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Business At The Price Of Freedom
An anonymous reader writes "The TechZone has an article on how much technology companies setting up shops in China have to kowtow to the Chinese government. All the major search engines have given in to Chinese demands to throttle liberty in exchange for access to the Chinese market and Microsoft has blocked users of its MSN site from using the terms 'freedom,' 'democracy' and other concepts China has designated as dangerous. From the article: 'Most disconcerting are recent reports that Yahoo!'s Hong Kong operation is turning over emails which helped convict a reporter. Journalist Shi Tao was jailed and sentenced to 10 years in prison for "illegally sending state secrets abroad." The secrets that he revealed were information his newspaper received from the state propaganda department about how they could cover the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. He was identified because he had used Yahoo!'s free email service for which Yahoo! turned over log files to authorities that were later tracked back to his computer.'"
If you don't like it, don't use them. You do have a choice, you know.
Striking fear in the authors of godawful fanfiction, I am here, appearing in darkness, Tuxedo Jack!
. . . unless and until the executives of these companies, and the American techs on the ground who were "only following orders" are brought back in chains and tried. If I had my druthers, they'd all be hauled to The Hague in chains, tried for crimes against humanity, and hanged.
Americans are dying everyday to bring democracy to the world, and Yahoo sells freedom down the river for a few Yen.
Dissidents of repressive regimes should be supported.
Students died for freedom in Tianamin but I guess Yahoo has no Do No Evil Policy
Yahoo should be deeply ashamed.
Boycott these Bastards.
The companies that are already in China know how to work with the government. They're not going to do anything stupid.
This seems like a warning message to companies like Google and Microsoft, who in recent events expressed interest in targeting China (in a marketing, not tactical, sense). Will these large corporations fall flat on their face when they move into China?
In America we don't kowtow to the government, we bend over and grab our ankles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism/
Though, like often, I would like to fall into some serious US-bashing I'm afraid the whole world sees China as THE market for the future with huge profits. The fact that there's oppression doesn't withold big company's from making money. OTOH, Chinese people get to learn more and more about freedom dealing with the internet and dealing with other countries. The US-navy actively sponsores TOR to help the freedom of speech in China...
Freedom comes from business. If I do not have a job how can I feed my family? If I do not have a job how can I keep my family healthy? If I do not have a job how can I afford to donate money to political campaigns? If I have no job how can I afford to protect my intellectual property from thieves?
Freedom only exists because of the free market, so if you denigrate businesses and the free market then you are denigrating freedom and the sacrifices made by heros past in protecting your freedom to live. Think about that next time you want to speak out against business.
Americans and their modern "gangs" (corporates) will do anything for a buck
i guess it shows how desperate they (and the so-called-civilized western world) are
The point is ladies and gentlemen that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of it's forms - greed for life, for money, knowledge - has marked the upward surge of mankind and greed - you mark my words - will not only save Teldar Paper but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you.
-Gordon Gekko
How about US corporations cooperating with CALEA (all wiretaps, all the time), broadcasters knuckling down on popular entertainment figures for fear of reprisals from the FCC, and ISPs who almost always say "we are cooperating fully with authorities," code for "we're not going to challenge the dodgy search warrant (or the fact that there's none at all), but will turn over subscriber records at the drop of a hat to avoid abusive regulators getting tough on us over other issues if we don't play ball. Other examples, anyone?
Everybody's a libertarian 'till their neighbour's becomes a crack house.
All of the so-called civil rights atrocities cited in the article, are now common practise in both Europe and America, no differently than in Asia.
Nothing to see here, move along sheep.
This is ridiculous. Surely the stockholders can't think highly of this incident.
How are the Chinese supposed to know what's going on in the world if they can't listen to Voice of America??
"Is this just useless, or is it expensive as well?"
They should just name their re-education camps Guantanamo Bay 1-2500 and suddenly all this would become a-okay and a commendable act in the war against terrorism.
When you leak this kind of information in the US you probably won't get away with only 10 years...
...and virtually a million ways to cloak sensitive data from You Personal Government's eyes. It's sad those who could have saved their liberty by using those, often did not do so, obviously :(
:%s/Open Source/Free Software/g
YTARY!
There was a recent article on the same topic in SF chronicle.
One of the compelling argument was "If the Chinese custom is to make children work or to kill women, you wouldn't do it," said Julien Pain, head of the Internet Freedom Desk at Reporters Without Borders.
I wonder where should the line be drawn.
95% of all sigs are made up.
If ever the US government took a sharp turn towards authoritarianism, we can assume that no large US corporation would take a stand against it. In fact, these will be the first organizations to tow the line, like the spineless Iraqi politicians who, while dissidents were being led out and shot by Hussein, responded by standing up and declaring their allegience.
IBM's role in the holocaust had nothing to do with a shared ideal with Nazism, and everything to do with the fact that dirty money spends just as well as anything.
And there's usually more of it.
I wonder what happens if all those Chinese Yahoo users start getting emails from all over the world detailing the things they would like to know about their own government. How much can Yahoo actually filter? If it was as plentiful as spam, surely the message would start getting through. What message? Pick one. I'm sure that international headlines about the Chinese government would be a good start. Chinese ex-pats should be able to tell people. Can't we get spammers to do something good once? The power of millions of sources of sensored material should be a challenge that the Chinese government cannot overcome with today's technology without shutting themselves off from the world again. It seems a simple thing to do, just spam the entire Chinese TLD space with news articles and information that has been previously sensored. After all, information wants to be free.... Well, its a thought.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
Don't ya think?
Unfortunately, since Yahoo isn't a government-run business they're not bound by any kind of code of ethics. The company is only bound by the ethical decisions that the owners and/or board of directors decide when making large business decisions.
As long as they're not doing anything illegal, then in a free-market system we, as consumers, have no option but to not buy their product. That is, if we object to their policies.
It's up to us.
~ "When I'm of that age I'm just going to live up a tree."
Sometimes, I wonder if market economy can success in a totalitarian country. It would be a huge blow in face of economist's theories if this is the case.
I am very curious about this.
Back in The Cold War, the US Government would've prohibited companies from assisting totalitarian regimes when it comes to things like this.
Assuming of course those regimes were Communist. Sadly, anti-communist dictatorships were another matter altogether.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
if "Journalist" Shi Tao is as stupid as to allow something like this to happen, then he deserves it. it's not like pgp, freenet/tor/what have you, anon remailers etc do not exist. what's that you say, there's the death penalty for possessing such software in china? surprise, surprise: freedom is not free.
hello and welcome to the real world.
Global warming is a cube.
Since when in this modern production age hasn't this been the case? China had almost always had "Most Favored Nation" trading status with us, even when their tank treads were rolling over protesting college students.
And while American corporations MAY want access to their markets now that they are growing as consumers, were that market not growing, corporations would be perfectly happy to only exploit the Chinese labor force to make cheaper widgets.
Once again showing that the US could give a RATS ASS about democracy. All ourt leaders care about is serving their corporate masters and opening foreign markets to exploitation.
Ignore Alien Orders
While I don't have a source offhand, I wouldn't hesitate in guessing that encryption technology and the use thereof probably has questionable legal status in China just as much as political speech itself.
Slashdot requires you to wait longer between hitting 'reply' and submitting a comment.
And spend eternity burning in hell.
Have fun idiot.
I know some one that will pay me $500 if I naplam your ass.
Profit!
Should it be really surprising that they do this? They're going to turn their back on a country that is 20% of the world's population?
The truth about Scientology, Xenu, and you: Operation Clambake
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
How dare we tolerate regimes that oppress their citizens fundamental freedoms, like speech and private behaviour. China is so evil, America would never do anything like that.
Face it neocon bush worshippers, America is just as bad. But I'm sure you'd never detain innocent people indefinitely or shoot protestors like those nasty foreigners!
I would be worried if China even acted like a "free country", but they don't. They are pretty open with the idea that they are restricting speech on the Internet, they aren't hiding it.
Now, OTOH, my country claims to be free - and it isn't. Your examples show this fact. So, let's stop talking about China and start talking about something we might be able to change: America
Get your Unix fortune now!
Here's another similar take from Guo Guoting, an attorney
It's only safe to do business in China if they need you more than you need them.
And don't forget Cisco - they're the ones who provided the hardware etc. for China's nation-wide firewall, after all. I'm sure they made a pretty penny with helping curtail Chinese internet users' freedom that way...
quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur.
Herd mentality to a large degree. The received wisdom is that China is the next boom time, so every thinks it will be. Everyone then thinks they can't afford not to be in the Chinese market because all their competitors will be. It's surprising that it's taken so long for dirty deeds among IT companies to float into view. Press barons like Rupert Murdoch were bending over before the Chinese government a decade ago.
So adopt a contrarian view. The Chinese banking system is known to be flakey as hell. Corruption is rampant. The Chinese have not, so far, shown themselves adept at setting up on a large scale in other countries. And the more wealthy parts of China become, so the more they will start to contempate secession into a state of their own. This next big thing could easily implode and become the next big nightmare.
So keep away from the Yahoos of this world. No one has to use them. I wonder where Saint Google fits into this.
Las qué passoun
tournoun pas maï
When it comes to seeking information on our users, we have a very clear-cut set of rules that any government has to engage with us through court documents, legal documents and legal procedures.
We get a lot of those every day around the world. We get hundreds of those in the US, we get hundreds in Europe, we get a lot of them in China. We do not know what they want that information for. We're not told what they look for. If they give us the proper documentation and a court order, we give them things that satisfy both our privacy policy and the local rules.
Sounds like what Yahoo did was very reasonable. The proper procedure was followed, with court orders and all that. The problem is with the PRC's laws and legal system, not with Yahoo.
Also, I wonder if there's any ulterior motives behind all the sensationalistic reporting by Yahoo's media competitors. Many of these companies would have a lot to gain if significant numbers of Yahoo's readers/viewers joined a boycott.
Yes let's all weep for the poor poor Chinese.
first they put a lawsuit to take over xfire, now this shit?
All this talk about freedom really makes me wonder if the people here care about quality of life or are they just interested in freedom because it's a buzzword that's been pushed onto us by the media and our government. Fact is, China's quality of life has been improving steadily over the years, even over those of democratic governments. Freedom is not only political freedom - it's socioeconomic freedom as well, which is more important, as evidenced by the voter participation rate here. Democratic governments are easy to manipulate by other powerful countries, such as the United States. This is one of the reasons why the American government has such a vested interest in promoting democracy, rather than quality of life. If they truly cared about quality of life, they would donate technological expertise, educate the population, and create industries that the population actually owns, instead of sending multinational corporations to "invest" and work their population dry.
Nothing, of course. Just like no one did anything when U.S. corporations set up shop in the newly formed Soviet Union. You don't challenge corporations - it doesn't work.
Do we really want our debt financed by China? What type of barganing power does this give them over us while our economy is so fragile?
Our debt financed by China? It's worse than that. Did you know that during that housing boom we just had that the Chinese central banks sunk a lot of the national treasury into the American mortgage market? They sure don't believe in property rights in China, but over here it's another story.
http://www.economist.com/finance/displayStory.cfm
Get your Unix fortune now!
M$ Against freedom? How un-american! Is that the kind of feather they really want in their cap? I hope the mass media gets all over this sickening censorship campaign. There has been no finer of example of M$ selling our souls for $$$.
"If we were to announce today that we intend to hang all capitalists tomorrow, they would trip over each other trying to sell us the rope."
Vladimir Lenin (or so they say...)
Capitalism just suck, in the name of economic freedom personnal freedom need to be set asside because they are bad for the economy. Although I believe communism also suck for many other reasons (there is more to life than capitalism OR communism, a huge grey area in between and quite a lot of space before reaching boundaries, heck we could even think of something new...) I still quote a communist leader who said something about capitalism that trully resume what's happening here, like it or not, Vladimir Lenin was right this time.
is the fact that this article is coming from TechZone and not NYTimes or the Washington Post.
I wonder how many people here have actually been to China for more than 2 weeks? Not many I reckon. In fact most of the (mis)information has been propagated by our media, most of whom have an agenda (hey they can't set up business there, so they bash the system).
I wonder how many people here make fun of Chinese or Asian stereotypes and yet bash China because they are "oppressing" the Chinese population.
I wonder how many people here are worried about immigration of people here and yet decry the low living standards in rural China.
How many people here complain about jobs going to Chinese and yet claim they are worried about the Chinese population being oppressed?
How many people here complain about Tibet and yet turn a blind eye toward Native Americans, Hawaii, and other American colonies?
My guess is many, and it all stems from ignoarance or being hypocritical.
Yahoo! was always Red. Didn't you ever look at the logo?
Because I have low karma, I need pills.
I wonder how Google are operating in China. I think they'll have to change their slogan to, "Don't be Evil (may not apply in some jurisdictions)".
Who are we kidding. Private companies will gladly sell out and kowtow to anyone as long as it helps them rake in the cash. Companies don't care if China never becomes a democracy, in fact they probably prefer it the way things are.
Personally, I feel the Chinese model is so attractive to business that pretty soon people in western nations will begin to lose their rights as companies demand more and more harmonisation with the superior Chinese model.
It seems capitalism can achieve what the soviets could not.
May the Maths Be with you!
Chinese users just have to learn how to start searching for fr33dom and dem0cr@cy. After all, that's only one step beyond searching for p0rn.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Geiz is Geil! (litterally: greed is horny)
A Guardian opinion piece on the subject: http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1568479 ,00.html
The whole idea of coorporations spreading freedom is simple sillyness - Corporations have evolved to make themselves rich, and any freedom they spread is a coincidental side effect. Market organisms have a life of their own, and their morality is based on dollar values, not virtuous conduct. The ultimate optimum state for a company isn't a democracy, but a tyrannical dictatorship where all wealth is directed straight to the few.
Where should the line be drawn regarding morality, freedoms, liberty, etc?
For example, I can understand an American company doing business in America, and a Chinese company doing business in China, and so on - that is within your own borders.
However if you are a corporation looking to do business abroad, you have to abide by that country's laws. That stands to reason.
However, that company can choose not to do business in that country if those laws stand against decent moral issues that your average American would have regarding freedom and liberty.
The fact is, Yahoo!, Google and Microsoft have chosen to do business in China, and abide by laws that really go against what your average Westerner believes in. Why? Because of the shareholders.
Money. They can't afford to neglect these emerging markets, because if they do, their competitors (also American companies for the most part) will gain an advantage over them.
If you as a person go abroad and commit a crime UNDER AMERICAN LAW, you can be arrested upon your return to America. As far as I can see it, these companies, which are American, are committing crimes under American law, and thus the same treatment should be extended. It is the only way to keep capitalism in check, otherwise our kids would be working in mines, there would be no minimum wage and so on. There must be a balance against the extremes of capitalism, and the law provides that - until the Government is pro-corporatism anyway.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Let's be honest. Anyone who has actually tried using Freenet knows rather quickly that it's just not that usable. Perhaps it is more secure than the WWW, but it is nowhere near as useful. I mean, waiting literally half a day to obtain a few KB of content isn't worth it. Chances are if you're in a despotic situation then you won't be able to wait the long times necessary with Freenet.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
I only use Yahoo for "groups", but I don't manage any groups. Can anyone suggest another service that is as useful as Yahoo, but doesn't have these ethical problems?
Also, can you suggest an easy way to transfer membership from one group to another? I bet that many group managers would be afraid of loosing subscribers if they shifted to a new service provider.
"eternal vigilance is the price of liberty" Wendell
freedom comes from business?
slavery was a business. did you know that? have you heard of it? it was a major cashcow, too.
i don't think you've noticed this either: many, or even most, people who have jobs still can't afford to donate to political campaigns.
have you ever heard of child-labor? the so-called free market necessitates such things, from the perspective of THE BOTTOM LINE, the profit/greed motive.
maybe you're about to say "Everyone is Free to be Rich." unfortunately, "being rich" by definition means a CONCENTRATION of wealth, which by definition means other people aren't rich.
have you ever heard of colonialism? mercantilism? the subjugation of entire countries had "business", money, and resources as its goal.
have you heard of christopher columbus? his crews murdered many people for gold. they came to the so-called New World for money and resources. that's business.
and i'm sure you also haven't realized this: some of the most tyrannical regimes in modern history had "free markets." they even hunted down and imprisoned or executed communists (communists are people who oppose capitalism and say a lot of nasty things about "free markets). hitler and mussolini both gave entirely free reign to big business. (in your view, the bigger the business, the freer the people, right?)
you're telling me that when i denigrate those enterprises, i'm denigrating freedom?
if freedom only comes from business, then what did the "heros" you're talking about sacrifice to protect my freedom to live? you make no sense.
the idea that "freedom" only exists because of the free market is one of the most absurd things i've heard in recent times. maybe you were joking, maybe this doesn't need a response, but i can't say i'm very optimistic these days.
"Sorry sir, I couldn't tell you even if I knew."
If Kennedy can't find out why he's on the list they won't tell you either.
FaclonShould there be a Law?
I love how little media reporting there was when the NSA Key was found in Microsoft Windows. And that's from before the police powers "patriot" act passed without any elected representatives having read it.
A free workforce tends to be more efficient, and selling them the chains they want to hobble themselves will make it that much harder for them to be a threat to us.
Journalist Shi Tao was jailed and sentenced to 10 years in prison for "illegally sending state secrets abroad." The secrets that he revealed were information his newspaper received from the state propaganda department about how they could cover the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. He was identified because he had used Yahoo!'s free email service for which Yahoo! turned over log files to authorities that were later tracked back to his computer.
Message to Yahoo's top executives: Please turn in your badges and be out of the building in 10 minutes. You should not pretend to be able to lead a company. You are yahoos.
Definition of yahoo: A crude or brutish person.
PS: I hate your disgusting use of tricky, sneaky advertising.
Nixon, facing down the Soviets, began a policy of economic entanglement with China. China was willing to move away from communism towards limited capitalism, but NOT towards democracy. Concerned by an arms race with China, wishing to put some ideological distance between the USSR and China, and in some part, driven by US corporate interests, Nixon launched us on a path which has lead to the consequences discussed in this article: when we do business with China, it is not unlike doing business with Nazi Germany. (Oh no, I invoked Godwin's law, but it is not out of order here.)
By tangling our economic system with China's, America received incredibly cheap labor, and the totalitarian elite in China received great wealth. America conveniently outsourced a lot of blue collar jobs to a country which didn't treat the worker as lavishly as we had to, which kicked organized labor in this country in the gnads, and was basically a similar exodus of jobs to what techies have experienced with India. We got (unethically) cheap labor, and the Chinese elite got rich. Some of this wealth trickled down, but you can be sure that in a non-democratic society, there have not been the mechanisms by which the poor could force some change in wealth distribution.
Nixon's, (and subsequent presidents'), not-so-secret policy towards China has been to hope that a wealthy middle-class would emerge and overthrow the wealthy elite. That has not happened. Look at the masacre in 1989 if you want an example of how easily totalitarian governments can keep control. Nothing has changed except the depth of corruption. In fact, China has actually GROWN in terms of the territory it administers, now able to command the lives of those in Hong Kong, for example. Nixon's policy has FAILED.
The average Chinese worker is a wage slave to American corporations. America exploits them. There is no other way to look at it, in my opinion. Democratic reform has not occured. The only real change has been that we are now dangerously dependent on the Chinese.
This dependency is very real, and very dangerous today. Look at our situation with North Korea. It is obvious the Chinese are not exerting the pressure they could wield there. Remember that train that blew up as it was going to make its way out of NK into China? What do you think that train was associated with carrying? How do you think nuke secrets made it to NK from Pakistan? By boat in international waters? No way! Through China. The Chinese have secretly been encouraging nuclear proliferation because they would rather we got into a nuke war with some minor player, like Pakistan, NK, or Iran. They would rather some other country, by proxy, took the punches and dished it out on us. If we are hurt by a nuke, China will be helped, ESPECIALLY in relation to Taiwan.
The Chinese government is our true enemy, and the people of China need to be liberated.
As an American, I want to see our government disinvest as quickly as it can from China. We should shift that investment into India and other countries with functioning democracies.
We need to punish and isolate the Chinese now before it is too late.
s/democracy to the world/profits to american oil corporations/
From the man you're going to hang with it.
I just hope that the internet is strong enough in china to remove or damage the otherwise oppressive censorship.
(Even in jest,) that's the wrong target, tovarich. I know it might be difficult, but we really ought to be directing our efforts against the shark, and not the remoras. The trickiest part will be finding alternative sources for textiles, cheap plastic goods, etc. But as far as finding another billion-person consumer market for our corporations to target- that's easy. I'm thinking of a five-letter word for "democracy" that starts with an "i"... (I know it should be capitalized, to show proper respect to a noble nation, but I don't want someone in Rio Linda thinking I mean "L"...)
I came, I saw, I left. It looked better in the brochure.
The U.S. IS corporatist. It is a merger of government and industry setting the rules of the governed... That's us. Fascism won WW2, even if Germany did not.
Although I don't think yahoo should do what the chineese government want, I doubt it will make any difference. We will beat the communists, not by people learning about "democracy", but by comparison. And western media has far more subtle tools for this showing how we are different. Harry potter for example is hugely popular in China, and promotes many of the things (such as personal rights) that the chinees government are so afraid of. The point is that the Chinees government are going to try and crush freedom of speech, but what do you expect from a communist dictatorship. The power of our way of living is that it can be promoted in ways that are far more basic, such as the media.
What's exactly wrong with the companies following Chinese laws? If you come to a country to do business - you follow this country's laws. If this country's government tramples on the rights of its citizens - you have to do it to when necessary. Otherwise you're a criminal. At best, you business will be done for.
And it's quite amazing to see the worldview of many americans here. Apparently, democracy=good, anything else=bad and communism=absolute evil. Land of the free, huh? More like Land of poor brainwashed hypocrites.
That's not to say I would like something like that to happen to me, but it's this journalist's fault for not being subtle enough. His and only his. Business is for making money, not "bringing the light of freedom and democracy to the opressed people of [country]".
And yes, I do sympathise with the students that died on Tiannamen (sp?) Square.
I toss and turn every night, "Why, oh why, can't ppl pay me to send /good/ spam?!"
At the risk of being well and truly flamed, why does this matter? A business is not, and never has been, an ethical concern. They make money for shareholders. Most shares end up being held by pension companies and other saving vehicles. We use said saving vehicles to get our % interest on our savings/pensions. That is all these companies do. That is there only function. There is no moral or ethical purpose to them, and as such condemning them for compromising 'freedom' is irrelevant. The use a trite saying, the business of business is business. Freedom and ethics are for the politicans and the voters to decide on. Don't criticise Yahoo for maing money - that is there sole purpose. Criticise the governments, they are the ethical controllers. It never has and never will be the scope of business to be some kind of moral barometer. So Yahoo sold a guy out who used their email systems? Just doing what they have to do to make money and fulfill their purpose. Blame rests on the country that forces companies to do this, not the companies that do it.
When dealing with oppressive governments there are ways to play it safe. Even if you *THINK* you are playing by the rules why take a chance.
There was a very good concept someone came up with several years ago to build an encrypted network on top of the internet. Myself and a few others decided to put forth the time and resources needed to bring it to fruition. What we ended up with is anoNet.
Most of the info about the layout of the network is available at that link, but here is the "quick and dirty".
We took OpenVPN combined it with Quagga then used IANA reserved address space to build a fault tolerant, encrypted, anonymous network. The basic premis is that you only know the ips of your peers. On top of that you make sure that the people that you peer with are in countries that are not on the best of terms when it comes to cooperating with law enforcement. IE: China -> US. This network is _primarily_ used for two purposes: 1 - We are a self contained (for lack of a better word) Darknet. We have root DNS servers, a search engine (mnogosearch), email (webmail if someone doesn't want to run their own), IM (jabber), Web servers (with the ability to post anonymous content, and by anonymous, I mean anonymous even from the people INSIDE anoNet), FTP servers, IRC, News servers, Asterisk VOIP (although this is still in testing), Proxy servers, etc..etc.. We have taken great pains to re-implement the internet but with anonymity and encryption in mind. 2 - To provide users in countries that restrict internet access (China) the ability to browse (proxy) in a secure, safe manner.
I was going to throw a few common questions and answers in here but this post is long enough. If you want more info we have a nice Wiki setup to handle just about any questions you could have (but you have to connect to access it).
Bottom line if the people mentioned in this article had been using our mail relays / proxies this wouldn't be an issue right now. If people in (supposedly) less oppressive countries want to make a difference in the world, then donate a little time and bandwidth to the cause instead of blowing up countries.
Put this on your website and title it "The Year of the Rat."
..refused to turn over the password of a dead soldiers email account to his parents a year or so ago? But appearently gleefully gave up emails so a guy in Hong Kong could be imprisoned? Erosion of freedom is still a bad thing whether from governmental sources or private industry. Yahoo and M$N should be ashamed to cave to the Commies for a buck. If you continue to patronize these businesses know that you are part of the problem, not the solution.
Yes. You might want to check out the history of Pinochet's rule in Chile. Pinochet was a totalitarian ruler who brought free-market economics to Chile. Laissez-faire capitalism can exist in a totalitarian government, just like socialism can exist in a democracy or a republic.
Chile didn't have when Pinochet was in charge and doesn't have a free market economy now. In a free market a company can't just take land from those who live on and own it yet that's exactly what is still happening in Chile:
The Spread of Commercial Tree Plantations in Ancestral Mapuche Lands
Important as they have been, government reform initiatives are insufficient to mitigate the negative effects of economic development schemes on Mapuche communities. During the 1990s Mapuche lands were profoundly affected by the expansion of investment in forestry, hydroelectric projects, and road construction. By the year 2000, an estimated 1.5 million hectares in ancestral Mapuche territory had been planted with commercial pine and eucalyptus. Two Chilean companies alone, Mininco and Arauco, accrued more than one million hectares of exotic trees, many of its plantations encircling Mapuche communities. Community members fiercely opposed encroachment by the forestry companies. They complained that the pine tree farms dried up their water sources, eroded the soil, and blocked the light needed to sustain the rich undergrowth of the native woods, on which Mapuche still rely for medicinal and ritual needs. At the same time, the Mapuche found only limited employment with the companies. For more than a decade, anger at what they considered the plunder of their livelihood exploded in public protests, occupations of forestry land, road blocks, and burning of trees, forestry vehicles, and equipment.
In response, the forestry companies denounced Mapuche leaders in the courts and invested in armed guards to protect their plantations and installations. Some communities reached agreements with government authorities to purchase forestry land through CONADI, regulate water rights, and institute bilingual education programs. However, in many areas the relationship between the communities and the forestry companies and government continued to deteriorate. These conflicts provide the backdrop to the prosecutions discussed in this report.
Another deeply conflictive development was the construction of a large scale hydroelectric project on the upper reaches of the river Bío Bío, ancestral lands of the Mapuche-Pehuenche people. The construction of a dam at Ralco, a project administered by the national electricity company Endesa, went ahead only after then-President Eduardo Frei intervened to secure its approval by the national environmental agency and by CONADI. Two CONADI directors who had opposed the Ralco dam were fired in quick succession. The project received a green light against the express wishes of the two indigenous communities directly affected, and of the Mapuche people in general.
Six Pehuenche families who refused to accept resettlement by the government led the protests against Ralco, gaining wide support from environmental and indigenous rights organizations across Chile.11 Many of the protests were broken up by the security forces. In March 2002, carabineros violently routed a group of families from the community of Quepuca Ralco who were blocking an access road to a construction site. Carabineros indiscriminately hit children, women, and old people and arrested about fifty protestors, who were presented to the military prosecutor in Chillán. As a leading Chilean environmentalist has argued recently, approval of the Ralco project without sufficient consultation with the affected indigenous families has inflicted profound damage on the government's credibility with the Mapuche people.12
In other cases the indigenous Mapuche people have been convicted of "terrorism" for opposing forestry companies who take their land for tree farms. In a free market these things aren't allowed.
FalconShould there be a Law?
It's easy to be shocked that they're doing this in China while forgetting that a lot of companies carry out the same kind of activities in Europe and the United States. If the Department of Homeland Security requested information about a poster on a Yahoo! message board, for instance, would anyone be shocked that they turned it over?
totalitarian government (or the other way around) Socialism is made for democracy/republic (because the basis of Socialism is democracy/republic, you could also say Socialism is a extension of democracy/republic)
You've got that all wrong. A Laissez-faire or free market requires the government to keep out whereas a totalitarian and socialist governemnt require the government to control the market. Perhaps a reading of Adam Smith's "The Wealth of Nations" will clear up the confusion of what a free market and laissez-faire capitalism is about.
FalconShould there be a Law?
I'm an American born Chinese whose parents are from Taiwan. I have friends who are Chinese from China who've moved here, and I'll be damned if all of them oppose the Chinese government.
Sure, you've got a large number of people in China who want democracy, who want elected officials and a say in government. But you've also got a large number of people that are either so caught up in nationalism to notice or sincerely don't believe it's that bad. For a change from totalitarianism to democracy to occur, the idea of change has to be internally ubiquitous.
When you've got a Chinese telling me that the Taiwanese form of government is worse than the Chinese form of government, we've got a problem here. Although the Taiwanese form of government may not be perfect, especially in its beginnings, at least officials are elected by the people, at least it's a multi-party system, and wow, there isn't this rampant totalitarian censorship and control exerted over the people.
When you've got people pointing to the Chinese legislature as a legitimate form of legislature, that's a problem. A one-party legislature is not legitimate, it's a pathetic excuse.
When you've got people saying that there should be a balance between control and freedom (which isn't false at all - for instance, you don't have the freedom to murder) and pointing to CHINA as an example of this, we have a problem. Especially when that same person cites the PATRIOT Act as a problem in the United States.
When you've got people failing to recognize that China is rampant with censorship and has a foreign policy that's worse as ours (Tibet, anyone?), that's a problem. They simply fail to recognize this as a human rights violation. Yet when we bomb Iraqi civilians, they're completely opposed to it, citing human rights. So when the United States kills people it's wrong but when China does it's not? Bullshit. Nationalism at it's peak.
These aren't conservative or totalitarianistic-thinking people either. In America's terms, they'd be considered liberal. It's just when it comes to the subject of China, they're automatically in support.
And it's so hard to show them how absurd this mode of thinking is.
Right now, I have little confidence in the Chinese people to change their government. I also have little confidence in foreign nations to have the ability to change the Chinese government. Not only that, I oppose any attempt by any nation other than China itself to change the Chinese government. Change must come from within. And it doesn't seem like it's coming anytime soon. Tienmen Square shut dissenters up pretty damn good.
You can't blame Yahoo or Google for complying with the Chinese government. If they don't comply, guess what? They're going to be blocked from China. Lot of good that'll do then, right? All those websites about democracy are going to do the Chinese real good if they can't even get there. At least with search query censorship, a clever search may yield good results. When blocking the entire search engine, that whole mode of finding information is lost.
If you need examples of China's probable future there are some rather frightening examples of Asian success stories like Singapore. Singapore has long been criticized for its human rights abuses; at the same time Singapore can be called Asia's most competitive economy. The people there do tolerate the abuses of their government supposedly for the order and peace that it maintains. Indonesia, Thailand, Sri Lanka, even India are all on human rights watchdog lists right now for various reasons. I have no idea just which direction the present government of China will take, an experiment on this scale has never been tried. What makes me much more optimistic about the future is that there are people (like some of the folks here) that care a great deal about what happens to these people and will actually go to some lengths to help stop these intolerable human rights abuses.
It concerns me that the Chinese government might spread their control of companies to locations outside of their territory. For example, they could ask Google to stop linking to any negative articles about China or its human rights record. In exchange Google would continue to have access to the vast Chinese market. If not, they would have to pull out which would loose them a lot of potential revenue. Wall Street would likely demand that they bow down to the Chinese government.
Capitalism just suck, in the name of economic freedom personnal freedom need to be set asside because they are bad for the economy.
Because economic freedom, freed market capitalism, requires a voluntary exchange, it can't exist without personal freedom.
FalconShould there be a Law?
They'll search for and write about "fr33d0m", or "d3m0cr4t1c", or "1 p3rs0n, 1 v0t3".
Or they'll create their own "free-speek", as opposed to "l33t-sp34k".
Lets face it, subcultures are good at producing their own language to communicate with that are impenetrable to the overlords.
The mafia, the hells angels, etc. all have their internal language to make sure that anyone overhearing them on a wiretap doesn't get the real message.
From outside the U.S., it looks like you took that "sharp turn towards authoritarianism" when you elected Bush in 2004. Events since (Patriot act, Guantanamo Bay, media-fear-campaign, Iraq war, etc) have certainly borne this out.
Of course the 2000 elections were rigged with the aid of deliberately-insecure closed-source voting machines by Diebold and others, and NEITHER the Democrats nor the Republicans tried to do anything about it in 2002 or 2004, so it's hardly the will of the people that Bush's government be in office. You should throw him out on his ass for lying about Iraq.
As an employee of a huge multinational corporation based out of Europe, I have to relate the following rumor. The vice president of the China group was let go (fired) a couple of years ago because he was caught trying to marry a fifth wife while visiting the US. He claimed he didn't do anything wrong as each of his earlier four wives were each in different countries.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
This is a good article, but it misses a key point: Yahoo's Hong Kong branch is actually under no obligation whatsoever to obey mainland China's law. Yahoo either (a) cooperated with a reasonable expectation of what would happen, or (b) was, unfortunately, naive.
Even if there were no jurisdiction issue, when the "law" is used as a tool to persecute people, it is not legitimate and should not be followed. Western companies may do well to think twice before doing business with a regime that has killed nearly 100 million of its own people.
Business At The Price Of Freedom
That is best description of the Republican Party I've ever read.
The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
Slashdot is an echo chamber where unless you agree with the inplied sentiment of the article you are therefore called a troll
More than the decade after the cold war, Americans are still talking about ideology supremacy. Russia is not spreading Communism, nor is China spreading Socialism with Chinese chrematistics. It is time for America to do the same.
The time when US could use economics as a weapon is gone. No country depend on US to get what they could not get anywhere else. As Zimbabwe has shown, Western sanctions only allowed India and China to move in and fill the gap.
The world is not created according to the American image. And it never will be. Cooperation is the only way of the future.
Given that China's trade surplus with the US is a relatively significant percentage of their GDP, wouldn't anything that hurts the US hurt them too?
Good for China. Not every culture wants to live under the same government or with the same laws. Thus we can't expect every country to act the same as us or to do our bidding.
Apparently the Chinese want or will tolerate the repressive form of government they have. It's not for us to judge them or force them to change. If they want change, it is up to them to instigate it. We did it for ourselves in the US, if they want to, they will do it in China.
If any US companies don't like what they have to tolerate to do business there, then they don't have to do business there. Quite simple really.
If things were always static, then you might be right. But things are never static, and that's where these governments get killed. Or more like, take the path that Germany did in the 1930's.
Look at US history. The indian wars, the civil war, the great depression, the racial issues in the 1940's, and the baby boom generation in the 1960's, and inflation in the 80's ( and now the financial system crash about to happen in 2005/06 with 270 TRILLION with a T dollars in outstanding derivative contracts ).
Has the US treated people like trash? Absolutely, but things eventually (more or less) changed and improved both politically and economically because the underlying forces securing individual freedom and liberty were in place moreso than in other countries that completely fell apart under similar pressures. Where are those underlying forces in singapore? Where are those underlying forces in China? They are not there, and when times change (which they always do) then the system will break down and they will loose economic freedoms (and thus economic strength) in addition to their already lost political freedoms.
Many of these companies are being short term prudent, but long term foolish when they invest in China without insisting on at least functioning democracy and basic freedoms first. About 10-30 years down the road, the people of China and the world will pay a bitter price for that failure of understanding.
Is wanting other people to enjoy the same rights under a liberal democracy that we in the USA have cultural chauvinism?
Where the fuck do you live in a "liberal democracy?" Surely not here in the US - where tolerance is only lip service and "liberal" means you only espouse a more agnostic fascism...
Nothing has changed. The Chinese gvt knew who the leaders of the rebellion were because they had photos courtesy of equipment released to them by the US gvt. (http://www.celestron.com/telescopes.htm) These compact Cassegrain optics were (and may still be) controlled items under the restriction of transfer of technology. It was a felony to export them The green light came from the highest authority. So the students who thought they were far enough away to not worry about photographs were wrong. Dead wrong in some cases. So to kvetch about Yahoo is just misplaced. It shows a lack of appreciation of the real dynamics of global politics. FK
You all have your knickers in a twist don't you? Well, get over it. China is a very reprehensible nation when it comes to individual liberty and political expression but what it did with Yahoo (HK) was, unfortunately, quite legal, normal, kosher. China along with all the major democracies have laws and regulations in place to require internet companies hand over membership data and history. The main difference between China and the US, it would seem, is that China allowed Yahoo (HK) to tell the public what it had done. In the US, the Patriot Act, check it out, makes it illegal to mention such a case let alone advise that a law enforcement approach/request had been made. Go talk to you librarian about the law's interest in your reading habits. Before you start sanctions on Yahoo, go have a look for own freedoms that have been put in the shredder over the past few years. Fact is, if Yahoo (US) or any other US corporation had a request made to them by the FBI or whoever, you would not know it. You can be guaranteed, however, that such requests are regularly made.
The priviledge of living in constant fear of arrest.
The freedom of suspecting your neighbors, co-workers, even children have turned you in to the government.
The warm feeling that you have little to no control of your life and there is nothing you can do to change that in your lifetime.
10 years in a Chinese prison? 10 years of your life? For what? For sending an email with some government policy info? Most people in democratic countries get annoyed when they wait 10 minutes at the dentist..
I advise you all to get some proportions - this is not like the FCC regulations, not even close, and anyone saying otherwise is a demagogue.
The excuse that "this is the law" in china simply doesn't hold water - I hope I dont have to remind you that in a totalitarian regime 'law' means 'the whim of an absolute ruler or group of rulers'.
These corporations are US corporations - they received operating licenses from the US government, which is the sovereign and holds responsibility for actions of its subjects, even if they happen to be doing some business overseas. This government was mandated by your US constitution, which I believe a major part of was dedicated to upholding citizens' rights. It is YOUR responsibility to go out there and make your government uphold that mandate. If you're sitting at home on your made-in-China chair watching your made-in-China TV sitting on the IKEA made-in-china cupboard then you are simply cowards.
Your representatives in the senate and in congress are here to represent YOU - do YOU regularly assist the mafia in harrassing the local drugstore owner? do YOU make your employees carry out abortions just so they don't miss work?
Imagine if corporations could be not only fined, but jailed for their behaviour? And the stockholders would have to serve that time proportionately to their share of interest in the corporation. Imagine Microsoft gets a year and you own 1/25,000,000 of it? You have to serve 1.26 seconds. Might as well just go to the station with a box of donuts and call it served. Own half of it? Now you're paying attention.
Mal-2
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
This is a VERY workable solution. I'd love to see the fallout of this!
Yahoo et al couldn't 'crack down' on the operation without drawing some seriously negative press.
They couldn't crack down on it without cracking down on regular SPAM too.
The parent post should be sitting on top of all the others. This is a solution that slashdotters can work themselves, rather than idle pontificating and posturing on this side of the imaginary fence or that.
**>>BELCH
Nauseating.