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China Shuts Down 8,600 Cybercafes
ThatGuyAZ writes "China has shut down over 8,600 internet cafes in the last two months as a part of a new crackdown on "underage" internet use. The crackdown has also limited access to blogs, and forums, and requires video surveilance of cybercafe patrons. Only in China would a reduction of internet access to the public be called an "education campaign"."
I had the good fortune to talk to someone whose degree was in library science. Their final assignment in college was to find a picture of a specified resource (It was a sculpture by an artist, but the name of both the sculpture and artist escapes me). The dozen or so students worked together, pored through the library resources, searched indexes and were finally able to uncover information about the artist and the sculpture, but were in the end unable to find any photo of the sculpture. This was in the 1970s or thereabouts.
A few weeks ago, he went to google, punched in the name of the artist and of the sculpture. The first three results had photos of the work.
For better or worse, the Internet has completely transformed the way that we find information. To deny people that tool is to ultimately make them impotent.
A DVD contains a limited subset of information; the Internet has a much larger set of information. So a DVD may or may not have the information you really want; the Internet almost certainly will.
I would be the first to agree that computers are overhyped and overtaught.
Allowing the government of China to control the behavior of their citizens is not going to keep the burgers and corn syrup away.
While I would agree that there are an increase of cases involving children and computers, consider for a moment the introduction of the automobile in widespread use during the 50s and 60s. No doubt a large population of children/young adults were all of a sudden being arrested for crimes related to driving cars: too fast, recklessly, etc. Many of them were illiterate with earlier modes of transportation -- they would be unable to ride a horse, for example. Nonetheless, I would say that the introduction of the car was overall a beneficial thing, and that allowing young adults to drive is also a good thing.
It sounds to me that your main issue is that individuals in the United States are increasingly likely to be jailed for performing actions online that don't harm anyone else and which are considered illicit only because they are happening through a computer. While this is a tragedy, it is ultimately unrelated to China's decision to close down the cybercafes and to the effect that this decision will have. China is not performing this function to save its citizens from being arrested by the state, anymore than the United States is allowing cybercafes to remain open so that it can have a steady supply of inmates for its prisons.
Our freedoms are not what China needs. Our freedoms aren't freedoms, they're "privledges", and we pay dearly for them.
Our freedoms *are* freedoms, not privileges. We have the right in the US to protest, and if we feel our freedoms are being limited it is our responsibility to voice our opposition to that limitation. As Utah Philips once said:
The problem in the United States is not that our freedoms are limited; the problem has become that people have put too much emphasis on their "pursuit of happiness" and not enough on their liberty.
Online activity is monitored and every ISP in the country is ready and willing to lift their skirts for every court order rubbed lovingly against their cheek.
I know that ISPs keep trac
Karma: Chevy Kavalierma.