June 22, 2005 — (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — In response to recently introduced Chinese government regulation that requires all private Web site and blog owners to register with the government, bloggers are considering moving their sites outside of China with the help of other bloggers.
The “Adopt a Chinese Blog” project is designed to help Chinese and other bloggers facing censorship find a safe haven for their sites. Blogs will “adopt” blocked blogs, running them independent of their hosts via a blog publishing service such as Blogger and Movable Type.
A blog adopting another blog should not have any significant readership in the country where the blog being adopted is based.
Project organizers say they are introducing this program in order to protect free speech and further shape the Internet as a tool for the free exchange of ideas around the world.
The Chinese government is well known for its hard line on political dissent, which has extended to the Internet. Blogs and private Web sites are of particular concern to the Chinese government because they can be fertile ground for political dissent. According to Chinese blog hosting provider cnblog.org, China has approximately 700,000 Weblogs.
