HONG KONG - Global Voices' Northeast Asia editor and Interlocals.net founder Oiwan Lam faces obscenity charges for posting an essay with an artistic photo of a topless woman on InMedia Hong Kong, a local citizen media website.
On May 11, Lam posted the essay criticizing and protesting against the Obscene Articles Tribunal of the Hong Kong Television and Entertainment Licensing Authority's classification of articles as obscene, even if they only published links to erotic photography on sites including Flickr, the photo sharing site owned by Yahoo! Lam displayed and linked the photo as part of a protest against the fining of a man who posted links to porn sites in an online discussion group. Lam also was upset about the Chinese University of Hong Kong student newspaper being deemed indecent for printing a questionnaire about sexual behavior.
Lam's essay on InMedia HK included the topless photo and also asked readers to post links to sites with erotic material. Lam was asked by TELA on May 28 to remove the offending photo and essay and she refused. She defended herself by stating online, "In the guidelines of the largest photograph storage and sharing company (Flikr) in the world, this photograph is regarded as acceptable, and it is quite prominent in terms of search results. But the Hong Kong authorities have defined it as indecent. Where should we define the boundary for netizen and public acceptance?"
Flikr launched a new Chinese-language service in mid-June but has refused to respond to Lam's request for defense. On June 22, TELA passed Lam's case to OAT (without notifying Lam or InMedia) and on June 26, the article was classified as "Class II indecent." If convicted of the charge, she faces a maximum penalty of one year in jail and a fine of HK $400,000 (about US $51,162).
Rebecca MacKinnon, who writes at Global Voices Online, explained on Monday that, "Whether or not she ends up doing jail time, she certainly faces a long, drawn-out court battle and series of appeals, and if she loses, will end up paying a hefty fine. People in the media business with experience fighting such cases also point out that the implications of a conviction are quite serious, because the conviction is passed to all governments and would affect her ability to get visas."
Lam's court date has been set for August 15.
