China postpones the controversial 'Green Dam' web filter

The Chinese government has decided to delay the requirement that computer manufacturers install their Green Dam filtering software.

BEIJING - China postponed a plan to require personal computer makers to supply Internet-filtering software Tuesday, retreating in the face of protests by Washington and Chinese Web surfers just hours before it was due to take effect.

The rule would have required manufacturers to include filtering software known as Green Dam with every computer produced for sale in China starting Wednesday.

A two-sentence announcement by the government's Xinhua News Agency said regulators "will delay" the plan but gave no indication whether it might take effect later. It gave no other details.

And it's all thanks to the drubbing they took from the cranky geeks of post-gazette.com's TechTalk.  Or so they'd like to think.