Saturday, January 20, 2007

Is Your Website Officially Registered?

I have read in several news websites (including BBC and The Guardian) about a recent announcement by the government requiring the owners of all Iranian websites and blogs to register their websites/blogs with the authorities. I could not find any information on this from domestic news agencies, though. I cannot say, such thing is impossible (nothing foolish is impossible when someone like Ahmadinejad is in power), but it seems completely impractical to me, especially about bloggers. Many Iranian bloggers already blog anonymously; others can go underground as well. I saw Several bloggers have added a banner reading "I won't register my blog" on their blog header.

I'm awaiting new information about the issue to be released. This can be the next step in a series by one of the thirteen enemies of the Internet. Maybe next year we will miss the current "great" conditions.

1 comment:

Jeremiah said...

You know I'm not a fan of the Iranian government (or any government for that matter), but is it possible that this information is propaganda meant to make your country look very bad to Westerners prior to an attack by the U.S.? Of course Ahmadinejad might be dumb enough to demand all Iranian websites and blogs be registered with the government, but as you pointed out, that is much easier said than done. I think it is very suspicious that you have not heard anything about this from Iranian news agencies. Please keep us updated!