You call it partly closed, we call it mostly open.

I think they need to look at what is being said. The Chinese have said free REPORTING while the games are on about games related news and not free access to whatever websites the reporters feel they need to look at. Going to any website for any reason other than for reporting of whats happening at the games was I think not part of the original plan.

Basically - report what you like about the games, just don't expect to have access to the web at large - should be the message.

'Free and open' was the promise they made before they were awarded the Games.

I have this feeling that bthis is only the beginning ..........

China is a evil country, so why:

1. Why it was choosen for The olympic (who got paid by who and how much)

2. China as illegaly censor net access (they said they won't), so why china is not punish on the spot

3. China is so polluted, that any physical activity will be a healt hazard. Why whould you send 1000's of athlets there to compete?

4. China does not respect its own citizens and heavily repress (and censor) them illegally agains all international laws... so why was it choose to held such a international peacefull competition in such a evil country?

This is the same country that has the venerable position of having constructed the most intensive firewall and net snooping infrastructure on the planet, the envy of almost all governments across the globe. I am more surprised the journos and media types thought they would be exempted from the great Chinese Firewall!

...and millions of people who've never heard of Falun Gong are now busy googling. Keep it up China.

"I would remind you that Falun Gong is an evil fake religion which has been banned by the Chinese government."

Which religion ISN'T evil or fake? They should ban them all!

If anyone's wondering why should foreign media get more open access to the internet than the Chinese, remember that they need this to do their job. How else can you boost the international perception of the Chinese state by Babelfish-ing People's Army press releases.

It's their country and they can ban access to sites as they seem fit.

It's like bitching about not being allowed to watch Child Pronz or Al Qaedia training videos.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7532813.stm

Take a satellite phone, and use that to bypass the great firewall of china.

I don't think anyone can admit to being surprised by this, the chinese authorities were never going to make good their promise, and the West, facing the future with the Chinese ascendant and us in decline, were never going to make a fuss about any of it.

Haven't these people ever heard of VPNs or anonymous proxy/relay systems like TOR?

Promises were made and are now being reneged on.

From what I remember it was going to be free and uncensored access to the internet.

Now it seems its going to be free and uncensored access to the internet if its Olympic games related.

...that the 21000+ journos will be unable to play online poker while on their hols in China?

Paris, cos she knows when she is getting screwed.

The IOC has, as we know, only the most incorruptible people on its payroll, has never been involved in an scandal over bribery, fraud, etc., so it fully believed the PR of China's assurances that China would be open and is tragically disappointed to find that this is not the case -- >cough< >cough< something's stuck in my craw...

Yeah seriously - I betcha each reporter knows at least one geek who could slap together somthing like this - and reporters would need VPNs back to thier office...

Well they're not stopping the reporting of the games, just as has been pointed out before surfing the web for sites they don't like.

So how many of people didn't see this coming?

I have been waiting for the rabid ranks of the world press to flood us with stories of how they have been blocked from "free" access which wasn't promised.....read the small print guys.

If they stop allowing the press to report that an athlete has won the (insert sport of your choice here) then they have a right to complain.

"BOCOG spokesman Sun Weide insisted at a press confernece: "We are going to do our best to facilitate the foreign media to do their reporting work through the internet. I would remind you that Falun Gong is an evil fake religion which has been banned by the Chinese government."

Later today, Prime Minister Brown insisted at a press conference that "I would remind you that thinking for yourself is an evil, fake concept, which has been banned by the British Government."

If, by "these people" you mean sports journalists, then no, in all probability they haven't heard of VPNs or TOR. Most normal people haven't, donchaknow.

I think you'll find that more oftern than not western hosts that are blocking the traffic. So much crap comes out of China - spam, bots, millions of script kiddies -that it's quite common to block out whole domains from ourside of the wall. Of course to your average Joe Sports Hack it appears that the chinese are blocking.

...and use putty as a SOCKS proxy

as said before why the hell should it get the games?

bad human rights, BAD pollution etc.

to be honest the olympic games is a shit event anyway. nobody cares about synchronised swimming or whatever shit even is on the list. the english press seem to think we all of a sudden will pretend to like rowing all along as someone fluked a gold.

scrap sports like synchronised swimming, triple jump (wtf is the point of a jump where you can be on the ground twice - its not a jump!), all the stupid dressage horsey events (for toffie nosed twats only)

i sighed a deep sigh when we got the olympics - it means more stuff for london at the expense of everyone else... we have seem plans for £12M arenas for sports we dont even play in this country (handball - wtf!). and how can the gov close DOWN sports centres up north (2 closed in my city!) yest use the money for facilities for bloody sountherners (no offence but if you lived north of watford you would realise how screwed we get by the gov! our town was given money for a ring road - yet 1/2 is single carriageway! result is 40mph due to the frikkin lorries!)

the games are a complete waste of money and every city hosting them has not done well out of it... apart from maybe better transport...

if you just look at China, it has only ever really been in one of three states.

1. Conducting vast devestating civil wars between angry war lords

2. Controlled by a powerful emperor/president

3. Controlled by an increadibly weak and tyranical national government (think the czar of Russia corrupt) so weak and ineffectual they let Japan take control of vast swathes of the country, and needed the communists to beat the Japanese back.

I suppose a 4th option of controlled by foreign powers, weak very short lived emperors and preparing for the next war.

The closed way in which the Olympics are run by these arrogant elitist needs to be reviewed and at least a major shakeup involving most of it's members getting the sack needs to happen.

Mr Coward, you are the twat-o-tron and I claim my £10.

> "with stereotypes constructed from hearsay and prejudice in their mind, regardless of the reality".

Why does this remind me of "Comical Ali's" comment "I triple guarantee you, there are no American soldiers in Baghdad!"

I mean, really? Is anyone actually surprised that the Chinese (or ANY government for that matter) isn't keeping promises? Any promise by a government is worth exactly nothing, because there is no enforcement possible if they renege.

The Olympics are a scam, designed to suck money out of taxpayers and funnel them to the IOC and their friends. Anyone making promises with regards to that scam really should not be trusted.

Having actually been there I found them a polite and helpful people, from the people I met in the street to the officials I had to deal with. In fact entering and leaving was much more pleasant than the UK.

I'm not saying they are perfect or without fault but a lot of the acusations also apply to the us.

yeah ... until someone unfurls a Tibet flag on the podium

We are heading that way with all the survailance Gordon Brown is putting in place, even the Phorm/webwise could censor or edit our internet and we wouldn't know.

All censorship and editing of the WWW needs to be stoped wiretapping connections needs to be only if a warent to do so is given to police or security forces but not by the ISPs.

Freedom of speach is our right we sholdn't now face censorshiop by a parniod government.