Over the years, numerous bans on Pakistani blogs have been arbitrarily imposed and lifted. Only recently, the Google-owned blog hosting software Blogspot was barred by the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) after a court order ruled that all sites containing blasphemous content should remain inaccessible within the country. But the blogosphere is, by definition, a space for resistance and free expression. After a small blogging community in Pakistan launched a sustained online campaign for the restoration of Blogspot, the ban was lifted.

And now, in a surprise twist, the government has softened its stance towards this emerging, yet feisty, medium. Today, the Sindh government is hosting the ‘First National Bloggers Conference 2009’ in an effort to ‘recognize blogging as an alternative medium and source of information’.

This change of heart is no doubt welcome in an environment where free speech is once again under threat. But why now? Can it really be that the Pakistani government sees the benefit in empowering citizen journalists and encouraging voices of dissent? Or are the authorities working by the old adage, know thy enemy, before they face the same problems with bloggers as their counterparts in Egypt and China. Not surprisingly, some wary voices in the blogging community are voicing their fears that this might be an attempt by the government to rein them in.

Dawn.com’s Salman Siddiqui will be live blogging the conference from the Regent Plaza, Karachi, in an attempt to determine the fate of Pakistani blogging. Bloggers - those attending the conference as well as others - are invited to join the conversation and help Salman determine why the government has had a sudden change of heart and whether this initiative will bring about any change in the online world of Pakistan.