My Life in China

As well known China has a troubled relationship to the internet, behind the Great Firewall of China websites such as Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, the New York Times, LinkedIn, IMDB, Flickr, Blogspot and Wikileaks are banned and one is unable to visit them unless one uses a VPN service. Now the Chinese government takes further steps to control and limit its citizens' usage of internet, it will introduce the odd-even rule that has worked well in curbing increasing traffic in larger cities.



The odd-even rule usually applies to car's licence plates so if you have an even number on your licence plate you are only allowed to drive that car on even dates, and cars with odd number on the licence plate can only be driven on odd dates. The odd-even rule will now apply to IP-addresses, if you have an even IP-address you will only be able to use the internet on even dates. There has been an outcry among young Chinese netizens but so far the policy makers stand firm. The rules are expected to be enforced by the ISPs next month.