michelle's blog

Source :China Times30 April 2012

Wang reported [Reporter Lu Sumei / roundup]

Sina weibo, China’s domestic twitter which has 300 million users, may under the threat of shutting down. According to Sina’s 2011 Annual report submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on 28 April, "the authorities required our users to use real name for authentication.. But for varies reasons we are unable to complete the task. We may face severe punishment by the Chinese government, including partial suspension of the microblogging’s function or even shutting it down." Sina reminded investors that if it was punished by the Chinese government, it might affect the company's share price.

Chinese origin:
Online dairy led to imprisonment
Chongqing senior editor was put to jail for writing online diary

In the early April, Gao Yingpu, an editor-in-chief in Chongqing Chinese BusinessTimes, was taken away by police from his home in the morning, July 2010. He was sentenced for "crimes against national security" for three years, and was due to his criticism toward Chongqing’s authority on personal online diary. The news was released after he has been imprisoned for one and a half years.

Caption: Hong Kong Bloggers' Facebook accounts were blocked after the forth Chief Executive was elected.

Leung Chun-ying (CY), the forth Chief Executive of Hong Kong was elected by 1200 election committees on March 25, 2012. He is alleged as underground communist party member and violated freedom of speech in the past. A famous Hong Kong blogger Kay Lam’s Facebook account was suspended after posting a picture with caption “Finally the lights are all gone, The Death of Hong Kong 1841-2012”, just three hours after CY was elected as Chief Executive.

Caption: Shall Hong Kongers enjoy freedom of assembly if the anti-stalking law is passed?

After Commissioner of Police (CP) Mr Tsang took office, his tough measures against the demonstrators have raised social concerns about the anti-stalking legislation. Law Reform Commission (hereinafter referred to as "LRC") published "anti-stalking" consultation document on 19 December last year which is called "The press 23" by the society. According to the document, stalking "may be described as a series of acts directed at a specific person which, taken together over a period of time, causes him to feel harassed, alarmed or distressed”. These acts might not be objectionable but, when combined over a period of time, interfered with the privacy and family life of the victim, and causing him distress, alarm or ever serious impairment of his physical or psychological well being. These acts may cause annoying or panic but still lawful at the beginning act, evolve into a dangerous, violent or likely to cause others to death. If a person ought to have known a course of conduct which amounted to harassment of the other, he should be guilty of a criminal offense. A maximum penalty would be a fine of $ 100,000 and imprisonment for two years, and with civil liability. The victim would be able to claim damages for any distress, anxiety and financial loss resulting from the pursuit and apply for an injunction to prohibit the stalker from doing anything which causes him alarm or distress.

According to the implementation of the “Beijing shi wei bo fazhan guanli you guan gui ding (Regulation on mirco-blogging in Beijing)” , the real-name authentication will be executed by the four popular microblogs in China from March 16. Theese include Sina (weibo.com), Sohu (t.sohu.com), Netease (t.163.com) and Tencent weibo (t.qq.com). Although this regulation claims to be “voluntary”, old users without real-name authentication are unable to post and forward messages anymore. They can only browse contents on the blog.

Translated by: Kenny Choi

Editor note: This article, originally published in inmediahk.net tells significant issues on free speech at Hong Kong, China, Taiwan and Macao.

Caption: Hong Kong Netizens against the Copyright (Amendment) Bill 2011，which forbid the exemption of derivative works as not being infringing.

At the beginning of the year, the Office for Personal Data Protection of Macau government issued the Guidelines on Publication of Personal Data on the Internet. In addition to include individual identification information, private life, medical records and other information as “personal data”, the guidelines also consists of “data revealing philosophical or political beliefs, political society or trade union membership, religion and racial or ethnic origin.” The Guideline states that except the consent of the litigants has been acquired or their information been published, any sensitive information cannot be publicized. Daily practice on the internet today could infringe Personal Data Protection Act. Therefore people who concern with freedom of speech requested amendment of the Guidelines.

Written by: Mainland Blogger Jason Ng
Translated by: Michelle Fong

Editor notes: This article was first published in Simplified Chinese by a Mainland Blogger about Ten things impressed him the most about Weibo.com (新浪微博，Sina mircoblog , akin hybrid of Twitter and Facebook and being the most popular site in China.) which is the most popular microblog in China.

Editor note: This article, originally published in inmediahk.net, tells how a small company can turn into giant enterprises through the mysterious network and relationship with officials.

Editor note: This article about the use of microblogs by Chinese police is originally published in Xinhuanet

Recent years, the People of the Republic of China police has created MicroBlog and has caused great concern in the Internet.

Is it a “show” or “internet politics”? How do law enforcers adapt the liberal and free internet atmosphere? How does MicroBlog reflect the governance mentality? Reporters visited the police MicroBlog to take a look.

On 25th of July, a “Support Cantonese Crowd Action” has taken place in in Guangzhou Jiangnanxi subway. Although it was officially classified as “unlawful assembly” and "Ying Ye", the 18-year-old founder, was brought to “drink tea” (by the Mainland police) twice, it did not prevent the Guangzhou people from supporting Cantonese. There were more than 2000 participants joined that action.