With the 20th Anniversary of June 4 approaching, netizens reported that a number of social networking and peer to peer communication websites have been blocked in China, including Twitter, Flickr, Bing, Youtube, Blogspot etc.
On Herdict, a censorship-tracking website, there are reports from all over China on the blocking of twitter since yesterday (June 2). Blogspot has been blocked since middle of May and Youtube has been on and off for a rather long period of time, Windows Live, Bing and Flickr have entered the blocking list at the eve of June 4 anniversary.
Hotmail was blocked temporary and its access has been restored in the past couple of hours. Twitter has enabled its https access in respond to netizens' call. Moreover, some of the twitter extension tools such as twitterfox are still accessible.
Meanwhile #fuckGFW has become a hottest search tag in twitter. Netizens are using the tag to express their anger, exchange information on tools for circumventing the GFW and give latest updates on the blocking.
Blogger tsw called June 2nd GFW Day, when netizens directly confronted with state violence in information control. Others are sharing information on how to get around with GFW.
Wodingdong recommended Virtual Private Network tool, Tor, Hotspot Shield Launch and OpenVPN GUI. Kenengba suggested to use third party connections to get access to twitter.
The blocking of twitter has been anticipated since blogspot has been blocked in Middle of May. Netizens' major concern now is when will all these websites be accessible again?
(Cartoon created by twitter user junde via Rebecca MacKinnon)
Related articles:
Rebecca MacKinnon - China Blocks Twitter, Flickr, Bing, Hotmail, Windows Live, etc. Ahead of Tiananmen 20th Anniversary
Danwei - Twitter and other sites blocked in China as of today
Guardian - China blocks Twitter, Flickr and Hotmail ahead of Tiananmen anniversary
[...] Twitter and a number of social network and peer to peer communication websites have been blocked since yesterday (June 2), the local version of twitter, Fanfou, has put up a system maintanence [...]
posted on June 3rd, 2009 at 10:14 am - #17366what are the possibilites that twitter marketing will work? i truely think that we need to have real value to give to our loyal follower . getting the right content to get the right customer? it also let your ideas or anyone’s ideas spreading all across the minds all over the world. thens it is time when twitter money is a ‘way to go’!
posted on June 3rd, 2009 at 12:46 pm - #17367[...] « Twitter, Flickr, Bing, etc. blocked in China [...]
posted on June 3rd, 2009 at 4:34 pm - #17370[...] Chinese citizens can’t even mark the anniversary on the Internet. Global Voices Advocacy reports: With the 20th Anniversary of June 4 approaching, netizens reported that a number of social [...]
posted on June 4th, 2009 at 3:22 am - #17379it’s a clash of the Titans — China versus Twitter and Microsoft
posted on June 4th, 2009 at 6:57 am - #17381Do they have their own twitter? Their can be a Chinese chwitter for Chinese people and language only. ha ha !
posted on June 4th, 2009 at 7:40 am - #17383[...] Twitter, Flickr, Hotmail, Bing, many other international sites, have been blocked. [...]
posted on June 4th, 2009 at 9:23 am - #17387i can use it as before because i have tools ,haha~~~
posted on June 4th, 2009 at 9:39 am - #17388just heard that twitter has been unblocked today.
posted on June 8th, 2009 at 6:47 am - #17464Flickr、Bing、Live are also accessible now.
posted on June 8th, 2009 at 3:58 pm - #17468[...] La censura china parece haber encontrado en el 20º aniversario de la matanza de Tiananmen la escusa perfecta para mostrar su verdadero rostro. [...]
posted on July 7th, 2009 at 8:02 am - #18640[...] least one blogger is calling June 2nd GFW day (h/t Global Voices); in symbolism of being blocked I’ve changed the background of this blog to black. I’ll [...]
posted on July 22nd, 2009 at 9:19 am - #19036