Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Bans 'Democracy' for China's Web Users
Doc Ruby writes "As reported, paradoxically, on MSN, 'Microsoft's new Chinese internet portal has banned the words 'democracy' and 'freedom' from parts of its website in an apparent effort to avoid offending Beijing's political censors.' MSN China says it must comply with local laws, but there is no Chinese law against the use of these words."
Maybe if they just used "democlacy" or "fleedom" - after all, that's how it's pronounced over there, right?
Sorry, couldn't resist.
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
Cisco built firewall for china and many other cos. helped china in a way that is in use against people who are working for Democratic or other free government. Now Microsoft
Reminds me of that miserable failure.
I think this should be categorized: Their Rights Online.
And, before I get flamed for being a typical American who thinks that everything revolves around him, let me refer you to the FAQ where CmdrTaco clearly states that 'Slashdot is run by Americans' and that 'the vast majority of our readership is in the U.S.' and therefore, most of the stories are US-centric.
But back to the topic at hand, I'm trying to figure out how this kind of a 'Microsoft is evil' story got onto Microsoft's own news site...
Why are the animals silent? Such is the nature of Chinese people. The problem is not merely Beijing. The problem is Chinese society.
Oh, Ubermensch from the 'Oh Great United States of America!', land of the brave and the free!
You surely got the right to call the Chinese people 'animals'. Coz they are animals, right? These things, we can barely call them living creatures, should be happy you call them animals.
But why would you post anonymously? You got it right. Why hide? You know, there are two parts in posting anonymousy. One is the anonymous part. The other one is 'coward'.
You're an asshole. Luckily, there's practically no chance of your getting laid, so we won't have to worry about your bullshit bigotry, and lies about your ethnicity and "feelings", being passed to another generation.
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make install -not war
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
You pathetic clown, Communism was Marx's idea in the first place. The 20th century proved that Marxism leads inevitably to "that inhuman disregard for human rights". 100 million people died to prove Marx wrong.
Capitalism, on the other hand, has done more to improve our lives than any other idea since the discovery of fire.
But you appear to be speaking for "our lives", which must mean you are including me -- so, tell me how the fact that I have been sickly all my life and that my parents never purchased insurance and that now I am an adult I am ineligible for appropriate insurance means that I should be praising Rand and Smith rather than Marx and Bevan.
You have a sucky life. That's beside the point.
Marx is still wrong. Communism still murdered a hundred million people. Socialism still sends countries into spirals of bankruptcy.
Look, this is how it works:
Socialism tries to take the pie (the economy) and spread it around as evenly as possible. Communism is just the same, except it shoots anyone who disagrees.
Capitalism concentrates on making more pie. Capitalism isn't fair. It's not about fairness. It's about pie.
Under Capitalism, almost everyone ends up with more pie every year. Some people lose out; that's why every capitalist country has some sort of welfare program.
Under Socialism, almost everyone ends up with less pie every year, and eventually the country collapses.
And that happens every time, in every nation that Socialism has been implemented. The only difference is how long it takes.
I have sympathy for your disability, and respect your efforts to overcome it. But economically, Socialism is pure poison.
They didn't care about the intelligence, in terms of justifying the invasion to their own team. They were already committed by (latest) July 2002 (according to British officials coordinating with them, as per the Downing Street Memo). They were probably committed by January 2001 (according to Richard Clarke, and others). It just took them as much a 9 months after 9/11/2001 to be "sure" they could hijack the "War on Terror" to invade Iraq, instead of getting Osama, or destroying the Taliban, or pacifying Afghanistan, or confronting Pakistan, etc. The real turning point came in the December 21, 2002 meeting with Bush, Tenet, and McLaughlin in a CIA briefing on WMD. Tenet's famous "it's a slam dunk" remark was not at all an estimate of his confidence in finding WMD. It was assuring Bush that such a story would convince Congress, and Americans, to invade Iraq.
That's all pretty stupid, except it worked. In terms of his actual agenda (provided by his backers), Bush is a crashing success. In terms of his public agenda, he's an unmitigated catastrophe. I hope to see him impeached, and even executed for treason.
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make install -not war