Slashdot Mirror
Chinese Sites Band Together To Counter Google
egoff writes "The China Search Alliance is a coalition of over 200 Chinese internet portals that have joined together to try to capture the Chinese search market before Google can "invade." Started by China.com.cn, an official government portal, the CSA has now expanded to include mainly commercial, non-governmental, Chinese sites. According to Guangzhou-based New Express News, Google has already approached several Chinese firms about forming a partnership. Being that it started in the government, this looks like a tool for greater control while appearing to be in open competition with Google."
You're only going to see what the government wants you to see.
As long as they stop spamming the world, thankyouverymuch.
It is their country. They can do what they want really. If they want to disallow the usage of google even, that IS their right.
:).
We also have the right never to use their search engines.
Aren't rights wonderful? Eventually they'll become more capitalistic. By allowing them to create their own technologies to do so we allow them to create superior products theoretically...and if they have a superior search engine eventually, they'll want to sell it to americans. Capitalism keeps the world going round and round..that or Newton's law of universal gravitation...not sure which
-gabe
Now that Google has a serious competitor (due to the enormous population of China), it will try to improve to compete fairly. So will the China search system.
As much as I like Google, it has a monopoly on non-suckiness of search engines. If China's search can compete, unfairly or fairly, it won't be a mere arms race - only good can come of this.
This is a good thing for everyone.
"The lesson to be learned is not to take the comments on slashdot too literally." --Vinnie Falco, BearShare
Sure and next you'll be telling me Yahoo! thinks they'll be able to take out Google.
If they want to beat Google as a fast, lightweight, and powerful search tool, they probably should kill those Flash banner ads...
Karma: Excellent (fuck, even in the future moderation doesn't work!)
The Slant
I'm theorizing that, if the Chinese government indeed builds a search portal that can compete with Google, their next step will be to keep Google's spiders from traversing the Chinese networks. This would cripple Google's ability to grow and update, and knock them out of the running.
This is good news for the consumers of course. With more people researching better search technologies, like this Chinese Search Alliance, like Yahoo announced a couple of days ago about trying to better it's search engine, and Microsoft trying to get into the search market, the products are only going to get better (*hopefully*).
But there is no substitute for now - Google rocks! I especially love Google Labs.
But a bunch of portal sites organized with the Chinese Government?
What benefit do they have? What are they afraid of? I could understand if they wanted to have a Chinese-only search-bot. But even still, there's little point in that. That limits your resources drastically.
Started by the government, but going to be non-governmental? Isn't that like saying you can register for an email address from the worlds leading spam guy (I forget his name at the moment) but not get spammed? Oh wait, I forgot, this is China; not America. =/ Sounds like a smart idea, though ... Yahoo should have started fighting Google sooner rather than lounging around on their asses and filling up their websites and user's-inboxes with more and more spam (we all know Yahoo does it). Now they are bitching about it; maybe China is too under-rated..
I sell out to The Man every day.
However, nobody knew that the Communist government of China, just as nimble as it was repressive, would be able to exploit its immense pool of cheap labor to remain a powerful force through the dawn of the 21st century.
But now we are seeing that power crumble. As Altavista, Lycos, and Yahoo realized in the late 1990s, it is impossible to become the best search engine portal just by becoming the biggest. Google brought us good results, minimal pages that weren't influenced by bribery or (in most cases) manipulation, and quick easy searches. Is that something that China's 200 competing portals will be able to bring to the customer's desktop? I think not.
Don't ever forget that the only possible outcome of a compromise is a poor product. Too many cooks in the kitchen inevitably produce something that none of them like and nobody will eat. Good design needs to be engineered into the product, not cobbled on at the end. And that is why Google will win this battle and beat Chinese Communism at its own game. And for that we will owe them much gratitude.
What's with the sudden explosion in anti-google news?
and thanks to the government, i can find both of the websites about aids
this is just scary.
-BlueLines
--BlueLines "The cost of living hasn't affected it's popularity." -anonymous
If China's search can compete, unfairly or fairly, it won't be a mere arms race - only good can come of this.
But will they compete, or will they block Google from the country once their search engine is large enough?
If you believe that, you have no rights. If you believe that there are no limits to government, obviously anything the government wants to do is OK with you. It's no more true than any two people have the right to kill a third. You have natural rights, one of which is to say and read what you will. It takes positive government action to interfere with that right. Because all governments are supported by the efforts of their people, those that violate natural rights are considered abusive wasters of resources. Abusive governments only exist when you let them and you would let them.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
I read the full article about the so-called Chinese search engine. It smacks of further government control. The Chinese people have approached the issue of government control in the usual fashion: total lack of ethics. The Chinese have not expressed any concern whatsoever for the moral implications of the government controlling the Internet and its access.
By contrast, look at our American society in the West. We have debated the issue of the government controlling the Internet. We have expressed grave concern over its moral implications. Heck, even the Japanese have publically debated the issue of government control and censorship and expressed grave concerns.
This Chinese behavior with regards to government control of the Internet is consistent with previous Chinese behavior. For example, immediately after the American nation froze or withdrew investments from mainland China just after the Tienanmen incident in 1989, the Chinese from Taiwan and Hong Kong immediately seized this market opportunity and poured billions of dollars of investment into mainland China. As another example, the Chinese on Taiwan use their constitution to declare that Tibet is part of mainland China while the Chinese People's Liberation Army torture and kill Tibetan nuns.
I really wish that people in the West would wake up. We should stop thinking that, somehow, the Chinese people are like us in the West. They are not. They are very different from us. We foolishly extol the Chinese values that we shallowly see among Chinese immigrants in the West.
We should look deeper. The Chinese are over-represented in our engineering and business schools at our elite universities. Yet, the Chinese are under-represented at meetings of Amnesty International at those very same universities. Why?
This observation is consistent with the story about the Chinese search engine. The Chinese will use this search-engine technology to achieve whatever unethical goals that they can envision. The Chinese have no ethics. The Chinese can understand engineering (in this case, software engineering), but they refuse to understand the basic tenets behind Amnesty International.
What follows is some observations, backed by verifiable sources, about the Chinese.
1. Most Chinese in Hong Kong support the return of Hong Kong to mainland China. A CNN/Time survey showed, in fact, that 60% of the Chinese in Hong Kong support the return of Hong Kong to mainland China. (reference: "Poll: Hong Kong residents optimistic [cnn.com]" ) While East Timorese fought and died for independence from the oppressive Indonesian government, the Chinese in Hong Kong cheered the mainland Chinese government.
2. The constitution of the Chinese living in Taiwan supports the integration of both Tibet and Mongolia into mainland China. While Tibetans suffer and die at the hands of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, the Chinese in Taiwan support integrating Tibet into "One China".
3. The Chinese son of the chairman of a powerful conglomerate in Taiwan has joined with the son of Jiang Zemin, the butcher of Tibet, to build an advanced silicon-wafer factory in Shanghai. (reference: "Sons of prominent Chinese team up on chip venture [taipeitimes.com]")
4. Senior Chinese military officials retired from the Taiwanese military have gone to mainland China and given military secrets about the American F-16 fighter jet to the Beijing government. (reference: "Military secrets on sale to China [taipeitimes.com]")
5. Most Chinese, including those living in the United States of America, support the territorial ambitions of mainland China. Most Chinese support integrating Tibet into mainland China. Most Chinese support integrating the Spratleys into mainland China. Most Chinese support integ
Does anybody know if NetBSD has been ported to this yet?
Hey that reminds me: Has anyone else noticed that the moderation policy of this hell hole website has changed? The number of -1 comments has dropped to less than 33%, which is extraordinary. In fact I saw a story earlier where there wasn't even a FP battle. It can't be because the trolls have left. I mean hell, *I* haven't gone anywhere, have I?
Well, have I?
Stay where you are. We'll send some representatives to explain in person.
The point being, that China can impose whatever they like, and Chinas citizens and any other people in the world do NOT have a say in it. There are people like Peacefide trying to enable circumventors so that people behind server-side blocking are able to freely view the internet, and I say good on them.
If you can't face up to the Chinese government directly (and let's face it, who wants to :P) the best bet is to go behind their backs.
Everybody knows they have the right to do that if they want. I didn't think that was the concern here. Who was thinking that China should be forced to use Google?
The concern was that this was going to mean a more restrictive search engine that is crippled compared to Google. This might be taken as an indicator of China's progress in becoming more free and capitalistic, in terms of the cyber world.
Again, their right, we all know that.
The search engine finds you!
When America invaded Iraq in order to stop the human-rights atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein, the Chinese people themselves condemned us Americans. By contrast, naturalized American citizens of Iraqi ancestry actually appeared out of the woodwork and gave speechs in San Francisco to support the American soldiers!
When Beijing tortures and kills Tibetans, no American of Chinese ancestry says a word. Nada. Total deafening silence.
Well... according to the Chinese Search engine, Slashdot doesn't exist. I think I will stick to Google for now.
Consider that they still commonly refer to China's humiliation at the hands of colonial powers, back in the mid-1800's. Give 'em time or flog them with WTO. If Google wins, it should be on a superior product for the customer. It's already acknowledged as such, frequenly on /., perhaps that success will carry over, or maybe they'll come up with something better, don't sell them short.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Granted we have our own big-brother issues, but at least we get to access Google. =)
-------
"In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
-- George Orwell
When America invaded Iraq in order to stop the human-rights atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein, the Chinese people themselves condemned us Americans. By contrast, naturalized American citizens of Iraqi ancestry actually appeared out of the woodwork and gave speechs in San Francisco to support the American soldiers!
When Beijing tortures and kills Tibetans, no American of Chinese ancestry says a word. Nada. Total deafening silence.
- Circumvention: Technically-minded users will be able to use http caches, ssh tunnels, open WinGates, and whatnot to defeat the block. History has shown that if people really want to get to a site, they will. Admittedly, proxying your connection slows it down significantly, and few Chinese are likely to use Google for their everyday search engine for this very reason. On the other hand, China is home to some skilled hackers.
- Public Opinion: If the China search engine sucks more than Google, average citizens may rise up against the Chinese government's blacklisting effort and call for access to Google. Google is already widely acclaimed for this to be larger than one may expect, if it needs to happen. Heck, Google is even a verb - and if Chinese can't Google, there may be some disgust. This may lead to wide circumvention or lobbying for a change in the law. On the other hand, the Chinese government may completely ignore its criticism.
Its difficult to predict which side will win -- but I hope for the best. There are too many mitigating factors for my crystal ball to function correctly at this moment, sorry."The lesson to be learned is not to take the comments on slashdot too literally." --Vinnie Falco, BearShare
When America invaded Iraq in order to stop the human-rights atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein, the Chinese people themselves condemned us Americans. By contrast, naturalized American citizens of Iraqi ancestry actually appeared out of the woodwork and gave speechs in San Francisco to support the American soldiers!
When Beijing tortures and kills Tibetans, no American of Chinese ancestry says a word. Nada. Total deafening silence.
It provides most relevent search results ....
and BTW everytime you use it, your penis grows by 20%, and someone in Somalia will send you a million dollar check
China search engine technology = 1 billion china men using google to find most precious result.
So soon I can choose between searching from a text based site or searching from a gazillian image pop-up based site with redirecting links to "larger penis size" or "bigger breastess"
hmmm... difficult choice...
Ave Molech Setting
Is that you?
When America invaded Iraq in order to stop the human-rights atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein, the Chinese people themselves condemned us Americans. By contrast, naturalized American citizens of Iraqi ancestry actually appeared out of the woodwork and gave speechs in San Francisco to support the American soldiers!
When Beijing tortures and kills Tibetans, no American of Chinese ancestry says a word. Nada. Total deafening silence.
All we need is for GWB to declare China to be the eggroll of evil, then we can invade and establish Google as the search engine for all of China.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
With as many pro-Google stories as there on Slashdot, they should ask Google about licensing their logo for the stories ala the Mozilla logo.
I don't know if I have made my point as clearly as I want. Basically, the government of mainland China will force their engine on the people so it doesn't actually have to be any good. Therefore, Google isn't going to be driven to be any better based on this new foray. Second, Google isn't losing market share because they can't get into the market, AFAIK.
I hate liberals. If you are a liberal, do not reply.
Why not just block Google? If you're the Chinese government, it's not like you're worried about people being angry about being unable to search with Google. Just forward your own inferior solution - no need for competition when you control the medium with an iron fist.
--sdem
If rights are not innate, regardless of culture then they don't exist. A right is something that can be restricted as punishment for a crime, but cannot be taken away. You can take away a felon's right to own a gun during his punishment period, but not so when it is over. If you believe that we can't judge them because they're different, you can't judge anyone's actions or views because you embrace moral relativism. Your opinion is no better, or more right then mine or theirs. Meaning who are you to judge the Nazis? They're right too, because their moral views are no less correct than yours since no one's are innately right. If that sounds like a reductio ad absurdum, it's because moral relativism IS absurd.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
Can you be anymore racist in a poorly written paragraph? I'm not sure..I'd venture to say yes, but I'd rather not see the examples.
-gabe
I firmly believe that Google is the only search engine that matters. As a result, Google will emerge victorious. In my opinion, Google should put all other search engines out of business.
because the Chinese communists don't care to have any entity in their country that can reach masses of people without their communist stamp of approval. Hell they can just chop off access to Google through the great Chinese Firewall.
This need to put the communist stamp of approval on everything exists everywhere. For instance Catholics in China cannot be loyal to the Pope, he qualifies as a foreign entity. Plus we have already seen the Chinese kidnap the Tibetan Panchen Lama with hopes of replacing him with one that will be sympathetic to the Communists.
Speaking of the Chinese and competition one must be skeptical since the government will always put those things that aren't officially sanctioned in a position of disadvantage (blocking it access for example)
If you believe that, then you also believe that the U.S. is absolutely unstoppable. China'd kick your ass in a street fight. They have well over four times the population than the U.S., more workers, and more untapped wealth. All you've done is give your wealth to 5% of the country, and anything left to Israel. Let's see you ask for that back!
And who do you think Russia is going to support? Best get your Mandarin books now while they're cheap, because the Chinese kicked your ass in Korea, in Nam, and they're ready for round three.
Or how about block the country from Google. Something along the lines of a mandatory robots.txt that blocks all non-chinese search engines from spidering any site owned by a citizen of China.
I am a sig. I wish I were a more creative sig, but I am not. I guess everyone has something to strive for.
Are you having issues mixing up business ventures with weapons creation? Can google be considered a "weapon of mass destruction?"
Seriously, stop the bush bullshit. It shows ignorance to blame everything on one person. I don't neccessarily like him, but back things up with educated knowledge or don't say it at all...oh wait, it's slashdot. sorry.
-gabe
Communism has not fallen in China because the majority of the Chinese people support Beijing. Read "Chinese Search Engine: Nefarious Purpose".
When America invaded Iraq in order to stop the human-rights atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein, the Chinese people themselves condemned us Americans. By contrast, naturalized American citizens of Iraqi ancestry actually appeared out of the woodwork and gave speechs in San Francisco to support the American soldiers!
When Beijing tortures and kills Tibetans, no American of Chinese ancestry says a word. Nada. Total deafening silence. In fact, 2 Americans of Chinese ancestry born and raised in Taiwan were convicted of espionage in January 2002. The FBI caught them in the process of stealing military technology to give to Beijing.
Enough said? Nigger, brainless at that. Was that succinct enough douchebag? The truth shall set you free, if only from this life.
Chinese Freedom Fighters: By our powers combined, we shall form Comrade Google!
Earth!
Wind!
Water!
Communism!
The search engine searches you.
stop jewing on him, hes telling the truth you faggot
Communism has not fallen in China because the majority of the Chinese people support Beijing. Read "Chinese Search Engine: Nefarious Purpose".
When America invaded Iraq in order to stop the human-rights atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein, the Chinese people themselves condemned us Americans. By contrast, naturalized American citizens of Iraqi ancestry actually appeared out of the woodwork and gave speechs in San Francisco to support the American soldiers!
When Beijing tortures and kills Tibetans, no American of Chinese ancestry says a word. Nada. Total deafening silence. In fact, 2 Americans of Chinese ancestry born and raised in Taiwan were convicted of espionage in January 2002. The FBI caught them in the process of stealing military technology to give to Beijing.
Second FP, but first, the moderators STOLE my FP, they do things like that, as we all know. Freedom of speech, not on Slashdot. Go ahead, ban me for posting TOO much from an IP address, you will never get my subscription, ever. Figure it out...if you can...
... will apply the Chinese Army Techique?
My exception safety is -fno-exceptions.
what did you expect eh?
you people aren't even making sense?
Well, actually I went to that site. I put these words into the text area: Falun Gong, pressed Enter. Once the first search page came up with some results, I just pressed Enter again (FALUN+GONG was already in the text area) and I got 'this page cannot be displayed' message. I tried it a few times, same results. I must note that I am accessing that page from my computer at work and it is a WinNT station with IE 5.5 and all ActiveX controls and scripting disabled.
You can't handle the truth.
Search for Hotmail on that thing .. :)
Siggy Say, Siggy Do
They are both the same link... to a pharmaceutical company, with no relavant and useful information.
so search for "search engine" on MSN (as other
What were you saying about censorship again?
Open source development is my way of competing with the low-cost programmers in India...
Didn't the Chineese govermnment actually try to sue Google at one point for use of Chineese characters or some such - claiming that they had such stuff copyrighted??
Looks like more of the same game to control their populace to me.
Have you compiled your kernel today??
It obviously worked wonders for Microsoft Windows. The communists could have cobbled together a better operating system. They actually did, it's called linux.
Governments don't uphold rights, they can only respect or violate them. It is up to the people to uphold their rights.
Actually, you can and should tell them how to live. This is how we all learn. Bombing, in support of a popular uprising, is not a bad idea but useless otherwise. We must continue to provide as many people with tools and methods they can use to exercise their rights. Encryption to defeat controls on free speech, alternate comunication networks to defeat censorship. Ideas are far more effective than bombs and that is what the Chinese government is fighting. Those tools and ideas are not just for others as you noticed. By protecting our own rights, we do the best job of helping others.
There is much that needs to happen here too. Google is a nice search engine, we need more and better. Search engines should be ecrypted so others can't snoop on what we are interested in. More people should set up encrypted browsing proxies to insure anymous reading. ISPs should hand out static IPs and alow publishing. People should co-operate to make anymous distrubuted publishing available used widely.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
People will use whatever search engine they think is best. It makes zero diffrence if you can access your favorite search from one place, or 200.
Unless the chinese outright ban google after proclaming their solution 'better', this won't affect them at all. besides, who would use a search they *know* is being filtered by the government when they can use something that's *not*? (even if they get booted off the net for using politicaly sensitive terms)
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Chinese power philosophy, then and now.
1946:
"All power Eminates From the barrel of a gun"
2003:
"All power Eminates From the most used Internet search engine"
I could be way off and someone out there will let me know I am sure, but wasn't/isn't one of googles technologists an ex-member of the NSA?
MOST of my spam is 100% pure American spam, thank you. So piss off with this sheer hypocrisy already.
The Chinese are over-represented in our engineering and business schools at our elite universities. Yet, the Chinese are under-represented at meetings of Amnesty International at those very same universities. Why?
US engineering and business schools don't exclusively cater towards engineering and business disciplines. There are other disciplines as well. All you are really discovering is that foreign students tend to study science, engineering and business; not liberal arts and humanities. If you wish to be fair you need to determine how many US engineering, science, and business majors show up at Amnesty Internation meetings. The answer is probably not many, irregardless of nationality. Face it, some majors are less demanding and offer more free time. Don't misunderstand, I'm not putting these majors down. I took senior level poly sci classes for fun, skipped the prerequisites, enjoyed the classes, and received A's and B's. These classes were stress relief from my advanced math and computer science classes.
Or the Chinese government will simply block all access to Google.
Anyway, I don't see this doing much good as far as creating a competitor for Google. Does AltaVista+Yahoo+MSN = Google? Hells no.
Except the Chinese have their own word for AIDS written in chinese characters:
äZa / ai4 zi1 bing4F 1jAIDS
which if searched for would probably yield more results.
Interactive Visual Medical Dictionary
Google, while technically advanced and lacking in intrusive ads, appears to have slowly drifted away from what most people would consider fair and impartial behaviour as it has grown in size. To take a recent example they have been refusing to index many non-corporate news sites in Google News, while at the same time deciding to start indexing press releases on the websites of major corporations.
While the crack down on independent news sites may have been unrelated to the invasion of Iraq it has certainly led some to speculate that they are under pressure not to index those who are not cheerleading the war. This is all before you get to the privacy issue and of course the allegations that one of their employees used to work for the NSA.
PageRank can also be extremely annoying if you are looking for information on an unpopular subject that is similar to a much more popular one. The ability to disable PageRank of even to invert it, to show the results with the least links to them first, would improve things greatly. It may be that the lowest common denominator effects of PageRank are all too welcome for some people.
Search engines are a critical part of the present web infrastructure and a website is of little value if no one can find it. In the long term it would be of great benefit to all if Google could be replaced by with some sort of distributed search facility with no centralised control, where the individual user would have full control of the process.
You're confusing the political right of a country with the individual rights of individual citizens of that country. The world is full of people living in former colonies who made the same mistake, usually to their chagrin. (What good is living in a "free" country if you can't exercise your rights?)
China -- the sovereign country -- has an established record of blocking and manipulating internet access, including search engines like Google. The government of China does this because it is an illegitimate totalitarian regime that must restrict the rights and freedoms of the Chinese people in order to survive.
It's obvious that the primary purpose of this Chinese search engine is to extend and strenthen the regime's control of the Chinese people, not to provide them a legitimate alternative to Google. Governments have no legitimate right to behave in that fashion.
Please don't be so naive as to presume this has anything to do with capitalism. It doesn't. Capitalism is based on the exercise of individual rights and freedom.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
So you're saying this'll be better because google will have to add features to compete... however it seems the competition isn't over non-suckiness, but over control.
So now google will work harder to create features to block controvertial subjects on behalf of governments?
http://www.cryptogon.com/2003_03_16_blogarchive.ht ml#90849948
"Being that it started in the government, this looks like a tool for greater control while appearing to be in open competition with Google."
Doesn't Google alter search results when whore_assed by legal papers? The law is the ultimate tool of control, it allows some to profit at the expense of others.
You think the Chinese will rise up against blacklisting Google, but not against all the rest of the crap the Chinese government has pulled? Yeah, right.
There are reasons why democracy does not work nearly as well as capitalism.
-- David D. Friedman
If the Chinese government competes unfairly, Google is screwed. They can't compete successfully and fairly with a government that's competing unfairly (and they all will, given the chance).
Besides: you have to show Google can improve before you can say something will cause it to improve. There is such a thing as a perfect tool.
There are reasons why democracy does not work nearly as well as capitalism.
-- David D. Friedman
for non-government approved material...
And this is different from other established news sources how?
There are reasons why democracy does not work nearly as well as capitalism.
-- David D. Friedman
Try searching for Great Leap Forward, or the Cultural Revolution on the search engine. The central government has historically been trying to sweep these events under the rug per-se, because both of them question the effectiveness of the communist government.
Either the search engine really sucks, or something is keeping me from trying to pull up any useful information regarding them. The Falun Gong search provided equally humorous results (all of them demonizing the Falun Gong).
And please, people, stop calling the US fascists, being stupid is not trendy anymore.
Pay attention people. This is typical China. They want to gain a foot hold in a business by using government intervention to either steal the technology, stop or slow competition, or force an outsider to use their IP to support a failing national / local institution. They are even doing this with their banking system.
Sure they are a nation and can do whatever they want, but this is not the only arena they are pulling this stunt in. In some areas it is way too late.
tried it
every serch led with
no tickee no washee
and
you like flied lice?
people (we) here in China are no idiots, nor backwards developed.
I'm not Chinese, but I've been living here for quite a while now and know that Google is here, just as (almost?) everywhere else, the number one search engine. The Chinese goverment can put up something like this, but it's not going to be easier for them to be any kind of real challenge for google, just because they're communists.
Trust me, this is another useless attempt of the Chinese goverment to control the internet and it won't work anyway.
So don't worry.
The Chinese government in this case, however, is not playing 'fair'. This is like the old railroad monopolies of the 1800's in the US. They basicly said "you don't have to buy our necessity of life product, but if you want to buy someone else's you have to move out of your hometown where you've lived for a century." Sure Chinese people can still use Google after the Chinese government censors it (which it will most likely do) but you'd have to bypass the government blocks (hack) or move out of China (railroad analogy).
seriously. The guy talks about how "different" the Chinese are and then talks about guys taking advantage of situations to become wealthy. Oh, that never happens in this ethical capitalisitic society! In capitalism, man exploits man, in communism, it's the other way around!
What the fuck is wrong with the mods! Damn! How can someone say "Chinese have no ethics" and be called "informative" and not "flamebait"?!
Yes, there are some differences between the core of the cultures and values of China, US, India, Eastern Europe, Middle East, etc. But somehow, "those" guys lack ethics, but people here are superior. what bullshit!
So Chinese in Hong Kong rather unite with China then be with Britain or independent, so what?! How is Chinese pride so different from Arab pride, religious pride or the ridiculous god damn amount of "patriotism" in the US? Where we can't question the president in the time of war without being labeled traitor by these "kind-hearted and naive" folks. Patriotism, nationalism, sexism, racism, etc. are all stupid in my opinion. All groups of people are equally stupid.
It's one thing to demonize the Chinese government. But quite another to insult the race and culture of all Chinese people.
You are further evidence of western arrogance and ignorance people talk about. But I won't make the assumptions that such a stereotype is valid nor will I prejudge other westerners on it.
In times like these, it is helpful to remember that there have always been times like these. - Paul Harvey
First china, what's next!? It's a good thing Microsoft isn't challenging google!
(Bigoted crap flushed)
You know, I've been seeing more and more anti-China/Chinese garbage on the web over the last 18 months or so--stuff about how evil and totalitarian their government is, how the Chinese people as a whole are "bent on conquest;" how China will be the United States' chief rival in the coming years and that "something should be done about it" now, before it's "too late." And some of it comes not just from net.nazis such as yourself, but from policy makers in places like the Bush administration and the Pentagon. I'm even hearing whispers about how the "brutish" Chinese will eventually have to be brought to "democracy" at bayonet point, as we are currently doing to Iraq.
No love lost for the authors of Tiananmen Square, but still I hope the Chinese, both government and people, are keeping an eye on the U.S. A new era of colonial degradation won't be any better for them in the 21st Century then it was the last time around.
I can't believe this has a +4 informative. It's just racist bullshit. Crap like this causes me to think more highly of China than I do of the evil empire (no, not microsoft, the US). btw i'm neither chinese or american.
You have my pity, wanted or not.
May you die slowly of the AIDS you got getting booty-busted by your father.
How much do you want to be that if the poster had talked about too many jews controlling american media or government, you'd have a different reaction and this post would have been a 1.
Doesnt bother me either way but I just love hypocrisy so much...
zack
I hear they are going to call it "Googer"
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
post reads YOU!
I currently reside in China. My connection is typical Chinese ISP connection, Geocities, tripod, angelfire, all blocked (though tripod.jp works, don't know why). My friends from US (I am American) emailed me as soon as they heard the news that google was blocked.
True, but not completely true. It was offline for a day, and then it came back up. It was NEVER fully blocked. There was a substitute for it, called gaidu or something like that. But any queries to Google works.
Of course, it makes sense to have a Chinese version of Google from China, because the engine itself can be controlled to what content can be displayed. This should be a partial intention. Another part would be their reliance on foreign products. Over the years, people in China have been frantically trying to produce things from their own land. Google is a foreign product. Almost all technical aspects of the market requires a specific type of foreign reliance. To them, this is almost a slave/master relationship. If Intel cuts off relations with China, as with AMD. Where would the new computers come from? In a sense, wouldn't it be the foreigners that are trying to suppress China (by making sure there's a reliance?)
Although the workings of the government is not transparent, there are lots of news regarding government change. Changes that will benefit the economical status of China. Many foreign countries are allowed inside to conduct business. There are changes inside the government. THey are being more opened.
Aside from that, the Internet is a place where information is free (to an extent) and free (to say whatever you want). Given the education level of the general population in China, how can people clearly and distinctly distinguish right from wrong? Especially when most people has bad opinion of China? I might also add that not all of them have experiences with or in China. Opinions are free for you to make, but what backs it up as you aren't really required to do so. False information and opinions come along with the truth.
Basically, there are always two sides to things. Sometimes you have to cross both sides to make a correct judgement. Jumping into conclusions isn't the best way to go
Just do that search 2 or 3 times a day. I'm sure that will stop them faster than anything Google can do...visions of government employees running around like ants at a kicked-in nest...
Sure I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
and given that about at least 80% if the population can't afford a computer
Unfortunately, there are many Chinese racists from overseas. They equate skin color with culture. I assure you that these Americans of Asian ancestry fully condemn China. They do not consider themselves Vietnamese, Thai, Korean, etc. They are 100% American. They certainly do not exhibit any Chinese cultural trait. They condemn how the Chinese army has tortured the Tibetans.
Anyhow, let's return to the original observation. I myself have attended meetings of Amnesty International (AI) at my university. I rarely ever see any Chinese in these meetings. A broad group of people often attend the AI meetings. They include majors in almost every field: engineering, history, biology, English, etc. The attendees come from many cultural backgrounds: German, Irish, American, Canadian, etc.
However, what is surprising is that I have never seen a Chinese at any of these meetings. My university has the same phenomenon experienced by other universities. Namely, 30% or more of the engineering or business college is Chinese. However, the local chapter of AI has almost no Chinese. This can't be an issue of discrimination since I see people from the Middle East and Africa at the AI meetings. Where are the Chinese?
That's generally why I have a problem with the term 'African American'. Most blacks in America were born here; how does that make them 'African'?
[SIG] Remember Mattel handheld games?
Indeed, a person has rights, but a country does not have rights. You are correct on that count. However, you are mistaken about the Chinese people. Read "Chinese Search Engine: Nefarious Purposes". The majority of Chinese support the policies of the Beijing government. They support the government controlling the Internet and its access.
A more serious problem is that if there _is_ a search engine with good coverage of China, the Chinese government will find it easier to locate and kill any web sites with politically incorrect information.
(Oh, and the last time the local Amnesty group had a publicity table, there were Chinese people working there....)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
and why does he gets modded up?
the entire post is full of racist stereotypical assertions that makes absolutely no sense. all he does is categorically insult all chinese people as immoral and unethical.
By contrast, the Chinese are totally silent on the issue of Tibet. When Amnesty International (AI) identifies key Tibetans who have been tortured and killed by Beijing, the Chinese are silent. When Beijing lobbed missles at Taiwan in 1996, the Chinese in the USA and elsewhere were silent. When Beijing is identified as the key supplier of weapons to the Khmer Rouge regime that murdered 1/3 of the Cambodian population, the Chinese are silent.
So it's ok for the RIAA and other corporations to control the internet but not the government?
It's insane. the wacko says "we have debated the issue of the government controlling the internet", yet we haven't debated the issue of MS, the RIAA, and the MPAA controlling the internet. Yeah, there have been debates about how they should do it (mostly in closed government meetings), but no public debates as to why they should be allowed to control the entire next generation communication system! Eventually, the internet is going to replace the telephone. I don't want a bunch of mafia goons saying whether or not I'm allowed to send email or make telephone calls.
By contrast, the East Timorese demanded independence from Indonesia.
According to a Time/CNN poll, more than 60% of the Chinese enthusiastically wanted unification with mainland China. The Chinese really are very different from Westerners and lack a modern notion of ethics.
Racist!
The chineses refuse to use an U.S. service to search their internet? That isn't like a act of terrorism but it does certainly cut the freedom of those people, because Google certainly does not censor any content. Goole is run by proud americans who are willingly to share their results to the chinese internet surfer.
....
... hits
Let's search the chinese google for "chinese culture":
1) Coca-Cola 1000000 hits
2) Amnesty International 500000 hits
3)
4) Banking
Thank you for your efforts in liberating us!
I must say, that's one of the best "In communist country, the noun verbs you" examples I've seen. "Evar."
I'm Chinese and I live in America but I've also been in China in the last year. It's nothing like what some of you are protraying. The government wants to control the population as best they can but they simply can't. Connecting to the internet from a residential area in Beijing, I was surprised to see all the sites that I was allowed to access, including anti-government ones. *shock* I didn't get redirected to pro-government ones when I viewed them either. Nor did the police knock down my door claiming I was a traitor to the Party.
You seem to think you know everything about China from reading HISTORY textbooks even though you've never been there. China's cities are very developed and comparable to New York(minus the crime).
Granted, they do have filters and their ISPs were not 'independent' however, this simply means mildly restricted access. The Chinese people are not ignorant to this either, they know they are being restricted but if they want to, they can get 'prohibited' information if they want to.
Ok,let's start at the beginning. Communism is supposed to benefit everyone, based on the humanist thinking that man is inherently good. Which he is not. He is instinctivily evil. Since the "Big Dawgs" are rather corrupt, the average chinese "Joe" didn't use to have much freedom. And still doesn't. And then computers came along. And the internet. And everyone can get online at their local internet cafe. And "Joe" goes to an internet cafe and is like, "Yo! I'm online!". And joe starts getting..ideas..which his goverment doesn't want him to have. So the goverment shuts down internet cafes. A lot of internet cafes. And the computers that are around, the gov puts Linux on. They know whats in linux. So this doesn't exactly make bill gates happy. So he gives them the source code to windows. So they know whats in it, and can modify it. So now they're using windows. Don't believe me? Go look it up. And here we have the chinese undermining google. With their own search engine. Reducing freedom even farther. I think its cool to be an american.
"The most looniest, zaniest, spontaneous, sporadic Impulsive thinker, compulsive drinker, addict"
when McDonald's opens in another country, it's called good business.
when an Internet company such as Google tries to expand it's markets, your paranoid slashdotters believe it's invasion.
grow up.
As much as I like Google, it has a monopoly on non-suckiness of search engines.
The thing here is that Google has it's "monopoly" because it doesn't suck. Because they *aren't* evil, and they *aren't* exploiting their position to fuck us all over. For all intents and purposes, they got to be what they are by giving us exactly what we wanted.
You should thank them, not call them evil for their own popularity.
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
Please don't abuse the word monopoly, it has a strong meaning. It doesn't just mean the lack of competition, it implies the exploitation of its position to prevent and nulltify competition.
See this for a definition.
And comptetions it has many. Inktomi, FAST, Teoma, Direct Hit, to name a few general crawler-based search engines.
See this for all the search engines there are out there.
Google has no monopoly whatsoever, it's just plain popular. it's popular because it's good at what it does, and the competitions just simply aren't as good at it.
Ironically, monopoly is what the Chinese government trying to achieve. The whole move is obviously politically motivated, the Chinese Search Alliance is government-backed, and undoubtfully the Chinese gorvernment will exploit its power to ensure the Chinese Search Alliance popularity and undermind Google's.
Why are all these people here dilluting the move into some technological arguement? Did the Chinese Search Alliance present any brillant search algorithm? No. So how do they intend to compete with Google? Market manipulation via their Government backing, duh!
I simply cannot believe my eyes. I don't care if some moderators see this post as flames but I find this kind of facist comments simply can't be tolerated. This is deniably some of the most racist, offensive things I've seen on here.
Does it make it right? No. Does it means the Chinese people wanted it? No. Don't make the assumption that the Chinese government represents its people's opinions and values faithfully. Not even the American government could represent its people faithfully.
What about the other 40%? Are they irrelevant? Not to mentioned that they have to be optimisitic since they have no choice. Considering the circumstances, 60% is an underwhleming majority and a misleading representation of what they really think.
That's some serious oversimplification. I'm not gonna speculate on the Tibetan situtation, but I can tell you why Taiwan kisses Mainland's ass once in a while: Mainland has a huge army and can take over Taiwan overnight, it hasn't yet only because the international community isn't gonna tolerate that. Just that Taiwan kisses Mainland's butt once in a while doesn't mean they really agree with them, they do what they have to in order to maintain a volatile relationship.
Taiwaneses also have many relatives in Mainland and are forbiddened to travel to Mainland to visit them (and vice versa). Maybe you should talk to some Cuban Americans in Miami and learn about this kind of sentiments.
What kind of facist crap is this? Like this kind of thing isn't happening in U.S. everyday? Enron? Hello? Anyone in any culture who gained a substantial amount of power is likely to abuse it for their greed. It's universal.
Because Chinese people are a buncha unethical, indifferent, selfish, greedy people? What kind of a facist implication are you trying to draw? Ever occur to you that Chinese foreign students have to go home eventually? What kind of consequences are they gonna face if the government finds out the kind of western, libertarian actitivites they engaged in overseas? As to Chinese Americans, they are only as indifferent as other American. Plenty of Chinese people fight for human rights and civil liberties and volunteer for their communities. What have YOU done for your community lately?
I really can't comment on the rest of your points, most of them can be easily seen as misleading, facist statements fueled by anti-Chinese sentiments. They are so ridiculous that I really don't know what I can say about them.
you're a fucking dirty jew
Half of my family is in China, half in N. America, and I'd have to say that the Chinese pay a lot more attention to the pride of the Chinese race and less attention to race-blind ethical considerations than N. Americans.
In this, though, they are not so different from ethnic Europeans (in N. America or Europe) until the mid-20th century.
I think the combination of the massive cultural inertia of the Chinese, relative isolation until recently, and centuries of grinding poverty where the demands of taking care of your own family left nothing left over for philosophical considerations of human rights around the world, has left the Chinese several decades behind the West in such things.
I think that the ideas the original poster called "ethics" are only rather recent mainstream features of Western society, and that gives me some reason for optimism that they will one day be as prevalent in Chinese culture.
Until then, though, the original poster -- despite the inflammatory wording -- is correctly identifying some real issues. He doesn't show any sign of understanding what lies beneath, but then neither do the political correctness police who automatically bash him for the crime of describing what he sees.
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
As for the claim about AI meetings having virtually no Chinese, just go and attend a meeting. Most universities have an AI student organization. Just attend an AI meeting. It's that simple. Just attend.
I myself regularly attend AI meetings. Indeed, there are virtually no Chinese at these meetings. What the original poster says about the Chinese is remarkably accurate.
Home centers are designed for the do-it-yourselfer who's willing to ...
pay higher prices for the convenience of being able to shop for lumber,
hardware, and toasters all in one location. Notice I say "shop for," as
opposed to "obtain." This is the major drawback of home centers: they are
always out of everything except artificial Christmas trees. The home center
employees have no time to reorder merchandise because they are too busy
applying little price stickers to every object -- every board, washer, nail
and screw -- in the entire store
Let's say a piece in your toilet tank breaks, so you remove the
broken part, take it to the home center, and ask an employee if he has a
replacement. The employee, who has never is his life even seen the inside
of a toilet tank, will peer at the broken part in very much the same way
that a member of a primitive Amazon jungle tribe would look at an electronic
calculator, and then say, "We're expecting a shipment of these sometime
around the middle of next week."
-- Dave Barry, "The Taming of the Screw"
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