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China Blocks Typepad, Prompts Weblog Blackout
dcm writes "As U.S. Ambassador Richard Williamson prepares to introduce a resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Commission to censure the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) government for increasing 'repression of its people using the Internet, democratic dialogue, religious expression,' the regime continues to block discourse.On Friday, China began blocking access to Typepad, a paid weblog hosting service in San Mateo, California. The communist regime previously blocked access to BlogSpot, Blogger's free hosting site. Yan Sham-Shackleton filed a report on the Glutter weblog, mentioning China is '...now using blocking software to stop information from leaking into the county via personal sites, an increasingly vibrant China Internet community, and a place where users are slipping in banned information. Some sites in the blogging community are turning black in protest of this event while others are reporting the incident.'"
Hello,
I am Kim Yee Ho Foo Yun Duck and I live in China. Recently our interweb be blocked by communist party. We don't like communist party but can't have others won't let us vote other. Today we find that China now block sites like blogs.
Please tell your honorable President Bush to liberate us! Tell honorable President Bush we have oil if he need convincing!
Communist party must be stopped at all cos.1!~~
(0fv... . . #@(*!
NO CARRIER
Q: Why are the chinese communists so afraid of free exchange of ideas and criticism?
A: They're afraid they'll have to give up power and find real jobs.
It's not the security of the country tyrants desire, it's their own security. It's unfair to call them leaders.
The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
This is just the latest front in China's attempt to try to stamp out any form of anti-government speech. Say what you want about the present US Governemnt, the fact that you're allowed to say it here is something that makes us very different from them...
I've got to think that anyone with the will and some time would easily be able to bypass the blockage, either by using underground ISPs, satellite, or other means.
It is technically very hard to block information on the net, without dropping connectivity. Of course, attempting it might provide a major impulse to AI research :)
This is not a signature.
Why does this help, I mean we are talking about the Great Firewall which will do some odd stuff with the internet, but how will it help. If they block blogs, use IM, e-mail, web page. Yes, they could be tracked, but they could with a blog too if China tried hard enough. People will find a way around it. This will just make people mad. What is the point?
http://www.beyourowneviloverlord.tk
http://www.frozenchickenthrowing.tk
http://www.killercamel.tk
I think this is more like the government blockading the door to your bathroom... of course, there's nothing stopping you from relieving yourself on the front lawn. ;)
So now nobody in one of the largest populations of internet users on the planet is going to be able to read my blog?!
Oh, wait... Nobody reads my blog anyway!
---
http://thewired.blogs.com/teotwawki
The techno-mediated cultural conspiracy
A: The short answer is "Gay Movable Type Blogger." This does not quite paint the full picture, however.
A GMTB uses a Mac. A GMTB is excited about "wireless hot spots" and "cafes." The prototypical GMTB can be found at a Starbucks with a 15" PowerBook. He will be wearing a black turtleneck and will go on at length about the wonder years where web designers were paid like programmers.
The GMTB will blog about you. Do not be alarmed. In order to make sense of their fast moving and confusing world, GMTBers need to write at length about even the most trivial encounter. They will likely Google you and turn even the most minor conversation into an exploratory experience. Every experience is like that of the newborn boy who finds touching himself over and over to be a pleasurable experience.
Do not make the GMTB angry. The GMTB has natural defenses known as "Google juice." With the application of this "Google juice," the GMTB will sour any future searches on your name. While there is no physical harm to be done, they can make any attempt at finding relevant and useful information about you a linkfest of armchair philosophy, ill-formed opinions, and broad and insanely overblown reactions to everyday occurrences.
Should you find yourself confronted by a GMTB and wish to escape, one need only mention that their "CSS" is broken. The GMTB invariably considers the CSS "correctness" and "portability" to be a craft, and the output thereof to be an "art." By pointing out that the page renders poorly on the most esoteric browser you can imagine, you will be assured a quick and uneventful escape.
Does anybody know how they go about blocking "unwanted" internet site from the public? I am sure there is a way around it. I mean, unless they don't have any lines to the outside world (and yes, they do have lines to the outside world) it would be impossible for them to absolutely block content.
-- johntracy.com, because everybody else is wrong.
women's nipples.
Which society would you rather live in?
Sounds like FCC / Howard Stern to me.. Congrats FCC, you are now offically, on par with Chinese Commi quality filtering.
It's totally understandable that China's gov't will be overthrown if people are given free access to information, but it is totally unacceptable to see the FCC pulling these moves.
Mod +5 Drunk
They've implimented a system to block free exchange of ideas about religion, politics and current issues through blogs and the internet...
But even they can't stop spam.
Interesting.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
Oh, that'll show them. I can just see China's head of information management saying to himself "I never thought it would come to this! Black weblogs! Damn those clever bastards!"
Webloggers have always had a hugely inflated sense of self-importance, but this is just ridiculous.
--
the strongest word is still the word "free"
I suppose someone could just ban any and all downloads of Freenet-related software so that's not going to solve anything. For anyone who ever said the mantra "Information Wants To Be Free" -- THIS is what it is meant to be.
Government-sanctioned censorship isn't anything new, though. We try to protect children with things like CIPA and the like. We've got watchdogs all over that won't allow us (folks in the US) to hear foul language over public airwaves, are looking to restrain violent video games, and in general trying to police what we do.
I'm not saying we're communistic, by any means. Just saying that censorship is censorship. Not as extreme, but the seeds are there.
In the end, it unfortunately comes down to "censorship is only bad when they're censoring something I believe in."
They can send their info to some FTP server and their US friends can copy it to Typepad. If FTP gets blocked, there's always e-mail.. and if I recall (can't find the link) there was actually a service that you could e-mail your FTP requests to. (wow, wish I could find that again, it was a list of about a zillion different services which were e-mail enabled)
I think it was on BBC I was reading about goverments blocking their citizens from content, I know Iraq did it at first. All I can see it doing is makeing them mad and giveing them more of a reason to find a way around the block. They might just have to come to the relization that if people want to see if they will find a way to see it
GeekLeak.com - Silly name, serious geeks
How about combine blogging with snail mail?
Those Communists!
As U.S. Ambassador Richard Williamson prepares to introduce a resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Commission to censure the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) government for increasing 'repression of its people using the Internet
Somewhat ironic given that U.S. companies are profiting by selling censorship software to China. And of course, the U.S. requiring (or trying to require) libraries to censor the Internet, for the children, of course.
Here come da fudge!
these are the perpetrators of the Tiananmen massacre. do you really think they would hesitate to block a few websites?
sulli
RTFJ.
it doesn't sue other country because they produce technology that could lead their citizen to uphold the law like another country we know, they sue their citizens for breaking the law using technologies produce by other country. Wether the enforced law goes against human right or not is another thing, imho human rights need to be seriously addressed in China but no one can blame them of being inconsequent, they don't blame others for the actions of its citizen. Some Countries prefer limiting the liberty of people outside of their jurisdiction to hypocritically pseudo-preserve the liberty of its own citizens.
Except in CCP's China, they'll execute you for peeing on the lawn.
It's not just the nipples. I believe it's the titty as a whole.
(paraphrased from a great obscure movie)
Remember, China blocked Google for a time out of fears that they could find anti-government info there...
So, it seems any site that lets somebody post infomation without has got to go. It won't be long until they decide Slashdot is not something they should let their people see.
True, although in both cases you'll probably find yourself entering the judicial system before very long.
Freedom of speech, people, it's no joke.
Just other day the WTO said that USA had to allow on line gambling. China has just joined the WTO. Typepad is an for profit company, why not they also can't make WTO force them to allow access to Typepad? At least this shitty globalization would give a little help to free speech. At least by now USA and Britain aren't trying to make WTO become irrelevant as they did with ONU.
the us is blocking nipples on BROADCAST TV. go here for nipples on the web, unblocked.
Do they only block the http ports?
Or do the block by IP or what?
Yea, Gopher is dead, but don't be insensitive.
Gopher was pretty cool, especially considering some of the terrible backgrounds and colors you sometimes get in http.
Or is this just like suggesting lynx?
Maybe it is a good thing that Apache 2 supports Gopher.
Stop laughing, I'm serious.
It wouldn't suprise me that the communist bastard politicians wouldn't know to block stuff outside http.
p2p is another possibility, but that's been discussed before I'm sure.
Promote Sensitivity on Slashdot, make me your friend.
Does negative metamodderation get you banned from moderating? That would be nice.
And it becomes obvious why cryptography is so important...
http://www.t0.or.at/crypto/crossbow.htm
If the WTO can force the U.S to admit offshore online casinos, perhaps the WTO can force China to admit offshore information services. The Chinese consumers should be able to access any commercial internet site (including a paid weblog service like Typepad) as a free trade issue.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
it's the blogosphere. do not fuck with the blogosphere!
sulli
RTFJ.
women's nipples. Which society would you rather live in?
I really hope you're asking that tounge in cheek. Please tell me you are. If you'd really rather live in a country that blocks information, political or otherwise, but allows you to see nekkid pictures whenever you want (oh and btw, China is very censuring in that aspect as well), I'm sure there a several million chinese that would love to switch places with you and let you live their lives instead.
I don't know how much good that would do.
Oh sure...we'll ignore the blocking of indie sites and people who have [not corporate approved and polically correct] content. But, block somebody's income stream and Woa Boy are we gonna kick someone in the head.
Somedays I just love living the U.S. of Americash, where we're all equal under the dollar.
"You cannot have a General Will unless you have shared experiences. You cannot be fair to people you don't know."
Do these rules apply to Hong Kong. I'm vague as to how seperatly they are treated since 1997 when ownship reverted back to China. I know for example a Hong Kong resident no longer needs a visa to travel to the mainland, and they still retain certain comercial freedoms.
Chinese government policies that favor Chinese companies over foreign firms are driving some U.S. tech companies from the booming market.
This month, chipmakers Intel and Broadcom said they'll stop selling wireless Internet, or Wi-Fi, chips in China. A new law requires that the chips include a security technology licensed by Chinese companies.
The technology can hurt chips' performance and compatibility with other devices, says Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy. And implementing it requires U.S. chipmakers to share valuable intellectual property with Chinese companies, says Semiconductor Industry Association President George Scalise.
The Wi-Fi dispute is one of several being waged between the U.S. and Chinese tech industries.
Semiconductor taxes. China slaps a 17% value-added tax on computer chips sold there. But it gives rebates of up to 14% to domestic chip plants. That makes it almost impossible for foreign chipmakers to compete, the SIA says.
This month, the U.S. trade office filed a case against China's semiconductor tax with the World Trade Organization (news - web sites), which China joined in 2001. China must abide by the WTO's decision or risk censure. Friday, China said it would enter talks with the United States.
Proprietary standards and practices. China is developing its own standards for 3G cell phone networks and DVD players. (The Chinese version is called EVD, or extended versatile disk.) If the standards are widely adopted, they will allow Chinese manufacturers to avoid paying some licensing fees to foreign companies and force tech firms to make special products only for China. Officials also have taken steps to keep government agencies from using non-Chinese software.
U.S. companies urgently want to do business in China because it's a huge, growing market. China has a $1.4 trillion economy and gross domestic product growth near 10%, according to the U.S. State Department. Political changes in recent years have increasingly opened the once-isolated country to foreign companies. U.S. tech firms are eager to sell PCs, DVD players and other products to China's 1.3 billion citizens.
Chinese officials talk about fair trade, yet "behave like a protective dictatorship when it serves their best interests," says Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America, a trade group. Chinese officials deny that and say they're working to understand U.S. concerns.
Nearly every country has some policies to boost and protect domestic industries. The U.S. gives tech companies a tax break for research and development, for example. But trade groups such as the ITAA say China's policies are so extreme, they infringe on free trade. In 2003, the USA exported $28 billion worth of goods to China and imported $152 billion.
--00--00--00--
Philippe Lacoste, director of French retail giant Lacoste and grandson of founder Rene Lacoste (L), gives a brief history of the company during a news conference in Shanghai March 29, 2004. French retailer Lacoste, frustrated over what it calls widespread piracy in China, may pull out of the market if it fails to stop a Singapore-based rival from also using a crocodile logo. REUTERS/Claro Cortes IV
The most troubling thing about this is that PRC is using US companies to write and implement the software and hard technologies that permit all this censorship. It seems to me that if our government is willing to prevent easy export of offensive military weapons, it should have similar strictures for the export of defensive weapons designed to promote closed minds in populations that want open minds.
Wireless blogging is going to be a way to get around many restrictions. Of course this doesn't help if they are blocking the servers. Fortunately these days there are a vast number of hosting companies which provide blog hosting. And wireless net is huge in China, with hundreds of millions of WAP-enabled phones. I think that the government will at some point just give up on this and realize that free expression is not that much of a threat. They should look over at the example of Singapore, where the government is very strict, but it tolerates a little joking commentary. The PRC will realize that people complaining is not the same thing as a real challenge.
Damn, Your wound a bit tight.
What you say is obvious, so obvious that what I said should be funny. Perhaps you need to check that site yourself.
1. Spam was mammals.
2. Spam frys ALL the time.
3. The purpose of spam is to make Hawiians somehow more exotic.
In communist China, government blogs YOU!
[ insert your own witty .sig here ]
...flashed pics of guys fucking women, of hung black dudes flashing their dick to your daughter? After all, it's just a picture, right?
I think this is more like the government blockading the door to your bathroom... of course, there's nothing stopping you from relieving yourself on the front lawn. ;)
;)
You've been playing way too much of "The Sims" haven't you?
That's not really the point, however. The point is, everyone claiming that information = insta-revolution well...I seriously doubt it. A lot of people left Hong Kong before PRC took it over...and then moved back when they saw that PRC didn't really change the system at all, and things were peaceful.
Seriously, they didn't really keep out outside information before; that fully explains the Tiananmen Square protests, as people knew that Communist leaderships everywere were falling appart so they wanted to try in China too. If people wanted a protest/revolution it would happen; I honestly don't think they do, and I don't think the internet will change that, blocked or unblocked.
I remember falling out of my chair laughing when afganistan banned the internet.
l
http://slashdot.org/articles/01/07/14/147233.shtm
This time I'm not laughing.
Man I wouldn't.
There ain't no way the Chinese are coming to America.
(We'd just bomb the fuck out of their transports.)
But they do have nukes and a couple of million people which would make invading China make invading japan look like invading iraq. (I hope that made some sense.)
Now what I would like to see is China attack Tiawan and the U.S. step in to help protect the island nation. We already have some missile cruisers parked there.
Or North Korea, I'd like to see the Korean war all over again with Russia and China secretly helping out. (I just want us to cover or asses and sides of the lines, not spread them out so thin.)
In Communist China, lawns pee ON YOU!
exactly how much off a @#$# China cares about what anybody thinks of them. I mean, gee whiz, if they're willing to shoot their citizens in the street (Tianneman Sq (sp?)) do you really think some UN resolution is going to matter?
BC
Couple billions obviously.
THE INTERNET BLOCKS YOU
Have you read Popper's 'Open Society?'
these are the perpetrators of the Tiananmen massacre. do you really think they would hesitate to block a few websites?
I don't think anyone here doubts that they want to censor. But just because they would doesn't mean they can. All a Chinese person needs to access subversive information is to find a mirror, cache, or proxy server(?) to say nothing of forbidden information hosted within the country.
They will try, but while China is a big place, the rest of the world is even bigger.
Promote Sensitivity on Slashdot, make me your friend.
Harpo Tunnel Syndrome--my wrist feels funny.
n/t
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
U.S. news agencies stopped broadcasting Bin Laden's speeches at the request of the U.S. government.
The U.S. government made the absurd claim that Bin Laden was "sending secret messages to his supporters" through his speeches, when it was blatantly obvious that the U.S. was simply interested in suppressing him.
Understandably in fact. Bin Laden was making a whole lot of sense and sounded extremely reasonable when compared to Bush.
The U.S. does not have the moral standing to criticise other nations. To do so is the height of hypocrisy.
It all started when Hao Feng Xi submitted a request for unemployment support:
This, of course, infuriated the whole fucking country, and now they're on a mission to stamp out this new form of "viral illiteracy."
REM Old programmers don't die. They just GOSUB without RETURN.
its been done before. not for the best reasons, but blackholing via routing policy should isolate them nicely enough.
don't want to participate in the IP world like good boys and girls? fine. [soup nazi]no IP for you! come back one year![/soup nazi]
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
I can access the site fine from an IP inside China.
Maybe next time somebody should verify the info before shouting it out loud?
I'd say, mind your own business before criticising others.
Above message brought to you by the Great Party of The People's Republic of China.
1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d
What indie sites are you talking about? People here are always bitching about U.S. censorship gone awry, do you have any examples of such? Is it all 'questionable porn' that's been taken off-line? Or some dude's home page where he just talks about how he dislikes the Gov't?
As far as I know the KKK still has a website, and they're pretty universaly hated...
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
The main advantage of having wireless blogging in a place like China is simply that so many more people have phones than computers so it is easier to get the word out. Also phones are more private because, unlike computers, they are not shared among multiple users and are not in semi-public places like schools, a family home, etc.
I don't know which is more mind-boggling - the fact that this was seriously posed as a question or the fact that it was modded insightful.
Kindly go to a strip club, get HBO, google for "nipple", or buy a magazine in a brown wrapper ALL LEGALLY and THEN tell me how terrible the US is just because most people who live here think it might be smart to not allow nudity during the Superbowl.
I mean, just like a stopped clock is right twice a day, they do have a great idea going: no blogs. I wouldn't mind getting rid of all blogs on the internet. At least I'd get better results on Google.
I'm probably at the karma cap. Mod up a funny troll instead, it lightens the mood
For how long will the Chinese Communist Party live of soviet-alike propaganda and censorship? Well, I see, still, chinese government can't effectively ban every kind of push-button Publishing Sites. They are trying to prevent that people who have unfavourable, "bad" vision of their country/communist party to publish their "harmful" points of view. What is funny is that every time they do something like this, it has a bad repercussion in the west, causing people to have unfavourable opinions about the chinese governemnt. So, they are doing the counter-propaganda job by themselves letting stuff liek this to circulate around the global press;
People here are always bitching about U.S. censorship gone awry, do you have any examples of such?
This case springs to mind. The government has prommised to stop thier harrassment for the moment, but until there is an actual ruling on this issue, I'm pretty sure that this pafrticular area of US govt. censorship is not quite dead yet.
Read, L
Can you come up with anything insightful instead this lame joke? Most people in China believe in this, especially after they have seen and experienced the western hypocrisy.
The breadth of censored content there is simply amazing.
Someone (it seems like everyone in China) using .cn (China) already has enough access to the 'net to accept golden U$ to provide spammers (e.g. Ralsky) with the ability to clog all of our inboxes. Is this done with or without the [Chinese] government's knowledge|permission? (or is there a kickback to remain in operation?) If someone's able to get that much access [now], I'd think the remainder of the [Chinese] citizenry could do the same.
.cn should be dropped into a realtime black hole until they cut off the spammers.
Beyond that, whether the Chinese gov't provides access to its citizens or not,
Umm... yes. Care to give examples of government mass repression of free speech?
Sorry, Ackhpht, I must eat my own hat. I had momentarily forgotten we weren't allowed to mention God on public property anymore.
First of all I find it very unusual any US politician would have anything to do with the UN.
I remember on CNN after two planes, of the anti-Castro group, were shot down by Cuba, a US polictican ( Helms...Burton? ) said that all the more reason to continue the economic boycott of Cuba.
The next story was on China and another politician speaking about China said that keeping dialogue open with China was the only way to make progress.
If the Internet in China, and also keeping dialogue open, is so important, why not do that for every enemy or the US?
China is so huge I wouldn't worry about the government controlling the Internet. They seem to be where the USSR was in the late 80's just before Communism fell.
How can they see and experience the westen hypocrisy when it's censored? Do you honestly believe that a site like Slashdot is allowed in China?
I'll start bitching when Bush censores anti-Bush jokes.
1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d
You've just "shown" ranked voting doesn't work in practice by criticizing it in theory. That doesn't make any sense. In fact, you've shown it isn't a good idea, and you claim that has no bearing on how it works in practice, so in practice it may perform well.
Disclaimer: I don't care either way about ranked voting.
Then why are all those porn servers in the US? Then why can people still sell porno videos in the US (as long as it isn't to minors)?
You only have problems when you try to get the govenrment to reserve part of the EM frequency for you.
#include "sig.h"
I hear the chinese are bad for our capitalistic selves. I mean what did China do for me personally?
Mod suggestions, -1 stupid and -1 troll.
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
... how the same people tend to curse at US for being oppressive, aggressive, and otherwise evil, and yet completely ignore China's record on the same issues.
For example, the French -- among the noisiest critics of US nowadays lit/painted the Eiffel tower red to greet the Chinese leader and to comfort him with support for his hostility towards Taiwan.
Italians, protesting every one of the executions in US, seem to completely ignore the public executions in China, which sometimes take place in stadiums and are often caused merely by alleged economic crimes.
Now this (as if we did not know about the Great Chinese Firewall before)... Where are the condemnations from the people, accusing the US for "suffocating the independent media" -- because Howard Stern was kicked off by his employer?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
I have not idea why China would block Taipei or Mahjongg, whatever you call it. I mean, that game w/ the little tiles is so fun and addictive. I mean why would China block... oooohhhh... Typepad... in that case who really cares?
What will they think of next?
Vivin Suresh Paliath
http://vivin.net
I like
Hey, its their country, their rules...
No one else should have the right to dictate internal policy, unless they are abusing or torturing their citizens...
---- Booth was a patriot ----
What is to stop a chinese admin from buying a server at a US colocation facility and setting up a proxy on the colocated server? Then he can use SSH tunneling to tunnel to the proxy server.
Does the chinese government block SSH too?
Brought to you by Cisco and Sun!
Take that, vile slashbots!
What I found funny is that your original post was modded insiteful instead of funny...
Happens to me all the time. Esoteric humor, I guess.
That's why I change my sig for a few minutes to something like "It's a joke! Laugh!" so I can get a couple of "Funny" mods for the rest of the herd (hurd?;) to follow. Kinda like a laughtrack during a sitcom on TV. Lets people know when to laugh.
Geez. I suppose you are the only people who are informed about the worldly events. All Chinese people in China are blind and stupid, therefore are totally brainwashed by Commie doctrines, and has no idea what Western countries are like. If you are truly interested, you are more than welcome to travel to China and ask people on the street their opinions, do a fact check yourself for once. Private bitching about government is allowed and goes on everyday in China. Thats why corruption is dealt so severally by the government, because it is the most discussed topics among Chinese citizens.
VOA, Voice of America, was a primary propaganda machine to China. Government had local efforts of jamming the signals but it was never effective. University students in China listened to it loyally, as a medium to learn English and learn about the world. But the fundamental problem with VOA was that being an American radio station, it broadcast contents to China as if it is the CNN. Feeding incredible biased "news" that people in China know aren't true. You think people will continue to listen to that bullsh#t? Thats why almost nobody listens to it nowadays.
Look, I'm not saying that the Commie Chinese government is an angel. It has done some pretty nasty stuffs and the people in China knows it. But they still approves because overall the government has done a lot of good things, for Chinese of course. Don't think that the Chinese people are not capable of another revolution if they don't see the government acting in their interests. The commie knows that too. Thats why changes are happening, steadily. And people like that instead of big bang solution that hurt the Chinese people's bottom line.
then why does the CCP have to spend so much energy to prevent people from getting information uncongenial to it? If the CCP's decisions and methods are correct, won't an open discussion of them reveal that? If so many concur, then the agreement would strengthen the Chinesse government, and give it the far stronger backing of >600 M people. Instead, the CCP spends its time trying to prevent uncongenial information from getting to its people and keeping an army to suppress them, moves which cost it both resources to build itself better and standing in the markets and the world community upon which its future rests.
This isn't the behavior of a stable government in concurrence with its people, but a government perched on a pinnacle, which can be toppled with just a few of the right words. The US tolerates a lot of hypocrisy, but it endures because the availability of information allows people to judge their government (somewhat openly); thus while there is dissent on a daily basis, the dissent doesn't destroy the gov't system. The US has many small cracks, but it doesn't fall apart because it isn't brittle and the cracks don't spread - people have enough confidence in it that dissent doesn't coalesce against the system. The CCP doesn't behave as if it were confident in its correctness - dissent not expressed hardens into rebellion, and threatens the entire nation. The Chinese gov't behaves like a brittle structure - the CCP has to prevent cracks (dissent) because their disagreement with their people means that cracks will propagate and break the structure. If your structure can tolerate cracks and still stands, you don't worry about them because it's a waste of time and money. Cutting off information that disagrees with the CCP implies either 1) the people aren't smart enough to succeed (which means China will go nowhere anyway) or 2) the people would rebel against the CCP if they read the information. 1) doesn't concur with experience (the large number of successful Chinese graduate students in America), so 2) is pretty likely, which doesn't agree with your initial statement.
A gov't in the right doesn't need to shield its people from the truth.
That seems a little bit different from just plain 'censorship' of free speach though, given that the case is about export laws. Note that he's still allowed to talk about the case freely. He's also allowed to disclose his cryptography to any US citizen, just not to 'foreigners'. Granted the gov't case doesn't make sense, but I don't think I'd consider this quite as serious as the China case...
The export laws just seem like the government getting 'used to' this new Internet thingy.
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
A properly constructed communist state would only require the dictatorship of the proletariat for a generation or so. After this time, no one would own any goods any more, and the only formalized government required would be for lawmaking and policing. The "communist" societies of the former Soviet Union and China are not really communist at all, as the parent poster said. They're really just state sponsored capitalism, and there are still people hoarding the wealth.
Wow, the gap is closing? You mean I can get myself arrested and deported to the gulag for insulting our Great and Glorious Leaders or for arguing with their policies?
I'm skeptical, so let's do a scientific test.
Unbelievable! I'm still here! Any real dictator would have had my ass slammed into a re-education camp (or simply shot) for a lot less than that. Since I can say such things with no fear of being strapped to a chair in a dank room with my eyes taped open so I could be forced to watch Fox News Channel (;-), I guess that Bush's dictatorship must be pretty wimpy. Maybe he's just a miserable failure at being a despot.
Perhaps I just have to try harder. Let me taunt them again.
(*checks self*) No, I didn't just get disappeared in the middle of the night. The jackbooted thugs aren't a-knockin' at my door. What a disappointment.
Yeah, here goes my karma, right into the Troll/Flamebait gulag. (Censorship! Censorship! The gap between Slashdot and Communist China is closing! Wahhhh!) Fuck it. I have family members who risked their lives 50 years ago to escape real tyranny. Comparing the current-day U.S. is an insult to them and to the hundreds of millions who have been brutally slaughtered by tyrannical regimes throughout history.
There is an order of magnitude difference America today and any dictatorship at any point in history. Are things perfect? No. Should we be complacent? No. Could it happen here? Yes, it could; and we should be vigilant against it; but saying it's practically here already is simply ludicrous. Sadly, saying that the gap is being closed demonstrates a true ignorance of what real dictatorship is like. Unfortunately, this only makes it more likely to happen here in the civilized world, for when people who claim to be advocates of liberty live outside of reality and scream like Chicken Little over simple petty politics, liberty looks pretty defenseless to me.
Microsoft Windows is, fittingly, the official Desktop OS of Olig
Some sites in the blogging community are turning black in protest of this event while others are reporting the incident.
Well thank God the all powerful blog-o-sphere is finally using its power to do something instead of just creating a rebellion symbol/meme and linking to real news sources.
Oh wait.
-Colin
And I would like to share a few things to anyone who is interested:
... US allies ... )
First of all: China is changing a such a rapid pace that no Cisco routers that are used to block a couple websites will have any major impact.
We are talking of about 100 million people rapidly moving up the social ladder. The communist party just aknowledged that they have to do something about the rest (more than 900 million btw), many of them on the way trying to get on board with the first group.
That said I would like to share some insight into history. Even though we know oppresive regimes are bad and the usual American only pokes at Communism with a 9 foot pole the regime served the majority of the Chinese people pretty well in the past 40-50 years. The cultural revolution was a major setback and the party says it was very wrong. Apart from that they had some great success at poverty reduction during the 70s and 80s.
Compare that to what You know about India, which has had a stable democracy during most of that time or South America which has been under US influence since the infamous "Teddy".
IMHO India lags behind China on the rights of the woman (in practial terms, theoratically all Communist coutries should be heaven for women, which never was) over all for example. I am sure You will find more.
At the moment the US govt. is using the "human rights tool" to apply pressure to China on the international diplomatic level. You know it, they know it and everyone else knows it too. (Saudi Arabia and human rights
Still we have an issue with free speech in China, since a corrupt govt. that has nothing left to justify its hold on power (they promote market economics for heavens sake) is trying to keep the country out of major shakeups. Remember what happened to Russia after the change? Live expectency is still going down there. Anyways, there are people in the party that try to move towards democracy, but that is not easy and they don't want civil war.
That said the most important problems that China is facing at the moment are corruption and trying not to loose the 900 million people on the way to wealth and prosperity. That is what the party is saying. IMHO the biggest problem is for the officials to stay on top of this huge moving mass that China represents at the moment. And it is gaining speed.
Exactly because of that the central government is trying to promote free speech to get more accurate reports from the various parts of China, since the official channels are slow and always change facts around so the local govt. looks good.
If you can read my posts made way back, I did "praise" China for being more capitalistic and affirming the rights of owning a personal property. I accuse Chinese of being blind and stupid, I bashed the government for censorship. Public forums, such as Slashdot, allows people to show facts that may have been "missed" by the major news outlets.
Private bitching's effectiveness is rather limited. For example, if you hate the Iraqi war, you easily create a web site for the millions to see, even if it's against the views of the Whitehouse.
1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d
I was in China just a few weeks ago -- Xanga have not been blocked for some reason.
I know many China-based bloggers who use Xanga as a matter of fact. It's not the best blog solution out there, because of its simplistic interface and lack of customization, but it works!
There's 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
On one hand the politicos take money from an industry repressing p2p usage and with the other they complain about centralized systems. One may wonder if it's not just a case of nationalism. Not much heard about the content filters in libraries, schools, etc, the content filtering by the fcc and others (mostly under the guise of protecting the children). Want to protect the children? Don't burden the unborn with billions of dollars of debt due to an unnessary invasion. If you stand back and listen closely, you can make out the squack of the gaggle.
"I accuse Chinese of being blind and stupid"
Good luck at getting Chinese people to agree with you there and take arms to overthrow the commie government. Hahaha. Again, as I said before, this is nothing but mental masturbation on your part.
Now that they've banned Typepad, they should also do some good and ban Notepad, the worst editor in all of computing history.
Oops, that should've been "I didn't accuse Chineses of being blind and stupid".
1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d
Iraq abuses human rights and we bomb the hell out of them.
China abuses human rights and we give them "Most Favored Nation" trading partner status.
Am I the only one that sees a double standard here?
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
So, what do you consider abuse? If you consider second amendment protection a right, do you not think the same of the first amendment? Or do human rights only apply in the US?
Member of Orkut? Annoyed with spam?
"W... What is that thing?!?"
"I... I think it's the blogosphere... And it's headed straight towards us!"
*various extras scatter. Camera pans to a model of the city being rolled over with a bowling ball*
"Oh no! It's Godzil-er... Ah damnit, I knew I should have came to rehersals."
Originally from those cowpokes (CDC) in Tejas:
o p= modload&name=FAQ&file=index&myfaq=yes&id_cat=1&cat egories=General#1
n am e=Content&pa=showpage&pid=1
China does NOT want this little application to surface.
The line starts here:
http://www.peek-a-booty.org/pbhtml/modules.php?
http://www.peek-a-booty.org/pbhtml/modules.php?
~hylas
China Sucks.
1. Set up massive block-lists and update them fervently. This discourages random websurfing from casual users from accessing "corrupting" information.
2. Impose jail sentences on those who try really hard to get around your restrictions. It's not a game they're playing, where they just cut off your internet access. This discourages the less-than-rabidly-disgruntled.
Communism, as true idea not as it has been implemented, is a wonderful idea. It was summarised best in a quote which goes something like "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs." Basically everyone works at doing what it is they do best. But they don't work for personal gain, as we do in a Capitalism, they work for the common good. Everything is then distributed equally, so everyone has the worth. You don't get tons of stuff just because you act in movies or struggle to make ends meet just because you work in a factory. Everyone is treated fairly and equally, and everyone works for the greater good.
Of course that rosy ideal has almost nothing to do with how Communism is actually implemented. It also utterly fails to accomidate basic human nature. Though there are notable exceptions, and varying behaviour in each individual, when you take humanity as a whole for economic design you have to regard them as lazy and greedy. Communism fails to provide any reward for hard work, since it doesn't appeal to greed (you get the same no matter what you do) so laziness sets in. Most workers do the minimum needed. Also all actual implementations of Communism have been combined with a very totalitarian government, which leads to corruption.
Capatalism isn't the most fair or best economic system we've come up with, it is the most fair and best economic system we've come up with that works in the real world. It deals with the objective realities of humans and tries to reward them (it's been accurately called a system of controlled greed) for hard work and risk taking. This leads to inequities, but it DOES work and makes economies work efficiently in the real world.
So Communism DOES look good on the chalk board. It's a wonderful idea, but it makes assumptions and requirements that don't exist in the real world. So it looks good on the chalkboard, but fails the real world test.
Y'all might check out this entry and this entry for the most likely explanation I've heard on this story yet and a little background info on the PRC Minister of Education who it seems is partially behind some of these restrictions.
Of course I can only say "seems" and "partially" because in a system where transparency is lacking *cough*Hi Condi! Hi Cheney Energy Commission!*cough* you can never really tell what the government is doing and who is to be held responsible.
Actually, I think China blocks both information and women's nipples.
Why does it matter if the dick is white or black?
I mean other than the fact that a black one is bigger, that is.
WOW! I't a good thing somebody stated the obvious by informing us that The Web Won't Topple Tyranny .
Optimistic, but ultimately naive.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Normal people say "Oh, wasn't that stupid", and get on with life.
Weird people get all freaked out, hold congressional hearings and then talk about how bad it was for the children.
And yes, I have two kids, thanks for asking.
china blocking the freedom of speech?!
WHAT HAS THIS WORLD COME TO?!
Joshua Kurlantzick writes:
According to Kurlantzick, the net has three major limitations:
It can only disseminate information, not actually produce it;
Its essence is primarily individualistic: therefore it doesn't naturally foster collective activities/a communal spirit;
It requires literacy.
He continues:
The liver is evil and must be punished.
Hello there, I am a Canadian and I'm now in China teaching English and doing some freelance web development. I've been in China (Shanghai) for about 9 months now and to be honest it is VERY rare that I can't access any particuliar website. I remember just when I got here I did have some problems with a very few sites but then they seemed to have really cooled down lately about it since now these sites are easily accessible. Same thing with Google, they un-blocked it long time ago. I just tried both of the supposedly blocked websites (blogger and typepad) and I have absolutely no problem accessing these sites. I don't know where this information came from but they surely didn't block it for me! ;)
I'm also pretty amazed by how easy and cheap it is to go online here (compared to Canada). I'm on a very fast cable connection, with no restrictions or quotas at all, and I pay about US 14$ (splitted between me and my flatmate). In Canada I have to pay over CDN 35$ for a cable connection that gives me like 6 gig max of downloads and a crappy 15k/s upload speed limit...
Anyways I just thought I should share that information with you guys as I feel sometimes we westerners tend to bitch a lot about China and its government without really seeing how things really are in the real world. China is under very heavy and fast transformations right now, as much economically than socially, and I think Shanghai is probably the best place to actually see that LIVE in front of your eyes. Shanghai is definately opening up to the world and its a pretty cool and fun place to live in (and party!) nowadays. You should see how fast skyscrapers are growing like mushrooms around here, it's quite unbelievable. And I haven't said anything about the amazing transportation system and its modern facilities... I still can't believe they can put these flat LCDs and huge plasma screens about every 5 meters in the metro, when I can't even afford one of those myself (Grr). Oh btw, I saw those terminals reboot once or twice, and yes it runs under Linux ;) The cultural changes are there as well, as the younger generations seem not to differ as much as westerners anymore... But at the same time it's a bit of a shame cuz with McDonalds and KFC invading China (There's a famous street in Shanghai, Nanjing rd. where there is a McDonald's or KFC about every 100 meters!) I see SO many very FAT youngsters, which is something almost impossible to see amongst the 20+ and older generations... Too bad, I guess the amazing fact that chinese woman are all very thin and healthy looking will be something of the past and to remember... sigh! ;)
There's a lot more to say but oh well, that was just my 2 cents about China...
If you ask me, the current government in China is simply driven by lust for power, and especially GREED.
The Bush administration won't really hold them to task because if the BushCo folks had their way, the US would be just like China. (no environmental regulations, no unions, no corporate taxes, precious little civil rights, no freedom of the press or speech, limitless government secrecy, high corporate profits...)
The whole Communism thing is just a front.. Karl Marx cultists are really not that different than Adam Smith cultists when you get down to it.
Several minutes ago a friend of mine was asking me the IP address of slashdot.org via IM. His DNS is no longer resolving slashdot.org! All of these happened just now. Looks like you folks are talking about something that Chairman Hu don't like their people to hear...
Confirmed! Slashdot.org was just blocked in China! $ ping slashdot.org ping: unknown host slashdot.org [Tue Mar 30 15:01:58 ~]
Looks like it is only filtering the DNS
/tmp]
$ wget -nd 66.35.250.150
--15:07:56-- http://66.35.250.150:80/
=> `index.html'
Connecting to 66.35.250.150:80... connected!
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... ^C
[Tue Mar 30 15:08:01
I'm doing some google searches to see how many pages there are, and what pages, on some specific subjects, and today typepad went way up on some of my searhes. Now I know why.. ;-)
I\'m an ex-pat currently living in China.
Yesterday I could get to slashdot.
Today I can\'t.
How interesting.
If they are block foreign products (weblog hosting from San Mateo, CA) just complain to the World Trade Organization.
-- AC
Two party system is only two times better than a one party system. And that ain't much..
These comments come from a country which has least corruption in the world (transparency international), has most press freedom (reporters without borders) and is the only country where prison system actually "heals" criminals (==minority of people who have spent time in jail continue committing crimes)... Can you quess what it is?
Better be careful about UN resolutions with the Chinese.
They 'actually do' have WMD.
Maybe, instead of prorouging Hans Blix, if Saddam had been censured to stop supressing the internet, all that ordinance spent being dropped on Iraq, could have gone to medicare or schools, or, I dunno, debt relief for the 40% of sub-saharan Africa, which is HIV+?
Maybe... just maybe, some people need try and grasp reality.
The internet is the perfect place for that... ask the Chinese!
Site: www.slant-six.org (and subdirectories) Blocked on: Aug 14 (Jiangsu), Aug 17 (Jiangsu), Aug 19 (Jiangsu), Aug 20 (Jiangsu), Aug 23 (Jiangsu), Aug 27 (Jiangsu), Aug 29 (Jiangsu), Sep 1 (Jiangsu), Sep 3 (Jiangsu), Sep 21 (Jiangsu), Sep 30 (Shanghai), Sep 30 (Jiangsu), Sep 30 (Guangdong), Oct 12 (Shanghai), Oct 12 (Guangdong), Oct 12 (Beijing)
Yahoo: News and Media > Magazines > General Interest
Description: slant-six.org
Inbound Link Count: 70 linking pages
Title: Welcome to Slap A Ham Records!
Site: www.slapaham.com (and subdirectories)
Blocked on: Aug 23 (Jiangsu), Sep 30 (Guangdong)
Yahoo: Business and Economy > Shopping and Services > Music > Labels > By Genre > Punk and Hardcore
Google: Arts > Music > Styles > Rock > Punk > Record Labels > S
Inbound Link Count: 112 linking pages
Title:
Site: www.slc.moj.gov.tw (and subdirectories)
Violating the US Constitutional Human rights wouldn't not qualify as *abuse*.
It would however, constitute violation of the supreme law in this country. Violation of the rights and privileges that were earned by our forefathers.
Have these other countries earned those same rights? No. Should they earn them and protect them? Yes.
Do they have the right to not be abused or tortured? Yes.
There is a difference, however subtle.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Can U.S. Ambassador Richard Williamson introduce a resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Commission to censure the US government for 'repression of foreign people illegaly arrested everywhere in the world The US capitalist regime previously blocked access to lawyers, international prisonners rights and insult the geneva convetion.
Thanks Ambassador......
Yeah, what toogreen said -- I'm sitting in a school in Shandong at the moment and could access both "blocked" sites without a problem. I've had nary a problem with accessing sites, except for the frequently-down local DNS.
$ echo "ceci n'est pas une pipe" | sed -Ee 's/(eci n|pas )//g'
the 3 rivers project will do to the prc what water does to alkaselzer.
my argument is that the energy of 50 new-clear generators coupled with modern day robotics will give every buggy wip maker in the prc a new learning experience, all at "government expense for the people".
"Seriously, what do you care about Chinese people's freedom and rights?"
I care enough to hope they don't get, collectively, *very* pissed off, have a revolution, and turn their aggression to the West.
After all, the chinese peasant can make a case to blame the West for his strife! It might not be rational, but a consequence of a revolution is impossible to predict. A revolutionary government with nukes and the biggest army that has ever stood, together with a cultural unity that is entirely foreign to most people's understanding? Frightening.
There's quite a strong case to be made for preserving the status quo in China.
With the rate of progress in the world, it's hard to compare against something that happened in the past. A good question is, and especially with the available of information and global communication... would the Chinese government perpetrate another such incident as Tiananmen Square?
Excuse me, you are, in fact, completely wrong. Typepad and Blogger\\\'s main sites have never been blocked. Try to go to a .blogspot.com or .typepad.com site and see how well it works. Or did you even think to read about the block before you posted?
The only sacrifice communism demands of you is that you don't *own* anything. You are still free to pursuade whatever artistic endevours you want, whatever ideas and research you want, whatever you want. And in *real* communism, not these warped state-run capital economies, the populace is free to spend their time *doing* what they want to do as well - your job is what you enjoy, not forced upon you by the state, or forced upon you by the need to earn a living.
If you feel that not being able to own anything means that you are somehow sacrificing your individuality, then by definition that means that in your mind, your possessions somehow define who you are. If that is true, then indeed, you are one sorry individual.
Did you even read my comment? Where did I say anything about not owning your body or your life?
You think the things you buy constitute your life??? Thats... just sad. I feel sorry for you.
Force cannot logically create wealth. Slavery represents only a transfer of wealth (the slaves' labor) to the aggressors. The aggressors gain exactly what the slaves lose. The net result is zero wealth created.
This rather reminds me of a passage from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy explaining why the population of the Universe is none.
Still, I would like to play devil's advocate with you're analogy and ask the question, does government create wealth. Now the government collects taxes, which on a conservative-libertarian viewpoint, and one I at least partially agree with, is theft. The government then takes a significant portion of the taxes, and exchanges it for say, high-tech airplains from Boeing. Because the taxes are taken by force, is wealth created in this scenario?
Also, coming from an anarchist viewpoint, communism is practice is more like what I think would be the end result of fascism: One big corporation that owns everything. Except in the case of Communism, the government takes on the role of the corporation.
Anarchism is described by some as a Libertarian-Socialism. While there are few examples of this on a large scale, there are also situations that can exist within our capitalist-democracy. One might be a library that is entirely voluntire funded. I could suggest that gaining knowledge is wealth but I have an idea that is a little more concrete.
Suppose there is a craft center that is voluntarily funded and free for public use. If a person makes use of this craft center to make something, say pottery or clothing, and then goes out and sell those goods, has wealth been created?
No one has lost anything by force, and goods have been exchanged for money which I would say counts as creating wealth under your definition. In this scenario wealth has been created in a libertarian-socialist context.
I hate Liberals and Conservatives.
If you are a Liberal or a Conservative, then HAVE A NICE DAY!
Courage.
thank you for your kindness~~ i think things are getting better because sites like cnn.com and nytimes.com are reachable now while fews years ago they are blocked. anybody who want to have a test may try this proxy in my office,linux powered :)
61.242.102.22:17910
if those commies still think censcorship is important theyre wrong. communism is best as an economical thing, not a way of life.