Limewire Goes Political, Fights Iranian Regime’s Censorship
Limewire has followed the recent trend of many p2p networks and file sharing sites which have become involved with distributing information about the protests against the Iranian election. After videos of the demonstrations together with the aggressive response against protesters have surfaced on BitTorrent, and then the Pirate Bay has even set a web forum to declare their support for the opposition in Iran, now Limewire comes forward with its own political statement.
Towards the end of last week Limewire introduced a splash screen asking users to share videos related to the protests in Iran. The company explained the request:
"Iran has been limiting its own citizens' and the world's access to coverage of the post-election protests by blocking sites distributing such material. Peer-to-peer software, like Lime Wire, provides access to critical information and coverage of the events in a manner that the Iranian government cannot effectively block."
Clicking on the splash screen in question triggers a download of a zipped 110 MB archive of videos from the much debated country. This Zip file originates in the company’s servers, and users are encouraged to unzip it and put it for share afterwards.
This movement from Limewire is meant as a firm stand against current Iranian government’s policy of concealing any detail regarding the recent events in the country:
"The Iranian government has been limiting the free flow of information in the wake of their presidential elections. Lime Wire takes no stance on the election itself, but we strongly believe in internet and information freedom."
Below we posted a video shot by the BBC, one of those which people were asked to share (Note: some of the images may contain violent scenes!) :
