censorship

"It was October 2003, and the national broadcaster CCTV carried live coverage of the momentous event, from Mr. Yang’s famous pleasantries uttered in space — “I feel good” — to the instant that workers opened the capsule door to reveal the pale but smiling face of a hero, offering irrefutable evidence that China’s maiden manned space voyage had gone off without a hitch.

Or had it?

"The one constant is its growing importance. Censorship used to be the sleepy province of the Communist Party’s central propaganda department, whose main task was to tell editors what and what not to print or broadcast. In the new networked China, censorship is a major growth industry, overseen — and fought over — by no fewer than 14 government ministries.

For some reason I don't have a whole lotta hope that microsoft will "do the right thing..."

Earlier this month, Chinese Minister of Industry and Information Technology Li Yizhong told the international press that foreign Internet companies must obey Chinese laws.

Now the question is: Will Microsoft take him at his word? Will Bing comply only with those censorship requests that have a clear basis in Chinese law and which are made through a legally binding, documented and accountable process? Will it challenge them?

It looks like for now, China is allowing people to access google search, just not the contents of the resulting suggested pages.  My hope is that these kinds of courageous actions can show people what they're missing, and breed resentment and change.  Stay strong, Google!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/24/technology/24google.html?hp=&pagewante...

Instead of going after it as a human rights violation, prosecute as a business rights violation - although it's kind of screwed up that business rights are considered more important and have stronger laws...

Interesting thoughts on the google-china controversy...

http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/01/21/zakaria.google.china/index.html?hp...

"The Australian government plans to test a nationwide Web filtering system that would force Internet service providers to block access to thousands of sites containing questionable or illegal content, prompting cries of censorship from advocacy groups. The proposed filter is part of a $82 million “cybersafety plan” started in May with the goals of protecting children online and stopping adults from downloading content that is illegal to possess in Australia, like child pornography or materials related to terrorism."

"The government says the list, which is not available to the public, includes only illegal content, mostly child pornography. But critics worry about the lack of transparency and say the filter could be used to block a range of morally hazy topics, like gambling or euthanasia.