being taken to jail."

22 November 2005

http://www.choicechanges.com/modules...rder=0&thold=0

**OSACIN** · 24-11-2005, 02:42

i thought France was a democracy - obviously wrong on that one then.

**Ord_Sgt** · 24-11-2005, 03:20

Lets be honest the less we hear from the French the better, so not all bad.

**Nehustan** · 24-11-2005, 03:24

One word...outrageous. I am an avid blogger and would go ballistic if the powers that be were to try and censor me. I already censor it myself (tho' you probably wouldn't notice!!!!). This said the blog has brought down unwanted attention, tho' probably not from British authorities.

I have often cited the Grand Orient's concepts of 'Liberte, Egalite, et Fraternite' It seems now they are applying UGLE rules to the internet. Having criticised the English rule of 'no politics...no religion' within, they now apply it to the public domain....

I'm stunned by a country with a history of philisophical, political, and thus intellectual debate and freedom!!!!!!

(and yes I know, but one word didn't allow me to vent!!!!)

**Mr_Fingerz** · 24-11-2005, 03:26

Does this mean that the French ISPs operate a cartel?

If they do, then the EC might like to ask them some very hard questions.

Wannadoo.fr should be told to foxtrot-oscar.

**Ord_Sgt** · 24-11-2005, 03:33

While my first comment was a bit flippant in reality this wouldn't survive first contact with a court of law, let alone the EU.

**jonwilly** · 24-11-2005, 08:35

It was reported in the Bangkok Post that Singapore has banned any blogs about their armed forces.
john

24-11-2005, 08:48

"Bloggers were recently arrested in Paris for daring to write that they were sympathetic with the social plight of the young people who were rioting at that time. The last I heard they were being taken to jail."

So France isn't all bad then!

**semper** · 24-11-2005, 10:09

they obviously forgotten how preciuous freedom is ? maybe a re run of German occupation is in order.

**Jailorinummqasr** · 24-11-2005, 12:34

Gruope France Telecom - Is a listed company (on the Dax), does anyone know what the Government Stake is?

If you do not like their actions, suggest that you write to the CEO saying that you are cancelling your subscription to Wanadoo and Orange Mobile and moving to other ISP/mobile providers.....hit em where it hurts... their profits.

**Plastic Yank** · 24-11-2005, 13:27

no surprise then that France one of the leading voices (along with China, Burma, Zimbabwe) in the removal of Internet control from the US control (which allows anyone to open a site and post) to the UN control (where individual nations will be able to monitor and control all internet access in their home territories).

**Escape-from-PPRuNe** · 24-11-2005, 15:43

Plastic Yank: you clearly have no understanding of how the Internet works at all. Can you perhaps explain how ICANN oversight of the root zone file keeps any individual nation from monitoring and controlling all internet access in their home territories? Or how "US control" allows me to set up a site located in the UK, in the .uk domainspace? The Chinese have no difficulty at all in censoring the internet access available in China even though you are in charge. They own the routers. Simple. How, exactly, would you censor anything through the root zone? Deregister domain names? Futile! One would simply use an IP address or register in a national TLD, such as .uk.

Regarding Barry, if you follow the link his site appears to be little better than spam. It seems he is dumping loads of links on his front page, probably with an automated script, in order to boost the Google pagerank of the sites who provide them. This is almost certainly a breach of Wanadoo's AUP, just as it would be a breach of AT&T's.

**jinxy** · 24-11-2005, 17:42

Agree 100% with your first paragraph.

I think if you had looked a little more closely at Barrys blog though, you would have seen most of the links go to other blog pages on Blogger.com. It seems he is trying to user blogger.com as a web site. Rather than post all his news on one page, as most bloggers do. He has created his Homepage==site index
links to other bloggs==web pages

Blogger.com is a free service, no hosting fees no bandwith fees...............Taking the p*ss perhaps.