Bits:
When Carissa Snedeker went to log into her Blogspot account Wednesday evening at about 7:30, she had no idea what would be waiting for her. She had created her blog, Blue Lyon, three years ago and up until this point had very few problems posting new content. But this time a message from Google came up when she visited her dashboard.
“This blog has been locked due to possible Blogger Terms of Service violations,” the message stated. “You may not publish new posts until your blog is reviewed and unlocked.”
But a short time later Snedeker received an email from another blogger claiming that a number of anti-Obama blogs had been “hacked” that same night. After some digging it became apparent that several Blogspot accounts had been shut down because of similar spam issues, and nearly all of them had three things in common: Most were pro-Hillary Clinton blogs, all were anti-Barack Obama, and several were listed on justsaynodeal.com, an anti-Obama website.
“I also felt a little bit humiliated that someone would think to characterize my Blog as ’spam,’” she said. “I had no idea why it would be ’spam’ I assumed it was just some sort of mistake. I did think it was an isolated incident. I requested the Blogger review. I then went to the Hillary Clinton Forum, a place I frequently participate in on line discussions, and I saw Nobama’s post ‘Blogger just shut down my NObama Blog!!‘ Then when other Blogger blogs were affected, I knew it was more than coincidence.”
RELATED:
Just another example of how far some far left Obama supporters are willing to go to shut down criticism about the Obamessiah? Bloggasm and Stop The ACLU take a look.
I haven’t had much of a chance to dive too deeply into the controversy, but it wouldn’t be surprising to find out this indeed was happening, considering how so many far left Obama supporters react at the slightest hint of criticism of Barry Oh.
Welcome to “freedom of speech” Barack Hussein Obama, style. Don’t worry people, it’ll get worse
Word Press!? Are you going to allow “freedom of speech” intimidation and stifling?
The Tizona Group 
June 30, 2008, 2:26 pm at 2:26 pm
I highly doubt it. Blogspot actually have an entire system which is easily manipulated by click-bots for saying that a website is spam, and with WordPress I think you actually have to write them a personal email telling them your objections to such a site.
June 30, 2008, 2:31 pm at 2:31 pm
Has anyone actually looked for Blogger’s public response yet, or are you all just going reactionary hardcore and beating about like chicken-littles the sky is falling.
I understand you don’t support Obama, but without Blogger’s reaction your article is more than one-sided, its reactionary.
June 30, 2008, 2:41 pm at 2:41 pm
Marc, first I’ve heard of it, but rest assured, I’ll be looking. In case you didn’t notice from my response, I suspect it’s more click-bots than individual thinking.
And thank you for making your point politely and saliently, I certainly don’t support Obama. I think his policies aren’t what the US needs.
But they don’t let me vote for some reason. They keep telling me it’s because I’m Australian. Heh. Discrimination! /sarcasm and joking
June 30, 2008, 2:44 pm at 2:44 pm
Marc
There is nothing “reactionary hardcore” here, but your comment. This was just noticed this AM. No doubt Instapundit (being a Professor of Law) as well as others WILL look deeply into this.
Maybe YOU, Marc could give it a shot, as well. IF this is true or has validity…YOUR typed words MAY be affected, as well.
“Chicken-Little’s” do occur…Just a slow, tad a time…You know, like the erosion of the U.S. Constitution?
June 30, 2008, 2:55 pm at 2:55 pm
Chill. Steyn fucked the CHRC.
June 30, 2008, 2:58 pm at 2:58 pm
Mind you, with thanks to folks like Instapundit. And Steyn himself. And Levant. And Iowahawk. And LFG. And Blair. And Bolt. Crittenden… and a ton of us motherfuckers doing grass roots shit.
June 30, 2008, 3:35 pm at 3:35 pm
I do apologize if I offended anyone, I just hate it when people start shouting conspiracy theories before they know all the facts. This was about the 12th blog I’d run into on the subject this morning and not a single one had posted if there was a response from Blogger yet.
The way the blogosphere works is everyone keeps repeating this stuff and soon it becomes “absolute truth” that the Obama campaign directed Blogger and Google to shut down the blogs, when really, everything is based on speculation.
June 30, 2008, 4:21 pm at 4:21 pm
#7 You gotta work harder than that to offend us, mate (AUD), pal (USD), fellow Earth warrior
(EUD).
PS BUT. You really think Obama is that innocent???
June 30, 2008, 4:22 pm at 4:22 pm
No need to apologize Marc…What WE BOTH should do is get to the bottom of this. I may not vote for Obama, you won’t vote for McCain…but the presumption here is…WE are both American.
If that is correct, what is going on, or seems to be, affects us. Sides don’t count.
June 30, 2008, 5:20 pm at 5:20 pm
My request for an answer from Google Help Center.
This is VERY Troubling. Does anyone know what is happening?
Is the above true or has someone hacked Google Blogs?
An answer MUST to be forthcoming.
June 30, 2008, 5:33 pm at 5:33 pm
Well, the guy who spouted the “whitey” claims without any hard evidence is hardly a good source for any article. He essentially wrote a story about a video he’d never seen that his friends had heard of secondhand but never seen either. Rumormill at its worst.
Also, most large sites use user moderation because it is impossible to dedicate the staff to monitoring the sites. You either have to accept the user moderation or give up having open access blog sites is what it boils down to.
I realize WordPress uses an e-mail policy but it also doesn’t boast the number of users Blogger does.
Finally, do I believe Obama is “that innocent.” I think he’s as much a political pragmatist as the next time, which is why I believe he’d never bother to be as petty as shutting down anti-Obama blogs. Let’s face it, left or right wing bloggers are an unstoppable hydra for politicians ( a good thing and bad thing) in that no matter the attempts to stomp out opinions they always crop up somewhere else, and is evident on this comments string, often with renewed energy.
Obama has realized the way to counter a blog attack is to counter-blog, or use a website like fightthesmears. If anti-obama blogs have been shut down it wasn’t at his campaigns behest, it was the actions of unaffiliated supporters who very misguidedly think they are supporting their candidate.
June 30, 2008, 5:58 pm at 5:58 pm
I would only point out that WordPress has gotten some bad… er… press for hosting many pro-Islamist sites, and shutting down a few antis. Wish I could find the link, but I’m pretty sure it was Instapundit or Jawa Report that clued me in.
July 1, 2008, 1:22 pm at 1:22 pm
Blogger and Blogspot have always been problematic, going down at the least overload. WordPress seems to be a bit better at managing. Whether this is a concerted effort to shut up anti-Obama blogs or not, I can’t say, but the history of a lot of Obama supporters is such that I wouldn’t be at all surprised.
April 8, 2009, 10:21 am at 10:21 am
Hello !! ^_^
My name is Piter Kokoniz. oOnly want to tell, that your posts are really interesting
And want to ask you: is this blog your hobby?
Sorry for my bad english:)
Tnx!
Piter.
April 8, 2009, 3:10 pm at 3:10 pm
Hi. Yeah, it’s just a hobby, a labour of love.