Originally posted to thinkingpress.com in August, 2008.
It’s a strongly held belief of mine that new media technology will change the face of the world at a pace far too fast for any oppressive regime to stop. Our ability to communicate perspectives and ideas in today’s world is bringing out many voices that have never been heard and sending them far across the globe to a growing number of groups and activists that apparently might even care.
Read the full article from Techcrunch.com here “Blogging is not a Crime”
Blogging is just one new technology that is allowing for civil disobedience in the oppressive regimes across the world but is a great example of the power of individuals to change their world or at the very least inform it. There are countless stories of courageous Chinese citizens that are pushing the boundaries through this medium and have opened up that society in ways only today’s technology could force due to sheer volume. An army of individual bloggers is far harder to control than a single media outlet and the pathways to broad recognition for these individuals grows wider and more diverse by the day.
As this army of informers grow we will continue to see more people jailed by these regimes but there is hope that this is a futile pursuit because you can not rid the world of a point of view simply by jailing one that believes it. It is our responsibility to continue paying attention to these voices and protecting the media that makes it possible for the individual voice through network neutrality and recognition of the universal right to free speech.
The arrest of bloggers is of course against these values and in that perspective is not a positive sign of growth however it does suggest that the oppressed world is aggressively pursuing this medium as a pathway to social change. Imagine a printing press that was available to anyone with a computer and you begin to catch my drift.