Ugandan government blocks Google Play Store, Apple App Store, and YouTube

Post by diminish » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 7:47 AM UTC

kstenerud wrote: post #288

mc32 wrote: post #4

Given how given to certain narratives some of these services are, I’m not surprised and I would predict more governments will do similar things pre-election. Now of course most of the governments that would do this would be authoritarian and would look to control their own narrative, I think this illustrates how unbalanced and agenda-driven these media and social graph services have become who bring in foreign values…

> Now of course most of the governments that would do this would be authoritarian Would they be? Consider what just happened in the USA: All of the major social media companies blocked a significant portion of the population because of the attempted subversion of democracy in the country. Now imagine if some similar subversion were attempted in another country, say Ecuador? Would these social media companies be as wi…

Post by jariel » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 7:49 AM UTC

rattlesnakedave wrote: post #42

Does anyone else feel like we’re going down the path of internet Balkanization? Not in any immediate sense, but it seems like a slow rolling type of narrative that we will retrospectively see at the end of the 21st century. I don’t have any _real_ evidence to support this feeling of mine, but occasionally there are blips like this that make me wonder.

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 8:03 AM UTC

Synaesthesia wrote: post #280

jhanschoo wrote: post #267

Can someone with more familiarity with Ugandan politics comment? My understanding is that outside developed states, lawful democracy can be very brittle especially in states containing multiple nations and tribes, and when there is a long history where the people tend to put their own nation and tribe before the others in the same state, leading to conflict. The rationale and measure seems to be a better evil if the…

Uganda is ruled by a virtual military dictatorship. There is substantial democratic opposition which is suppressed by the govt. It's quite an oppressive country, you see soldiers in black patrolling the streets on trucks.

Post by depressedpanda » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 8:09 AM UTC

BlueTemplar wrote: post #18

tester756 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how's "app store" critical infrastructure? internet access should be enough

It's critical for those people who's only computer is an iPhone.

Post by emteycz » Sun, Jan 10, 2021, 8:12 AM UTC

Blikkentrekker wrote: post #298

kstenerud wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now of course most of the governments that would do this would be authoritarian Would they be? Consider what just happened in the USA: All of the major social media companies blocked a significant portion of the population because of the attempted subversion of democracy in the country. Now imagine if some similar subversion were attempted in another country, say Ecuador? Would these social media companies be as wi…

It's an interesting point I had not yet considered that most private internet censorship seems to relate to some political issue or moral value that primarily plays in the U.S.A.. That, and of course financially complying with pressure from the Chinese government to be tough on whatever independence movement it struggle with now — Catalonia was of course free to chant it's independence.