Blogging in China

Internet censorship in China is among the most strict in the world. The Chinese government requires that websites employ people who monitor and delete content that is questionable. Despite this, China has over three hundred million internet users. Of those users, seventy million blog. Imagine blogging while knowing that every word you type will be monitored by someone employed to do so. That alone would prevent me from blogging. I feel as though Americans would never allow the government to enact legislation that censors everything uploaded to the internet. First of all, creating a firewall as intricate as China's would be extremely hard. Americans tend to be more objective as well. There was uproar after the passing of the Patriot Act following the terrorist attacks of September 11. I don't think censorship of the internet in America would go over well at all. This is not to say it was a smooth transition in China. Google closed it's internet search service in March 2010. They would do so until it's search engine was no longer filtered. The Chinese government did not give into their demand and said that companies doing business in the country must follow the law. Google attempted to get around the law by directing Chinese users to its uncensored search engine in Hong Kong. This only further angered Chinese officials. Weeks later, Google created the option for users in China to chose whether to use an uncensored version or not. It would be interesting to see the reaction of Americans if the government were to create a firewall that censored everything put on the internet. I believe it would be a disaster!