China Blocks Flickr

You know you’re big when China blocks you. That’s what they’re doing to Flickr on the 18th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.

The popular Internet photo site Flickr said that its service is being blocked in China, although the Yahoo subsidiary did not directly blame the Beijing government, which aggressively censors the Internet of material it deems subversive.

The blocking, which began Thursday, is keeping Internet users across a large part of China from viewing photos on Flickr, home to millions of snapshots of everything from birthday parties to beach vacations to nudes.

The Web site also hosts a smattering of images that may be frowned upon by Chinese censors, including student protesters in Tiananmen Square in 1989, which includes the famous photo of a man blocking the progress of Chinese army tanks, and bodies of students who were killed in the streets as part of a government crackdown.

To see what all the fuss is about, check out this slideshow of Tiananmen Square massacre photos from just one Flickr user. He’s not the only one documenting that horror, either. You’ll see why the Chinese government fears Flickr.