Slashdot Mirror
Beijing's New Enforcer - Microsoft
QuatermassX writes "The New York Times editorial page comments on the responsibilities of American technology companies doing business in China. From the article: 'Such obvious disregard for users' privacy and ethical standards may make it easier to do business in China, but it also aids a repressive regime. Some in the American Congress are talking about holding hearings. Microsoft has responded to criticism by saying, 'We think it's better to be there with our services than not be there.' This is a false choice. China needs Internet companies as much as they need China.'"
Goo-do-no-evil-gle also has a stake in Baidu, which conveniently offers painless search for MP3 downloads.
I guess it's better to be there (do a bit of evil) than not be there (no evil).
From the article: "Western technology companies could have a powerful case if they acted as a group in telling China that they are under tremendous consumer and political pressure to stick up for free expression."
You mean like countless protests, threats of sanction on China's poor treatment to basic human rights, which result in nothing? Or do you mean North-Korea or Iran's nucular plan despite pressures from western countries?
I guess it's time for parents to wake up and realize that their children have grown up and are strong and indenpendant enough to ignore or repel parental guidance. These parents can either act nice in order to live peacefully with their children, or get kicked out of the house.
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
I'd avoid "we were only obeying orders" but "if we didn't do it, then someone else would" has had good results for justifying appallingly immoral behaviour at times. Give it a try.
" From the article: 'Such obvious disregard for users' privacy and ethical standards may make it easier to do business in China, but it also aids a repressive regime. "
So what do you think outsourcing does then?
There often is a difference between what's legal and what's right in a moral sense - in other words, the "right" in "a right" is not the same as in "morally right".
China may have the legal right to do whatever it wants with its citizens, no matter what that is, but it doesn't mean that it's morally OK for them to do it. Furthermore, China *did* sign and ratify the Universal Declaration of Human Rights - in fact, there even was a Chinese professor (Zhang Pengjun) on the commission that drafted the declaration.
That being said - as has been reported, there *is* not even a law in China that would require censorship of words such as "democracy". Microsoft is simply sucking up here, in one of the worst ways imaginable.
Fed up with slashdot? I am too.
"The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them." -Lenin
It's beyond time to question "free trade" when America can't sell it's #1 product: the freedom to say what you want.
If we can't export that, we should no longer import cheap junk and cheap labor from China.
I'm very concerned about the two-track ethics on display here by Microsoft, Yahoo! et al. American companies doing business in America conduct themselves with a very different set of ethical standards than when they conduct business abroad. Where do we draw the line? I expect more ...
"Nope, nothing here giving Congress any authority to regulate business in the U.S. ..."
It's called the interstate commerce clause. Or did you sleep through high school government class?
China needs Internet companies as much as they need China.
No it doesn't.
PimpMyMazda.com - Crazy mods to a 2002 Mazda Protege DX.
A country that jails people for expressing opposing political viewpoints is in material violation of the spirit of the free software movement. IMO, there should be an anti-totalitarian variant of the GPL that denies repressive states and their institutions any license under which they can legally run the software or use the source. And the FSF should be suing these states at the Hague daily.
Why should the burden of trying to use software as a lever to lift state oppression fall on the shoulders of Microsoft? If any group has a philosophical goal that is in line with lifting oppression, it is the Free Software movement. So why is Microsoft lambasted in the NYT while the OSDL gets cheered for admitting Red Flag Linux?
- Greg
Start a happiness pandemic
//I know of one that warmongers in 100 countries as we speak, forcing oil-buying countries to use this Empire's currency, all the while stomping on its own citizens' rights and freedoms while pretending to defend liberty.// There are currently US-backed wars in 100 countries? Please, list them. And ... if you really believe that living under the current US Government is *worse* than living in China ... an asshat, you are.
Frammin' on the jim-jam, frippin' at the krotz!
I'm no expert on this, but is it not true that U.S. companies are currently forbidden to do business with/in Cuba? If so, what's stopping the U.S. government from instituting the same restrictions for China? (I'm talking legally, not economically)
End transmission.
... the citizens of a country carry their morals with them when they go abroad, no? It isn't so much China's behaviour, it's the behavious of my fellow Americans that disturbs me.
Microsoft has silenced a well-known blogger in China for committing journalism. At the Chinese government's request, the company closed the blog of Zhao Jing on Dec. 30 after he criticized the government's firing of editors at a progressive newspaper. Microsoft, which also acknowledges that its MSN Internet portal in China censors searches and blogs, is far from alone. Recently Yahoo admitted that it had helped China sentence a dissident to 10 years in prison by identifying him as the sender of a banned e-mail message.
Even as Internet use explodes in China, Beijing is cracking down on free expression, and Western technology firms are leaping to help. The companies block access to political Web sites, censor content, provide filtering equipment to the government and snitch on users. Companies argue that they must follow local laws, but they are also eager to ingratiate themselves with a government that controls access to the Chinese market.
Such obvious disregard for users' privacy and ethical standards may make it easier to do business in China, but it also aids a repressive regime. Some in the American Congress are talking about holding hearings. Microsoft has responded to criticism by saying, "We think it's better to be there with our services than not be there." This is a false choice. China needs Internet companies as much as they need China.
A decade ago, consumers began to rebel against the sweatshop practices of Western manufacturers that made clothes and toys in China and elsewhere. The smart businesses cleaned up. They formed associations to adopt codes of good labor practices and set up independent monitoring.
Reporters Without Borders, a group advocating press freedom, recommends that Internet companies also adopt a good conduct code, pledging not to filter out words like "democracy" and "human rights" from search engines and maintaining their e-mail and Internet servers outside China.
Western businesses have always overestimated the price of defending human rights in China. Some have done it effectively - privately and respectfully - and paid no cost. But the beauty of such an industrywide code of conduct for Internet companies is that it would put no company at a disadvantage.
Western technology companies could have a powerful case if they acted as a group in telling China that they are under tremendous consumer and political pressure to stick up for free expression.
+1 fashionably cynical
A corporation's primary obligation is to make money for it's shareholders, so don't expect them to do anything else that interferes with that. If you don't like a corporation's practices it is your obligation to make it as costly as possible for them to do so to the point that it is no longer profitable to employ said practices.
Picture another scenario.
Companies such as Microsoft refuse to help China. China's government still sees the need for the technology, so they create a government branch to build the technology they need. Obviously, this branch would gravitate towards the use of free Open Source software, since the vendors won't support them. This new branch builds China's own IT infrastructure, and in doing so, has a much deeper knowledge of the technology. Now the Chinese government has full control, and the knowledge to go with it.
I think it's better to have vendors holding the government's hand and selling them their insecure software. The experts in the country will be the individuals who use free software to find holes and workarounds to get the information and services they need.
Help me take back Slashdot. When did 'News for Nerds' become 'FUD and Conspiracy Theories for Extremist Nutjobs'?
With so many MS bugs it'll be imposible to stop free speach!
By nature, the any corporation's sole obligation is to increase profits for its stock holders. The exposure of corporate misdeeds is not enough to curtail unethical behavior. Only when you hit them where it hurts(in the wallet) will they show accountability for their actions.
http://stockmarketgarden.com/
I take it you've lived in both countries....
How much you want to bet that the article was written on a Mac?
Still with MS Office, of course.
Wow
We're going to censure MS for abiding by Chinese law, while simultaneously maintaining MFN status with them?
And what do you suppose we'd say if some company from another country set up shop here, and refused to abide by OSHA regs or US child labor laws?
This is just...asinine. I can even see an argument that MS should voluntarily choose to not do business in China for ethical reasons, but I just can't see our government mandating it.
Reality has a conservative bias: it conserves mass, energy, momentum...
http://www.thelaptopfund.com/
. . . all the way up to Gates if he authorized it, need to be brought to the Hague in chains, tried, and hanged for crimes against humanity. I hope they have enough gallows for the execs from Cisco and Yahoo in the bullpen.
I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
Nope, nothing here giving Congress any authority to regulate business in the U.S., let alone China.
Wrong on both counts. The Interstate Commerce Clause gives Congress broad authority to regulate business within the borders of the US, and various trade treaties approved by the Senate give the government strong powers at regulating the activities of American companies in other countries. In addition, the Federal government explicitly has the authority to level taxes and tariffs on all commerce coming in, or going out, of its territories. So, yes, the federales can tell Microsoft where they can and can't sell their products.
Even leaving all that aside, it can be argued that the US has a strong strategic interest in seeing democracy flourish around the globe. Companies which empower countries to keep a chain around their citizens' necks shouldn't be able to plead "We have no choice, we have to do as they say!" Because they do have a choice, and that choice is not to do business in those countries. There's nothing immoral in, effectively, blockading China's ability to buy software from American companies. Whether it would be effective is a different argument which I am avoiding.
FWIW, China isn't the worst government. I know of one that warmongers in 100 countries as we speak, forcing oil-buying countries to use this Empire's currency, all the while stomping on its own citizens' rights and freedoms while pretending to defend liberty.
Oh, please, now you're just trolling. We're not actively at war with any other country currently, we don't force anyone to use our currency (in fact, the Congress was about to levy sanctions on China if they didn't stop pegging their currency to ours exclusively), and if our rights and liberties were as jeopardized as you seem to be claiming you'd be in jail right now, or worse.
I usually agree whole-heartedly with what you write, dada, but you seem to have some wild hair up your butt that's making you spout nonsense today. What gives?
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
Correct, the US can't really regulate businesses that don't cross state boundaries except for through taxation just like everyone else. However, most businesses they are interested in operate throughout the country anyway so they can regulate them with their regulation of interstate commerce power. I imagine they also have a strong interest in these company's dealings with a foreign government on national security grounds (whether or not it's really a security thing).
That Would kill our economy. Turn over some of the things you have in your house and see were they are made. As much as it pains to say, we are depended on China. Need more proof? America's (and the world's) largest comapny, Wal-Mart, needs China's cheap labor to 'Roll back those prices' in the United States.
How, as a citizen of this world, would one aid in a "information revolution" - IE, making available documents, news, stories, and facts that their government may not want you to see to the "information revolutionaries"? [1]
I'd wager that my government would like me to do nothing - that would upset their status quo and their trading relations with China. I'd wager China would like me to do nothing, because it threatens their rule. How would I go about getting information, person-to-person to people living under a repressive regime?
I really ask because it seems to be just starting here in America ("liberal media, activist judges"), and if we had ways to help "the people of China", it would help ourselves in the long run.
[1] Presupposing that I only want to pass on things like news and other information that is not deemed "state secrets", freely available everywhere else in the world, just not China.
Article II Section 8 grants the Legislative Branch (Congress) the power to " To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;" This is what is known as the Commerce Clause
Also in that same section: "To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof." This allows them to actually do the above.
That would grant them say the ability to prohibit U.S. Businesses from engaging in commerce of proscribed types with select foriegn nations. This has been done with Cuba, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, the USSR...
First, the last Constitutional war was declared in the 1930s or so -- WW2. Since then we've sent troops all over the world and currently quarter troops in over 100 countries.
Secondly I've resided in HK and China for business. In China I can open a business in under 4 hours, I can travel without ID and I can smoke, drink and rent prostitutes if any of those were my thing.
From the article: "Western technology companies could have a powerful case if they acted as a group in telling China that they are under tremendous consumer and political pressure to stick up for free expression."
You mean like countless protests, threats of sanction on China's poor treatment to basic human rights, which result in nothing? Or do you mean North-Korea or Iran's nucular plan despite pressures from western countries?
I'm sure you've read the Foundation books - if you recall the Foundation's conflict with Korell (or not, in fact); the controlling regime is brought down by the withdrawal of Foundation technology, and the economic chaos and public dissatisfaction that results in.
The analogy here, is that while political pressure seems to have minimal influence, global corporations have a stunning (or terrifying, if you prefer) amount of political clout - just look at the U.S.A.
Of course in this case it isn't like MS, Google, McDonalds or whoever could damage the Chinese economy in the same way - or at least not without collapsing much of the rest of the world's along with it. (Assuming they grouped together and all withdrew their interests from China, an event aproximately as likely as me shagging Evil Willow within the next ten minutes)
fortune -o
The market doesn't cure all ills. We should censure MS / Yahoo! for not maintaining American ethical standards while operating abroad. Sure a corporation exists to maximise shareholder value, but we should ALL operate with our ethics intact. To do otherwise implies what's good for Americans is ... flexible for others. While this may fly with our "guests" in Cuba and those nice people we fly around Europe and the Middle East for "talks" in non-US jails ... well ... this is all plainly wrong.
This goes back to a fundamental mistake made by many people... a company's purpose should not be to make money at any cost, legal or otherwise. Companies are not mindless entities that must suck as much money as possible from people to add value to its stock price. Companies wouldn't exist without the people that run and own them. Those people have basic moral obligations to society. And I believe those should translate into the corporations they own and run.
In fact, corporations that follow basic morals can make as much or more than companies that do not, in the long run. And that's one of the problems... they often don't care about long term costs of acting unethically. Take Microsoft as an example. If they acted better they'd have more community and corporate support long term. They'd have a much better image and not have to be so reactive to every threat to their bottom line.
Ethics in corporations matter. And more people need to realize that.
Developers: We can use your help.
The two are bound together. It is impossible to look at one or the other in a vacuum.
China needs Internet companies as much as they need China There are many Internet companies but only one China
Microsoft very honestly see a market that they can provide with service. A smart CEO will notice that if Microsoft does not take that market, another business can. The morality of the service is not coming into play, only the profit. This could be a case where the Ethics Committee was not consulted. And yes, I'm being generous in assuming that Microsoft has one of those.
I wonder if IBM said the same thing about working with Nazi Germany. Despite China's oppressive human rights record, you'd have to be a moron to equate the two countries. But there are clearly special ethical perils to supplying information technology solutions to repressive regimes.
I'm generally "Interesting," "Insightful," and even "Funny" here. What the hell happens to me at parties?
FWIW, China isn't the worst government.
Right, there is still North Korea, and arguably Cuba.
know of one that warmongers in 100 countries as we speak
Which one? As we have around 192 countries in the world, give or take, the country you are talking about would have to be in a state of war with more than half of the world. As it stands, the only one who loudly declares an intent to do so doesn't even have nukes yet.
Oh, wait... you meant the US, just because they are waging war in Afghanistan and Iraq. This is clearly less than "100". And I personally wouldn't blame the US for these wars -- they deserve blame for waging them in an ineffective way. They at least had the balls to step up while many others just blabbed around. And yeah, there is the question of hypocrisy of being on friendly terms with China, North Korea and Russia while not having official diplomatic relations with places like Taiwan or Tibet.
How many countries that are more free than the US can you name? Certainly no more than a handful. In fact, it's basically only a few Scandinavian ones that can even try.
UK? Mass surveilance. Poland? Rampant corruption. Russia? At the level of Germany in the 30s. 90% of Africa? Muslim countries? Venesuela and the like?
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
If you are talking about the US constitution, it's here:
Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution, known as the Commerce Clause, empowers the United States Congress "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes."
US Corporate Law is what ensures vile and reprehensible behavior as standard practice... It's known as "Profit Maximization" and it's part of the corporate charter in most western capitalist societies.
In my opinion this is the one of the most significant flaws in capitalism and in modern societies in general.
Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
The question, when you boil the article down, is whether or not we can hold a US based company, or any company that operates in the U.S. responsible for its activities in other countries? This is a really big can of worms that I'm uncertain most people would want to open... at least those that collect money from businesses and lobbyists.
It would limit the amount of business that could be done in other countries depending on how you define standards. Furthermore, what about "turnabout"?
Could this effectively serve to better enforce international human rights law by blocking US companies (or any company that operates in the US) from being involved with activities that are decidedly in violation of international civil rights law? I'd like to see hwo it plays out but I imagine that when they see how complicated this could be and how much short-term profit this could cost, I think the notion would lose a lot of backing.
All that said, I think we should be able to do more than vote with our dollars against companies that do questionable things in other countries. Imagine a civil activist group suing under such resulting legislation that Nike or Microsoft be barred from doing business in the US until they cease offending in other nations. Fining or suing for money just isn't enough of a deterrent.
Microsoft can do whatever they want with their products, they own them. Congress can regulate or compel any company that does business in America. Its called freedom, by the people. We can regulate any business entity in our own country, if they don't like it, they can leave =). As for the US forcing countries to use their currency? That is just ridiculous, lets see some proof =)
Sounds like you have a predisposition that you use to justify your ideals. Very strange way to form political foundations - "Building facts off of fiction".
Now i know the common response to this here is to say we live in a police state run by christian oil lovers and their cronies. But whats neat is, you can say whatever you want, its a free country =) I would just ask that you back up your statements and refrain from ad hominem attacks. It will make you more credible to the people in the middle and you will convince far more people instead of just fueling the extremists that believe everything they read.
Are you intolerant of intolerant people?
C'mon people, this another Libertarian ./ troll.
....
...
Mod this crap down, people.
check this out
Section 8 - Powers of Congress
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
\
than a companie that writes secure software.
that I've seen the The Corporation just today.
Everyone should see it at least once.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
If Microsoft (or Cisco, or Google) is willing to assist China's requests to abuse user privacy etc, don't you think they will be even more enthusiastic to assist those from the NSA, FBI, or any other of the TLA (three letter acronym'd) agencies?
And the FSF should be suing these states at the Hague daily.
Precisely how would they go about that? As a non-state entity, the US Federal courts or the courts of the offending country are your only options. Unless you can get a state to bring the case to the ICJ/ICC, you're not going to get past the gate.
>what's stopping the U.S. government from instituting the same restrictions for China?
That Would kill our economy.
I would say that, to the contrary -- this is pretty much the only way to save the US (and Polish, the UK's, etc, etc...) economy. Sure, it would cause some short-run shortages, but in the long run, there is no real way you can compete with near-slave labour.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Clearly, it is economically infeasible to stop doing business with China. All I'm asking is, does the gov't have the power to stop someone from doing business with China, not should they.
End transmission.
'We think it's better [for our bottom line] to be there with our services than not be there.'
I smell a dupe2 28230
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/14/1
"The use-mention distinction" is not "enforced here."
"A survey of public opinion in 16 countries released by the Pew Global Attitudes Project on June 23 found a dismal opinion of the U.S. Most said the world was more dangerous after the downfall of Saddam Hussein, rated China more favorably than the U.S., and said the world would be better off if a group of countries emerged as a rival to U.S. military power."
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0703-25.htm
If other countries have a better opinion of China than the U.S. maybe it is time to reflect that the U.S. is doing something _very_ wrong?
Glad i live in the US where corporations are put in their place when they get out of line.. Remember the anti trust suit? Oh wait.... nevermind.. 'welcome to the club China'.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Whatever moral highground the West may have had at the end of WWII has been sacrificed on the altar of the almighty dollar. Western governments are whores, so why should we expect Western business interests to be any different.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
You mean December 7th of 1941? Heh. Open a business in four hours. You must be from a different China than me, or you have a rolodex of bribable officials you could sell for half a million.
Hoist Number One and Number Six.
The voting was fun too I bet. Oh, wait... Well, I'm sure that will change, I mean, it's not like they just roll over democracy protesters with tanks, right? Um, right.
And who really needs freedom of religion, speach, the press, any significant restraint on corruption, I mean come on, they've got whores! What else do you need?
And just to be nit-picky, WW2 was in the 1940s.
You must be kidding, right? You think the US economy would collapse without the junk imported from China? How about maybe, just maybe there might be reasonably-paying factory jobs in the US again. Maybe, just maybe if we turned off the tap with China that we would have folks over here working for wages instead of goverment subsidies.
Continued trade with China will result in nothing other than China ending up owning every part of the US because of the trade deficit. They make what we want with slave labor and want nothing we have. We have "free trade" where they can export stuff to us at no cost and if you try to import a grain of rice into China it is taxed and tariffed so it costs three times what local rice does. So nobody bothers.
You like the idea that every manufactured item in the US will be made in China in a few years?
Let him burn in the fires of American justice. Hoo-rah! Let the High Priest of Technology, Bishop Jobs smite the snaky Gates!! Burn baby - BURN!
So, yes, the federales can tell Microsoft where they can and can't sell their products.
I don't agree. I've studied the commerce clause and speeches of the time and believe that the clause is being read incorrectly. Even the mercantilist Whigs Clay and Hamilton believed in Federalism (States trump Central authorities). Commerce in 1780 did not mean business or economic passage but intercourse of human interaction. I strongly believe the clause was a limiting factor on Congress, not an unlimited power. Congress was to make sure that no State impeded trade, communications, travel or human progress. The Federalist Papers are key to this debate.
, it can be argued that the US has a strong strategic interest in seeing democracy flourish around the globe.
Considering that the US wasn't a democracy but a Republican Federalist Union of Independent States, I can't agree. Washington himself said trade with everyone, entangle alliances with no one.
ve a choice, and that choice is not to do business in those countries. There's nothing immoral in, effectively, blockading China's ability to buy software from American companies.
That's anti-liberty and undeniably tyrannical. Let consumers make their own decisions.
What gives?
I was thinking the same! Odd.
I'm peeved about the elasticity given to our most prized documents -- we are at war with dozens of economies, we've demanded petrodollar use for decades and we're on the verge of collapse if we don't stop this imperialism. This past week we printed US$25 billion new dollars out of thin air, and no one says anything?
China isn't the bad guy -- consumers have decided this.
Here's a really good index of economic freedom:
o untries.cfm
http://www.heritage.org/research/features/index/c
I realize that economic freedom is just one of the "types" of freedoms, but it's still a very interesting read. We tie for 9th in the world.
An example of an apparent (though maybe not actual, I'm no expert) flaw in using this as an index of freedom as a whole would be the UK out ranking the US considerably, since the massive surveilance that you mentioned would seem to preclude that.
In a competitive market, morality is defined by law. Companies will (and are supposed to) do whatever it takes to succeed. If one company decides not to do something on based personal morals, not determined by law, they'll be simply be pushed aside by a company that will, so that their restraint will have had no positive effect. Same goes for pollution. If the profitable choice is the polluting one, the companies that choose not to pollute will have no success in reducing pollution, but instead will simply be pushed out of the market by those that are willing to pollute for profit, unless the law steps in to make pollution an unprofitable choice.
From another perspective, China's protecting it's citizen's privacy from Western influences, which in the past has meant such fun things as opium.
More than obviously, the MS China isn't MS USA. Sure, there is some connection and MS China likely pays lots of money to MS USA for the right to sell MS products and services. But don't think for a moment that China would allow a US corporation to operate independently in China. It is a independent business unit that is very much subject to the whims of the Chinese government.
MS could close the independent business unit down. Or not. And that is about it.
Hmm. Would that be Article I, Section 8:
Nice try, though...
how about getting a job and not begging for it here with anti-capitalist bullsheet!
I usually agree whole-heartedly with what you write, dada, but you seem to have some wild hair up your butt that's making you spout nonsense today. What gives?
At least I'm not the only one thinking that. I may not always agree with what dada says, but I can generally appreciate where he's coming from. Usually, he stays pretty on topic, but today it seems every other comment is solely to troll about unrelated topics (be it Iran or the Imperialism of the US)
"This calls for a very special blend of psychology and extreme violence" - Vyvyan "The Young Ones"
> You don't believe, despite their own claims to be doing so, that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.
Care to back that statement up, neocon? As far as I know, they've claimed to develop a peaceful, civil nuclear program to generate power.
Of course, nobody believes them, but then nobody believes you either.
Free Manning, jail Obama.
I think it would be a good idea if Congress, in these hearings, were to make a similar law that American companies can not help foreign states censor things like China and some other countries try to do. So the company could either not do business, or perhaps leave hooks in so that any censorship would have to be made by the government and installed and run by them.
We are a free country. We are committed to showing others the virtues of freedom. You shouldn't go around selling anti-freedom software to other governments to use on their people.
But that last part is just my opinion. It's business ethics. Something we don't see enough of.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
MOD PARENT UP!
Older geeks on /. will remember that it used to be a mantra in the West that if we only showed how good it could be to have our consumer goods and other material things to the citizens of repressive regimes, they would ultimately overthrow their Evil Overlords. It was due to this pattern of that the we actually wanted companies such as Coca-Cola and McDonald's to do business in totalitarian countries like the USSR.
Flash forward to now, and suddenly it's a bad thing? I'm sure US companies in the Soviet republics had to do their fair share of blinking previously, and it's still the price to pay when dealing with a repressive oligarchy like the current Chinese regime.
I guess the big difference now is that I don't think having Microsoft or Google in China is advancing American interests much. Quite the opposite, in fact.
If thou see a fair woman pay court to her, for thus thou wilt obtain love
I the long run I agree. We need to disentangle ourselves from China but I do not feel that that can be accomplished until we have more domestic alternatives to China's factories.
I lived in Pennsylvania, where there was much industry years ago. Now those factories have fallen into disrepair or are torn down. Leaving lost jobs in their wake. But does this stop Americans from buying at Wal-mart and others that use this cheap labor? No
Until this problem is solved we are dependent on China's labor.
Giving sh-t to Microsoft for supporting China - an oppressive regime - is a cheap shot that only alleviates our guilt. Did any one of you refuse to purchase the componets from the computers you are using right now that were made in china? Fuelling money into this opressive regime? Did anyone complain about how cheap their latest gadget was because it was manufactured in China? Did you opt out of buying clothing that was made there? Are Microsoft's actions more politically vulnerable to attack? Yes. But lets not forget all the other companies that operate in China that we are all too happy to support. In my opinion, Microsoft getting their software in the door with restrictions is much better than an insulated China-made alternative. Anyone who thinks that it's the microsoft software that's keeping people from free expression, and not the people that are going to come knocking at your door, is crazy. Free expression in China will require people who can avoid detection and get around restrictions anyways - a word filter from Microsoft isn't going to stop them.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/vance/vance8.html
I was wrong, it isn't 100 countries it's ~130-something.
Out of nearly 200.
Only foreigners and communist party members can use the Internet in Cuba. Compared to Cuba, China has much freedom.
Why do people cite partisan think tank reports as authoritative? I suppose it's not as bad as newspapers presenting them as fact, but really...
One thing is filtering search results, and a very different thing is shutting down your website. It's like building a wall to prevent people from getting EASILY to a library, versus burning down the library so NOBODY can read its contents EVER.
Well, it's more like playing a board game. If the rules of the game change, then you have to adapt yourself to those rules in order to win. This is what, although I cannot exactly agree, Microsoft is doing. They've adapted themselves to the rules of China's playing field in order to be more successful there than other foreign companies are there. Now, to put on two faces is just like putting on a poker face. They put it on to win, in their current situation and where they are located. They want to win, and they're doing what they can to do so. This isn't so much a question of right or wrong as much as doing business.
My page.
In China generally, no. Regulate trade between the US and China (including businesses there) yes.
U.S. Constitution, Article 1 Section 8-- 3 events that reshaped the world in the 20th century: WW1, WW2, and WWW
Elastic? You've just stretched it beyond all recognition.
...To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.
Looks pretty clear to me. "Commerce" did indeed mean all sorts of human interaction INCLUDING economic activity. In other words, the current understanding of the language is more restrictive than you're suggesting.
Is there a single ruling in the history of the Supreme Court that supports your bizarre interpretation?
nuclear attack? It'll probably just be the filthy Jews vs the towel-heads.
Let's just get back to playing WoW some more, dude! You got your MegaSwordOfDoom yet?
I'm sorry you feel my recent comments are trolls. I just looked back and all my initial comments on an article are on topic. If people replied and took it off topic, I may have replied and continued that thread.
/. has headed in a political direction. If the original article says Congress or the like, don't you see a reason to condemn Congress' abuse of power?
Much of
Well, in this case because the methodology is sound. I'm an economics student (as well as CS) and after careful study I felt that this was a pretty good summarization.
While I certainly share your scepticism regarding partisan think tanks, the source doesn't _always_ completely devalue the information. The fact that the source is a very partisan think tank means that the information deserves the highest of scrutiny.
Also, I'm not sure that any list of "freedom" can be authoritative. I didn't try to present it that way. I described it as "pretty good", not "the final say".
Sure, it would cause some short-run shortages, but in the long run, there is no real way you can compete with near-slave labour.
You understand that the labor in the United States is near-slave from European point of view? What if they stopped buying from us using the same argument?
It is worse than war, actually - China is setting out to commit cultural genocide.
Ironically, I recently got in an argument with a Chinese guy about our treatment of Native Americans. Tibet is much worse, though - it would be like everything that westerners did to Native Americans except:
1: Performed long after the rest of the world realized such behavior was wrong 2: Followed the actual military conquest with a determined effort to whipe the culture from the survivors.
China has no moral high ground on this matter.
No one could care less about the people in China. "Human Rights" is an issue people bring up when they want an excuse to complain about Microsoft... or when they want some protectionist policy to save the local sock factory.
Here is an example of the totaly inconsistant views that many people have about "human rights":
1. Why did labor unions in the U.S. start worrying about human rights in China, only when China started winning jobs from the United States and kicking ass economicly? I don't remember labor unions upset about Maos Cultural Revolution back in the 60s the same way they railed on about the Tianemen Square massacre!
2. Why is it bad that U.S. companies are NOT doing buisness in Cuba? Every anti-corporate crusader who thinks U.S. corporations should stop doing buisness in China because China censors the Internet is in love with Internet censoring Cuba and thinks the trade embargo on Cuba is some big horrible plot by the corporations.
3. Why is it bad when the U.S. tries to stop advanced U.S. weapons from being sold to China? I think the Guardian newspaper called it "Imperialistic" that the U.S. didn't want advanced weapons sold to China via 3rd parties in Europe. I guess it is a human rights violation for Microsoft to help read people's emails, but not a human rights violation to blow people up?
4. Why is it so bad when the U.S. doesn't want to turn over control of the root internet name servers to an organization dominated by countries like China? Why is it reasonable when China demands the U.N. give it the ability to censor the Internet , but the epitome of evil when Microsoft inside China aids censorship strictly inside China?
5. Why are Europeans always carrying on about capital punishment in America being an affront to human rights not urging Mercedes, or LG, or Semens, or Shell Oil, or Nestle, or other European companies to stop doing buisness in the United States?
I don't care what your political beliefs are, or what country you are from, I bet I can point out a whole bunch of inconsistant and hipocritical positions on "human rights"!
Why are people's views on human rights so inconsistant? Because people don't care about human rights: People care about their own economic self interest or their own political agenda, and human rights is a rhetorical tool. If you look at people's views based on what benifits them economicly or politically, you will find their views are 100% rational and consistant.
So, come to me with human rights issues when "human rights" means something more than a political slogan or economic tool.
Thousands of cases before FDR stacked the SCOTUS to keep his tyrannical New Deal intact:
c e.html
http://www.landmarkcases.org/landmarkframe_commer
The latter, restrictive operation of the clause was long the more important one from the point of view of the constitutional lawyer. Of the approximately 1400 cases which reached the Supreme Court under the clause prior to 1900, the overwhelming proportion stemmed from state legislation.578 The result was that, generally, the guiding lines in construction of the clause were initially laid down in the context of curbing state power rather than in that of its operation as a source of national power. The consequence of this historical progression was that the word ''commerce'' came to dominate the clause while the word ''regulate'' remained in the background.
As is recounted below, prior to reconsideration of the federal commerce power in the 1930s, the Court in effect followed a doctrine of ''dual federalism,'' under which Congress' power to regulate much activity depended on whether it had a ''direct'' rather than an ''indirect'' effect on interstate commerce.616 When the restrictive interpretation was swept away during and after the New Deal, the question of federalism limits respecting congressional regulation of private activities became moot. However, the States did in a number of instances engage in commercial activities that would be regulated by federal legislation if the enterprise were privately owned; the Court easily sustained application of federal law to these state proprietary activities.617 However, as Congress began to extend regulation to state governmental activities, the judicial response was inconsistent and wavering.618 While the Court may shift again to constrain federal power on federalism grounds, at the present time the rule is that Congress lacks authority under the commerce clause to regulate the States as States in some circumstances, when the federal statutory provisions reach only the States and do not bring the States under laws of general applicability.619
I believe Justice Marshal through it all to hell.
You bet. Other people's firewalls and security software might actually work and that would be a bad thing.
You're wrong.
c e.html
http://www.landmarkcases.org/landmarkframe_commer
The clause was usurped by FDR when he stacked the SCOTUS to keep the New Deal alive. It is too bad you had to hide behind AC as I have about 400 letters and speeches during the debate on the Constitution dealing with Congress' powers being explicitly limitee by the rights of the Independent States.
Oh, so you claim that 'Commerce' back then was like cultural exchanges? Sheesh!
Look at Federalist Paper #11 for example.
http://www.conservativetruth.org/library/fed11.htm l
Its title is "The Utility of the Union in Respect to Commercial Relations and a Navy"
Is it speaking of touchy-feely "human interaction"? Hell no. It is talking about TRADE.
E.G.
This paper is all about commerce as business trade. No where is it used to denote something less commecial like social intercourse.
-- 3 events that reshaped the world in the 20th century: WW1, WW2, and WWW
How many of you have mutual funds in your 401Ks that invest in Microsoft? Much like Noam Chomsky (R), for all of your carping you know where to put your money to insure a comfortable retirement.
In Communist China M$ software makes your family disappear.
SBS TV Australia has an interesting interview "Inside the Lao Gai" labour camps.
http://news.sbs.com.au/dateline/index.php?page=arc hive&daysum=2005-10-05
"16 or more hours a day of hard labour, and often in toxic conditions with no protection and starvation is used as a tool for control."
Also ppl may want to read up on Harry Wu http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Wu
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Everyone seems to really be getting on the "China is bad, we should be punishing them not helping them" bandwagon... O.K whatever but this is a country who's government is supporting Linux development and OSS as a way to improve thier IT infrastructure. If you really want to hurt China, encourage MS to operate there... Hell suggest that they opperate ONLY in China and leave the rest of us well enough alone. The state of Chinas IT industry without MS makes thier continued pressence in the country look like modern day privateering...
Is Slashdot only for English speaking people? You know what, most people who got different opinion don't speak English! Damn /.
I don't completely agree with your interpretation of the Commerce Clause, but I don't entirely disagree with it, either. I agree that its original intent was to prevent States from interferring with interstate commerce, or even international (so Virginia, for example, can't raise tariffs against baskets from Georgia, and Texas can't have tariffs against oil from overseas), but it, coupled with Congress's ability to set tariffs, means they do have the power to regulate any business activity which crosses internal or external borders. Just the ability to set tariffs alone is enough to prevent American companies from doing business overseas. Note that you don't have to agree this power should be used to acknowledge it exists.
Considering that the US wasn't a democracy but a Republican Federalist Union of Independent States, I can't agree. Washington himself said trade with everyone, entangle alliances with no one.
You're splitting hairs. The US has a strategic national interest in not being attacked. The more free, both economically and politically, other countries are, the less likely it is they will attack us. Ergo, we have an interest in fostering freedom around the world. And you can't really quote Washington in foreign policy. He had his strengths, but in his heart he was just a farmer from Virginia who wanted to be left alone. That's not always an option.
"There's nothing immoral in, effectively, blockading China's ability to buy software from American companies."
That's anti-liberty and undeniably tyrannical. Let consumers make their own decisions.
Except that the "consumer" we're talking about is a blood thirsty monster. You would agree that it's sensible to prevent murderers from buying guns, right? So why wouldn't you prevent dictators from buying [insert evil software here]?
we are at war with dozens of economies, we've demanded petrodollar use for decades and we're on the verge of collapse if we don't stop this imperialism
"War". You keep saying that word, I do not think it means what you think it means.
But just to prove the world isn't completely off its kilt, I do agree whole-heartedly that we need to do something about the fiat "money" we're using, and the ability of the Fed to arbitrarily control the economy.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
The scary thing about all this, is that it sets a precedent that this kind of thing is not really so bad. China is not at the apex of its power now, but likely it will soon eclipse the combined power of the US and EU.
In Australia, part of the justification for the recent erosion of workers' rights, is that we need to compete with Asia. How long will it be until there are similar erosions of civil rights and human rights to allow our contries to compete with Asia?
We are in a position of relative power now - we're relatively wealthy. Free trade is one thing, but it should be contingent on countries respecting worker/human rights. That way, we can force countries to make things better - while we still can. Once China is as wealthy as the West, there'll be bugger all we can do.
I'm not fearmongering, and I've got nothing against the Chinese, but their government is f*cked (tho Western govts could be a helluva lot better), and it could turn around in a few years and bite us all in the ass.
... harmonised laws re: business practices with shared ethical standards? If the whole world is one big ol' market, then it needs to play by a broadly compatible set of rules. I suppose this doesn't extend to ethical behaviour. And we don't fancy sitting in the docket at the World Court over ... well, anything, ever. Hell, our current President think he answers to no one but himself, anyway.
*sigh*
These are NOT faceless organisations. We have individual responsibilities and we have shared responsibilities. And American companies that behave in an ethically dubious fashion when they're beyond the reach of American justice clearly exhibit a lack of respect for the rule of law.
The NYT is the same paper that knowingly printed false WMD stories to justify Bush's illegal war. Cheney, Miller, and Chilabi were partners in spreading WMD propaganda. Chilabi would feed Miller false WMD stories (stories that she knew were false as she was in the inner circle of Cheney, Libby, Chilabi), she would print the stories in the NYT, and Cheney would appear on the Sunday news shows citing those NYT stories as evidence of WMDs, knowing that the stories were fabricated by his man Chilabi.
The NYT is also the same paper that purposely held off on publishing Bush's "spying" policy for over a year, saying "We didn't want to affect the outcome of the election." Hello? They're supposed to print relevant stories, and if a story might have affect an election, then all the more reason it should be printed. Otherwise the public is voting out of ignorance.
NYT has no business criticizing anyone for placating the Chinese govt when the NYT does everything in its power to prop up the Bush government and its illegal policies home and abroad.
-- "I never gave these stories much credence." - HAL 9000
You say ...
...
... To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes".
"nothing here giving Congress any authority to regulate business in the U.S"
Constitution says
"Section 8 - Powers of Congress
The Congress shall have Power
I'm wrong?
Dude, go back to smoking "Atlas Shrugged" or whatever it is that gives you such incisive mental powers.
when microsoft says it's better for them to be there as opposed to not, they are thinking of Microsoft's benefit, not China's. and it is indeed better for them to be there - 300 million+ in their urban centers alone. So much money to be made.
you guys are inconsistent. Microsoft in China is evil. Google owning part of Baidu is smart.
news flash: every day you wake up and go to work perpetuates some "evil" - a very funny word that gets bandied about on Slashdot even though most of you scoff at religion. the nature of our codependencies necessitates evil. Like that latte from Starbucks or those running shoes from Nike? Evil. That Hummer you drive with spinners? Evil. Leave your computer on for weeks at a time? Evil. Spend three hours on Slashdot during your workday when you're being paid and are thus contractually-bound to be working? Probably evil. Magnify the average slashdot evil by the $40 billion in cash that Microsoft has in the bank, and you might have Microsoft sized evil. And don't use that lame "convicted-monopolist" argument. lol... cause it's lame. You don't blame a monopolist when they succeed - lol - you blame insufficient and incompetent competition. I wouldn't blame a football team for winning by imposing suffocating defense on its opponent thereby reducing and impeding scoring opportunities. I cheer these things. When Shaq gets fouled and sent to the free-throw line, I don't respond with something like (that's not sporting) - that's a good move. Lol.
All in short: selfishness is the way of nature. evil is the way of nature. It is impossible to succeed excessively and be good. This is not possible. Find out what happened to that really nice guy who dropped out of school because your 4.0 killed the curve? Or the guy who needed his heart medication that you didn't hold the elevator for this morning because you were late to work (or because you didn't like the cut of his britches? lol)? So this talk of good and evil when it comes to success... even life... is beyond absurd.
The US economy is artificially propped up and saturated. There are three major markets left to develop. India will be hard because of entrenched religion so progress will be slower a more gradual process. Africa is in disarray - not timely yet. China is a must, be it "evil" or no.
un burrito me trampeó.
http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/20 05/11/continental_divide.html
A listed company has an obligation to maximise value to their shareholders. However, some of that value must surely be moral value and not just $$$$. If you make money out of a company that exploits people, then you are just exploiting those people yourself.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
coupled with Congress's ability to set tariffs, means they do have the power to regulate any business activity which crosses internal or external borders.
Interesting. I'll not continue to argue the "commerce" definition as my poor PDA can't pull up my defense. I don't see how Congress can prevent a company from investing in another country and developing business there. If you think Congresss can prevent me, a free citizen, from starting businesses elsewhere with my money, I'm freaked. That is tyranny. Let them prevent my product from coming back to the US -- I'm selling it elsewhere anyway.
Ergo, we have an interest in fostering freedom around the world.
By quartering our troops in ~135 nations? If I want more peace, I'll consider the better way to spread it -- buy the products of the poorest people to help them gain wealth. That's capitalism at its finest!
China will gain liberty from free trade, not from Congressional threats and our troops forcing the issue.
Great post, btw.
Also, when did China become a global threat like Nazi Germany? They're using their economy as their weapon, unlike other superpowers I know...
China is a more benign threat to be sure. But it's not economic might they are threatening to use if thye do not get thier way with Taiwan, and they are very powerful militarily and growing moreso.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If somebody with the resources that Microsoft has told me that they weren't doing business in China 'for moral reasons', I would call them a liar and beat them until they told me the real reason.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
WTO might have something to say about that.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
The US would still be competing with China's lower production costs even if it completely severed trade with them. Buying high-priced products and services raises the cost of doing business, making it harder to compete on price when exporting derived goods/services to the rest of the world.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
The "nothing matters" defense has been invoked on this thread. This defense holds that, because someone else, at some time, did something evil and got away with it, the present offense isn't something to worry about. Nothing really matters, because evil is everywhere. Microsoft's snuffing out free speech doesn't matter, because OSDL allowed China to use Linux, and you bought some Nikes and drove a gas guzzler, and on and on.
Do you think I could use this in court, or is the "nothing matters" defense reserved for defendants like Microsoft, who have large numbers of people paid to argue on their behalf? People paid for by money they earned by silencing Zhao Jing!
Tesla was a genius. Edison however was a overrated hack who liked to torture puppies.
That is exactly how MS has been behaving at home and in Europe.
By buying Microsoft products, paying for Microsoft services and helping spread Microsoft-only protocols and formats, you are endorsing their behavior in China and elsewhere. By endorsing their behavior, you are saying "that is how I want the world to be"
We've seen from 2 decades of court cases and lobbying efforts time and again that MS doesn't give even a rat's asshole about being on the right side of the law or even on the right side of ethics. Any fines or remedies that may happen to eventually be enforced, even partially, are simply seen as the cost of doing business. Courts and legislator haven't been able to stop any of this and are more and more a part of the problem. The only thing that will make a difference is if people affect the bottom line, since that appears to be the single measure by which the company operates.
Sure a boycott may be harder for some people than others, but then it is a choice people have made over time, often unawares. But most people do have a clue and just choose to ignore it thus ending up in a difficult spot. A lot of honest Christians/Buddhists/Muslims/$FAV_REL would balk at having anything to do with a neighbor, dealership, or local business that even hinted at a similar lack of ethics and disregard for the law that MS has time and again demonstrated. Said same people put up a few hours of volunteer work or a few dollars for a charity once or twice a year to make people's lives better and then turn around and plunk down hundreds of dollars for a company that works with oppressive regimes to make people's lives worse. I guess it has to cancel out.
Most religions have regular periods of atonement or penance. For many, Lent is coming up. These are just some options, some harder some easier to do for 40 days. If some are too hard, well just recall that bad karma (or however you want to call it) is hard to work off:
Wake up. Vote with your wallet. By buying into MS you are endorsing its business methods and ethics. Software is simply another tool and in no way exempt from the standards of behavior that we expect from other tool makers.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Poor Microsoft "OLYMPIA, Wash. -- A Redmond, Wash., pastor is calling for a national boycott of Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard and other companies that support a gay civil rights"
Microsoft is a savage competitor. In a world of sharks Gates & Co has eaten its own young. It has consistently distinguished itself with vicious and not always legal practices here. Remember what they did to Word Perfect? Compaq? (when they dared to ship OS/2 Warp?) Netscape? R.I.P. (Okay, Mozilla is Risen, but you get the point.)
For MS (or any big public Co) this is SOP. Customer is always right. Shareholder value. Yada yada yada. I am not sure how much good this particularly noxious piece of amorality will do though. Most of China's software is pirated. Even the big stuff like CAD etc. (Yes, your cheapo Wal-Mart widget was designed on a pirate CAD. Pretend you didn't know.) If they want to even try to tame this huge market they will have to kiss acres of Chinese butt before they are done. Rotsa ruck Charie.
When the Chinese do start loading legitimate software it will probably be open source. I spent five years in Asia. Asian display a lot of common sense. They will never pay for something they can get for free if it is practically legal to do so. So I think, eventually, when the pressure is on the Chinese to dump their warez most companies will probably Penguinize rather than pay the piper. If they do cut Bill a deal it will be very close to the bone.
I would not expect Congress to do much with China. Trade deficit. T-Bills. Kinda hard to spank your banker.
"No fear. No envy. No meanness." Liam Clancy
Though I don't know their reasoning all that well, I do agree that it is better for U.S. businesses to be in China than not.
Don't agree? Trace back 20ish years. What if no foreign company had dealt with China in the late 80s when the economy was opening up? Is the hope that the Chinese economy would have imploded like the Soviets and caused them to get a freer government? Unlikely. What is more likely is that without growth or access to the rest of the world the government would have become increasingly abusive. That is what has happend to most failed economies.
China has becoming a better place to live over the past 20 years, and it is just getting better. I spent 7 years there from 92 to 99. I have monitored it closely since then (and returned for short periods.) It is only getting better. Senior officials who publically abuse protesters are now being prosecuted. In another 30 years it might even pull a Taiwan and become democratic (as Taiwan did in 88 -- a move from dictatorship.)
The only additional pressure I think the U.S. congress should place on China is to open up its borders to even more foreign cultural and financial investment. It might not bring information as fast as the internet does, but it does bring it in the form of person-to-person contact, literature, etc. It also presents new products and social concepts that cause people to think.
And that is not evening mentioning the education boom that has been sparked by opportunities available entirely because of foreign engagement. Education systems have spread and matured. Cultural development has been embraced by the populace.
Hope is in the air in China. It should be here too.
What comes first, finding a teacher or becoming a student?
"EXACT SAME GARBAGE". :-) I'm glad to see there's at least some people who are awake.
When Craig Whitney on the Council on Foreign Relations admitted that the whole Weapons of Mass Destructions in Iraq deal was a scam and he, along with Charles Duelfer, announced that the USA would first attack Iran and then North Korea on May 24, 2005 in New York, he blurred out: "But we now know that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction to speak of in 2003, when we went to war. Does it matter to Americans that our country went to war on a false premise?"
Guess not, because in the very same briefing, minutes later, Charles Duelfer said:
"Secondly, and we describe this in some detail in the report, there was a greater concern than we could appreciate sitting here in Washington of the threat posed by Iran. And we just, you know, that our gut feeling for that was not the same as the gut feeling one would have sitting in Baghdad, where you had invaded and killed a lot of those people, and then every once in a while they were throwing rockets at you, so there was an ongoing conflict there. And Saddam was certainly aware of the WMD assessments of Iran and he created intentionally a certain ambiguity about what his capabilities were. So there were mixed motivations."
http://www.cfr.org/publication.html?id=8157
(for those of you who haven't realized it, the Council on Foreign Relations is the primary political institution of the power elite in the USA and behind the facade controls both political parties)
9/11: Never forget it was a false-flag operation
Then invite their children to the U.S., educate them 'the American way' and then send them back to promote a pro-democratic/a pro-republic/the pro-communist and work our way from there. Quit complaining about 'Microsoft bows down to foreign government' while the U.S., U.N., E.U. and other trade organizations/governments allows China to violate labor laws (poor safety, lack of minimum wage, etc), make a mockery of the WTO (World Trade Organization, see labor law violations) and (back to the topic at hand) censor the internet (one way or another).
"1. Boycotts don't work very well unless a significant number of people engage in them."
And that is exactly why you should boycott and thereby become a good example for others to follow. And not only temporarily, the longer you stand by your ideals firmly and courageously, the more people will notice them.
9/11: Never forget it was a false-flag operation
On the same line, networking companies already offer corporations ways to control what comes in and what comes out. Exactly how are you going to prevent nations from using the same technology?
Actually, the phony ideals of enlightenment humanism have been discredited by well over a hundred years of intellectual development in Western culture, going back to Nietzsche and Max Stirner.
Instead of giving the world bullshit about an "axis of evil", we ought be giving them "Beyond Good and Evil".
Microsoft isn't really doing anything wrong; it is simply providing a service to Chinese consumers. The service is not ideal, because it does not allow Chinese consumers to say whatever they want. Certain forms of free expression will be censored. However, we can not blame Microsoft for this, because Microsoft does not have the option of providing unrestricted service to Chinese consumers. Microsoft's only choice is this: Provide Chinese consumers with non-ideal service, or no service at all.
Why is no service preferable to non-ideal service? The fact is, even if you can't say, "The Chinese government sucks" on a Microsoft message board, you can still use that message board for other things. If I were a Chinese consumer, I would definitely prefer restricted service to no service at all. Of course, I would prefer unrestricted service to restricted service, but I can hardly blame Microsoft for that; the Chinese government would not allow Microsoft to provide unrestricted service.
We could demand that Microsoft give China an ultimatum: Either allow unrestricted service, or China will not get any service at all. However, what good would that do? The Chinese government would not change its policy just because Microsoft wanted it to. Besides, why should we ask Microsoft to sacrifice for us? Are we Microsoft's master? No. Microsoft is not, and should not be, our slave. If we, as American consumers, hope to change China, then we should be the ones sacrificing. Of course, I don't think there is really any sacrifice American consumers could make that would change China's policy. It's out of our hands. The Chinese citizens will have to stand up to their own government if they want to see change.
If you think Congresss can prevent me, a free citizen, from starting businesses elsewhere with my money, I'm freaked.
"Can" and "should" are two different things, my friend. Though there are times when it makes sense for the government to prevent its citizens from investing in foreign countries. Like when they're actively at war with someone, and want to prevent any resources from reaching the enemy.
If I want more peace, I'll consider the better way to spread it -- buy the products of the poorest people to help them gain wealth.
It's certainly more moral, and probably more effective in the long run, no argument there.
Oh, and thanks, you, too.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
Interesting, cause I was listening to NPR the other day, and they said that Tibetan monks are becoming quite accepted and even sought out by Chinese society. Today they were talking about a Seminary opening up in China, the first ever.
I wish I could tell who was bullshitting me. The idea of religious freedom becoming more in vogue is, I think a good thing for China.
1: Performed long after the rest of the world realized such behavior was wrong 2: Followed the actual military conquest with a determined effort to whipe the culture from the survivors.
I'm not sure that point 1 has ever been realized.
And the US engaged in point 2, so I'm not sure what your point is.
[i]"Companies which empower countries to keep a chain around their citizens' necks shouldn't be able to plead"[/i]
Yeah, it should be just like how it is in America! The companies should dictate to the government, the needs of the people. Corperations should be in the pockets of every politician and the citizen neck would be chained by the corperation.
I think China is actually doing what our own government here in the US refuses to do... and thats keep corperations in check, for the betterment of its own people. Now you may disagree with what China feels is good for their people... But atleast China has the balls to tell corperations how to operate within their own country.
We let corperations run wild here in the US. So much that it has hurt our people beyound repair at this point.
No! It is NOT .....'cool'! To countenance this evil as a corporation on the ground that you will somehow 'reform' it is to be a fool. Worse than a fool, it is to be corrupted in ways ever so small at first and then greater as time goes on. It leads to a broad agreement with the oppressor and more and more active cooperation with it, all in the name of profit. Where does this end? Can and will the WTO lead to abrogation of constitutional freedoms of peopls all over the world inasmuch as the expression of freedoms in any country can lead to lessening of profits to combinations from totalitarian countries? When and where will it go from there? If our freedoms to surf are to be abrogated by overseas tinhorn dictators in their zeal for power and permanence, or if our freedoms to express ideas are to be suppressed in forums normally used for that expression simply because said expression may contravene the whims and caprices of distant foreign dictators; then where are the limits of that suppression? The logical conclusion is that eventually American citizens can and will eventually be under the WTO arrestable from our homes here in this country and extraditable to these other countries, there to be tortured or killed or imprisoned under inhuman conditions for long periods or for life. Better to consider those who will make immoral compromises with tyranny as being agents for and acting with that tyranny. Microsoft should register with the federal government of the United States as an agent of the Chinese government under various trading with the enemy acts. It should be forced to do so, and its corporate board members and major stockholders should be required to register as foreign agents of China or whereever as well. In addition, the citizenship of those people should be called into question as well. They are either for us or against us! They do more against the liberties and safety of Americans that any single Taliban or Osama lover. In their own way, they are the most dangerous 'enemy combatants' of all and should be treated as such. There is no compromise with our freedoms as Americans or our safety and security in our own country. There is no place for Microsoft's actions to lead to foreign secret police in coal bucket helmets and jackboots kidnapping American citizens out of our homes in the middle of the night to face torture in foreign countries because the leaders of those excused for countries fear criticism. China has been an autocracy for thousands of years and will never change for long. It got its name, China, because the first 'emperor' Chi Wang Ti decided to name the country after the name of his family - Chi...na! If you do not think it can happen here, THINK AGAIN. Look what WE do in foreign countries. WE kidnapped German citizens off the streets of Greece and took them to Afghanistan to be tortured by Afghan warlords loosely allied with our secret police, the CIA. When the Afghan warlords got through with them, we took them to Rumania or Ukraine, then to Serbia and dropped them unconscious on the streets of Belgrade. Think some of these countries may want to return the favor, ask for equal benefits to do the same to some of those that irk THEM in some way? Some countries that let our corporations make a lot of ill gotten gains from the use of slave labor factories making bad tennis shoes. Some countries in physical possession of a great deal of so called 'intellectual property' that they have 'promised' to keep secret or not use or transfer. Some countries in possession of trillions of dollars of American corporate investment and backing trillions more in corporate bonds that could be nationalized or sold at the whim of a telephone call.....
The Chinese secret policemen in YOUR neighborhood may even now be on their way to your house.....
This is a doubledge sword.
If you are Bill Gates, who better to work with than the head of China in charge of a billion potential customers.
If you are the head of China in charge, who better to work with than the richest guy on the planet.
Yes I know this is only econnomically otivated, nobody cares about human right until their bottom line get lower, but...
...Citzen in countries imprisonning other people with "enemy combatant status" without lawyer indefinitly in a small island offland and refusing them geneva convention recognition (and the same country being suspected of torturing in east europa in contra of ANY human right convention) SHOULD try to clean up their own horseshit at their own barn before complaining that the neighbourgh's own barn stinks.
And I think this little fact is sorely missing in this discussion.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
This is not news. Because very few people (if any) in Goverment Offices (the country doesn't matter) has any form of understanding of concepts like privacy, security and freedom (as in free).
They are happy that someone else is willing to explain and taking care for those things on their behalf!
Maybe Computers will never be as intelligent as Humans.
For sure they won't ever become so stupid. [VR-1988]
After several years of daily reading this is one of the best comments I have ever read on slashdot.
I already severed my relationship with Yahoo! over their reprehensible behavior. Filtering is one thing, turning someone over to that regime is something else entirely. Now I'm forced to re-evaluate my business relationship with MS, although it's a hard call about whether I should inflict pain on MS as a whole for what may be legal behavior of their MSN China operations. I spent much of my life in the military so human rights are near and dear to my heart (despite what some people think, we aren't blood thirsty thugs). It's a tough call and I'm still thinking about it. Legally, they probably behaved correctly. The ethics are tougher to call due to what I perceive as tensions between various considerations. Morally? No question in my book, it was immoral.
This type of dilemma is why I would never consider either operating in China or taking employment there (as if the US Government would let me). I don't need this type of problem, I have enough dilemmas of my own to deal with.
"[I]t is a wise man who admits the limits of his knowledge or skill, and that pretending either causes harm." --Terry Go
China's actions in Tibet exclude it from the club.
Where is the US engaged in number 2? I sure can't think of any situation that even remotely qualifies.
In soviet china trade regulates you!
would they, by any chance, be mostly Skull & Bones members?
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II#A_debat
Britain and France declared war on Germany on Sept. 3, 1939. If that's not what you consider the beginning of the war, what exactly does it take? A lot of things happened before this that some people argue was the actual beginning of the war, but nobody in their right mind says it started after this.
I'm absolutely bored by history, and the first thing I thought when I read your comment was "WW2 started in 1939, not 1941." If I know this, then pretty much everybody else should, too.
Don't believe Wikipedia? Fine. Here's the whole timeline, according to the BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/wwtwo/ww2_summar
"City hall" in German is "Rathaus" Kinda explains a few things......
Let's see, I can get Linux for free, and do what I want. Or, I can live with the pharase, "Use Windows, Go To Jail." Yep, works for me.
World War II started significantly earlier than 1939, in 1931, as a matter of fact, with the Japanese invasion of China, but I can tell you don't care much about details, or you would have referred to the post I was responding to. In this case, the attack on Pearl Harbor does mark the US entrance into the war, which appeared to be what the parent referred to.
Hoist Number One and Number Six.
The war was declared in 1939. The US entered it in 1941, but they didn't declare anything. They just jumped into the fray, as far as anything I've been able to find.
From your post:
According to the Wikipedia link I posted earlier, this invasion happened in 1937, but an "occupation" occurred in 1931. I don't know exactly what the difference is between an invasion and an occupation, but apparently a lot of people are confused about what actually started WW2.
I still stand by my original post though, that the latest starting date for that war would be 1939, whether the US was in it at that point or not.
"City hall" in German is "Rathaus" Kinda explains a few things......
new engines? Why? So they have reason to fight ever'body
on th' Planet?! http://free.seekon.com/NonNuclearFusionEngines/
The word "fuel". What does it MEAN?! The oil cartels, oil companies, oil barons and grandma's stockbroker all think fuel has to be something that combusts. Even nuclear energy is the same burning swill being fed the American Public.
These people do not want you to know about my engine systems that don't use their burning fuels. The new oil company TV commercials by Kerr-McGee & Philips Petroleum are doing a great brainwash job on the American Consumer. hehehehe THEY know about my engines. THEY run like the antelope & the deer trying to escape my engines... knowing the hunter is closing in, knowing their time on Earth is short. Check my links on this page. Learn about engines that totally do away with American subservience and slavery to oil cartels. http://free.seekon.com/NonNuclearFusionEngines/ And if you think Saudi Arabians don't know about my engines, you're wrong. They visit my webpages every day. United Arab Emirates? Ditto. Venezuela & Tel Aviv are there.
Why do you think Alaska is winning the fight to stop destruction of their A.N.W.R. Nature Preserve?! They visit my pages & THEY KNOW WE DON'T NEED NO MORE STINKING PETROLEUM TO RUN OUR VEHICLES. Ever watch the movie Soldier when Gary Busey advises his superior officer of the advantage of using a hammer? It isn't pretty but it's EFFECTIVE.5 .
So are my engines right now, early forge hammers.
My pictures and animations are crude but effective.
We stand poised on the edge of total Energy Freedom >
http://www.renewamerica.us/bb/viewtopic.php?t=397
Not selling; just telling. The engines are free to whoever wants to build one. They are your property. I'm just the messenger. If the government won't build them, so what? What young buck wouldn't want to have a home for his new wife that doesn't have a monthly electric bill? hahaha The engines will get built. What young buck doesn't want to spend more on his gal & less for gasoline? Yep, the engines will get built & the builders won't be in Detroit. They'll be the next generation who demands something new ie: a better life for their family, affordable. Woodrow Riley, Open Sourcing a Future that isn't using crude oil or sitting around a fire praying for more firewood. Consider this too. There's a REASON my personal websites are being converted by Google into other languages. People want to be free & freedom from energy slavery is what I have brought them. Not by 2050. Not by 2025. Not by 2012. Energy freedom has been dropped inthe world's lap before 2006. Ask the bloggers over on http://www.livejournal.com/ they hit my pages daily by the hundreds because they know, they know they have found the pot of gold we've been searching for. Politicians in Washington, D.C. have found my pages but so far little has happened but that's okay. It's early yet. Sometimes the Ford lightbulb wants to be turned on slow & be savored like a fine wine.
http://www.newpath4.com/WorldwideClimateEngineMsg. htm . Yeah, they know.
The best aspect of American companies (like Microsoft) in China is that they'll most likely have a VPN solution deployed so Chinese workers can access American computers. The next step from this is ford employees in China can set their web browser, internally, to a proxy server in the USA.
This gives them unfetted access to material on the Internet that they couldn't previously see.
If I was the Chinese government, I'd be watching _all_ of my people working for big American companies _very_ closely.
1) FDR failed in his attempt to stack the court.
2) For the sake of argument, let's say that the New Deal courts did in fact expand the power of federal government to regulate what had previoulsy been considered a intrastate, or even private, enterprise. (eg. workers rights). That is the point of your citation, but it has nothing to do with the interpretation you put forth, namely that constitution does not grant the federal gov't the right to regulate interstate and international trade.
3)If I understand your last remark correctly you are saying that there is in fact no Supreme Court case that supports this interpretation.
"I would not call Unnecessarily dropping a nuke on japan during ww2 as responsible."
Well, since that's never happened, you won't have to make that decision will you.
Now, what you meant was "I would like to make an idiotic attempt at revising history, because I'm a foolish child who is easily duped, and then attempt to smear the US because I'm historically ignorant. In addition, I would like to apply my moral compass to a situation that occurred SIXTY years ago, during a time I'm neither able nor qualified to comment about. Oh, and tactily approve of Japan's cowardly actions in starting the war by ignoring them in my factually inaccurate post." That's a bit closer to the truth.
I blame your parents.
How pathetic are you that you follow me from topic to topic and waste all your mod points at once modding me down?
"American companies doing business in America conduct themselves with a very different set of ethical standards than when they conduct business abroad."
Yes you're absolutely right. In the US and Europe, MS breaks the law, and gets vilified.
In China, they follow the law and get vilified.
So while MS behaves very differently depending on the circumstances, the slashbots respons the same way every time.
How pathetic are you that you follow me from topic to topic and waste all your mod points at once modding me down?
"Being a totalitarian state is not a matter of interpretation, as you seem to think it is. In fact, it is pretty much an absolute. Says it right in the name: totalitarian. Totally not much wiggle room there, dude. If a given country's government maintains absolute, unquestioned control of its citizens and has the right to mass-murder or imprison them at will without the slightest repercussion, then pretty much we can call it totalitarian. China fits that particular bill to a tee, I'm afraid. See: Tianamen Square"
Your statement is itself indicative of how difficult this subject is, and how easy it is to fall into rhetoric without thinking, like you did.
If "a given country's government maintains absolute, unquestioned control of its citizens" and "has the right to mass-murder or imprison them at will without the slightest repercussion", then what does it meant that you're questioning them RIGHT NOW, and people are boycotting Chinese products RIGHT NOW.
If we use your definition, China is not a totalitarian state, because it is not doing its business unquestioned, and there are repurcussions.
I believe the phrase is "hoist upon your own petard".
How pathetic are you that you follow me from topic to topic and waste all your mod points at once modding me down?
... question the actions of their government. When I said "absolute, questioned control" I wasn't ...
... question the actions of their government. When I said "absolute, unquestioned control" I wasn't ...
Should be:
Oops.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Directly taken from slavemowgli's post on June 17th. What a slimeball. Don't you have any ideas of your own?
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
"When I said "absolute, questioned control" I wasn't referring to you and me"
Then it's not ABSOLUTE and UNQUESTIONED.
Why do you use language that you don't understand?
Why can't you just admit you overstated you position and got stepped on, instead of saying "I didn't mean a=b when I said a=b, I meant something completely ridiculous and irrational, that I'm only trying to pawn off because I'm embarassed that I got outsmarted."
Is that really so hard, or does your humongous ego prevent you from admitting you fu*ked up?
I'm going with ego, and I'll bet money you'll try to find a way to make "a=b" into "a=w" again.
Don't bother, you sound like an idiot and I don't humor idiots.
How pathetic are you that you follow me from topic to topic and waste all your mod points at once modding me down?