Simon Roughneen has an article/blog post for PBS’ Media Shift program. Key excerpts:

“Today I have to go all the way to Khon Kaen to report to the police,” said Chiranuch Premchaipoen, the editor of Thailand’s well-known online news site Prachatai during a recent conversation in Bangkok.
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“We have changed our domain name eight times since April,” she said, referring to the month when Thailand’s military-civilian-run Center for Resolution of Emergency Situation (CRES) pulled Prachatai into its swelling dragnet of blocked websites. It did so by citing threats to national security and stability amid violent protests in the center of Bangkok.
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According to a recent Thammasat University report, “Control and Censorship of Online Media, through the Use of Laws and Imposition of Thai State Policies,” just under 75,000 websites are blocked by Thai censors. The report’s authors argue that this is in contravention of Section 45 of the Thai Constitution, which says, “[a] person shall enjoy the liberty to express his opinion, make speech, write, print, publicise, and make expression by other means.” (The report is not yet available online.)
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Teepagorn “Champ ” Wuttipitayamongkol manages the youth and lifestyle-oriented website exteen.com, which he says gets 300,000 unique visitors per day. He lamented to PBS MediaShift that he “has been called in by the police, though his site has nothing to do with politics.”

Commenting on how political turmoil can sometimes engage Thai youth, he did say that “when the political incident took place they freely share their thoughts on my site.” However, if one user makes a complaint about another user, citing lese-majeste to the police, the police are in turn obliged to investigate.

While Thailand has regressed in terms of freedom of expression, it must be acknowledged that researching or writing a story like this would be much more difficult in some other Southeast Asian countries, such as Laos or Vietnam, and downright dangerous-to-impossible in Burma, which is usually covered by reporters based in Thailand.

BP: That final paragraph is also important because it does affect the quantity of the coverage in the international media as it is easier to criticize the Thai government on what they censor or try to suppress. The government is concerned on how it is portrayed although they will then try to paint themselves as defenders of the monarchy. Nevertheless, it does not mean that the criticism of the government for censorship is not factual.

When BP says government BP is referring to all parts of the government including the military and bureaucrats and should not be taken to mean that Abhisit sits on a room and sees things he doesn’t like online and orders the site banned or someone to be arrested. BP doesn’t think he does and well censorship can sometimes cause him more problems. He is not completely powerless about doing something, but well he is picking his battles with them and this focus on doing something has dropped way down the list of as he tries . Also, shutting off some forms of criticism of his government particularly up-country also helps him.

To clarify something, about some forms of censorship hurting Abhisit more, BP is referring to online censorship and particularly Prachatai. Although, no doubt Prachatai is more cautious as you have self-censorship, the webboard was shut down, and they have had to change their URL multiple times. This going after Chiranuch hasn’t really been that effective when you look at the criticism in return (i.e to put it crudely a cost-benefit analysis would show there are better methods of censorship). Yes, there is no Prachatai webboard, but many others have popped up (i.e www.internetfreedom.us). Now, not every user can find these other sources of information, but in an online environment it is much easier to find alternative sources. Now, compare that with shutting down community radio stations, red shirt TV, and some red shirt magazines.  If your community radio station or red shirt channel is shut down and there is no other station, well that is. You need to look at other methods of finding information – there is still SMS and local chatter – but unless there is another community radio station or TV station your access is also much more greatly affected compared with a web user. Also, there is no single poster child for the print and broadcast media like Chiranuch has become – it also helps that her arrest is about not deleting comments and she is facing such a long prison term. So forgive BP for being slightly cynical when Abhisit says he regrets the Prachatai case and that a factor in this regret is not the problems it causes albeit mainly from the international media. This is not to say that the online censorship and suppression does not create a climate of fear, it does, and it certainly works to a certain extent.

On Chiranuch, also see this interview with her by France24 and some quotes from her in this article in AFP. An excerpt:

Chiranuch Premchaiporn’s air of cheerful optimism crumpled briefly as she contemplated the threat of 70 years in prison — for remarks about the Thai monarchy that other people posted on her website.

“People ask, ‘why don’t you flee or escape?’ But it is not my choice at all. I grew up in Thailand. I am part of this society,” the 43-year-old editor of the popular Prachatai news website said.

“I still hope that I will be defended by the fact that I complied with the law,” she told AFP in an interview.

Chiranuch was arrested in September as she returned home from attending a cyber freedom seminar in Hungary.
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Chiranuch, who is now free on bail, believes Thailand’s government has tried to promote self-censorship.

“They create a kind of fear and there is no need to be accountable at all,” she said. “They try to control or silence the voice of the people.”