Hot Seat

It was a tough Valentine's Day for Google. The No Love for Google website was urging users to "Break up with Google" in a widely disseminated video on the Internet. Meanwhile, another group of activists for Chinese democracy were marketing Goolag apparel to protest the company's tacit approval of authoritarian information policies.

Right now I am watching live streaming video of Congressional testimony about Internet restrictions in China with which American companies like Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and Cisco are cooperating. The philosophical issues are interesting and include the question of whether a "right to knowledge" is a human right. Practical concerns about how to regulate a globally distributed Internet that can't be easily commodified for purposes of trade policy certainly merit being on C-SPAN as well. To read more see today's New York Times story, "House Members Criticize Internet Policies in China."