Insult Laws Reigning Supreme in Thailand

When Thailand blocked YouTube last year, Google, which owns the video-sharing Web site, sent its deputy general counsel, Nicole Wong, to help restore access. In Bangkok, a sea of yellow shirts stunned her.

It was a Monday, when Thais wear yellow to honor King Bhumibol Adulyadej. Seeing their reverence, Wong said she grasped why officials reacted so strongly to a video blending a picture of Bhumibol with graffiti - an image that violated a law against insulting the king. Google agreed to block the clip in Thailand while leaving it available elsewhere, and YouTube returned to Thai computers.

Along with other American Internet companies, Google, which owns the world's most popular online search and video sites, is learning to live with countries that "don't share the same baseline" about the Web, Wong, 39, said in an interview at Google's headquarters in Mountain View, California.

Read the rest of this Bloomberg article here.