Brown Blocks Comments on His YouTube Channel

The British government has tried to harness the power of the Internet, but for Gordon Brown, the Web’s been prickly: a video of him picking his nose, for example, has been viewed far more often than recent policy address. Now the prime minister’s team has disabled comments on its YouTube portal, saying that moderating them would be a mammoth task, the Times of London reports.

“In terms of allowing people to comment online, we need to adhere to the Civil Service code: no content on the website can be party-political. We would need to monitor and moderate all comments,” said a spokeswoman. The PM is on Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr. But “do they really think they are going to win over one extra voter with this stuff?” asks a political blogger. “All interaction is another way of people saying they hate you.” (More Gordon Brown stories.)