Microsoft Faces Backlash after Site of Prominent China Blogger is Deleted

From Forbes:

"Microsoft is again facing a public relations backlash after a Chinese web blog hosted on its MSN Spaces service was allegedly shut down.

The MSN Spaces-hosted blog of Michael Anti, a Beijing-based researcher for the New York Times, was closed down after he had posted articles critical of a management purge at Beijing News."

"The Beijing News had printed a string of sensitive stories, including on police beatings of villagers, as well as routine scathing editorials on a host of problems including corruption."


China's #1 Portal Sina.com is also being criticized for censorship

From Danwei:

"Yesterday Danwei reported news that the Guangming Group had taken control of The Beijing News — Beijing's best newspaper — from its more liberal and truth-minded joint venture partner the Nanfang Group. The Guangming Group is controlled directly by the Ministry of Publicity (neé Ministry of Propaganda), and it seems that most editors and journalists in Beijing believe the newspaper will soon go the the dogs under Guangming's leadership.

An editor at The Beijing News named Wang Xiaoshan responded to the hostile takeover on his blog with a post in large highlighted characters:
There's no way to retreat, so we won't retreat. The butcher's knife is already raised... We're going to die so let's make it a beautiful death.

But Wang Xiaoshan's blog is hosted on Sina.com's blogging service; less than 24 hours after he published his battle cry, Sina's censors deleted it from his blog, together with all comments that readers had made to the post."