The Real Internet Menace
In Egypt, however, after a five-minute court session, a blogger was sentenced to four years in prison for insulting Islam and insulting the country's president, Hosni Mubarak.
According to BBC News, "Egypt arrested a number of bloggers who had been critical of the government during 2006, but they were all subsequently freed."
And while the prospect of "Internet addiction" here in the United States might generate an amusing story on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, in China, your parents might send you to rehab for it.
As countries like South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam have taken legislative measures to limit the amount of time teens spend online, China has gone far further than just banning youths from Internet cafes – the government is helping to fund eight inpatient Internet addiction rehab facilities across the country.
Few patients (from ages 12 to 24) are at one facility willingly. "Most have been forced to come by their parents, who are paying upward of $1,300 a month -- about 10 times the average salary in China -- for the treatment," writes the Washington Post. Treatment entails "a tough-love approach that includes counseling, military discipline, drugs, hypnosis and mild electric shocks."