China / Asia

  
Rebecca MacKinnon, shown here in Tunisia last year, asserts in a new book that citizens and governments must decide the power of the Internet. (AFP/Fethi Belaid)

Does the Internet boost freedom? We decide, book says

The Internet doesn’t bring freedom. Not automatically, anyway. That’s one of the main messages of Rebecca MacKinnon’s new book, Consent of the Networked, which had its New York launch at the offices of the New America Foundation last night. In a conversation with CNN managing editor Mark Whitaker, MacKinnon, a CPJ board member, said it’s…

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The sky over Beijing, as it turns out, isn't quite as blue as the government long claimed. (Reuters/David Gray)

Chinese press has impact, against the odds

In China, state control over the media hasn’t become more lax in recent years. Each year brings a new excuse for Communist Party censors to tighten the screws. The year of the rabbit brought the Arab Spring, and fears of a Jasmine Revolution. The year of the dragon brings a major political transition. 

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For journalists, cyber-security training slow to take hold

For centuries, journalists have been willing to go to prison to protect their sources. Back in 1848, New York Herald correspondent John Nugent spent a month in jail for refusing to tell a U.S. Senate committee his source for a leak exposing the secret approval of a treaty with Mexico. In a digital age, however,…

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Google+, real names and real problems

At the launch of Google+, Google’s attempt to create an integrated social network similar to Facebook, I wrote about the potential benefits and risks of the new service to journalists who use social media in dangerous circumstances. Despite early promises of relatively flexible terms of service at Google+, the early days of implementation were full…

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In China, real people vs. Internet minders

In the next three months, users of China’s microblog weibo.com — “weibo” is the generic Chinese term for Twitter-like platforms — run by the huge sina.com (the English site is here) news portal, entertainment and blogging site, will have to start providing their real-world identities to the site, instead of simply being able to register.…

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Uighur journalists who covered protests such as this one in 2009 were sentenced to harsh prison terms. (AP)

China’s jailed Uighurs: Out of sight, not out of mind

For the first time in more than a decade, China is not the world’s worst jailer of the press in CPJ’s annual census of imprisoned journalists. Among the 27 jailed in China, one group has seen a massive jump in imprisonments. In another first since CPJ began taking its census, more than half of those…

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Defending the middle ground of online journalism

It’s easy to use polarizing descriptions of online news-gathering. It’s the domain of citizen journalists, blogging without pay and institutional support, or it’s a sector filled with the digital works of “mainstream media” facing financial worries and struggling to offer employees the protection they once provided. But there is a growing middle ground: trained reporters…

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A new set of media regulations in China is attempting to control the growing influence of social media users. (AFP)

China’s new rules step up state control of reporting

China’s latest media regulations, issued Thursday in a bid to take some steam out of microblogs that increasingly drive the country’s news agenda, signal an increased role for the state in drafting and enforcing press standards.

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Keeping a website alive behind the Great Firewall

Wednesday’s post, “Advice for colleagues on the digital front lines,” offered practical advice for keeping a website up and running in a hostile political environment. But such measures are not universally applicable. Sky Canaves, CPJ’s new East Asia and Internet consultant in Hong Kong, sent this reality check for Internet writers in China, where tighter…

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It's not clear whether Beijing will require licensing of social media sites or users to register under their real names. (Reuters)

Planning the next steps in Chinese media control

In the latest sign of increasing pressure on Chinese companies to tighten control of the Internet, Chinese authorities convened an unusual seminar in Beijing for senior executives of 39 major enterprises involved in Internet services, technology and telecommunications.

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