Apparently this blog is now blocked on a common content filter for its “porn”:
according to the barracuda web filter here at work, i am now denied access to your website because it falls into the category “porn”.
Well, shit. I hate to disappoint. All those surfers coming here expecting porn .. and I don’t deliver. Maybe I should start!
Thanks to testing by friends, I can now report that I’ve achieved my lifelong goal of becoming an Enemy of the Chinese State – this blog, and domain, is now blocked in the People’s Republic of China.
Interestingly, the block is keyed by domain – the block is not on the IP itself, as other sites operating on this IP remain unblocked. The actual mechanism seems to be the good ol’ TCP RST trick.
No idea why. I can only assume that my dangerous levels of awesomeness presented a threat to social order in the Middle Kingdom.
UPDATE: unblocked.
Looks like France will be the first large first-world country to start seriously censoring the ‘net. What a depressing day that will be. Funny how I’m not the least bit concerned about terrorism – not the slightest little bit – but I am plenty worried about governments starting to filter the net at the country level. Time to open a VPN business?
def pick_bogeyman bogeymen = [ 'terrorists' ] bogeymen << 'drug dealers' bogeymen << 'the mafia' bogeymen << 'child pornography' bogeymen.at(rand(4)) end