It seems that the Internet is neither the republic of virtue, nor a utopian society. The skepticism would be shared by many netizens.
 
Alibaba.com, a business-to-business trading portal, named on its website over 1,000 dishonest vendors, whose thousands of victims don't trust online traders any more. Exposed to the peril of computer viruses, netizens are careful when surfing Web pages.

At the beginning of Internet era, intellectuals envisioned an online republic of virtue, where people used the Internet freely and stick to their self-disciplines.

Unsurprisingly, this failed. The Internet just mirrors the real world, where chaos, disputes, and cheats occur on a daily basis. There are 2 billion netizens and the Web is still expanding.

The vastness of this virtual world leads to questions ranging from users' privacy to national security. The more convenience Internet offers, the more risks it poses to us.

The responsibility of regulating this chaotic world has to be taken by the body that controls most of the social resources –  the government. It supervises online business and scrutinizes content to protect specific groups and people's privacy.

This has become a global standard.

However, in some people's views, the necessary regulation is equal to coercion and censorship, which should be fundamentally opposed.

This is a distortion of the truth.

Absolute freedom exists neither in a real nor a virtual world. All activities online must be subject to laws and sometimes morality.

There should be boundaries to freedom as one group's freedom shouldn't trample the others'.

Thus, the regulator should be not only the government but also netizens themselves.

People's Daily