Tweets censorship triggers global outrage

Twitter, the global megaphone for dissidents and activist around the world become the target of outrage by the same users after it announced yesterday that it would allow country-specific censorship of tweets if it breaks local laws (See: Twitter to censor tweets on a country-by-country basis).

Dissidents and activists fear that the San Francisco-based company's new policy would stifle free speech and thousands of its 100 million users, mainly overseas, are threatening to boycott Twitter, which just a year ago championed free speech by saying in a blogpost 'the tweets must flow'.

The social microblogging site yesterday made a stunning reversal of its stated policy by saying in a blogpost that it will now block specific tweets on a country-by-country basis should the messages violate the laws of those countries.

Yesterday's announcement ironically comes exactly the day after the first anniversary of the Arab Spring on 25 January, and has taken Arab users by surprise as the 140-character tweets played a pivotal role in the political protests and uprisings in Egypt, Bahrain, Tunisia and Syria.

Users immediately responded to Twitter's reversal of policy decision with a barrage of tweets - proposing a boycott today and demanded that the censorship initiative be scrapped.

The boycott of Twitter is being promulgated by the hashtag #TwitterBlackout and most of it is expected to come from the Middle East.