Press freedom in the US blocked?

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "David P. Reed" <dpreed () reed com>
Date: Fri, 04 Apr 2003 11:55:47 -0500
To: dave Farber <dave () farber net>
Subject: For IP: Press freedom in the US blocked?

If there is a shadow of US Gov't intervention behind the unwillingness to
let Americans connect to al-Jazeera, ...  perhaps some more pro-freedom,
pro-democracy Internet company would like to step up to the bar here.
Maybe a French or German one could show what freedom of speech is about?
Vivendi or Bertelsmann?

U.S. firm Akamai cuts ties with al-Jazeera TV-NYT
Reuters
Apr 4 2003 7:23AM

NEW YORK, April 4 (Reuters) - Akami Technologies Inc. <AKAM.O
<aol://4785:AKAM> >, a U.S. Web content delivery firm, has scrapped a
contract to provide services for Arabic news network al-Jazeera's Internet
site, the New York Times reported on Friday.

Akamai, based in Cambridge, Massaschusetts, would not comment on the reason
for the contract cancellation. But Jeff Young, a company spokesman,
confirmed in a statement to the Times that Akamai would no longer do
business with al-Jazeera.

"Akamai worked briefly this week with al-Jazeera to understand the issues
they are having distributing their Web sites," Young was quoted by the Times
as saying. 

"We ultimately decided not to continue a customer relationship with
al-Jazeera, and we are not going to be providing them our services," he
added. 

The newspaper report did not mention the value of the contract.

Young did not immediately return calls seeking comment early on Friday.

In their response, employees at al-Jazeera headquarters in Doha, Qatar said
they were frustrated by the decision though not entirely surprised, the
Times said. 

"It has nothing to do with technical issues," said Joanne Tucker, the
managing editor of the English-language site. "It's nonstop political
pressure on these companies not to deal with us."

<SNIP>
http://my.aol.com/news/news_story.psp?type=3&cat=0541&id=03040407235420003
<http://my.aol.com/news/news_story.psp?type=3&amp;cat=0541&amp;id=0304040723
5420003> 

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