The 2008 Golden Scissors of Cyber-Championship, Clothilde Le Coz

From Week One’s readings, I found the 2008 Golden Scissors of Cyber-Championship by Clothilde Le Coz the most interesting article. I think living in Australia we really take for granted our freedom of information and expression.
I find this reading really emphasises the power of the web and how much of a threat it can be, and the lengths a government will go to have complete control over its citizens, even $7 billion worth in China. I thought it was pretty funny thinking about sitting in an internet cafe in Aust and a policemans head popping up and warning me he's watching what I do.
The writer named Iran the best crackdown and told us how things like YouTube were banned. I thought it was good they way he described the web as a 'vehicle of social expression' for the oppressed in Iran, particularly the women.
It talked about the incident with Yahoo and the Chinese citizen who was jailed after being reported by US Company Yahoo! to the Chinese authorities for having posted "foreign based websites an internal memo sent to his paper by the authorities". I guess foreign relations is more important to the US than some guys freedom?
Then it talked about the censorship in Zimbabwe, how the national telecommunications company TelOne is controlled by the government, and one of the agreements for controlling access to online communications is to "take the necessary steps" to prevent the spread of illegal content on the Net. Imagine taking a stab at Rudd and then being "taken care of". I can't picture it.
Le Coz talks about the incident concerning Reporter Without Borders and Cuba, and how internet access has been limited even further. Theres only one internet cafe available in Havana, and private internet connections are illegal, and jail is a consequence of accessing it.
I just find it so amazing and so hard to imagine the government trying to impose such restrictions on the Australian people. I highly doubt it would ever work.