First, though, the facts: YouTube use from China started dropping off the map sometime Monday night, with traffic nearly reaching a standstill by Tuesday morning. Google (which owns YouTube) has confirmed the apparent ban, though its staff is not certain of the cause.

"We do not know the reason for the blockage, and we're working as quickly as possible to restore access to our users in China," a spokesperson says.

Google does believe the Chinese government knowingly cut the access. The spokesperson, however, questions why officials wouldn't have just blocked a specific video, as they've done before, rather than nixing the entire site.

Conflicting Messages

Here's where things get interesting: A Chinese Foreign Ministry official his nation is not scared of the Internet -- in fact, he says, it embraces the exchange of electronic information.