Bloggers Beware!

The annual World Information Access (WIA) briefing booklet for 2008, compiled by Philip N. Howard at the University of Washington, reports a growing trend to arrest bloggers. At least 64 people have been jailed for using blogs as a means of protest since 2003, but there could be hundreds more as sources cannot always be verified. More than half of all the arrests since 2003 have been made in China, Egypt and Iran, but in the last four years British, French, Canadian and American bloggers have also been arrested. The average prison sentence for politically incorrect blogging is 15 months, the longest sentence eight years! The good news is that repressive governments are scared of bloggers. The bad news for Brits is that the UK Government is one of those regimes. Note the graphic. At the weekend three pensioners wearing protest T-shirts with the message Stop Airport Expansion were cautioned by police at Heathrow Airport for wearing "inflammatory" garments and were escorted from the premises under threat of arrest if they returned. In State Britain, not only must bloggers beware, but also law-abiding pensioners!