China, Internet Behavior, and Censorship

Attending a press conference for the Canadian Internet Project - a partner of the World Internet Project - a couple of months ago, I was struck by some of the survey data on citizen attitudes and orientations towards Internet use around the world. One area that stood out was the political. I would have thought that it went without saying that the presence of the Internet offers a valuable resource with which to share political points of view, criticize the government, and more. But stunningly, a jaded public in North America doesn't seem to believe that the Internet helps them as citizens, or "provides more opportunity to criticize the government." Really? The lowest number of all was in Sweden. Probably, it's no coincidence that in societies that are highly literate and comfortable with free speech, citizens believe they don't get anything "extra" out of the Internet that they wouldn't already have through other means. I'd call that naive, but that's the type of response you get, I guess, when freedom is taken for granted, and when great access to the Internet has been available to everyone. The Internet now seems a bit like electricity -- shrug, so what? Well, it's a big deal in some places. Page Zero Media, a marketing consultancy which focuses on maximizing clients' paid search marketing campaigns.