Posted: Fri May 20, 2005 3:01 pm Post subject: A Blog on Life in Qatar
Since people ask this now and again, here is a blog that I found posted on the Lonely Planet Thorn Tree.
The blogger is an American Muslim who has moved with his family to Qatar. Some may accuse him of being overly positive about life in the country, and I didn't notice what employment he is in. He does cover many of the controversial stories in the local news though, so he isn't sugar coating all.
"We apologize the site you are attempting to visit has been blocked due to its content being inconsistent with the religious, cultural, political and moral values of the United Arab Emirates."
I'm so glad that the UAE protected your virtue BD.
It took me awhile, but I finally figured out which pictures were censored. (I think... january 1 entry?) It was the article about the camel jockeys!!! There was a photo of some kids on the camels and then a close-up of one of the boys.
"We apologize the site you are attempting to visit has been blocked due to its content being inconsistent with the religious, cultural, political and moral values of the United Arab Emirates."
How bad exactly is the censorship in UAE and is there a way around it?
On home internet connections, which have to go through the proxy server of the sole telecoms provider, anything sexual is blocked and anything critical of the UAE is likely to be. Normally it's a whole site that's blocked, not individual pictures, so maybe these pictures were hosted on a different site from the others - I haven't checked that out. Sometimes they do pick up on a single article from a website that's otherwise permitted; for example, one of the travel articles in the Guardian (UK newspaper) that made a few comments about bad taste in Dubai's architecture, lifestyle, etc, was blocked - but it took them a week or two to spot it, by which time most people had already read it and chuckled over it and it was off the regular site anyway.
The international newspapers online, plus BBC, CNN etc are all available and not censored - not till the news is cold anyway.
The universities and colleges - and major companies with dedicated internet services, I believe - have unrestricted access but only onsite, so you can't log in from home through your college service.
Last edited by younggeorge on Sat May 21, 2005 5:32 pm; edited 1 time in total
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