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China Hits Internet With Secrecy Rules
MetalHead writes "Anyone running a Web site in China may be interested in this story." You should check this out even if you don't run a Chinese site; it's yet another case of a government cracking down on news media.
One of the main reasons why drugs are illegal in the US is that there is more of a chance of you going out to hurt others under the influence of marijuana than you would after drinking alcohol.
Eek. I actually have never heard a decent reason behind the criminilisation of marijuana. I remember one senator a couple decades ago saying it "forced people to have sex with negros and satanists", but somehow I doubt that excuse would fly today.
And also, the reasoning that it could cause you to do bad things doesn't fly well with me either. It's the same thing as drunk driving laws -- we already have laws against impaired driving, so why do we need another law to do almost entirely the same thing? If someone can be over the legal limit and still not be impaired, then what's the harm? If someone's over the limit and is impaired, then there's already a law to cover it. The same thing can be carried over to drug laws. If someone takes drugs and acts recklessly, then there should be laws to arrest them on acting recklessly. If someone can take those same drugs and not act recklessly, then there's no harm done.
sure you can, i see it all over the place here in vansterdam... err.. vancouver
Some Cato Institute refs:
Too Many Sanctions
A Chance to Rethink Sanctions
Stuck in Sanctions
Time to Stop Sanctioning the World
These people feel so threatened they banned falun gong, nothing more than a bunch of meditative exercises!! This government is clearly very weak.
Democracy could not evolve into communism. Democracy is people making decisions that require community effort. This could never be replaced with a system for the destruction of individual property, because they are fundamentally different.
Is there a country that is to anonymous web servers/domain reg. what the swiss are to anonymous banking? It would seem that some offshore taxhaven type country might want to become the HQ for anon colo.
Anyone reading that post should be aware that Stormfront.com is a Nazi site. I don't mean it's "like" a Nazi site, I mean it really is a Nazi site.
When you hear that kind of rhetoric, be aware where it is coming from.
Actually, logic doesn't dictate that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. That's a *premise* you have, or perhaps isomorphic to a premise you have.
;-)
Logic only tells you that, if B follows from A, and A, then B. It doesn't tell you that B necessarily follows whether or not A.
Sorry, pet peeve.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
Oops - that's stormfront.org, not .com. Apologies to stormfront.com.
already happened to an american who went there to do academic research on the 60s cultural revolution.. didnt even use the web.
Firearms are second only to the Constitution in importance; they are the peoples' liberty's teeth. - George Washington
This, coming from a guy with no teeth.
This is certainly an interesting point. It's hard to determine how "right" we are because we know we were raised with certain values. Personally, I (and most /. readers) lean more to the left than the average American and we try to allow for more open source/free speech/anti-Kansas opportunities than most. So, I think that even if we were born in China, we'd be the kind of people that were at Tinnamen square.
:)
And for those that aren't quite sure if we are brainwashed, do yourselves a favor and try to learn things our schools didn't want to teach us. Edison did not invent the light bulb. Fulton did not invent the steamboat. Columbus was not the first European to see the New World... etc.
This is best seen when foriegners come to the U.S. My friends often have exchange students come over and after a few days will ask: "So, where are all the KKK houses? We heard they were all over." or "I can't believe I've been in the U.S. for a week and haven't seen anyone get shot." These are actual thoughts from European students, who already live in a free world. Imagine what kind of statistics the Chinese are learning! It shouldn't be hard to see that there are probably a lot of Chinese who
1. Love Communism and
2. Are glad they don't live in the crime-ridden U.S.
...but I still think we're right
Rick
dear whoever, states that were considered communist such as china, soviet union, romania, poland, chile, etc failed because they murdered their people. fascist states such as nazi germany, mussolini - italy, whatsisname - portugal, franco - spain, thedudetheCIAreplacedaillendewith - chile, mobutu - zaire, amin - uganda, fail because they murder their people. complex arguments about 'people didnt want to work' are unconvincing to me.. nobody wants to work for a government that has murdered their friends.
The reality is that since NAFTA, the economies of countries like Mexico and Ecuador (keep your eye on the current beginnings of a revolution in Ecuador) have been devastated, despite the fact that a large amount of our factory work has moved there.
Before the introduction in 1970 of protectionism and state direction of the economy, Mexico enjoyed annual growth rates of 6%, and single-digit inflation. Banks were nationalized in 1982, and by 1988 the inflation rate hit 159%, and real wages declined 45%. The Peso Crisis was only one in a long line of bad decisions in expansionist monetary policy in Mexico. Some argue that NAFTA made the recovery from the recent crisis much faster than similar events in the 80's. Mexico needs an independent voice like Alan Greenspan running their monetary policy. And they need to privatize the state owned oil monopoly, PEMEX.
Keep in mind there is only one party in real power in Mexico, the PRI, and it's been that way since the revolution. Even in El Salvador there is a rich multi-party democracy (now that the US and USSR stopped paying for the civil war), along with substantial growth of the economy.
Not to mention the incredible amount of drug war funded corruption in the Mexican government and police at all levels. Of course, I blame the US for the drug war.
More importantly where is this information going to come from? A lot of us are assuming that it's going to come from the West, but all they're likely to get from here is a lot of crap about eating Big Macs in Ford Explorers with a PalmPilot in your pocket is going to make you happy. As far as I understand it the Chinese govt. is very happy with consumerism and is moving rapidly towards a consumer society, this has been part of its official policy for the last 7 years. So, where's the disturbing democratic free-thought coming from?
...the sign of someone with WAY too much time on their hands!
...but then it would no longer look much like the internet the we all know/love/hate/whatever today.
To use the open-source analogy, the Internet is like a free, open bazzar, but it is possible for a colusion of large international companys, the protect-our-children crowd, and big government to
build walls around the bazzar and regulate trafic and turn it into a fake, controled, "safe" 24-hour shopping mall.
It would probably destroy most of the good things about the internet, but I think that many of the above-mentioned Big Three would not mind a mindless shopping mall of "Good, Wholesome Capitalistic Americal Values"
Why would Microsoft, Jerry Falwell, or the Chinese government need free-speach??
It's true that parts of the U.S. government have acted in such a manner in the past, and probably will try to do so again. The difference is that U.S. citizens have recourse to the protections provided by the U.S. Constitution and enforced through the judicial system. Granted, this doesn't always work (just ask the Cherokee Indians, or any of the Americans who were interned on the west coast during WWII), but there is the clear understanding that U.S. citizens have certain rights and have an expectation of legal recourse when those rights are violated. In the People's Republic of China, you have no rights except what the Party determines that you have.
In short, in the U.S. we have the rule of law, which may not always be enforced evenly. In China there is rule by fiat of the Party, which guarantees uneven standing under the law. Yes, the U.S. is far from perfect, but I don't think you can compare the full history of both countries (remember, the U.S. has about four times as much) without deciding that China has a much more oppressive government.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Actually the only money that was proven to have come from China to a U.S. political party was $2 million from a guy in Hong Kong who had denounced his U.S. citizenship.
The Republicans gladly accepted the contribution. Just like the money from tobacco companies, oil companies and lately Microsoft...
nice point, Chinese government is two steps ahead of you, geoshities is already blocked in China for precisely the reason you gave.
Sam's da man!!!
Economic conditions in China are improving, people are getting rich, but people are politically apathetic -- and this is probably the worse thing that can happen to democracy in China, because if you're getting rich, why do you care about abstract concepts like democracy?
Gains that have happened in China are actually slowing down now as the government tries harder and harder to crack down on the political views of the growing middle class.
I don't think anyone can say one way or the other that trading with China will by itself end the totalitarian dictatorship there. At the end of the day, we cannot export freedom. If people want it, they must TAKE it for themselves.
However we can definately say that 1) there is a middle class in China now who are beginning to have the means to think about counter-revolution and 2) things are looking better there than Cuba, who the US has no trade with and 3) at least Chinese aren't starving to death in politically created famines as has happened in the past in China, and is happening right now in North Korea.
This slashdot man! People can't get "Its" and "It's" right and you expect them to be able to get who and whom?
Is it that logical reasoning that can lead to this conclusion simply does not exist, and it is all a matter of perspective? Or is it that the citizens of those countries aren't able to get to the "enlightening" information?
In Cuba, any political mistakes you make (not attending a political rally, not volunteering for cutting sugar cane, etc.) goes on your permanent record. This can lead to you being unable to get a job.
Any political dissention can lead to your arrest. Informers are placed in almost every block. From the day you are born, you are faced with a daily decision to go along with the government line or face poverty or imprisonment.
In China, political dissent can be a death sentence as well.
> that money is one of the driving factors
> of the production of news items.
Not necessarily true. The general populations of many East Asian nations have a strong streak of dissidence in them. Chinese society in particular exhibits this behavior - it has a great deal to do with growing dissatisfaction over the disparity between the quality of life in the PRC and in Western nations. It has been noted that this dissident behavior shows up most often in university-level students - the very people most likely to understand the internet, and the people most likely (outside of government officers themselves) to have internet access.
Here's how a likely scenario would play out: A group of students much like those at Tiananmen Square a decade ago come upon (by hook or by crook) some information damaging to the Chinese government. Using an anonymizer, they post the information to Geocities/Xoom/WebJump/so on and so forth. Or they smuggle it out as an attachment or an encrypted email to someone outside the country. In the former case, the information is posted and the Chinese government will have a singularly difficult time tracing it because I doubt Yahoo! or Xoom or any other hosting company is particularly anxious to make their information known to governments. As a result, then, the Chinese go into spin overload mode, trying to deny what's been publicized.
In the second, the information isn't necessarily made public, and the government may in fact be none the wiser - it's impossible for a government - especially one responsible for over a billion people - to review each and every individual piece of information that leaves its borders electronically.
In either situation, though, the Chinese will probably not hesitate to backtrack on their stated goal not to restrict the Internet in China. There's a definite tradeoff - if the Net becomes a significant source of leakage, which it very, very easily could become, then the government will take definitive - and quite possibly violent - steps to close down those leaks and the structures which made them possible. Any leakage, if discovered, will *not* last long.
But that doesn't mean it's not possible. After all, once the information's out.. well.. you know what happened to DeCSS.
Chris Tembreull
Web Developer, NEC Systems, Inc.
My opinions are my own, and nobody else's.
Chris Tembreull
"My karma just ran over your dogma."
Not only is the US big brother to the world, it is also the strong arm of the UN.
-B
Does it not happen here?
I never said it didn't. I just said it doesn't always, and it doesn't because the media is afraid to, but that they choose to.
Well, from my perspective most reporting is extremely biased in favour of the status quo.
You won't get any disagreement from me on that point, however, the part of it that matters is the word "most". That is significantly different than all. You may have to work to find it, but there are media outlets in the US that offer distinctly nonconforming viewpoints. In a country like China, publishers of such content are brutally suppressed. Occasionally rogue government groups will harrass people like that here in the US, but it isn't an official policy, and generally when they get caught, something is done about it. Not usually as much as should be, but usually something at least.
Take the Seattle coverage, how much of the media focussed on the insignificant and unrepresentative trouble caused by a surprisingly small minority of the crowds?
I would agree that a lot of the press did a poor job of covering that story, but the difference was they did it because they wanted to cover it that way, not because the government made them. Unfortunately, a lot of their behavior in that case was due to their desire for sensationalism.
How much did it focus on the brutality of using tear-gas?
Enough that you know about it. In a truly oppressive society, anyone reporting that kind of detail would probably be jailed.
I really have to disagree with such a rosy assessment.
Don't mistake my statement as 'rosy'. I am no big defender of the US government when they are going over the edge, but I just don't see a lot of evidence that the US government is doing a lot to try to stifle the press. Instead, I would be critical of the press for not always taking advantage of the freedom they have to try to present a balanced, unbiased view of the whole news. Their biggest sin is usually the sin of omission, and of placement (they just neglect to cover things that don't match their biases, or they cover them on a back page, etc).
Better countries? Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Iceland.
By what criteria though? I have nothing in particular against any of those countries (I'm 1/4 Norwegian by descent), but I personally don't want to live in a country with high taxation, oppressive gun control or socialized medicine either. I can't say for sure that all of those countries suffer from those ills, but I know that at least a couple of them suffer from one or more of those problems.
Man, the Chinese Government is acting like a bunch of fucking Communists!
Wasn't it Marx who stated the first step towards communism is to establish a totaltarian regime to weed out all the evil capitalists? Might have been Lenin, Contemporary World Issues is fading away heh...
I already thought a lot of this crap was already in place over there. All of my native Chinese friends told me about things like this years ago. I seriously need to lay off the Red Bull. That stuff'll rot your brain.
Hey, I found some more pictures of linux babes on the the stileproject
> http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick. jpg2 > http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick. jpg3 > http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick. jpg4 > http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick. jpg5
http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick.j pg
a href=http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick.jpg2
a href=http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick.jpg3
a href=http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick4.jpg
a href=http://www.stileproject.com/linux_chick.jpg5
Anyway...
[ c h a d o k e r e ]
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
oh well
funny, but true. china.com owns the domains taiwan.com and hongkong.com and run respective portals in each market. In mainland China, China.com a Hong Kong based company with AOL backing has a joint venture with Chinese government publishing/news organ known as Xinhua, jointventure is called CWW. Oddly enough Xinhua, despite having a JV with China.com have been reported to have blocked China.com within mainland China. hope this answers your question
Only communist countries will try to silence Internet users!
:)
:)
And totalitarian states (like Singapore sometimes appears to be)
And clueless, brain dead, wanna-be totalitarian governments (like the ones we have here in Australia).
Oh, and a stack of religions/cults
Hmmmm..... Face it, anyone who has a vested interest in protecting their power situation will do almost anything to protect it. Slowly removing the ability to bitch/moan/coerce/educate freely is one of the best ways of doing it.
Hell, if I were evil overlord with slaves, harem and so on, I'd be doing all I could to protect my situation. I've read The Rules
I left my body to science, but I'm afraid they've turned it down...
It is known that the Peoples Democratic Republic of China is a totallitarian regime- why are we surprised. My only surprise is that this measure was not already in place.
I am not logging in because I am worried about the state of my Karma- I don't want to loose any.
Robert
This post encoded with ROT26. If you can read it, you've violated the DMCA. Handcuffs please, sergeant.
Well, I've got to give it to you that you're pretty reasonable and responded in a logical and convincing manner to my points. As for the last one, I'm afraid we have to agree to disagree, my criteria were based on all three of the things that you find to be bad!
OH please, the "protesters" in Seattle were nothing but a bunch of crackheads who didn't have a frigging clue what they were protesting. The police showed remarkable restraint and did their best to allow the protesters and the conventioners to cohabitate. It was only when the demonstrations turned violent that the police were forced to use tear-gas, to protect property and the rights of the people who had travelled from all over the World to meet each other.
I was there. I know some of the people who were "protesting". The ones I spoke with didn't have a position on the subject that could stand up to more than 10 minutes of argument. It was mostly a bunch of kids whose parents pay for school and everything else who were bored and loved to pretend there was a cause to rebel against
This is not to say that there weren't people with legitimate causes they were protesting there. They were in the minority, though
Interestingly, if you read reports in newspapers in other countries, they allege that it was the US government which indirectly encouraged the protesters to make talks impossible because it was in US interests that very little negotiations take place.
Mmmm.. Donuts
So, no, logic isn't universal. People (especially in totalitarian regimes like China and Cuba) don't always have complete information, and even if they do, prejudices often get in the way. Like the US in this case.
BTW, most Australians who know anything about the issues agree that our censorship policies have been infiltrated by the religious right and Something Should Be Done(TM). Unfortunately, the only thing that can be done is vote out the present Federal Government and that won't happen for another 18 months or so :(
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
I find it interesting that they're requiring source code for products which have crypto functionality. That's actually a good thing.
You're absolutely on the right track. They can't have it both ways. The soviet union collapsed under similar pressure. The soviet union fell far behind technologically starting roughly in the 60's. The "information revolution" has been going since about this time, which includes print media, television, etc. Free flow of information is necessary to keep up in today's economy, and the USSR's paranoia controls simply prevented this from happening. I once read that an average worker had to obtain 3 signatures just to make one photocopy.
They tried to apply some capialistic features to their economy in the early 80's but it wasn't enough, you know the rest. Of course the whole situation is much more complex, for a good analysis try reading "End of Millenium" by Manuel Castells, most online booksellers have it. His style is very "academic" but I thought it was very interesting since I'm interested in the interplay between government, society, and technology.
So China has survived the first 30 years or so of the information revolution while allowing a capitalist development model (I really don't know how extensive) but they still lack a lot economically, much of their population is in poverty. They also rely on a lot of "technology transfer" (stealing from the US mostly. much of what you hear on this is US media/gov't propeganda, but it does happen.) The Soviet Union did a lot of this as well, especially in the computer industry, with a lot of reverse engineering. Unfortunatly, after a while they just fell too far behind and couldn't recreate western technology. So China might be in trouble.
However, what is the threat really? That Chinese will find out "the truth" by looking at American websites? I think a form of that already happened at tiennaman square 11 years ago. No matter how bad the situtation is for the majority of the population, if the government can indoctrinate the population well enough, they most likely won't rebel. Even our government practices this, with a few layers of plausable deniability. Infromation control is the key here, and they ARE playing with fire if they really want to use the internet for eceonomic gain. Capitalism and thus materialism is an powerful apathy producing drug (just look at it in our society) and the chinese seem to be applying it as well. The poor are probably the best hope for some type of revolution.
The chinese government's ruthless nature can prevent change as well, they have shown that they are very much willing to kill their citizens who disagree with them, on a level far beyond what the US practices.
It's unfortunate, if they developed a government similar to ours (which is corrupt as well but it's still better than communism) they could easily be the economic powerhouse of this century.
This is a nitpick, but the above things really aren't independant thought. They are just erroneous facts. I just graduated from highschool, and we learned that the Vikings were the first (euro's) to travel to the continent. However for all practical purpose, it was Columbus's rediscovery 500 years later that led to the formation of our Country. He didn't even land on any part associated with America if I remeber correctly. I belive America Vesitigo (probably not his real name, but its close to it :) was the first to actually rediscover America (after the vikings that is).
I just garduated from hs (last year), and my general impression was the emphasis was more on concepts and less on memorization of facts (although that still did play a prominent role). It appears that they are actually starting to teach you how to _think_ and not just regurgitate in public schools now a day (at least mine did).
The "religious right" is neither.
"Communities" and "societies" are absolutely nothing without individuals. They come into existence purely through the actions and interactions of individuals and don't matter a damn compared to the individuals that comprise them. Once you forget that simple truth and try to glorify the "community" or the "nation" over the "lone individual", you get 99% of the barbarism and slaughter of this century.
Because even the people on Slashdot who happen to be from the United States aren't "the US" or "the US government", but instead individuals with opinions and moral viewpoints who may (may) happen to dislike totalitarianism.
And that, of course, has exactly nothing to do with the US government butting ino the business of other nations.
The near-religious belief that free-trade will somehow cure all problems is so naive and pollyanna-ish that it beggars belief. Add to this that the U.S. does not practice free-trade and you have to wonder are the advocates of it aware of the the disjunction of reality and fantasy.
>Drug law enforcement costs a fortune, and has not stopped the flow of illegal drugs anywhere. Actually no, it has worked wonders in China, if you are caught selling drugs there twice you are executed. >More liberal drug laws work. Go check out what Europe does. Extremely strict drug laws also work. Again, when you face execution for a second offense you will think twice. Note however, that I don't claim to agree with China's policy on drugs, I just disagree with the statement that anti drug rules do not work. They just don't work when you take a halfway aproach, as in the U.S. I'd rather see an aproach more closely resembling that of Amsterdam, but it should be noted that the other extreme can solve the problem as well.
not to be a little bitch, but you want who, not whom. in your quest, who(m) functions as a pronoun, standing in for a subject (not direct/indirect object), so you want to use who
Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms? LOL! Oh, that's a good one. I've lived in Canada all my life. Trust me, it's a Communist nation. They say stuff like "It's a Consitutional Monarchy!" like some scrap of paper is really going to make people play nice. We're buddy-buddy with Cuba and China, and will violently put down any dissenting opinions. We have a system that is inherently a dictatorship - the leader of the country/province is the leader of the party with the most votes. So what he says goes. Our twit of a Prime Minister will strangle someone when his bodyguards are there to watch over him, but he hears a noise in his house in the middle of the night and who gets up to check it? His wife! I hate the British Throne, but the country was a helluva lot better when they had some amount of control.
And don't get me started about Pierre Idiot Trudeau....
.. to equate the Kennedys with Hitler.
:-)
Keep it coming, this stuff is absolutely hilarious.
The difference here is that in the US, the press is free to put coverage of such events on the front page of the newspaper and on the 6pm news. In China, the government controls what their state run newspapers and television stations broadcast. Protests that are suppressed in China aren't reported to the people or are at least reported with the best possible spin for the governmnent.
I am not always happy with some things that happen here in the US. I don't believe that the US is perfect. However, it could be a lot worse than it is, and comparitively, I can't think of many examples of countries that are better.
> want nothing more than to tear down the
> freedom that we have online Maybe you could be a little bit more ridiculous next time, hmm?
Communist governments (which China, no matter how loudly it claims otherwise, is NOT) have no fear of releasing information to the public, because they know that the public, as good Communists, will not in turn release that information to the world. At the same time, until a worldwide revolution is in place, then Communist governments must keep their cards close to their vests, because they're well aware that not everyone is a good Communist.
You might go so far as to compare the free software movement to a burgeoning Communistic revolution. We, the people who use free software, are encouraged (possibly expected) to contribute to the spread of this mode of software distribution, whether it be by enhancing the kernel, creating new software, integrating old software, porting software from other platforms, running informational websites, evangelizing, and so on and so forth. All the tools and information we need are provided freely to us, so long as we pass these tools and data on to others, also for free, and incorporating any modifications we make. In this way, we spread the revolution across the world, and the Internet is what makes it all possible. We have no fear of our source code falling into capitalist hands (e.g. Microsoft) because we know that it already has and it is powerless to stop our advance - we come with a better way of life, and let capitalism tremble at our footsteps!
You see, we who participate in this glorious software revolution are, after a fashion, Communists. Everything we do is for the enhancement of our community - our State.
Your mistake, my anonymous friend, is in thinking that governments such as the old Soviet Union and China and the Eastern Bloc were Communist. They were not. They were, in fact, Socialist governments, which are sort of a blend of Communism and ordinary, garden-variety totalitarianism. They are a middle point, a semi-secure position to take after the revolution has begun, the communization of the country is in progress - they are a bulwark against the rest of the world while the State waits for the worldwide revolution that Marx, Engels, and Lenin stated *must* come for Communism to succeed.
Sorry 'bout the rant there, but I really dislike having people make such foolish statements about my political beliefs. Oh, that's right, I forgot to tell you - you see, I am a Communist, and proud to be one. We're not about suppression of freedom, not by any stretch of the imagination. We're about the idea that a unified state can best take care of its people if their production is guided and utilized by the state itself, and then returned to them in the form of the things they require to live and thrive. And the Internet, to us, is the best way we've yet seen to encourage the rest of the world to join us in making life better for ALL citizens of the world - not just the wealthy.
Chris Tembreull
Web Developer, NEC Systems, Inc.
My opinions are my own, and nobody else's.
Chris Tembreull
"My karma just ran over your dogma."
The effect is the same, the enforcement is not. A large company like Mattel will try to sue you into oblivion is you don't shut up. Maybe they will get the government to kick your door down and throw you in jail. A government will just throw you into jail, cutting out the first step of suing you into oblivion.
The problem is this website which not only encourages
;) Seriously,
trolls - it demands them. They need to...
1) Remove the label "coward" it is meaningless unless
Taco and friends will say it to your face outside of
any legal jurisdication or with no witnesses present.
Think about it, when you post, the first flame/troll
comes straight from Slashdot. Thanks, assholes.
2) Allow people to search "lowest scores first". Not
only does this partially reverse the subversive act
of censorship, it also allows the "good" moderators
to rectify the stupidity of the "bad" moderators
(without having to search through every freaking
comment to find the -1's and such).
3) Eliminate anonymous moderation (it is far more
"cowardly" than anonymous posting). Screw this
"meta moderation" open it up and let's see who's
saying what. Also, let any registered users with
no posts in a thread moderate that thread. Maybe
a carrot like that would get me to register again.
4) Fuck the kharma whores. There is absolutely no
reason why the "good" posters should post at 2
(their drivel is no better than unregistered
posters). All posts should start at 0. The
benefit of registration should be letting people
know who you are and your website/e-mail if you
so desire. Plus you can moderate! (Warning:
sarcastic use of exclamation point.)
5) Moderate this to -5... asswipe!
How do I sort through all the "just plain bad"
posts to get to the truly bad posts? Moderation
should be from +5 to -5. This way I can skip
through all the "on topic" talk and head straight
to posts about Natalie Portman petrified naked and
turned to stone.
Give me as break! The US Media has pictures of the Vice President, Al Gore, receiving Chinese campaign contributions ($5,000 a pop) funneled through Buddist Nuns in California who take a vow of poverty! Johnny Chung, one of the funnelers, even admits on his website gathering Chinese cash to bribe the President. If the Republicans were guilty of this, the liberal press of the US would be eating their collective lunch over that issue.
That is NOT an accident :)
Isolated incidents of police abuse are hardly comparable to government-sponsored mass murder and the consistent suppression of individual rights of hundreds of millions of people.
Do you expect the secret police to come knocking on your door because you speak out about US government abuses? Didn't think so. The situations are not even vaguely comparable.
I agree, but usually you can define evil people as those with bad credits.
I mean just look at the Falun Gong bunch. I saw some material in the TV about them, they were waving their hands in a tai-chish way looking a bit stoned, passive, just minding their own business in a park or something. They were not bothering anyone.
Their website has some stuff like books about the essentials of Falun Gong. Mostly it seems like some semi-newage thing with science-can't-explain-all and third eyes and chakras revisited and everything. But these people are now hunted down because they choose to follow that philosophy while excercising. It's like doing Yoga. You either follow the guru/chakra/energy/whatnot phenomena-explanation-frontend or you don't. It's just a way of thinking which goes with the sport so to speak. The ideas of the Falun Gong gang do not seem to be "anti-government". Hunting them is just as absurd if the US goverment were tracking down Yoga practitioners and putting them to jail.
What I'm trying to say is that hindering access to the internet is a small potato for the government of the Peoples Republic of China. It's just one aspect they use in controlling the minds of the population. They've been doing it for a long time and probably keep on doing it for as long as the country holds together.
HUH??! Communism (theoretically speaking, i.e. Marxism) is absolutely and utterly at odds with totalitarianism. In fact, democracy was supposed to evolve into communism (through a few steps), and culminate in the dissolution of government. Government by the people, for the people. The problem with communism is that it assumes that if people are equal and happy, avarice, greed, and powerlust will die out. Never going to happen.
I really have to question your equation of communism with Marxism! Communism is nothing more nor less than the principle that there are no indvidual property rights. All goods are common property and the use of them should be determined by the community.
This is separate from Marxism which admits this principle and builds a very specific structure on it that could fairly be construed as authoritarian and totalitarian. This was one of the main differences in the 1st Working Men's International which split at the Hague Congress 1972 over issues of authority. The Libertarian Communists/Anarchists such as Bakunin were expelled. They believed in autonomous federations. Marx believed in dictatorship of the proletariat. Definitely totalitariansim.
Regards, Crush
Some Cato Institute refs: Too Many Sanctions A Chance to Rethink Sanctions Stuck in Sanctions Time to Stop Sanctioning the World
HAHAHA! the Cato institute eh? we are talking about the same shamelessly biased right-wing "think-tank" here are we not?
you can show me hundreds upon thousands of pages of material cranked out by the Cato Institute, and you will objectively prove absolutely nothing to me besides something I already know:
Money talks. And bullshit walks.
the only place you're going to see the Cato Institute, or anyone who serves them, taken seriously, is in the usual mega-mass-media joints, where there is obviously a vested interest in pushing this Free Market (tm) crap down everyone's throats, while filtering out all that nasty dissent that is so hard to swallow.. oh and have a closer look at who funds and works for Cato sometime too.. probably should be doing that before you cite them as some sort of authority rather than the propaganda-machine they are..
jd
um.. MODERATORS.. would you please either
moderate this guy up, or moderate down the
knob calling all the protestors "crackheads"
and basically spewing out the myopic opinion
that the media fed to his stupid ass?
I was in Seattle as well, and I'm fucking
AMAZED at all these people who watched CNN and
think they just KNOW ALL ABOUT what happened,
who apologize for the police, and generally
just toss it off as "crackpot stuff", not
worth thinking about really.. busybusybusy..
oh and nevermind the fact that the constitution
was suspended in Seattle. that too, water under
the bridge in Amerika. just goes to show you
that there is a reason to worry about media
concentration/distortion : because there really
ARE legions of dunces out there who can't be
bothered to really look into something, and
are going to swallow the prefabricated
corporate perspectives no questions asked.
easier on the noggin to do that I guess..
SIEG HEIL, and hurrah for the US of A!
jd
That was 1872 not 1972, sorry!
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Nicotine free Amish .sig.
Australia already has a (unworkable) censorship scheme for The Internet. At the moment it's only for porn, but perhaps they'll take a look at this too.
I mean traitors who steal state secrets are worse than pornographers aren't they? Oh hang on it was to appease some screwed up religous nut in government..
The thin edge of the wedge, as they say. If you want more info about what Australians have to put up with go to The EFA website.
um.. MODERATORS.. would you please either moderate this guy up, or moderate down the knob calling all the protestors "crackheads"
Agreed, his content free rant equates to a dismissal of the issues raised by very thoughtful people who protested in an amazingly peaceful and effective way.
Protests that are suppressed in China aren't reported to the people or are at least reported with the best possible spin for the governmnent.
Yes, this happens in China, yes it's bad. Does it not happen here? Well, from my perspective most reporting is extremely biased in favour of the status quo. Take the Seattle coverage, how much of the media focussed on the insignificant and unrepresentative trouble caused by a surprisingly small minority of the crowds? How much did it focus on the brutality of using tear-gas? I really have to disagree with such a rosy assessment.
Better countries? Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Iceland.
The schools I went to never had such brainwashing. Is the state of education in the US really so bad? Don't answer this, I probably already know the answer.
Well, that depends on what class you belong to here - rich people get a pretty good education, better than some Europeans! ;)
Open Your eyes, and see what your government does wrong, this is more important to you than what happens on the other side of the planet.
Well, that hasn't actually been true for a long time and it's becoming less true by the day. Yes, we should open our eyes to the problems of our own governments, but we can't ignore other nations! We are affected by them and by trans-national corporations, we should know as much about them as we can stomach! You can unfortunately no longer develop an isolated perfect society - if you ever could: remember all the socialist debate about one-nation socialism vs. global socialism?
Crush
You want high taxes, government rationed healthcare and oppressive gun control? Yea, I guess we will have to agree to disagree on that. If nothing else, it proves that one person's valhalla might be another person's hell.
The reality is that since NAFTA, the economies of countries like Mexico and Ecuador (keep your eye on the current beginnings of a revolution in Ecuador) have been devastated, despite the fact that a large amount of our factory work has moved there.
NAFTA is not exactly the equivalent of free trade. A free trade treaty doesn't require that level of detail.
The USSR proved that the welfare of people and the environment is ignored when power is put in the hands of the government, and it's my belief that the next 20 years are going to show that the welfare of people and the environment are non-existent when placed in the hands of multinational corporations and the capitalist class.
I agree with you there. Corporations don't have values. They exist to organize groups of people to produce products and services for a profit. Any care for our neighbors and environment is going to come from people. That is not to say that corporations can't participate, and they often do. Many companies will match charitable contributions of various sorts by their employees. But in the end, the choice of what causes to support and the support for them comes from individual people.
Personally, I am a bleeding heart libertarian. I want government out of the charity business, and I give generously to charities that I think are getting it right.
The net will not be what we demand, but what we make it. Build it well.
--thi
Anyone reading that post should be aware that the poster's user ID is ARCHIE BUNKER! I think the URL is a somewhat distasteful joke.
I did not see any indication that stormfront.org was a Nazi site; there is a Nazi political party, and I saw no such affiliation. I did see plenty of indications of white supremacist beliefs.
Do you expect the secret police to come knocking on your door because you speak out about US government abuses? Didn't think so. The situations are not even vaguely comparable.
Have you ever heard about COINTEL PRO? Look into it.
Michael Chisari
This does not express my opinion, but is just a point that is argued.
Per that article, the Chinese government has two overriding needs: to keep their tight control over China and to embrace the Internet for economic gain. IMHO, these goals are mutually exclusive.
We have no real evidence that a use of the internet for economic purposes *inherently* implies it's use for political purposes. It is up to us (non-Chinese) to make/keep those purposes mutually exclusive. This means we must help people in China who have somethingh nasty to say about their government to get their message out. This means anonymous remailers, anonymous web hosting, etc. It also means putting economic preasure on China to reform.
Also, adding StegFS in the default Linux kernel distribution would help a lot too, as it gives people plausable deniability for having it installed (the system it's self gives you plausible deniability for not giving up the key). Making crypto a standard part of the kernel would really help a lot of people in these situations.
Jeff
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Last time I checked, geocities is *censored* from chinese internal network.
thank you sir, may I have another? (-1)
Jackbooted thugs breaking into a certain Danish home probably indicate much bigger, more threatening players in the big-stakes game of Global Domination.
Care to provide some information as to which home this was and what colour the jackboots were, or are you merely indulging in propaganda?
Whilst I can't condone any organisation, be it a private company or a national government, imposing censorship and 1984-style mind control, at least there's some semblance of directness about what they're doing. The film industry seems to much prefer subterfugue, lies, intimidation, threats, and tactics remeniscent of 1940's Germany.
Well, as regards the admirable directness of the Chinese being similar or dissimilar to 1940's Germany, which part of the 40's are you talking about? After Hitler? or during the "admirably direct" extermination camp part of the 40's?
Your post is a masterpiece of evasion, innuendo and non-sequitur, congratulations, you've confused yourself and others.
Crush
(Political freedom is just another personal freedom, just like economic freedom.)
Trade and the Internet are bad for the PRC government's control. The reason is quite simple. People may grow up in China, as they have in many other societies, accepting their system, oppressive as it is, as natural and perfectly reasonable. However, trade and communications threaten that complacency by exposing Chinese people to people of other societies and letting them exchange ideas and experiences. That exchange lets them know that it is possible to have a political system besides what they already have, that people can live without being oppressed by such a system, and that their system isn't "natural". That sounds like an oversimplification, and it is to an extent (it's not a matter of "poor, ignorant chinese folk finding out about America" but of becoming familiar with a different culture and internalizing that an aspect of one's own way of life isn't the limit of human experience), but it's true, and the PRC government knows it.
As for the "hypocrisy" of criticizing China while maintaining "Most Favored Nation" trading status with them (which merely means we do not favor any nation above them in trade, not that they're our favorite), and the idea that trade should be linked to human rights and that we should sanction certain nations for their government's misdeeds...What exactly have sanctions ever accomplished? We've tried to starve out Saddam Hussein for a decade, and all we've accomplished is the deaths of a large number of the poorest Iraqi civilians. Arms sanctions on the combatants in the former Yugoslavia led to mass slaughter of relatively defenseless Bosnians since the Serbs already had weapons. Libya and North Korea have been defiant for decades against global sactions, even as their people starve.
All sanctions have ever accomplished have been the isolation of deviant regimes and their bolstering by giving them an enemy (America or the entire world as the Great Satan!) to rally the people against. No leader has ever been deposed by sanctions, while untold numbers of innocent people have starved.
Chinese society in particular exhibits this behavior - it has a great deal to do with growing dissatisfaction over the disparity between the quality of life in the PRC and in Western nations.
No, Mr rich american, it is not what chinese people are dissatisfied with. It is the corrupted government officials and all their relatives that eat upon the national treasure box piss people off big time. Most of the chinese people are happy with their own lives.
If you want to read a very succinct criticism of what happened in Russia, from an Anarchist perspective, read "My Disillusionment In Russia" by Emma Goldman, published in the 1920's. If you can find a copy, of course, as many copies were burned by American Communists when they got their hands on them.
Did I miss something?
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Trade and the Internet are bad for the PRC government's control
I agree, but on the other hand, I don't think trade and the Internet will inevitably lead to greater political freedom in China. It will make people more aware of their situation (there's a well written post on this topic here), but I don't think this automatically translates to political action.
The irony here is that as China gets more prosperous, the incentive to rebel decreases. And people in China do have a measure of political freedom -- if I'm not mistaken, people do get to vote for their local officials, which is really the extent to which political freedom matters to most people; Central government is merely a distant, abstract concept. The Chinese government just has to make sure the risks greatly outweigh the potential gains (and you have much more to lose when you're wealthier), and the status quo can be preserved.
We've tried to starve out Saddam Hussein for a decade, and all we've accomplished is the deaths of a large number of the poorest Iraqi civilians.
Yes, I agree. Sanctions haven't worked.
Where are my TRANSPUTERS! GOD DAMN IT. I want TRANSPUTERS
Y aknow, the chinese tell a joke about state secrets... " Two young students went to protest at Tiananmen Square on day, each holding a large dazibiao (sign). One read 'Long live Democracy!', while the other read 'Li Peng is an Idiot!' Naturally, they were both hauled off to jail, then taken to court. The first one was charged, naturally enough, with having engaged in counter-revolutionary activities. But do you know what they charged the second one with? (Wait for it... ) Revealing State Secrets!"
But in the end, the choice of what causes to support and the support for them comes from individual people.
Don't you find it odd that the same corporations which promote the class-divide and ecological destruction would be aiding charities to solve said problems? McDonalds makes billions off of unskilled labor (especially in inner cities where it is abundant and desperate), and pays minimum wage (less if they could). They also clearcut rainforests for cheap grazing land for their beef. Does that make a donation on their part to a poverty- or environment-oriented charity in any way sincere?
I think something that people don't realize (but Linux helps) is that we don't need corporations! We can do things without shareholders, CEO's and upper management. In fact (and nerds realized this a long time ago, some would even argue back in high school), they're the ones keeping us from moving forward. Bureaucracy and heirarchy just get in the way of being able to do really cool stuff.
Personally, I am a bleeding heart libertarian. I want government out of the charity business, and I give generously to charities that I think are getting it right.
If you ever find yourself leaning in a more radical direction, remember that there is an alternative to both government and capitalism.
Michael Chisari
All we need to do is start sending "State Secrets" through the relay, and alert the gov't.
...
Hmmm. Maybe we could relay through the PPC - especially the military side where the Party Techies live? Wouldn't that be fun if they had to purge themselves?
And, as a bonus, they'd imprison the only ones who could stop the script kiddies
Will in Seattle
After I had discovered the extensive Jewish involvement with early Communism, which I had hoped was an uncharacteristic blight on Jewish history, I began to ask questions one dared not ask in polite society about this interesting people and religion. I had read about the many persecutions of the Jews throughout history, including their great suffering now called the Holocaust (in the mid-60s that term had not yet been appropriated by the Jews to apply exclusively to their sufferings during the Second World War - holocaust merely means, as it always has, destruction of anything by fire).
Mark Twain wrote, "Every nation hates each other, but they all hate the Jew." Somehow I found the impertinence to ask why. In a historical context, almost every major nation of Europe had expelled them, some repeatedly, after renewed waves of Jewish immigration. What was it, I wondered, about the Jewish people, that inspired such hatred?
Normally, when we study historical conflicts between nations or peoples, we do it dispassionately. For instance, in examining any war from long ago, we list as objectively as possible, the grievances and rationales of the opposing sides. When studying the War for Southern Independence, every American school child learns the Southern arguments for secession and the Northern arguments for forced union. In contrast, when studying the historical disputes between the Jewish people and others, only the Jewish point-of-view is acceptable.
In early 1995, Congressman Newt Gingrich, Speaker of the House, fired his newly appointed congressional librarian, Christina Jeffrey, for having once suggested that history students, when studying the Holocaust should also be exposed to the German point of view. She was fired in spite of her high standing in her profession and notwithstanding her long and cozy relations with the powerful Jewish ADL (Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith). The very suggestion that there could be another side to any issue affecting Jews is decried as "anti-Semitic." In both the entertainment and news media, the only permissible opinion is that Jews are always innocent victims persecuted by intolerant Christians and other "anti-Semites." Maybe they were always innocent, and all the other peoples of the world were always unjust, I thought. But they weren't so innocent in the Russian Revolution. I realized I could not evaluate the issue fairly until I had read both sides.
This dude apparently doesn't know anything happened to China these past decade besides the old crap Cultural revolution he had always dreamed about.
>on your door because you speak out about US
>government abuses? Didn't think so. The
>situations are not even vaguely comparable.
Have you ever heard about COINTEL PRO? Look into it. For the reader's edification, COINTELPRO means "Counter-Intelligence Program." It was ostensibly a program run by the (US) Federal Bureau of Investigation to prevent foreign intelligence agencies from interfering in domestic politics. In practice, it was a program in which the FBI harassed domestic dissidents.
FWIW, COINTELPRO was shut down when we finally were rid of J. Edgar Hoover. Congress had one look and decided that it was of at best questionable Constitutionality. (Put another way, it was flatly illegal.)
Are similar programs running today? I dunno, but maybe not all that the militias talk about reference Waco is paranoid delusion. That was so incompetently handled that one could reasonably suspect malice.
As for the Seattle situation, it's worth noting that[1] irritants were not used until the rioting actually started. And that most countries would have used troops with live ammunition instead. And would have prevented any publication.
[1] Unless a LOT of Seattle cops perjured themselves. Like all of the officers present at the riot.
... if the pages are not hosted on a Chinese site? Most of what the article referred to was news sites, but what about personal pages? Suppose Mr Chinaman hates the Republic so finds him the "inside scoop", and gets himself a Geocities page..the pages will still be viewable by Chinese users and the Peoples Government. What's a Communist Totalitarian Governmant to do?
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"...and the Universe," continued the waiter, determined not to be deflected on his home stretch,
Is this from babelfish?
did you even bother to read the whole article ?
the citizens who have big sites as said in the
article said its no big deal to them !
Let me tell you about the chinese governemnt. THey are in USA TODAY.
I got one for you.
WOrse than that, my boss is fron china and he knows. THose chinese are oging to take over the wrold soon. I'm not makin it up. If you need to know get the usa today. SAsk pusiehr he knows too. He got the toshiba 66 inch tv. That is bitg.
...remember that the USA government (and governments of many other nations) has a long history of censoring indiscriminately things it doesn't agree with. The various religious groups and corporations who control government think nothing of squashing anything they find offensive or against their interests.
________________________________
Ummm... I hate to break it to you, man, but Reefer Madness was discredited a couple decades ago. Under the influence of pot, you're most likely to sit on the couch with 20 bucks worth of Taco Bell and laugh at Sesame Street.
At least in the US, people under the influence of alcohol make public nuisances of themselves, beat their spouses, start fights, become involved in sexual assualts... People under the unfluence of pot become involved in extensive navel-gazing and find American TV entertaining. Everything else you've heard is boolsheet.
--
There is no sin except stupidity -- Oscar Wilde
Um..go to graphics and National Socialist graphics.
Jeez, you think maybe it's because the corporate owners of the media in the US don't want it heard (given that the people who own the media and who decide what you see are conservative as hell)? Right now, it's in their best interests to make both parties look bad, but to make the Dems look a little bit worse.
Face it, the liberal media is a myth. You can't have a liberal corporate media, and the media in the US is most definately corporate.
--
There is no sin except stupidity -- Oscar Wilde
Not just in China...
'nuff said.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
the US, Canada, Japan, Germany, Israel and all other free nations
Your characterization of Japan and Israel as free nations is really interesting. Neither of them have what I would recognize as 'freedom.'
Japan's criminal justice system, in effect, has no prohibition on torture.[1] There is no right to counsel. There is no right to remain silent. And APBNews (a law enforcement website) had some VERY interesting material on the Japanese prison system.
Israel has freedom in the same sense that Alabama did in 1951. Arabs need not apply. And Israeli law has made physical torture explicitly legal under certain conditions (such as whenever the Shin Bet secret police want to torture someone)
[1] In theory, there is, but Japanese courts are extremely reluctant to throw out confessions elicited by torture.
How do you say "flamebait -1" in Chinese?
How do you say "troll -1" in Chinese?
How do you say "moderators on crack" in Chinese?
Only communist countries will try to silence Internet users!
The internet represents the most powerful tool to promote freedom of information that has ever existed. I know it is a cliche, but the truth is what sets us free. The elites in china are essentially trying to stick their fingers in a leaky dam. Sooner or later the thing is going to collapse. I think the internet represents one of our best weapons against censorship and oppression. Freedom of information leads to freedom of thought and someone who thinks for themselves can never be truly conquered because they can't be fooled. The worst you can do is kill them. The chineese people might not have the right to keep and bear arms, making them physically defenseless against tyrrany, but hopefully this new powerful force for liberty will help set them free.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
A researcher has found some Echelon documents and made some conclusions that counter those put forth by the online community. Wired story here Please do not moderate down, this has relevance.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
when is the 'free world' going to stop kissing their ass? hmm.. maybe when the free world is actually free someday.. maybe when things like civil rights / social justice mean more than MONEY to our own 'democratic' governments.. until then, there's money to be made in China, and we can't let trivial, subjective things like morality get in the way of Economic Growth. after all, aren't your mutual funds more important than a billion-odd people across the world living under totalitarian states, many of them tacitly approved of, if not actually installed by, your own government? of course they are.
Anyone who wants to get a street-level view of the WTO protests can visit Free Speech Internet Television and take a look at some videos produced in Seattle during the actual protests. 85,000 people were present; approximately 200 engaged in destructive behavior.
There was no shortage of people who knew exactly what they were protesting, and why. Black propaganda-- coordinated disinformation masquerading as independent "news"-- works even better than executing journalists. It inspires no uproar, and leaves no martyrs. Welcome to Facist Amerika, which every day adopts more from Stalin, Hitler, and Mao.
So far, Internet users have not suffered too much government interference. Ther internet bypasses state censorship, and the Chinese are obviously big into this. We should be grateful for the privilege of free speech. I say privilege, because it is not a right, but something that can be taken away. We need to keep fighting for it. The internet means that you can express your opinions off-shore. I expect that a reaction to this embargo will be that some Chinese people will create 'off-shore resources' to tell their story to the world. Don't think that the west will be immune from this. freedom of speech may exist here, but once we start doing a lot of business over the Internet, and encruypting it, expect our 'liberal' governments to get hot under the collar. They can't tax what they can't see, so expect some 'interesting legislation' in the next decade in the US and Europe, as tax revenue start to disappear, and people start to move money and bank off-shore via the Internet. I am convinced that this was one key motivation of the US Government ban on strong encryption.
Stephen Hawking has written another book. It's about time as well.
I'm hanging from the lampost from the corner of the street..... *sing in the style of george formby*
Actually, although most people don't know
this, Mussolini didn't even get the trains
running on time. Everyone says he did, but
I guess they unknowingly bought the propaganda,
even if they didn't think he was a nice person.
"Free Flow of information is necessary to keep up in today's economy..."
This is a sort of off-topic question, but if the main assumption of this thread, or what the above poster has so succinctly stated in this quote, happens to be true, then what does this imply for the US's increasing reliance on capitalism-based information media. For example AOL-TimeWarner, the Disney conglomerate with ABC (or CBS, I don't remember) etc, etc, etc. If you ask me, we are progressively moving away from free flow of information in this country, it just happens to be controlled more and more by big business instead of the government. I mostly ask because I'm 1)curious as to ya'lls opinion, and 2) I'm not sure as to whether this assumption actually IS true.
Looks like China may be beating us in censoring the internet. I'm sure we'll follow. We're not far from a communistic internet as it is.
so why did the comment receive no points. are the moderators totalitarian?
I don't know if many people ever go to the site, but it's linked to on china.com and shares a lot of the same graphical apearence (like a sister site or somthing). I know china.com is owned partaly by the chinese government, does this mean that Taiwan.com is as well? It seems a little weird, like Iraq owning CNN.com or somthing here. Does anyone know the details?
[ c h a d o k e r e ]
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Having taken a quick look at the posts with the threshold set to four I find it disturbing that all the posts are so one sided. In a commninity that prides itself on being open mided, there is clearly a closed mindset in view here.
/.tters will understand), as is any news that trashes some other country.
/.:
/. has a worldwide audience, and again, I apologise for those posters from other countries for making this an American-centric post. But it does seem that most of the anti-China sentiment comes from within the US.
I live in Hong Kong. I am Indian. I find it interesting to sometimes see how Americans are so unobjective when they read news. Any news that honours America is 'Insightful' (to put it in terms
There is a need for objectivity when we read news. If you just accept what you read without thinking about it then you are as bad as the people who write it. I know some Americans and while I recognise they may not be representative of the whole population, to them, the world ends at the American borders.
I know people who have been asked, "How long a drive away is Hong Kong?", or "Is Hong Kong in Vermont?", or "Do you speak Japanese?". Clearly, a wider teaching of things non-American should be put on the agenda in schools, as should critical thinking.
Now, how does this relate to this topic? I've seen posts that call China fascist. It is not. Posts that claim China does not allow private enterprises. It does - the big thing in the 1980's and early 1990's was privatisation of state-owned industries, and Deng Xiaoping set up special economic zones for foreigners to invest in China.
A need for research is apparent. Do not believe everything CNN tells you. BBC is far more objective than CNN, but I do admit its horrendously boring. CNN tells you one side of each story: the American side.
I study history in school, its taught me to discern and see what is reliable and what is not, what is a good source of information and what is not.
China is not an 'evil' state, as someone so ineloquently put it. It is a state with a different type of government. I can see myself that it has a bad rights record, and such, and it is plainly obvious that thats what all of you see too, the side that CNN likes to tell you guys about.
But what I think a lot of people in Asia see is that China has been advancing steadily since the days of Mao. It is developing as quickly as can be expected for a 1-billion person strong country. You cannot just give universal suffrage and expect people to vote cluefully. People need to be educated first. Some things, such as this issue at hand here of web censorship I think are wrong and I do not agree with. But, it does not mean that China is has a bad government.
To sum it up, this is my complaint about posters on
If America does something wrong: Yes its wrong, but we are the best nation in the world, and we are mostly right. Its OK for us to screw up sometimes.
If China does something wrong: Yes its wrong, we knew all along that China is a bunch of communist fascists with no morals. What does this change?
This view has got to change. I'm sorry for making it sound like all Americans do this. They don't. But by and large, most Americans do.
What's wrong with you man? There's no better
country to live in than Canada.
Unless, as seems to be a growing trend in the UK at least, you go and drive to Taco Bell to get your munchies. Then your slowed reactions get really dangerous.
Maybe the Chinese government will accidently shut down some of those china-based mailservers that are relaying Spam all over the world.....:)
Come on folks. This is the same totalitarian regime that led the slaughter of peaceful protesters in Tiananmen(sp?) Square, then refused to let their media mention that anything happened. This is one-and-a-half steps away from the regime that led the Cultural Revolution. These are ruthless dictators, and they will NOT let free speech occur until the only 'free speech' is in their favour.
/. sort of article.
This is not news.[1] This is not a change of policy. This is entirely consistent with the Chinese government's way of doing things.
Something you might want to consider then next time your government talks about 'wonderful foreign trade opportunities with China.'
[1] Which isn't to say that I don't think it should have been posted--it's definitely a
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
cool. they are one target of cracking I do agree with. Take the fuckers down.
I'm not really surpirsed at all by this... remember, we're talking about a country that's been fairly shut-off from the world for years, and the Internet is wide-open for people to share stories, ideas, secrets, opinions, etc. which might be anti-Communism and anti-government - and last I checked, this wasn't really looked upon very well in Communist contries ;)
While government regulation/limitation/control may be protested in the U.S., it's almost the norm for many other countries such as China and Cuba. At least in the U.S. we give slanderous and hateful idiots the first amendment to try to hide behind. =P
-k
--
I couldn't agree with you more..
Case in point: the recent DeCSS fiasco...
BigCorps: "Hey, we can't physically stop the average joe from copying stuff he's bought legally... let's make a law where making copying equipment is illegal.. oh, that reminds me, Harold, how is that proposal coming, you know, that one where it would be illegal to think about copying?"
China is neither Fascist or Communist - it is Confucian. As soon as 1 billion people think that their government should be changed, they will. Don't sweat it. In the meantime, we could help them by explaining what the term "democratic" means - as in "Peoples Democratic Republic of China". As it stands, the effrontery required to use the term to describe their system of government stands at odds with Confucian philosophy. Democritus must be turning in his grave.
But:
1. If I say Bill Clinton sucks, I know that the CIA or FBI isn't going to come knocking at my door.
2. If I want to leave the country for any reason, I can.
3. I can write what I want, read what I want, see what I want. Yes there are pressures from outside sources to control the "under-belly" of our culture. But, hey, If I want to do it bad enough I can and I don't have to worry about being put to death for it, (first degree murder aside)
4. We musn't be to bad. We have thousands of people from Cuba, China, Mexico, etc, etc trying to get in illegally.
We do have our problems, every country does. But I'll be damned if I'd rather live anywhere else.
-FirstNoel
"Hmm. I am to metaphor cheese as metaphor cheese is to transitive verb crackers!"
If the chinese government is so weak that it feels menaced by websites, they deserve our pity, not our flames ;)
I don't know why this comes as such surprising news to us all. I mean, it's china. they've been surpressing human rights for a long time now. This is nothing new to red china.
...just a note to let You know that there is a "virtual" Democracy Wall for mainland China on the web, at
http://books.dreambook.com/vead/tian anmen.html.
This was originally put up to serve as a forum in which residents of the mainland could freely ( and anonymously ) express themselves without fear of government retaliation, in support of the cyber-petition convened by Mr. Wang Dan, located on the web at http://www.june4.org.
Anyone may post their opinions on THE WALL.
This attempt by China to rationalize censorship (`protecting state secrets' my ass-- which secret in particular, the one about shitty living conditions?) is another pathetic attempt at, like the MPAA with the DeCSS source code, putting the genie back in the bottle. They've realized, much too late, that a brand new medium has arrived. One that is so fundimentally anarchistic, they can't control it, nor can they ever hope to. What's more, the world is becoming so dependant on the internet, they will never be able to cut their nation off entirely. They're in a bind, and liberty and democracy will eventually rise up because of it.
What this most likely will do is give justification when the Communist Party needs to find a reason to throw someone in jail. ``Well, he hasn't actually committed a crime,'' the party heads will say, ``but look! He has a web site! And it wasn't authorized by us! To the gulag!''
I suspect the Australian net censorship laws will be used in a similar way. The government knows it can't censor the internet, but at least now it has a legal means to punish someone for publishing something it doesn't agree with.
Actually neither the government, nor media should have an excessive ammount of power. Both tend to serve the interests of those who control them.
Democracy is simply the form of government where as many different interests are represented as possible.
The internet is an example of the same type of idea brought to the media.
Democracy and freedom of information are a severe threat to the elites who rule china. They run the country to serve their own interests of course and more often than not this is at the expense of the population who have no power. Look up "evil" in the dictionary for more information about this.
The idea that slashdotters should pick a side suggests that everyone here should agree with each other. Sorry, but in the real world people who think for themselves rarely agree on everything. Differing opinions are a sign that slashdot is working exactly as it should.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
this is informative
Gee this is really the most terrible thing china has done. PErsonally I think this is peanuts compair to things you don't hear.
Eveyone is America is up is arms about that cuban boy but you never hear about those Hong Kong business men and woman who are jailed without trial in China often on non existance charges. And what's more the chinese authority isn't only breaking international laws they are breaking even their own laws. In truth having them do some sensoring on some sites is hardly going to give people scars are or kill.
Just tonight i saw a show about how one guy was charged by his business partner and basically kidnapped by the chinese police tied up and shove into a house where his business partner was allowed to beat him and pour boiling water on him.
What's really wrong with the chinese government isn't about the really high up leaders. It's about the common rabble that's lower down. With the central government you just have to be polite in the chinese way. As in don't come right out and say they are wrong. Sort of indicated privatly. But for those people in jail right now nothing will get them out unless someone with connections speaks to their "friend" about him.
Anyhow I am just ranting here. But this is a point i think alot of people overseas should be aware of. You never hear about this stuff on 60 mintues and such. But it's happening everyday.
Why should someone outside of China care about these new regs anymore than they otherwise care for China? That's not meant in a bad way, but it sounds like (i've never been there) a rather repressive society that already censors every other news outlet. Censoring the internet is a little more daunting, but they can simply forbid access and jail anyone who does use it, if that's what it takes.
It's not another case of government cracking down news organizations.
This doesn't affect people or companies based in the US, UK, etc... Because of the chinese governmnet declaring this, there is no added risk that the US government will follow suit.
Yes, it would suck for any of us not from there to live in China. But we don't. Be thankful, but don't raise the red flag (pardon the pun) saying that we all need to be aware of this as if it affects anyone not already in china.
The rant is over.
Nothing will inevitably lead to a freer society for the Chinese people. Even if the PRC government collapsed, something just as bad might pop up in its place. However, I think you both overestimate the material wealth of the bulk of the Chinese people and underestimate the propensity of human beings to push for freedom when they see the possibility of it and think they can get away with it. I expect that China will become a freer nation in my lifetime for the almost the same reasons the Soviet Union fell.
Of course, an alternate point to be made is that a free society doesn't necessarily require democracy. The American Revolution wasn't a social aberration but an intense example of a growing tradition of limited government and personal freedom that existed in England, which still had its king as a significant force in government. Theoretically, China could become a much freer nation, and possibly even a tolerable one to live in for a freedom nut like me, while still retaining absolute Communist party control of the central government.
Of course, by the time the government gets done formally acknowledging personal freedoms like private property, free markets, freedom of association and movement, free speech, etc, that Communist government will be even more of a meaningless, denatured Old Men's Club than it is now (just lacking the power-of-the-gun that the current one has) and will crumble under the first major scandal that crops up. And, of course, even though democracy isn't at all synonymous with personal freedom or even good government (hence the old "three wolves and a sheep voting on lunch" Twainism), democracy at least gives us some control of the government short of revolution, so it is the most preferable of systems.
"The regulations appear to give authorities a powerful instrument of control over the Internet in the name of protecting sensitive government information."
Is there ANYONE in the media that understands that "The Internet" does not live in a particular country?
You want high taxes, government rationed healthcare and oppressive gun control?
I'll just suggested a couple of things based on my experience of having lived for years in countries other than the U.S (nothing like experience for a different perspective) and having visited many others:
As in many of the recent articles concerning China and the internet, there is a lot to be worried about, but there is often a slight glimmer of hope. While the Chinese gov't may be communist and have all the anti-freedom baggage that goes along with it, they aren't stupid; they see the enormous economic opportunity that the internet brings. As this article mentioned, it is those invovled in economic policy that are inclined to side with more open policies regarding the internet.
For whatever reason, I have a certain amount of faith (what an ugly word *that* can be) that in the coming years it will be those economic ministries that will win over the security-oriented ones and institute more open policies. Chinese officials are hungry for power and money - public opinion isn't terribly important to them for obvious reasons. Bringing the benefits of the "internet economy" is inherently in their best interests, and they know it, but they want to keep the Chinese people miserable and ignorant; that's the problem.
Our media is definitely universally illiberal, but I think I use a different meaning of the word than you do. :)
It's rather safe to say, however, that the majority of the national media, and the dominant members of it in particular, are just a step or two more leftist and statist than the "center". Hardly enough to be very different, but enough to irritate those who disagree. The only major outlet that's more central and possibly a step from the mainstream to the right (and still statist) end of the spectrum is Fox and particularly the Fox News channel (which is just enough different from the slightly leftist mainstream of the news media to provoke worried "Does Fox News have a Conservative Agenda" articles)
What people forget is that self-interest often takes a backseat, at times, to one's own political and other beliefs, even for "horrible, evil, rich media executives". That's why you can see Ted Turner, who's gotten rich enough to be able to throw away a billion dollars into the black hole of the UN, mouth off on how "Christianity is the religion of losers", even at the threat to profits such an incredibly offensive and stupid statement represents. It's surprising, but a lot of executives don't have any particular reverence for the free market and are happy to entertain and even support the idea of increased government activity to support their pet social causes.
You can drink as much alcohol you like, as long as you don't drive until you've sobered up.
America Vesitigo (probably not his real name, but its close to it :) was the first to actually rediscover America.
That must have been Amerigo Vespucci, if I am not mistaken.
Le Couard Anonyme
Henceforth, all moderators will be hired from the Peoples Republic of China. All current moderator points have been revoked. All new moderators will come from this pool of Chinese agents.
Moderation catagories will now be:
Dissenting -1
Dissenting -1
Dissenting -1
Dissenting -1
Stealing American Nuclear Secrets +1
Please return to your normal browsing.
Did someone say Fascism? :)
Benito Mussolini!
Hey he got the trains running on time.
Sometimes, you can walk a fine line between two opposing needs. There is a happy medium where each need is satisfied. I believe that there is an "unhappy medium" where neither need is satisfied, and the government is actually at risk of losing the Internet opportunity as well as their own control over their people.
The Internet is not about technology. It's been around since the sixties, and the Web could have been invented in the seventies. The Web is about community; the technology only gives us an opportunity to meet, and that's where the magic starts. Strict control over a portion of the Internet immediately renders that portion useless.
I think that the only chance for the Chinese government to survive in its present form (and, frankly, I'd rather it didn't) would be for it to close off the Internet entirely to its people, and to ignore it as an economic opportunity. I feel that anything less would destablize the Chinese government. The nation would not collapse, China would still exist, but it would have a new form of government.
If the Chinese government allows access but try to control it, they will destroy their own power structure and lose an economic opportunity simultaneously.
--The basis of all love is respect
Is it that logical reasoning that can lead to this conclusion simply does not exist, and it is all a matter of perspective? Or is it that the citizens of those countries aren't able to get to the "enlightening" information?
The percentages are Federal Funds, calculated after removing Trust Funds( such as Social Security), which are raised and spent separately from income taxes. What you pay (or what you don't) on April 15 goes only to the Federal Funds portion of the budget. The government practice of combining Federal and Trust Funds (the so-called "Unified Budget") began in the 1960's during the Vietnam War. The government presentation makes the human needs portion of the budget seem larger and the military portion smaller.
"Past military" is represented by veteran's benefits plus 80% of the interest on the national debt. If there had been no military spending, most (if not all) of the national debt would have been eliminated.
Interesting, no?
In the CNN version of the story there is the following interesting line: "Some major international companies, including Intel, IBM, and Yahoo! have already made substantial investments in Chinese Web sites, despite government restrictions on outside investments." Does this mean they will submit to the same invasive tactics? What if Yahoo! distributes the content over servers that do not all sit in China? If Yahoo! allows Joe Chopstick to anonymously set up webpages on a Chinese Geocities will they be responsible for anything posted?
"Shredded cabbage and mayo go good together." Cole's Law
> a Nazi site, I mean it really is a Nazi site.
> When you hear that kind of rhetoric, be aware where it is coming from.
The media has you trained so well, sheep. "Racism! Disregard everything he's said even though it's been verified by multiple independant sources!"
Chinese news sources from releasing their 'private information' to non-Chinese news sites? I am not sure I understand what this is meant to accomplish exactly. Is there someone here that has a better grasp on the politics of this that could explain the ultimate goal of this seemingly futile gesture?
But look on the bright side. Things are getting better. For instance,
Web sites -- and any organization with computer links to the Internet -- which failed to implement safeguards against security breaches could be shut down, they said.
At least it didn't say that they were going to shoot them.:)
I am not surprised at all by China's actions. The Chinese spent millions of dollars funneling campaign donations to the US Democratic Party for the sole purpose of acquiring US military technology. If I was dishing out big bucks to Bill Clinton for this material, the last thing I would want to happen is my citizens giving away those secrets to the world on the Internet for free.
So kudoos to the Chinese Government! Smart move. Bribe US Democratic Leaders for military secrets and then crack down on your own citizens so those secrets don't leak out for free to other 3rd world countries. You got to protect your investment.
So, China is trying to control. So, some US agencies and foreign countries are trying to control. So, why not create a free tool, perhaps coupled to a GPLed database, that allows a user to query whether any of the servers it relies upon are owned by an organization that complies with Chinese, or Kuwaitii, or US agency requests?
Then, the user would at least have the option of choosing not to do business with them. The trouble is, of course, an agent who did do business would try to hide the fact. But that attempt can be skirted.
It could be a resource like peacefire.org, except aimed at servers.
Jan Theodore Galkowski, (Oo) http://www.smalltalkidiom.net/ MySQL,PHP,ETL,SQL,MinGW C, and plucking the Web
Yeah, don't leak the secrets of the chinese goverment - they payed a lot of money and worked really hard with the Clinton/Gore Regime and the DNC to steal them from the US!
I'm not sure of the source (and reliability) of the numbers, private ownership of businesses has gone way, way up in China in the last few years. Another interesting tidbit was where a court decided that male prostitutes couldn't be prosecuted because the law was written assuming only female ones, so even in cases like this the Rule of Law can trump the Powers That Be in China. So I'm hopeful.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
Jackbooted thugs breaking into a certain Danish home probably indicate much bigger, more threatening players in the big-stakes game of Global Domination.
IMHO, the Chinese mandating secure web sites is probably a good thing. Certainly better than the US, Japan, et al. (Mind you, Japan's attitude to, ummm, certain historical events could be construed as baiting.)
Whilst I can't condone any organisation, be it a private company or a national government, imposing censorship and 1984-style mind control, at least there's some semblance of directness about what they're doing. The film industry seems to much prefer subterfugue, lies, intimidation, threats, and tactics remeniscent of 1940's Germany.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I can't help it, I think that's funny!
I wonder what the Chineese government would think about posting that DeCSS code...
-ShelbyCobra
Living life in the right side of the s-plane
If you'd log in you'd get to be a moderator. If you'd meta-moderate you'd get to counteract poor moderation. You have only your own apathy to blame.
The Chinese first and foremost must secure the future of its people and its childeren. The Chinese are entitled to a national determinism that doesn't include Michael Eisner, Sumner (nee Rothestein) Redstone, or Edgar Bronfman. These media parasites, and fellow members of their tribe, control almost all international news and media. Records, Television, Movies, News, Magazines -- you name it, these lampreys have monopolized the control of the media, and use it to advance their destructive ammoral New World Order agenda. They surely don't have the interests of the Chinese people in mind. I urge you to read Who Rules America for further insight into who actually owns and runs the international media companies.
I guess you are speaking to the others. I always post logged in and frequently metamoderate.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
The communists and socialists of the world want nothing more than to tear down the freedom that we have online and the relative freedom we have in the "offline" world. I for one am sick of their rhetoric about "helping the poor". Since when is dehumanizing and slaughtering innocents helping? Socalists and Communists have proven to ALWAYS be tyrants when they get into power. I think the US, Canada, Japan, Germany, Israel and all other free nations should place a unilateral media and trade embargo on China until they end their despotic ways. The problem is that our President has been giving head to the Reds like a cheap whore
Maybe we could use this to close up some of those open mail relays that spammers love so much. All we need to do is start sending "State Secrets" through the relay, and alert the gov't.
;)
I think a public execution would work wonders to get a few relays secured.
Ask me how the Heisenberg Principle may or may not have saved my life.
3133ti5+...
The South China Morning Post published an arti cle about another media crackdown in China where an editor was removed for publishing stories not approved by Party officials. "One recent edition explained to Internet users how to tap into mirror Web sites abroad, which could help them skirt government blocks on Internet sites that officials did not like." This quote is from the Internet version of a paper published in Hong Kong supposedly under the same rules. My, my, my how this Internet thing does seem to get out of control! .
"Shredded cabbage and mayo go good together." Cole's Law
This is very much in line with China's information policy...and we can be sure to expect to see a crop of hactivist websites publishing news from inside transmitted over SSL/ssh/etc.
I wonder what the Hong Kong Blondes are going to do...?
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
Who da Man?
That was me, naked and petrified.
I've been trolling here for probably close to a year now. Open Source Man, great as he is, hasn't been at it that long, as far as I know.
The only thing the Chinese government could do that would surprise me, is to admit they're wrong.
Given their history, nothing's shocking.
Well...let's see what role "the only Super Power", US, plays in all this.
vr
PS: Anonymous Coward also means Spam Hater.
Is this really any different from how web sites in the US are policed? Granted the US Government is slightly more lenient, however they could censor or shut-down any web site that they wish in the name of "national security".
What is the definition of mutually exclusive?
"Cannot have both at the same time?"
Meaning no disrespect, you might want to go over your polysci notes again.
"Communism goes hand in hand with Totalitarism" HUH??! Communism (theoretically speaking, i.e. Marxism) is absolutely and utterly at odds with totalitarianism. In fact, democracy was supposed to evolve into communism (through a few steps), and culminate in the dissolution of government. Government by the people, for the people. The problem with communism is that it assumes that if people are equal and happy, avarice, greed, and powerlust will die out. Never going to happen.
You'll notice that I never refered to China as a Communist country in my original post...
Moving on, "They [governments] are not evil, they just have a different method for creating a great country."
...and also...
"Again, I don't agree with their methods but I do know they aren't evil."
While it's true that governments may not be inherently evil, they're also not inherently good, and not necessarily interested in creating a good country. Take the Taliban in Afghanistan, for instance; I can't imagine that they have anything other than their own power/money, and the destruction of anyone they hate in mind. They did _not_ forcibly take control to create a happy, egalitarian society.
As a final point, I'd point out that "evil" is a vague term. Wiping out all hints of cultural impurity (a la the cultural revolution) may not have been an evil goal to those doing it, but to me it is, no matter what.
And regardless of all of this, we still have to look at China's record. No matter what comes out of their mouths, the blood on their hands won't wash off easily.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
What can be expected from the filthy, anachronistic government of the PR of China?
No, the Chinese government is more worried about the Internet fostering activism. When each dissenter has to stand up to the government alone, it's easy to frighten everyone into submission. But let people get organized, let the dissenters know they are not alone, and before too long you can't frighten anyone into submission. That's what the Chinese government fears, and that's what it is trying to crack down on with these measures.
-r
In my poly sci courses I developed the personal belief that almost all governments were formed with good intentions.
Communism is really just the idea that everybody works to the best of their abilities and the wealth is evenly distributed. Communism goes hand in hand with Totalitarism (complete government control).
I don't agree with it. I think that what America (and many other "western" governments) have is pretty close to ideal. However, it's important to understand that when a government takes control and distributes that wealth, power, etc. they often have the goal of creating a great country.
They are not evil, they just have a different method for creating a great country.
Open communication hampers their efforts by allowing the people to speak up against their government. The government thinks keeping them quiet is okay because they have the best interests of the people in mind.
Again, I don't agree with their methods but I do know they aren't evil. (Or at least they didn't start out as evil. Power corrupts)
That which does not kill me only makes me whinier
why should we even be talking about it? What right do we have telling an entire country how to control and govern their people? Its like the US is big brother to the world, sticking his nose in everybodys business where it doesn't belong.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Umm are we really all that surprised here? This is
certainly no different than any of their other
mass censorship policies.
But THATS the way... uh huh, uh huh... they like it!
-matthew
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
Sadly, that's not a fair assumption. Their definition is something closer to, "anything we don't like, or that might cast the government in a bad light." Also, espionage in the US (and many other countries) is a legal charge which resultingly has to be put through due process.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
The Chinese government is FASCIST in structure, not Communist, which does not allow for any private enterprise. But of course, saying Fascist is not politically correct.
As long as you have a type of political philosophy you essentially have the government. That does not mean that the government does in principal exist. People very much believed that communism when Stalin and the boys were in control. Yes in theory he ran a different ship but try telling that to them or others who wanted to look at things in a more formal manner.
Tell me why fasciasm is politically incorrect and communism is more so? Is this to mean that we should all believe in communism if we are to be good citizens?
The policies of China make it in the style of governments of the 20th century who tried to call themselves communist in that they are attempting to censor material that disagrees with the state. In fact in almost every government calling the people in control fools is usually a really bad idea. Just look at the Sedition acts passed around WWI in the USA. Some poor shmuck called Eugene V. Debbs decided it was really cool to insult the government and big business and he got a few years in the pokey for it.
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
1) Always remember that neither China nor the CCP are monolithic. The nature of Chinese/Confucian governance gives bureaucrats a lot more leeway in interpreting the various laws and regulations as they see fit than their counterparts in America or Europe would have. This wide-ranging discretion and power also leads to a fair ammount of corruption, but that's outside the scope of our article today.
2) This announcement is largely about internal politics. One or more members of the conservative wing of the CCP called in a favor, and so this little gem of an announcement appeared. In a few months, it may be forgotten again, or a more restrictive regulation may appear to supplant it. This arbitrary use of the law is very common.
3) In a lot of cases, Chinese law is not as hardcore as CNN or Richard Gere would make it out to be. In most cases, you receive several visits from various people explaining that there is a problem that needs to be addressed. Only if you insist as a matter of principle to continue to do whatever is irritating the government will they run their teeth through you. (this does not excuse the restrictions imposed on free speech in the PRC, but serves to explain a little about how it works).
What it means for website operators is very hard to say. Bearing in mind points #1 & 2, it probably means very little. If your organization enjoys a good relationship with your counterparts in the CCP, they are not likely to go out of their way to hassle you unless some impetus to do so is given from above. If they have it out for you, another tool has been added to their already ample box of Ways To Make Unruly Citizens Have a Lousy Day.
The proof will not be in the newspaper article or associated regulations, but in how things are handled afterwards. There's an expression in Chinese: san1 fen1 zhong1 re4 du4 literally: "Hot for three minutes", i.e. someone goes and does a crackdown to score political points, then life goes back to normal.
Take care!
Jeremy
Even if the chinese government restricts encryption, this should be one of the less important worries for the chinese peole. Check out Amnesty International's Annual Reports on China.
I seriously need to lay off the Red Bull.
Can you ship all your extra stuff over here to Canada? Can't get that shit here, as Canada has fucked up caffine laws.
What's so special about it? You do realize that caffene has an LD50 level for it you know.
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
Assuming that the chinese definition of "state secrets" is not too different from ours (i.e. national defense) you couldn't do this in the US either. It's called espionage boys and girls.
-- Slashdot sucks.
Knock it off for fucks sake. You have posted this link for the last 10 or 15 stories, so either everyone has visited it, or don't give a shite (like me). In closing, I say to you sir "Shut the fuck up".
got to get my facts straight before i start writing. :)
-- J.R.R Trollkien, son of Troll, son of Trall
Get used to it. Slashdot readers are sheep. They'll believe whatever they are told.
BAA! BAA! BAA!
"Authorities are anxious not to smother the Internet, keenly aware that new information technology is key to China's economic future. Yet they fear an information free-flow which could threaten communist control."
Long live the revolution, eh?
Why is it that a corrupt, foul government is overthrown by smart citizens... then the new one designed to smooth the flow of goods to everyone goes and decides that it will be the forever government, instead of a transitional one? So what does it do to cement its power? Why, the very things the original government was over thrown for!
I really with that the people had forced Mao and the rest on the hundred day march to properly get some sort of "we have rights" document signed, ala the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, or the US Constitution. Actions like this fly in the face of what Karl Marx wrote about. They also remind me of the actions of the MPAA and RIAA, so who am I to judge?
---
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
This probably sounds like a flame, and in a way it is. But the last few days we have had hundreds of comments yelling how the media has too much power and the government has too little.
Jon Katz had an entire rant of how we should "ph33r the m3dia m0g13s!" Suddenly we have this thing about how the government is limiting the meida (though it does have implications on Joe User's website), and people are going "Up with the media! Down with government."
Slashdotters should pick a side, or find a place in between. As the topic says, Who's the enemy? Maybe that is what we should be discussing, and not just specific cases.
Thanks for the time, now all I have to do is wait for this to be buried at the Anonymous Coward's default of (Score: 0).
Hey man, did you ever think that if this socialist revolution thing was going to happen- you know, with the spread of communism, overthrow of capitalst democracies, and all that cool stuff- wouldn't the internet be a pretty good medium for spreading those ideas? I guess that if the people were really in favor of it, we'd be seeign a lot of "Why communism rules" web sites, and ever more propaganda. Which also leads me to wonder- what if the communists really won, and our money is meaningless? Maybe this whole time we have been trying to make money, but it's for no good, cuz the people we thought were just wealthless BUMS were really communist agents, who had already realized the futility of accumilated weath! Shit, I think I'm no to something. I guess that by posting this, it puts me at risk of drawing fire from the powers that be- if that whole communist secret government revolution deal is true- and it puts my LIFE at risk! Oh well, one way to find out. By the way- I'm being pretty brave hitting "submit" so please don't down-moderate me for takign this risk. (Damn, if the communist assasins don't take me out, it'll be the /. moderators!)
Don't listen to me- My voice recognition software doesn't know what i'm talking about
the US, Canada, Japan, Germany, Israel and all other free nations
decide to do something together then it will be multilateral not unilateral won't it?
Yes, in principle communism is supposed to be a utopian society. Except the founders of communism forgot one little important point that basically destroys there nice little concept.
People are "thinkers". In other words, we are not mindless robots who live are lives out on this earth eating, sleeping and producing (some of us do, of course). The other related point to this is that we do not live in a perfect world. Its basically every man for himself or in Darwinian terms "survival of the fittest". That is why capitalism has been so successful and why it has become the prominant societal feature of the 20th and 21st century.
Communists societies will ultimately break down not because it isn't a good idea but because human nature will not support it.
Lets think about it for a minute... what is the point of working hard or getting good grades if you are never rewarded for it. Human nature is such that we are all very selfish, if it doesn't directly profit us then we don't usually do it, its as simple as that.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
NPS Internet Solutions, LLC
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
www.haidacarver.com
Actually I'm pretty sure I also cannot post John Grisham's newest book on the Internet. I'm pretty sure I can't post the source code to Windows. I don't think I can post libelous or defamatory stuff. There's probably a lot of stuff that we as Americans aren't allowed by law to post.
Hey, he had plenty of teeth. A couple different sets, in fact...
The crime of leaking state secrets has been used to jail journalists and is often invoked against opponents of the Communist Party.
Funnily enough we've seen exactly the same thing here, both in the past during the 30's - 50's when Communism was a little too popular for comfort (we can all afford to be tolerant about it now because it hasn't an ice-cube's chance in hell of making a revival anytime soon!) and more recently with the "nuclear secrets leak" where funnily enough a scientist who just happened to be from China (our big opponent supposedly) was accused of betraying state secrets.
Yes, that's a far cry from having to have /. monitored every day by a special FBI task force *hi guys!*, however, consider the fact that there are STILL twelve documents in the FBI files on the John Lennon investigation which they won't release. I wonder what would be the fate of any web-site that put them up if they got hold of them?
Also, while China is bad and all, We the people are still trading with the buggers, not mention Indonesia, Burma, anywhere else horrible you care to mention.
the web page you referenced to is a page dedicated to anti jewish nazi bullshit. Excuse me, but you guys lost big time in WWII. Get over it. Nazism is illogical and for the weak minded.
Lawyers, MBA's, RIAA? A jedi fears not these things!
The people running the show in China use the term "state secret" very broadly. It can be something defense releated, but it is usually something the government finds embrrassing or annoying. Things like publishing a letter that is critical of the government, or running a web site that contradicts the party line. Something like this comments, for example.
What's really great are the punishments! You can get dead for saying the government is wrong. If the judge is feeling generous, you might only get 15 years of brutal labor, making products to sell to the US.