Posted on 07/16/2010 4:07:25 PM PDT by Windflier
After the U.S. Government took action against several sites connected to movie streaming recently, nerves are jangling over the possibility that this is just the beginning of a wider crackdown. Now it appears that a free blogging platform has been taken down by its hosting provider on orders from the U.S. authorities on grounds of “a history of abuse”. More than 73,000 blogs are out of action as a result.
Hot on the heels of recent threats from Vice President Joe Biden and Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator Victoria Espinel directed at sites offering unauthorized movies and music, last month U.S. authorities targeted several sites they claimed were connected to the streaming of infringing video material.
(Snip)
Fears remain, however, that this action is only the beginning, and that more sites will be targeted as the months roll on. Indeed, TorrentFreak has already received information that other sites, so far unnamed in the media, are being monitored by the authorities on copyright grounds.
Now, according to the owner of a free WordPress platform which hosts more than 73,000 blogs, his network of sites has been completely shut down on the orders of the authorities.
It is important to understand that there are two different flavors of Wordpress.
1 - the free hosted service (like Blogger) based on the Wordpress platform.
2 - the full-featured Wordpress open source software.
The first piece is directly managed and affiliated with Wordpress. The latter is freely distributed and may be installed on any server or website address.
This story relates to one incidence of the latter version - not an action against Wordpress. This is an action against a major Wordpress user/account reseller/host.
Here we go.... Alex Jones was right all along !
Ok. How does that relate to whether or not this is a despotic overreach by government?
It's hard not to think that, but we still need to keep our cool until we see some corroborating reports, and more details.
I'll agree that it's hair-raising, though.
I cannot get too worked up about that.
The title freaked me out though. =:^o
The story is also found here:
U.S. Authorities Shut Down WordPress Host With 73,000 Blogs
http://www.visiontoamerica.org/story/us-authorities-shut-down-wordpress-host-with-73000-blogs.html
“After the U.S. Government took action against several sites connected to movie streaming recently, nerves are jangling over the possibility that this is just the beginning of a wider crackdown. Now it appears that a free blogging platform has been taken down by its hosting provider on orders from the U.S. authorities on grounds of “a history of abuse”. More than 73,000 blogs are out of action as a result.”
From TechDirt:
http://techdirt.com/articles/20100716/04053910248.shtml
Authorities Force 73,000 Blogs Offline?
from the that-doesn’t-seem-right dept
TorrentFreak is reporting that a company, Blogetery, that hosted about 73,000 blogs, has been shut down by US authorities. Details are, admittedly, sketchy at this point, but the entire site has been taken down, and the company’s ISP claims that they had to terminate the account immediately due to the “request of law enforcement officials, due to material hosted on the server.” The ISP also claimed:
“this was not a typical case, in which suspension and notification would be the norm. This was a critical matter brought to our attention by law enforcement officials. We had to immediately remove the server.”
...more
I read the article too, but I haven't yet seen confirmation that 73,000 blogs, all routed to the same server, were all distributing movies (etc.) illegally.
That sounds very unlikely to me.
Gunny G:
Internet Censorship Beginning???
http://torrentfreak.com/u-s-authorities-shut-down-wordpress-host-with-73000-blogs-100716/
Lieberman…Purging The Internet of Dissent
US Cyber Command...Perfect Citizen Or Big Brother?
http://gunnyg.wordpress.com/2010/07/16/us-cyber-command-%E2%80%A6-%E2%80%9Cperfect-citizen%E2%80%9D-or-big-brother/#more-21595
—
**********
Glenn Beck Is Warning Us To Grab Everything We Can Off The Internet Because They Are About To Shut It Down!
Free Republic could disappear for the same reason. We need a P2P version of Free Republic with encryption and anonymous relay servers.
Excerpt from: http://www.helium.com/items/1893892-why-73000-wordpress-blogs-were-shut-down-by-the-us-government
by Bruce Tyson
Recently targeted by federal action, the free WordPress blogging site Blogetery abruptly came offline after hosting provider BurstNet complied with undisclosed demands from authorities. A message viewable upon visiting the Blogetery site gives this message from its owner: “After being BurstNet customer for 7 months our server was terminated without any notification or explanation.” A link on the site leads to a forum called Web Hosting Talk, where the site operator has posted correspondence with BurstNet, that suggests feederal involvement in the incident.
Those first to learn about the Blogetery shutdown seemed to think that the move was due to intellectual property concerns. The online discussion supposedly with the Blogetery owner suggests that users of his site prompted frequent cease and desist demands from copyright holders to which he responded with appropriate action against users of his site.
Original speculation seemed to be misguided upon the release of comments from BurstNet that disclosed that the action against Blogetery was not “typical” and required instant compliance with federal demands to close the entire Web site. Some reports seem to suggest that intellectual property rights actions typically target specific users of a service rather than the entire operation. Now, some fear that the suffering of the innocent together with the guilty as the free speech of many appears to have been infringed by government action. Such fear supposes, of course, that not all 73,000 blogs on Blogetery were lawbreakers. Some consider the magnitude of the federal action as an indication that the Blogetery site itself and its owner may have been involved in some type of wrongdoing.
BurstNet and authorities have been mum on specific details of the case, saying only that they have refunded the payments from the Web site owner owner.
I understood the attempt, but your fictional situation was not analogous to the case at hand, and thus did not make the case you intended for it.
You seen this?
I notice the link for that story is 404.
Thanks for finding those related articles. Have you posted any of them as threads here?
No, guess why!
and...(surprising (read all)....
http://gunnyg.wordpress.com/2010/07/17/facebook-deletes-official-alex-jones-page-over-gadsden-flag/
I copied your blog post about Facebook’s censoring of the Gadsden flag and other Tea Party references and sent it to my email list.
You should post that here, if you haven’t already.
For instance, what if Tea Party members all started changing their Facebook profile "face" picture to the Gadsden flag? Would they cancel all the memberships? Would they ban the flag outright and face the repercussions?
I'd like to see them try to shut the Tea Partiers up... Yep, I'd sure like to see that.
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