The Thai government retained a ban on the Youtube.com Web site on Thursday, despite the removal of a short film deemed insulting to the king. Although the offending video was withdrawn, the site continued to feature at least one still frame from the contentious 44-second clip. "[Getting rid of the video] is not enough," said Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom, the minister of information and technology. "We want the picture removed too before we unblock it." After the site was blocked and news of the ban circulated, the number of viewers of the video skyrocketed, with more than 40,000 visiting the site in about 24 hours. Total views reached 66,553 before the video was pulled.
AP
AP