China Looks to Rein in Bloggers

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The director of China's General Administration of Press and Publication, Long Xinmin, said the administration was forming rules to further regulate Internet publishing, including the country's legions of bloggers, the Beijing Morning Post reported on Tuesday.

Long Xinmin, the director of General Administration of Press and Publication, the government oversight and control measures were easily possible before when newspapers were present but now with the advent of blogging it has made it difficult for the Government to control or monitor. He assured with increased control measures, we will fully protect "Citizens freedom of expression". How one can have rigid controls and freedom of expression at the same time, we will have to wait and see.

For the ruling communist party, China's blogging population has been a major headache, more are able to say things much more openly than before in their blogs. Also, there has been a huge increases in the number of Chinese internet users with more Internet access available in cafes and homes.

By last September, the number of blog sites in China reached 34 million, a 30-fold increase from four years before.

Chinese bloggers have detailed their political views, hobbies and grudges. One famed pioneer, Mu Zimei, a young journalist, attracted a storm of publicity in 2003 by chronicling -- names and all -- her complicated love life. Another blogger, calling herself Liu Mangyan, published nude photos of herself.

Others write more combative type blogging which was not possible before, would have resulted in instant arrest and some cases summary executions.

Long Xinmin and others in the Communist party want to formulate new rules to cover Internet "Publishing activities". He said they have been paying attention to this new mode of web dissemination.

There are already existing rules in China, with several agencies of the Communist party issue regulations.

Last year, China's Ministry of Information Industry issued rules on Internet news content that analysts said was aimed at extending regulations governing licensed news outlets to blogs and Internet-only news sites.

But it is difficult to apply when the Internet is involved. Hence the reason for formulating new rules to cover the internet area.

How the new rules will be administered and how the freedom of expression is protected will be watched by the users in China and worldwide.

China is changing and growing too fast, the younger generation are more expressive than their elders, it is not going to be easy for the Government to control or curb them.