Bagan ISP, one of the two internet service providers under MPT (Myanmar Post and Telecommunication), has started banning more websites, including blogs with their own domains.
[1]Screenshot of Global Voices website being banned in Myanmar
Some of the newest addition to the ban list includes twitter [2], wordpress [3] (and its subdomain blogs), and Global Voices [4].
Htoo Tayzar [5], one of the bloggers who has his own domain, wrote:
Actually, this is not the first time (that my site has been banned). Since 2007, Bagan (MTP) has banned the entire blogspot.com. At that time, I was still writing in blog, and when I refreshed the page, I first saw that it was banned. At that time, MPT's side is still open. So I moved to the cyber-cafe that uses MPT connection. That didn't last long. After about 2 weeks, MPT has also banned (Blogspot). After that, I bought my own domain.
However, Htoo Tayzar wrote that in the beginning of 2009, he saw his domain being banned, so he sent a request to the ISP to open it back. After about 2 days, his website, including the other 5 websites he included in the mail was re-opened. Today is the second time that it has been banned. It's banned only in Bagan connection but open in MPT.
The ISPs have banned Blogspot and its subdomains since 2007, so some of the bloggers who were blogging in Blogspot bought their own domains so that their readers can easily view them.
Nyi Lynn Seck [6], one of the bloggers who bought his own domain wrote:
I am sorry. My blog has now been banned by Bagan ISP. I bought my own domain with my own money, and redirected it so that the readers can easily view my site when they (ISP) started banning Blogspot and WordPress. Now, I can't do anything anymore. However, I have been writing in my blog since 2005, and I will continue to write here. No matter how blogs are banned, because there is Mail to Blogger system, where I can e-mail the posts from any address, I will continue to write in my blog. I value my life as a blogger, for every post I had written, I had put a lot of effort in writing my experiences,
There are currently two service providers – Bagan ISP (Myanmar Teleport) and MPT ISP. Some of the websites that has been banned in Bagan ISP are not yet banned in MPT ISP and vice-versa.