The article talks about "Access Controlled", a new book from the Open Net Initiative that examines the new second and third generation filtering techniques employed by governments such as Russia and Belarus that are far more subtle than China's 'Great Firewall' but can censor unwanted content as effectively.

A different kind of censorship: this critical article talks about the British government's promises of supplying every household with broadband internet. Yet 1 in 4 Britons are estimated to have an inadequate broadband connection, even more so in rural areas. Villages in rural areas are raising money to connect their communities to fast broadband access. How much is the government censoring its citizens' right to information through inadequate internet access?

The first domain names using the Cyrillic script are now available after Russia was assigned a new Cyrillic domain by ICANN. Ealier that month Arabic script was introduced in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. ICANN regards the new native-script domain names as a tool to make the web more global but critics fear that Russian authorities could be encouraged to follow China's example and introduce Internet censorship.

Steve Jobs released an open letter on the Apple website explaining why they decided not to allow Flash on their iPhones, iPod Touches and the new iPad. Interestingly, the very first arguement is about open software and open program standards such as html5, css and JavaScript, so highly relevant for the course.

The manifesto, further discussion and information regarding the Pirate Party in the UK

A blog post covering the Pirate Party UK and the recent launch of it's manifesto. The Pirate Party is fighting to reform 'intellectual property' law but also covers freedom of speech on the Internet an other web related issues. After winning seats on the European and German parliament, could they also be successful in the UK?

Additional information regarding Iceland's initiative. Watch the video, summarizing and explaining the plan, it's really good!

Iceland is planning to propose the "The Icelandic Modern Media Initiative" to save freedom of expression on the internet, aiming at press and source protection it would turn the country into a save haven for journalists and bloggers all around the world.

Great comment by Lawrence Lessig on his speech at the Italian Parliament last week and the discussions that arose afterwards. In this article, he also summarizes the key issues of Italy and the Interent, covering censorship, copyright issues but also Italian's push to get the Nobel Committee to consider the Internet for the Peace Prize.

Surprisingly, a Spanish judge has ruled today in favor of a file-sharing website since P2P networks as a mere transmission of data between Internet users, would not violate, in principle, any right protected by Intellectual Property Law. Furthermore, he decided that "offering an index of links and/or linking to copyright material is not the same as distribution." The decision was based on the notion that the file-sharer doesn't make any direct or indirect profits off the site

Nobel prizewinner Shirin Ebadi accused German engineering giant Siemens and Finnish telecoms firm Nokia of supplying Iran with technology to help it suppress democratic dissent. The European Parliament also supports that arguement and strongly criticised international companies, in particular Nokia Siemens for giving Iranian authorities the tools needed for censorship and surveillance. Both companies argue that they could not be blamed for the misuse but that their technologies "play a significant role in the development of societies and the advancement of democracy"

The "Digital Economy Bill" has been passed by the Lords and is now expected to be rushed through the Commons before the general elections. Despite criticism by the UK's major telecommunication providers and global internet giants like Google, the government said it was still committed to giving courts the power to block websites which are infringing copyright. The bill is mainly aiming to tackle internet privacy. Some of it's paragraphs however could lead to internet censorship.

Information about the Digital Economy Bill provided by the UK Parliament. Includes a summary of the bill, its progress, latest news and the link to the full bill.

Amendments made to the digital economy bill last week, handing courts the power to force internet service providers (ISPs) to block certain websites, threaten freedom of speech and will lead to British websites being blocked without due judicial process, the chief executives of leading technology companies said in an open letter to the Financial Times. The heads of the four largest UK internet service providers as well as Google, Facebook, eBay and Yahoo have all co-signed the letter, along with consumer groups and academics, objecting to amendment. Theoretically the amendment could lead to sites such as YouTube being blocked in the UK.

Ilse Aigner, Germany's minister of food, agriculture and consumer protection, who usually concentrates on issues over rotten meat, genetically engineered corn and imitation cheese, recently took on a different kind of issue: the Internet and data privacy. Suddenly Aigner finds herself facing online giants Amazon, Facebook and, above all, Google. Soon Google plans to send cars equipped with cameras out onto Germany's roads once again for the company's Street View project. Aigner is now insisting that Google should ask permission before violating the privacy of German citizens. The minister's attack and the following discussions reveal just how divided the German government is when it comes to the online world. The debate revolves around questions of national security and individual self-determination on the Internet. But it also concerns the power of the large giants such as Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and MySpace, as well as the question of what these companies are doing with the records of our everyday data, and how they will be able to obtain information from us, influence us or perhaps even control us in the future. It seem like, once again, a German politician is exploiting the popular issue of internet privacy and censorship in a superficial way in the hope of scoring political points.