For anyone who enjoys late-night gaming or a good sex chat in a public place, we've got some bad news.
Beginning today, all public internet access points in Saigon must close by 10pm, reports Vietnam Net. This includes internet cafes, gaming centers and any public computers in areas like train and bus stations or restaurants.
Moving forward, all public internet access will be kept between the hours of 8am and 10pm. According to Giao Thong newspaper, a 2013 circular already forbids gaming centers from staying open past 10pm, however the new regulation now extends to all public internet venues, including internet cafes and other places not strictly reserved for computer games.
The move comes as an effort to quell late-night gaming binges, a phenomenon that's less prevalent in Southeast Asia but has happened elsewhere on the continent.
But that's not the only concern city officials seem to have. In addition to multi-day gaming benders, authorities are also worried about what they refer to as “sex chats”.
Nowadays, the article claims, some local internet cafes go so far as to provide users with VIP rooms, which include air-conditioning, a bed and a webcam. This, authorities believe, could lead to salacious behavior like sex chatting and prostitution.
While some question the effectiveness of the new regulation, pointing out that it will be hard to police every internet cafe in the city, one thing is clear: everyone is just going to have to keep their sex chats and gaming binges at home from now on.
