Journalist-bloggers admit site closure was part of joke

Tuesday March 14th 2006, 10:26 am
Filed under: Newspapers

The international community was last week again outraged by the closure of two more blogs in China, when censors apparently targeted Massage Cream, run by Beijing journalist Wang Xiaofeng, and Milkpig, penned by a journalist in Guangzhou. Yet there was something strange about this most recent action. Milkpig did not usually tackle sensitive issues, while Massage Cream was primarily known for commenting on the news using ’sophisticated metaphors’. Nevertheless, Reporters Without Borders condemned the unplugging of Massage Cream and Milkpig, only to find out their ‘closure’ was part of an elaborate joke. The international community was not laughing. To Milkpig’s credit, the blogger has since apologised. ‘I like to make jokes but apparently this time it didn’t make everyone laugh. My intention was not to make fools of you. I don’t want you or the foreign media to think that.’ (South China Morning Post, Asia Media, March 14, 2006)

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