Occasional Tales

Last post for the next two years? I’m hoping that I’ll be returning to the Empire with some means of circumventing the Great Wall of Paranoia, although whether such means work depends on just how exceedingly paranoid the imperial government is. I’d like the Internet back, thank you very much. As I said, Spaces got transferred to WordPress, which first got crippled while the mandarins had their conference, and then got sent to intensive care – behind the locked door. So much for my main blog. That forced me to switch to Live Journal ( Green Bamboo ) and basically begin again because five years’ worth of blogging was no longer accessible. I assume that Live Journal has been left alone because it’s popular with the Russians, and since the imperial government views the Grand Duchy of Muskovy as safe (i.e., corrupt, paranoid, and authoritarian), such people aren’t likely to care about those little inconveniences such as human rights, the rule of law, freedom of speech, and democracy. Anyway

And I’m bloody well going to do so. As I’ve just said over on my new main blog, I should be making some effort to read The Girl who Played with Fire , but I also feel that I should use and abuse my blogs now that all of them are accessible. On that matter, I’ve taken some steps which might get me round the petty paranoia of the current regime so that I can see the Internet as Al Gore invented it to be. I have seen one or two articles in the past couple of months which have observed that the Web hasn’t brought democracy because it’s spurred various disreputable regimes to extend their degree of control on the channels of information. In fact, the Web won’t bring democracy, I think, but rather offer a channel for the next oppressive regime to make a bid for power. In truth, the Egyptians will get more of the same unless they end up with some nutjob theocracy. (That probably means more of the same, but with prayers and mindless chanting against Egypt’s supposed enemies; all right, the Hit