I’m still thinking about this, but this is an interesting development. Yahoo and Microsoft can go into China no problem, but once Google does, then the US Congress gets into the act.
Google China: Congress Wakes Up
I'm still thinking about this, but this is an interesting development. Yahoo and Microsoft can go into China no problem, but once Google does, then the US Congress gets into the act….
From the news link;
“Mr Smith on Wednesday accused Google of “collaborating .. with persecutors” who imprison and torture Chinese citizens “in the service of truth”.
“It is astounding that Google, whose corporate philosophy is ‘don’t be evil’ would enable evil by cooperating with China’s censorship policies just to make a buck,” he said.”
U.S companies should not be in the business of aiding and abetting oppressive regimes. The bottom of the page disclaimer they intend to display on Google.cn is an insult to the Chinese populace and a weak defence.
The Google party line seems to be any information is better than none but if the information presented is propaganda it’s best not presented at all.
Why can’t they see this?
This was actually already planned as News.com reported earlier this month: http://news.com.com/2100-1028_3-6026733.html. Google was already being called in by Smith. Sounds like he’s just making it sound like it’s new in the wake of the latest publicity.
Total PR driven pile-on. Sigh.
— Stuart
Total PR driven pile-on! Sweet!
– What’s good for the goose…
Could be because people care about google. Where as MSN and Yahoo dont really grab the headlines that google do.
“The Google party line seems to be any information is better than none but if the information presented is propaganda it’s best not presented at all.
Why can’t they see this?”
One man’s goddess is another man’s slut and
one man’s propaganda is another man’s poetry.
“Smith has invited all three companies to testify at a Feb. 16 hearing to examine how U.S. internet companies operate in China.”
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,70089-0.html?tw=wn_index_5
Podcast with Sergey Brin at the World Economic Forum in Davos
http://www.loiclemeur.com/english/2006/01/podcast_sergey_.html
That is out of order. I think its because Google is growing so quick. I remember when Microsoft was rising quicker than anyone… they had so many plans stopped and interfered with. Its the way of the world im afraid.
They should bring all of them in. The question is not just about censorship, but propoganda. If you do a search on Google China for the Dalai Lama, it does not say “not allowed,” (that would be censorship). Instead the first page is to the Government’s malicious attacks on him. That is supporting propoganda. What if searches for all of us “could only bring up negative items.” We would probably feel a little differently about this.
Lets say the civil rights movement in the US some years back was unsucessful, and now our government wanted a history book written with no mention of it or Martin Luther King jr. Would not producing that history book while leaving out this info be supporting propoganda? What Google, MSN, and Yahoo offer is access to one freaking big history book. They can say, “Well, we do not write the content?” No, but you agree to take things out of it, and therefore only allow access to other parts.
Saying “not allowed” is one thing, taking people to malicious and untrue attacks against a great leader, how does Yahoo explain this? John, you have got their ear. Can you ask them? Say “not allowed” but don’t encourage agression and animosity to one of the great leaders of our time.
Geez, a bunch of two-faced publicity-seaking politicians. I note that while the White House is busy scouring through the search engine queries of ordinary Americans, they take a different position when asked to release photos of Bush with Abramoff. Such requests are dismissed as irrelevant, but some how millions of search queries by innocent Americans are relevant? Hmmm…
And, while we condemn Saddam for producing weapons of mass destruction and gassing people, the source of some of these biological weapons came from who? Ah, Rumsfeld.
And, after being told that democracy is the solution for peace in the Middle East, we learn this morning that democracy is not the solution in the Middle East after all. Funny how that happens, especially when the people elect the “wrong” people.
I don’t think Washington politicians are in any position to criticize Google.
As for all these so-called prohibited topics, I’ll bet the the ordinary Chinese knows more about these topics than the ordinary American.
it is amusing to read here the kool aid drinkers come to goog’s defense.
john et al, where are your bullshit detectors? your critical eyes? your spines?
the check is in the mail..
i will still love you tomorrow..
its a good thing we allow china to censure us… really it is…
wake up peoples!
“all animals are created equal but some are more equal than others.”
It’ll calm down soon, Google is a great tool but is rich pickings for some…
Politics, Culture, and Society are far too complex for this ickle blog, but…..
can we please get a few things straight and some perspective before the navel-gazers get their way!
In China…..
How many people have electricity ?
How many people have Television?
How many people have computers?
How many people have Internet access?
How many people do not care that just another chinese search engine doesn’t allow certain search terms?
How many people of the One Billion Population of the Republic of China, appreciate that their system of Governance is one based on a hybrid communist-one-party-many-members-capitalist-ish society, and tacitly approve of it?
How many of all of these chinese people’s are better broadly informed about their world, then the average westerner, let alone specifically american?
How much of all the media and political furore, and corporate placations are there for the benefit of the western audience and wholly/mainly due to being in hok to the vested interests of self-appointed organisations/ [ngo’s/lobbyy groups) (plus those pushed by western govt. policies) mainly in the west and those who do not believe in plurality or sovereignty, but are quite happy with their version of totalianism and absolutism, and despite all history teaching us otherwise, and that no system exists without enough people wanting it to!
France and Germany, who have such a wonderful history of “knowledge-Management”, along with many other countries, due only to their own prejudices, ban many many areas of human thought including not having the right to curiosity (by by being equally treated whether you look at a picture of a child, or actually commit a physical criminal action) to learning about the different historical artefacts including clothing from the losers of the most technically advanced/greatest wars the world has seen, despite the continuing pre-occupation that exists for one range of perspectives. Many/most countries (their government’s) have buttons that they don’t like getting pressed, and no one bats an eye-lid – but hey, if it’s the chinese, then lets all have a go, as long as we can keep looking at every version of grown up (debatable) naked women!
Rant Over!!!
btw, in case anyone’s confused, nothing is about my personal views, more a comment on our lazy knee-jerk reactions, where we don’t actually bother thinking, but let others do it for us, or our bigoted reactionary conditioned dogma’s;-)
Kind regards,
Shakir Razak
“questions hurt”
Lazy?
Shakir falls into lazy trap himself when he spouts that the Chinese like and accept their oppressive government because they are still there and haven’t risen up….Maybe Shakir is very young and doesn’t remember an uprising in a certain Square that some outlets claim over 25,000 students were killed and/or taken to slave never to be heard from again.
Yeah maybe they accept their governments heavy handed management of their lives or maybe they just wanna live.
Wake Up!
You people are too funny. Let’s look at two of the prohibited topics – Tibet and Taiwan. I’m 100% positive that if you polled the PRC today, you will be hardpressed to find people supportive of Tibetan or Taiwanese independence. They pretty much view secession the same way that Lincoln viewed the South. NFW. Barring them from seeing Taiwanese independence material is like barring us from seeing some Confederate fanboy site.
As for the oppressive Chinese government, it’s only oppressive if it’s oppressing you. And for the most part, the honchos in Beijing have as much an impact on their daily lives as the bigwigs in DCs have on ours. In other words, not much.
Thanks for the patronising…..
If you specifically read my comment, shakira (is that really your name?!), then you’d observe that I especially didn’t comment on the specifics or put my own views forward.
My personal bug-bear of the modern world is that I essentially believe in sovereignty and the right/desire of those who offend me to exist, somewhere; how many of those who offend believe in those they are offended by to exist….
I simply raise the question of plurality (one thing i do believe in), facism (inc. left-wing), totalianism, homogenosity, sovereignty, diplomacy, difference.
While I am younger, my curiosity about the world around me, means that I did watch the uprising in tiananmen square, as it happened, as well as the collapse of the berlin wall, the ascension of yeltsin, et al, and the many follow up documentaries explaining how and what happened in china.
As a person with an interest in history stretching millenia, though no need to, I also learn the lessons of the consequences of revolution and the mind-set that exists when they occur, as well as the consequences (inc. of democracy); whether they be nixon, clinton, bush Sr., or cromwells england, the bolshoviks, former communist now democrats in the eastern bloc, the success (not!) of East Germany and the waste/lack of ‘progress’ (another loaded term) in the russian federation over the last 15 years+; right up to the orange revolution!
If you went beyond the eternally repeated dogma (think inverted “1984” – doesn’t matter if there’s a 100 channels if they all say the same basic thing….), which of course is completely well meaning – just lacking empathy and full consideration, and corrupted by pressure-groups, and also travelled to a wider range of countries, you’d realise that most people in the world want to just get on with work, family and some pleasure. People only get into trouble, as in democratic societies, when they break the rules, and normally actively so (see kens last paragraph).
Just because they’re not the rules we’d envision for our own societies, doesn’t mean they shouldn’t exist – unless your an absolutist who believes in colonisation (and suppression)!
The people of china have made a pact, get us richer, and carry on; evolution over revolution. If you’re a scared westerner who doesn’t want a once mighty country to regain what it believes is its righful place in the world, with a single-minded strategic focus, then to want it to become a devided and more easily conquerable society (not just with land), would be best.
This subject is still just too big, and way off-blog!
sorry.
btw, one of my core world-views about china were formed after listening to an actual dissident, it was that he couldn’t “submit humbley” to the government -unfortunately, we make our choices, we sometimes suffer the consequences, sometimes we forget, or don’t have the honour to want to.
As for lazy -believe me, it takes way more effort to think on the other side of an argument that we are presented with at almost every exscuse.
Kind Regards,
Shakir Razak
p.s.
china to be a democracy in >65 years….
“Shakir falls into lazy trap himself when he spouts that the Chinese like and accept their oppressive government because they are still there and haven’t risen up….Maybe Shakir is very young and doesn’t remember an uprising in a certain Square that some outlets claim over 25,000 students were killed and/or taken to slave never to be heard from again.
Yeah maybe they accept their governments heavy handed management of their lives or maybe they just wanna live.”
I apparently love “asian” threads. anyway, over 60,000 protests in China last year, but over compensation for land. As for do people in China actually support communism yeah a lot of people do although I’ve never seen an actual poll or talked to enough mainland Chinese to really know if such is the case in the entire country. My point being more people march for Democracy in Hong Kong (pop is what 8 mil?) vs China (pop 1 bil).
“You people are too funny. Let’s look at two of the prohibited topics – Tibet and Taiwan. I’m 100% positive that if you polled the PRC today, you will be hardpressed to find people supportive of Tibetan or Taiwanese independence. They pretty much view secession the same way that Lincoln viewed the South. NFW. Barring them from seeing Taiwanese independence material is like barring us from seeing some Confederate fanboy site.”
Not to mention that alot of people aren’t even aware of the fact that Taiwan is independent. China and Japan are currently talking to split Taiwan’s oil reserves.
“As for the oppressive Chinese government, it’s only oppressive if it’s oppressing you. And for the most part, the honchos in Beijing have as much an impact on their daily lives as the bigwigs in DCs have on ours. In other words, not much.”
This is really true. China actually has entire departments that study why people don’t obey the laws etc. They’ve found that holding town meetings in cities help.
Shakir: Is that you Kaczynski? Fess Up.
I read your 1st post and it is utter bs just like your 2nd post. Are you typing this out from the internment, maybe your reeducation will be complete after 1000 more progovernment postings.
And this: A scared Westerner? Of what? A third world country and its peasant farmers or it huge megopolisis spewing pollution the environment.
I feel for the chinese people but believe you me no one I know is scared. We will continue harvesting your cheap labor and capitalist aspiration and continue to get richer and richer while your country slides closer and closer to civil war between the haves and have nots. Which will happen. Get Ready, Its gonna be one hell of a ride!
A graphic (sorry) example of this comes from Good Morning Silicon Valley..
http://images.google.com/images?q=tiananmen
http://images.google.cn/images?q=tiananmen
I guess censorships not so bad when you have a “pact” to get rich…Riiiightttt
I have a teacup and saucer here that say on the bottom “China” but then they also say “Made in U.S.A.”
This is propaganda if I ever saw it! It’s an outrage. It’s a travesty. It’s a mockery. It’s a travesty of a mockery.