Should you have a non-Western back up host?
Robin Good posted this interesting discussion on looking for a non-Western bloc hosting provider (therefore non-American, Canadian, or European, I gather). Is this paranoia? I'm not sure. I don't think that a site would go down, per se in the event of a terrorist attack. The Internet as a whole might slow down to a snail's pace, but an individual site should be fine (assuming the data center wasn't affected by the attack directly). I think what is more likely is that if the American government doesn't change in the fall of this year, that another attack could very well cause another curtailing of civil liberties. I think in that case having a site hosted outside the realm of U.S. control could be a good way to keep political dissent and dialog going.
A central premise behind Cryptonomicon was that the world needed a data haven so information could be transmitted and stored without government interference. I hope we're not heading in that direction, but I guess if you run a site that dissents from the opinion of the current American government, then it couldn't hurt to plan.
Hosting Your Site Outside Of The Western Bloc
I have recently embarked on a quiet search to identify trusted, reliable and performing hosting providers outside of the US and of the main Western European countries. The idea is: if for some unexpected reason, like a terrorist attack or a sudden change in world state of affairs, the US and its allies were not able anymore to protect and guarantee my ability to publish my news and information online, where would I select to have an alternative hosting shelter?