Those Wacky Turkmen

Here's a story... From Turkmenistan!

Turkmen President Saparmurat Niyazov has banned the playing of recorded music at all public events, on television and at weddings.

In a decree, Mr Niyazov said there was a need to protect Turkmen culture from "negative influences".

This is the latest move by the authoritarian president to minimise foreign influence in the isolated former Soviet state, analysts say.

He has already banned opera and ballet, describing them as "unnecessary".

This is similar to the French "Google rival" that's being developed as a counter to Google's efforts to put fifteen million English language books online. It all seems pretty silly to me; the way to solve this kind of problem is to use the technology to spread and catalogue your own culture, not deny people the technology in some misguided attempt to deny them access to other people's cultures.