See also this PRI report (audio file) by Cyrus Farivar, and this Global Voices posting which wraps up some early blog reactions from the Farsi blogosphere.

The closest thing to a defense of the bill comes in Farivar's report, where he interviews Sanam Dolatshahi (who blogs in English (rarely) and Farsi. Her reading of the situation is that the bill is aimed primarily at shutting down porn sites in Iran, including some sites that feature hidden cameras that record real rapes.

Now, hidden-camera rape porn is pretty far down on the list of types of speech I'm eager to protect. But even if the bits about corruption and apostasy (or atheism, as Farivar reports it) are add-ons, it doesn't mean that they won't be used. Iran is not shy about using the death penalty, with 317 executions last year alone.

Expect to hear a lot more about this in coming months.