Iran launches YouTube-like website

TEHRAN, Iran Iran says it has launched a video-sharing website in the latest move to create government-sanctioned alternatives to Internet powerhouses such as YouTube.

The Web page of Iranian state TV says the new site -- Mehr, or affection in Farsi -- seeks to promote Iranian and Islamic culture and artists. It's unclear, however, how heavily the site, www.mehr.ir, will be monitored or censored.

Western websites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are blocked by Iranian officials, who claim Western bloggers and governments are waging a "soft war" against the Islamic Republic.

Iran also says it is seeking to create its own Internet universe scrubbed of Western content, but experts in cyber-technology question whether any country can completely break away from it.

[Forty-Four]

"Soft war?"

Really? Most of the negative things said about that religion come from misunderstandings from the media. You blocking the sites certainly doesn't help your case, nor does it give your people the chance to try and change that either

[GeorgeKafantaris]

Hiding from the world is proof enough that the Iranian regime cannot withstand scrutiny even from its own people.
And with Assad on the way out -- and perhaps Chavez going before him -- the regime will get lonely. Indeed, the only friend left might be Kim Jong-un.
In the end, this stubborn, myopic, and anachronistic theocratic regime has succeeded in turning Iran into another North Korea.
Yet these two countries could just as easily have become economic and technology powerhouses for the good of their people.
Iran's loss is worse because the regime has foregone its chance to set a new path towards the country's Persian greatness -- not as a military power, but as a technology and industrial leader of the Middle East. This is hard to do when a country is in deep isolation.
"If you can't beat them, join them" might be an American proverb, but the Iranian and Korean regimes will be glad when they eventually figure it out.