Microsoft has blocked access to Windows live messenger (i.e. Hotmail webmail and MSN chat) to people living in Iran, Syria, Sudan, Cuba and North Korea. The reason is that the company suddenly realised that it doesn't do business with countries sanctioned by the U.S. At the same time, Iran blocked Facebook ahead of the presidential elections because a candidate is using it successfully for his campaign.

Microsoft's decision doesn't mean that people in those countries can't only communicate over IM. It means they can't also access their email including their archived messages.

Ok, I understand that Iran did this because it lacks confidence. But why did Microsoft do this now?

Blocking porn sites is not the main issue here, there are ways to circumvent censorship and if people want to watch porn, and they do, they will resurrect VHS.

A chart from Google Insight showing the search for the term "sex" and "سكس", originating from Egypt and from 2004 till now. The annual dip in search, marked with the red R, coincides with the month of Ramadan.

This ruling is like legalizing the monitoring of people's thoughts and controlling what they want to see. Perhaps tomorrow they will want to control what you think of too.

I understand that a court can make the production of pornographic material in Egypt illegal, which is currently the case, because of the possibility of abuse of minors and women through trafficking, etc..

Another problem is the blurry definition of "obscene sites" that is described in the ruling as sites that "destroy the values of the family and society that injects its poisons and spreads vice." I am sure that inclusion of political thought considered by the government as astray is next. Didn't this already happen?

In the UAE they keep on blocking and unblocking Flickr because some nude or semi-nude photography. Which is not pornographic by any means. The UAE reduced Flickr, the best photo sharing website in the world, into a valueless site.

You can listen to live streaming internet radio if you have a mobile phone with a 3G connection. The phone should be able to run J2ME MIDP applications (most do). Download and install MFRadio. It is open source and free. MFRadio can only play Mp3 streams.

The second step is to be able to connect your phone to your car stereo. This is highly variable, so you will have to find this out on your own.

[JC says that |http://jimmys-corner.blogspot.com/2006/03/step-on-way-to-democracy-update.html] that he received two emails informing him that three main opposition websites are now blocked by the government. Users of the main ISPs (Linkdotnet, Tedata and Raya) in Egypt cannot have any access to these sites anymore.

These websites are:
*[Save Egypt Front|http://www.saveegyptfront.org/]
*[Masreyat|http://www.masreyat.org/]
*[Egyptian Talks|http://www.egyptiantalks.org/]

The [Ikhwan website is still accessible|http://www.ikhwanonline.com], which was [blocked in 2005|http://www.manalaa.net/ikhwan_online_blocked]. I think blocking an Ikhwan site now is harder than it used to be. The 87 Ikhwan MPs will bother the government about their own sites only.

Egyptian Talks is a respectable forum with long history of discussing many political issues in Egypt openely and in reasonable and moderate tone. Although I remember once they had to shut one of their forums that discussed an issue related to Mubarak.