Folks,

Looking here again this morning I see that there were more problems I missed last night. There are so many connections between typepad and China that are blocked that when I edit a post, pieces of it quite literally disappear. I just realized large chunks of text are simply gone from the posts. The one post I actually managed to make from typepads web interface actually reported a ping back to a prc server. It only flashed on the screen so I didn't get to capture it.

I'll be digging back through trying to fix them. This is turning into quite the challenge. I've started using ecto to post which is the only way to effectively do it from here, but any changes to my posts really do damage to them (and as I'm new to ecto, I'm making mistakes that I want to fix).

The iTunes store is now blocked in China as well, causing its own issues.

I linked to the story in the Guardian yesterday of the women in in their 70's being sentenced to a re-education program, and I also met one of the photographers who was roughed up in covering a protest before the Olympics started.

There are more interesting stories developing; if you read BoingBoing or follow xenijardin on twitter you'll see those.

As I've been here, I've seen sites blocked one day that were open the day before. I can't get to CNN mobile on my iPhone, and most of the political blog pages on CNN are blocked.

It's interesting to speak with western journalists who've been here for a months or years to hear how they cope with it. The challenges in covering a story could be more interesting than the story itself.