While the statute could limit online video to state-controlled media sites and ban foreign-owned video-hosting sites like YouTube and MySpace, it may also go unenforced, serving more as a threat to coerce video-hosting sites to police themselves. Rather than banning sites like YouTube altogether, says Ben Edelman, a professor at Harvard Business School and an Internet filtering researcher, Beijing’s new rules may be “a shot across the bow.”

This is only the latest measure taken by the Chinese government in this recent cycle of repression. Others include the arrest of blogger and activist Hu Jia, the hijacking of the Beijing Association of Online Media and the increased repression of religious groups.

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Update: ONI has translated the law in question into English.