We apologize the site you are attempting to visit has been blocked due to its content being inconsistent with the religious, cultural, political, and moral values of the United Arab Emirates.
- page that loads when attempting to access Twitter from UAEFor me this was a little bit of a shock. I've been to a number of restrictive countries before, but as we are still in a somewhat nascent stage of the social media lifespan, I believe many of us are pushing the edges of what types of communications are acceptable to employers, and in this case, governments. A Facebook friend and social media champion, who works for the administration, had noticed that in my profile that I had been unable to Twitter from Abu Dhabi. It was an interesting contrast to see this person's take on the draconian speech restrictions placed on web conversations here. Ultimately though, it was just a bit of a nuisance for me - causing a few hours of Twitter "blackout" - and i was able to resume posting from Saudi Arabia.
Why do I care? Well, as I posted yesterday, a potential nightmare for U.S. technology and media companies is how they deal with governments which might not be as friendly to free expression as ours. Do they simply make nice and make a buck (and risk lawsuits), or take a moral stand and risk shareholder anger (and lawsuits)? It really doesn't have to be a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation. Really. This is another example of why Interactive Media needs its own voice. There are ways to handle these issues, and there are ways to get killed in the press and made to look like evil mercenary henchmen. The trick is to choose the right one. Check out the rest of Jim's post, please. I am hoping to get a chance to talk to him soon.
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