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Face-off

The moment we start thinking that it is okay for the people in power to block a global network, even if momentarily, and remove particular contents from it, is the moment we step on a slippery slope downhill; today it is Facebook over a silly doodle, tomorrow it will be Wikipedia for a controversial article and the next day it will be YouTube for an undesirable video.

Adit Rahman
I first heard the news from a friend on Facebook a couple of hours ago. A quick Google search turned up a couple of blogs and aWikinews post that corroborated it. The final confirmation came from a journalist friend at the BBC (again via Facebook): Facebook, the world's most popular social-networking site, has been temporarily blocked in Bangladesh. My friend wasn't sure about the exact reasons, but there were rumours about a youngster being arrested for posting 'not so flattering' doodles of political leaders on his social profile. When I asked him about the media community's reaction to this incident, he told me that it is still a "nonissue." After all, the Facebook user base in Bangladesh is still quite small and a little delay in posting status messages or playing Farmville is not going to do any serious damage. (I must admit that for a moment, the idea of not having to see stupid notification messages seemed quite appealing.) However, the fact is, in this day and age, blocking a social media is just as unfortunate as shutting down a
mainstream newspaper or TV channel and just as alarming.
All around the world, online social media such as blogs, wikis and social networks are being recognised as potent sources of user-created information. In many ways they are even more powerful than traditional media; they create a networked public sphere (a term coined by Yochai Benkler in The Wealth of Net works) where everybody is able to voice his/her thoughts and concerns freely and openly. Everybody can become a pamphleteer, and directly speak to the world. With social media, the audience does not consist of passive onlookers, but active participants in the info creation and sharing process. I witnessed this firsthand as my Persian colleagues used a variety of online media including YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Blogger to gain access to news and to stage protests after the shooting in June 2009. Where it was possible to crack down and stop the information flow on traditional media, it wasn't possible to do so with social media.
Like in most other places, Facebookers in Bangladesh use it mostly
to stay in touch with each other. But there is more to it than that. Every once in a while we come across shared documents and video materials in there that the mainstream media decided to ignore (or had to avoid) but are no less authentic or significant. (For example, I came across a video a couple of days back in which a certain minister was professing some very questionable practices and plans of the ruling government.) People are also using YouTube and other social media for these purposes. As I see it, this can help people become more politically aware which is always desirable in a democratic process. As transparency is one of the things promised by a democratic government, it should have no objection toward social media. Needless to say, this is probably just wishful thinking in the context of Bangladesh.
Coming back to the situation at hand, it may seem that I have been crying a river over nothing. What was it about really? Have I been suggesting that the media and the liberal societies in Bangladesh should take a stand to preserve a foolish young man's right to post objectionable things on Facebook? The answer is yes, that is exactly what I am asking. The moment we start thinking that it is okay for the people in power to block a global network, even if momentarily, and remove particular contents from it, is the moment we step on a slippery slope downhill; today it is Facebook over a silly doodle, tomorrow it will be Wikipedia for a controversial article and the next day it will be
YouTube for an undesirable video. Come to think of it, it is not tomorrow or the next day, but just last year when the government went after YouTube. I dare say that the emerging pattern doesn't look very encouraging.
Also, if we condone these actions now, we would be allowing the government to send out a clear message that reads: "Be careful of what you post online because we are very willing and quite able to make you pay for it." This is definitely not the way to uphold freedom of thought and speech in a democratic society.
I would like to end on an optimistic note by pointing out that these policing activities are, in the end, quite futile. They can, at best, slow things down for a bit but can never really stop them. Ways are found to work around these obstacles quite easily. Within a short while after the Facebook blockade, the online communities started exchanging tips on how to bypass the firewall by using anonymous proxies. One of these chatters on lifedork.net read: "If Bangladesh Govt, thinks (that the) Internet is like a cell phone service (that can be switched off at will) then they are living in (a) fool's paradise." If worse comes to worst, people will just start posting "risky” elements on more anonymous platforms, much like the way hundreds of anonymous file-sharing sites sprang up after big record labels shut Napster down in 2001. At any rate, freedom of speech will prevail on the Internet.
Adit Rahman is a student of Media Management (Master's) at Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden.