Professor E. Dommering of the University of Amsterdam opened with a review of the current situation of censorship on the internet, with the most recent example of Google’s decision to launch a special google.cn service in China. Next the Tibet Support Groep Nederland explained how the Chinese regime uses internet censorship to block access to information about the situation and history of Tibet, its ongoing occupation and the Dalai Lama. In December Margot Wallström, Vice-President of the European Commission had already criticized Google, Yahoo and Microsoft in her weblog and hoped that these companies one day will understand that to endorse democracy and corporate responsibility is a prerequisite for “smart” growth.

That internet control and censorship also happens in eastern Europe was the subject of the next presentation. Aleksander Parfentsov, director of the Informational Development Promotion Foundation (IDOF) and of the TV-production Studio 42 in Minsk, Belarus, gave an overview of the current social and political situation in Belarus and the creative ways in which young people exercise their right to free opinion.

As a positive example for free information and communication, the videoletters project was presented next by Katarina Rejger. In Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Hercegovina, Macedonia, Serbia, Monte Negro and Kosovo Videoletters reconnects former friends who stopped talking to one another since the war.

The video webcast of this even will soon be online on Fabchannel.

Technorati Tags: google, belarus, videoletters

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