Category Archives: Transhuman News

The swelling ranks of Chinese fans of streamed Hollywood TV shows, such as The Walking Dead and House of Cards, have expressed outrage at recently issued regulations requiring tighter censorship for all streaming video in China.

The broadcast watchdog, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT), said in a statement on its website last month that online companies would have to closely vet content before making it available to stream.

STORY:'House of Cards' Season 2 Skirts Censors for China Release Online

A survey on Sina Weibo found that 130,153 surveyed users of the micro-blogging service did not want censors to decide which Western television series they could watch.

We should be free to choose what we want to watch and experience multiple cultures, wrote one Weibo user.

Just 6,476 people backed new guidelines that require regulatory approval before Western series -- which now include Saturday Night Live, The Ellen DeGeneres Show and the Danish political drama Borgen --can appear on a Chinese online video website, with some arguing they were too open and could affect domestic culture.

In a report on the Xinhua government news agency, online companies such as Sohu ruled out the possibility that shows like The Walking Dead and Masters of Sex would be banned.

They insisted that many of the censorship rules were already in place, and said the statement on the government website merely reiterated the status quo.

STORY:China's Censors Clamp Down on Booming Internet Video Sector

"Although American TV series are strictly scrutinized in China, most of those currently available to the public have already been approved," a Sohu.com source told Xinhua.

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China's 'House of Cards' Fans Revolt Online Over Fears of More Censorship

Demonstrators take part in a mass "face-sitting protest" outside the Houses of Parliament in central London.

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London (CNN) -- Visitors to the Houses of Parliament on Friday may have seen more than they bargained for. Protesters against new rules limiting online pornography gathered to simulate some of the now-banned sex acts, including "face-sitting."

The campaigners aimed to highlight what they say are arbitrary and sexist changes to the law that don't distinguish between consensual and nonconsensual acts between adults.

But to spare onlookers' blushes (and a potential brush with the law), those taking part in what was dubbed the #PornProtest on Twitter remained fully clothed.

The new regulations, which came into force on December 1, ban various acts being depicted in online pornography produced in the United Kingdom, including face-sitting, female ejaculation and spanking, in part to protect children from being exposed to potentially harmful content.

However, they do not make it illegal for people to watch videos produced outside Britain or to perform the acts themselves.

One of the protest organizers is Charlotte Rose, winner of the UK sex worker of the year title in 2013 and a free-speech advocate.

She told CNN that the bill could be perceived as being sexist because the banning of certain acts appears to target women's sexual enjoyment.

"This is about censorship, and what the government is doing is they're censoring our consent -- so yes, it does affect women, but it also affects every man and every woman," she said. "It affects anybody who enjoys these particular activities."

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'Face-sitting' over porn censorship law

Last week, two Australian retailers pulled Grand Theft Auto V from their shelves in response to a petition decrying sexual violence in the game. What I found interesting about the situation wasn't so much the news itself as the curiously strong reaction it drew, lighting up Twitter feeds and comments sections, including ours. The first GamesIndustry.biz story on the situation drew nearly 100 comments, the second pulled in about 50.

Compare that to the zero comments that greeted last month's news that Indian obscenity laws would prevent Dragon Age: Inquisition from releasing in the country. So what's the difference? Why are people so upset about two retailers choosing not to stock the poster child for controversy-courting games, but evidently apathetic about a billion people being denied the option to play another game held in almost universally high regard for vaguely defined obscenities? (Interesting side note: Grand Theft Auto V is readily available in India.) For an industry so vocal about even the faintest shadow of censorship, we're pretty damn complacent when it comes to the genuine article.

"As far as censorship goes, this may be the least harmful, least effective strain of it you can find."

Yes, Grand Theft Auto V is a hyperviolent game, and its removal from some retailers is censorship of a form. Not the government-mandated, legally binding form of censorship, or the sort of censorship that will actually keep interested people from finding and buying the game, but it is a private institution removing one route of access to a title because it objects to the content within. And yes, Target Australia and K-Mart Australia are well within their rights to do that. As far as censorship goes, this may be the least harmful, least effective strain of it you can find.

Compare that to the situation with Dragon Age: Inquisition in India, or the industry-approved censorship that has shaped the console and mobile markets for years. Apple in particular has been heavy-handed with what sort of games it allows on the iPhone and iPad, deciding that people who use its products shouldn't have access to educational games about female masturbation, games that use nudity to help get across a worthy message, games based on current events, or titles that criticize sweatshop production methods and smartphone makers like Apple in particular.

"We view Apps different than books or songs, which we do not curate," Apple says in its App Store Review Guidelines. "If you want to criticize a religion, write a book. If you want to describe sex, write a book or a song, or create a medical App."

And if that weren't enough to show how little Apple values freedom of speech, just a few lines later in the guidelines, the company is nakedly threatening those who run afoul of its policies--those whose speech it has already silenced--to stay silent.

"If your App is rejected, we have a Review Board that you can appeal to," Apple says. "If you run to the press and trash us, it never helps."

"How many of the people furious about the Grand Theft Auto V situation own iPhones? How many developers see the company's behavior for what it is and then support the platform anyway?"

My problem isn't so much that Apple won't let these games on its virtual shelves. Like Target Australia and K-Mart Australia, Apple is a private company and can choose what products it will offer through its store. My problem is that this is accepted by the industry as a whole. How many of the people furious about the Grand Theft Auto V situation own iPhones? How many developers see the company's behavior for what it is and then support the platform anyway? How much of the principled outrage we have seen this week doesn't apply to Apple? How much is rationalized by thoughts like, "But it's a really cool phone..." or "But it's such a large potential audience..."?

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