PTA, Please Open YouTube or Ban Tune.PK Too!

Just to recall your memories, PTA — on directions of Supreme Court of Pakistan — had blocked the access of YouTube in Pakistan on September 17th, 2012, because it contained blasphemous videos.

Majority of Pakistanis supported this ban then as YouTube decided not block those blasphemous videos in Pakistan (unlike it did in various other countries).

Since then — for more than three years now — Pakistanis are deprived of the YouTube and everyone is instead told that Tune.PK is going to fill the gap. We were of the same view, in fact we actively advocated for Tune.PK as an indigenous solution that can become a handy alternate for YouTube.

However, Tune.PK has taken a different route now that essentially kills its core slogan of being a Pakistani video sharing website. Instead they are aggressively marketing themselves as a platform to access YouTube videos.

Meaning that in addition to videos that are hosted on Tune.PK, users can access YouTube through Tune.PK chrome extension.

If you are wondering that how this is happening then you probably missed our this coverage, in which we specifically explained that how video sharing websites are using YouTube APIs to stream YouTube videos for users in Pakistan, despite the service is blocked in the country.

Now, when a gigantic website such as Tune.PK — with millions of views per day — submits to YouTube and starts showing YouTube videos in Pakistan, then there’s no point of keeping YouTube banned.

So here’s what Pakistan Telecommunication Authority should do:

• Lift ban on YouTube
• Block Tune.PK

As banning YouTube and letting Tune.PK to show YouTube videos is just mindless, incomprehensible and looks suspicious.

Same goes for every other video sharing website that is showing YouTube videos, but we focused on Tune.PK just because its a giant as compared to other small ventures.

And if Tune.PK believes that it can control content of YouTube, as people reporting the content will be removed from the index then its a shame for PTA. If a small start-up can manage YouTube content then why can’t PTA open the YouTube and start moderating the content itself?

Update:

Tune.PK was quick to post a response on their blog here and they have decided with withdraw their Chrome extension that allows streaming of YouTube videos in Pakistan.

Here’s what Tune.PK said:

Tune.pk had no plans of copying youtube, our vision idea was different and perhaps we diverted from it. 

Again we are going to take down this service and bringing a new model for content uploader. This can hurt us bad but that’s what we have already prepared for.

An email from ProPakistani is still awaiting response, in which we have asked them about the timeline for removal of this extension from Chrome store.

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