By "Unrestricted," We Mean "Restricted"

Part of the agreement to let China host the Olympic games was that foreign journalists be allowed to have unfettered access to the internet. I am sure you already know that China, with the co-operation of many American tech firms, blocks many websites so that its citizens cannot learn dangerous information. It seems that, despite promises to the contrary, China has gone back on their word, with the approval of the Olympic Committee.

Some International Olympic Committee officials cut a deal to let China block sensitive Web sites despite promises of unrestricted access, a senior IOC official admitted on Wednesday.

"I regret that it now appears BOCOG has announced that there will be limitations on Web site access during Games time," IOC press chief Kevan Gosper said, referring to Beijing's Olympic organizers.

"I also now understand that some IOC officials negotiated with the Chinese that some sensitive sites would be blocked on the basis they were not considered Games related," he said.

If you guessed that some of those sites that are not "Games related" are sites that detail human rights abuses in China, you'd be right. Amnesty International is blocked. As are websites related to the Falun Gong, leading to this quote from a Chinese official which I thought was hilarious:

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

Interestingly, one of my favorite sites, Fire Joe Morgan, has also been banned in China, leading contributor Ken Tremendous to issue this statement:

We will not stop blogging until every Chinese citizen has the right to read curse-filled nonsense about Dusty Baker. And that is a kind-of promise!

While censorship is horrible, I do have to acknowledge that the blocking of FJM probably means some poor Chinese wife is being spared her husband reading her the "hilarious" snarky comments found on FJM, even though her knowledge of baseball does not really incorporate an understanding of RBI, let alone why they are such a poor predictor of future success compared to, say, OPS+, as my wife frequently is.

All that said, let's hope that NBC doesn't spoil that majesty and non-political wonder that will be the Olympic games by injecting a lot "politics" into their commentary. After all, we wouldn't want anyone thinking that China is anything but a wonderful, wonderful country that is finally taking its rightful place on the world stage, now would we.