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Chinese Portals Pledge More Self-Policing
An anonymous reader writes "A slew of Chinese web portals have pledged to self-police even more, after signing on to a Beijing plan to 'clean up the internet'. Google and MSN have not joined the group." From the article: "The firms' pledge states that the Internet has become an important source of information and entertainment in China, now the world's second-biggest market with more than 100 million Web surfers. 'At the same time as the Web develops quickly, certain sites are transmitting unhealthy news ... and uncivilized voice services, including pornographic content that can be harmful to society,' said the pledge, which was dated earlier this month in a posting on Sina's Web site."
Sounds more like something Alberto Gonzales and the Bush White House would say.
The sad part is, while I'm writing this "tongue-in-cheek", if it were to be a headline in tomorrow's paper, nobody would be surprised.
More details at snopes
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
This is how the Chinese people wish to live. They have chosen a government that promotes their values and ideals. We as Americans are hardly in a position to offer criticism to other cultures, as we have more significant problems than anyone despite our supposed economic superiority (which will be gone soon).
But at least our whole country isn't behind a firewall meant to hide us from the truth.
Between forced abortions, organ harvesting of Falun Gong members, and poisoning sitting presidents at large banquets, China has shown its true colors time after time. I guess if China keeps funding our government, we have no choice but to look the other way.
A bit sad really.
Now there's a great tag for some Slashdot stories...
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
And thus the Slashdot bash-China-first-crowd assembles for yet another self invigorating hate-fest.
Don't you guys just feel so good hating China so much?
Some say he is made with ascii, others that he is eyeballed daily by millions. All we know is, he is known as the Sig
You mean to tell me there is stuff on the internet BESIDES pornography? Why didn't anyone tell me!
Monstar L
Retard alert.
There is only ONE LEGAL PARTY in China. Get a clue and quit posting nonsense.
I thought we already cleaned the internet earlier this month...
Goatse pics definitely are "pornographic content that can be harmful to society"
Tomhudson, I'm against human rights abuses without regard as to who the perpetrator is. If human rights are abused by China, them I'm against it. If human rights are abused by George Bush, then I am against it. Those are my principles. What are yours?
Despite your tongue in cheek escape valve, the tone of your post apologizes for human rights abuses in China because you see some abuses in America. Does this mean that in tomhudson's world that two wrongs really do make a right?
Sounds remarkably like what Hollywood did in the 1930s or so and what American comics publishers did in the 1950s in the form of the Comics Code: In order to avoid being censored by government legislation, they decided to censor themselves.
Movies abided by rules such as: No prolonged kissing - never show even a married couple in the same bed - no revenge plots (the hero just happened to kill his enemies in self defence while pursuing nobler goals) etc. ad nauseam. The excision of politics was just an unwritten rule, but followed particularly religiously until the 60s.
The Comics Code was even more rigorous. It killed comics as a form of entertainment for adults up until the 1990s. Horror comics, erotic comics, realistic violence etc. ceased to exist. Nothing but spandex pap was left in its wake. And if you say now that you're a grown-up who reads Marvel comics, tell me: Just how grown-up do you feel while you're doing it? I feel about 12 years old when I dive into X-Men.
Yahoo will give up anything a government asks for. They don't even question why a government would want some piece of information. I wish entities like the ACLU would go after Yahoo and make them start, at least, pausing and thinking before they act.
Hitler never actually came up with or did much of his atrocities himself, or even thought up the details in the first place. Instead he encouraged many of his cronies to come up with whatever ideas and act in whatever manner they thought would please their leader the most. And they happily complied.
its lieing when it says i'm posting from a .gov.cn address, it is, please believe me! dont you? i'm just a regular user!
nothing happend in tienamen square, you have no proof! the chinese government doesn't lie! also nothing happend in tibet, its a lie too, you are all full of shit, please stop posting that somthing did happen. there is lots of pornographic content out there, i can get to every site and it offends me, when i login with my username bighairycunt i dont want to see naked people doing sick things with machines! i think this is a good idea to clean up the internet, there are lots of lies around
these comments are my own and my family has not been kidnapped and they do not have a gun to their head and i do not work for the government as a netcop, this is also a lie, somebody with much time on their hands created this idea. the government does not do these things!! why wont you believe me? i am jsut a normal person!
...at least they have Google to look up to in their quest to self-censor.
Then again hearing Bush go on the attack against the press makes you wonder if it isn't merely a little more obvious in the case of China. I'm sure I'm not 100% right about this, but I can't remember a single newspaper officially taking the position that invading Iraq was wrong back in 2002/2003, not even the New York Times.
My sig is too lon
Warning: Keep out of reach of children. Slashdot may contain flamebait, trolls, and sheer nonsense. Slashdot may cause sleep deprevation, procrastination, or eye strain if used excessively. Use at own risk.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not entirely sure about the universe - Einstein
The artical sights a few examples of things the government deems unhealthy, including stomping cats while in high heels and voic/porn services... FTA: The pledge comes amid a broader, ongoing movement by Beijing to clean the Internet of pornography and other content that leaders of the ruling Communist Party consider "unhealthy." So basicaly we are just looking at mainstream chinese internet affiliaes looking to keep the government off thier backs by being proactive in filtering content.
The majority of Slashdotters do NOT hate China or its people. But we do hate the Chinese Government and its continued suppression of it's people. The fact that you are equating the both the government and its people as one is part of the problem.
China is slowly becoming the new hegemonic power in the world, and while the US Government is a despicable sellout to corporate interests, at least it believes in relative freedom and democracy (if you discount the whole Patriot Act thing). But as China becomes a larger world power, its overwhelming ideals of government suppression, censorship and "big brother" mentality will be foisted upon the countries it interacts with.
What Slashdotters see in China is the potential future in store for all of us, and we don't like it one bit. So while the majority of Chinese may not believe in overwhelming censorship, Chinese Government does (and actively pursues) this type of culture, and we will continue to attack it in speech and writing until it stops.
"I may disagree with what you have to say, but I shall defend, to the death, your right to say it." -- Voltaire
Even reading this makes me sick. May be that is the reason the details of such incidents are not made public.
/.ers knew, existed in Soviet Russia since 60s. Many people complained, including myself, to people who we trusted, but very few actually went out to the Red Square after Prague spring 1968 was suppressed, went on strike in Novocherkassk in 1962 and were shot to death on the streets by the Soviet army.
Now on more general note:
Chinese society is quite stable and as far as I know the dissidents are minority. And by dissidents I mean people who are ready to do at least little sacrifies in fight for their convictions, not people who grumble about politics to their wives in their kitchens
Same situation, as probably not so many of
The reason for the small number of dissidents is that both Chinese and Russian societies at their respective times were/are relatively stable and pieceful. People had some social security and some level of life was guaranteed by the state for the vast majority of population. Another reason of course was formidable effectiveness of the reppressive state apparatus.
Foreign public opinion had little effect though it was relatively easy to have a radio access to BBC, Voice of America or Radio Liberty. It again comes to bottom line of how much do you want what you do not have and how much you are going to pay to get that.
In Russia most people considered the possibility to freely form multiple parties or criticise authorities not worth the price they would have to pay for that. And the reason for that was that they were relatively fed, relatively clothed, lived in relatively decent homes and even had possibility to freely vent their despise of the government and government officials in their kitchens.
At the absence of any possibility of spiritual education of children that would give them an idea that some human values (dignity, faith) are worth more than their lives they inevitably grew up opportunistic and staunch materialists which is paradoxically (paradaxically, as usual, only on the surface) similar to what we have in US now. Very different paths, quite similar results.
Bottom line:
1. Let Chinese figure out for themselves what do they want and what are they are ready to pay for it. If people have no idea that they are living miserable lives, meaning they are happy with what they have, then what right do we have to impose our view on their life? Let us be more concerned about our own countries (US, in my case). Same applies to any other country, Iraq, Iran, DRNK, etc.
2. If the system works, do not fix it. Chinese country functions quite well (may be too well as far as their Western competitors are concerned?)
3. Your convictions, your ideology are worth the price you are going to pay to get them. The slogans might be "patria o muerte", or "from my cold, dead hands", or "for Lenin, for Stalin, for the great Communist Party" (there is issue of what is brainwashing, what is upbringing and what is legitimate convictions, I am leaving it out for now).
Can you say "laissez faire or death"?
Can you say "I am ready to go to jail for downloading even when the effectiveness of detection of this type of activity will be much higher than now"?
What personal sacrificies are you going to make for your convictions?
Sorry for off-topic.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
The solution to the problem of Chinese censorship on the Internet is simple enough -- we just make the internet flee China completely. How? [insert evil grin here]
Imagine a botnet, sending out rapid-fire cease-and-desist notices to every site operating in China, informing site owners of out-of-compliace content. Companies will struggle to remove content from the web fast enough to keep up with the vaguely threatening notices. That's the second edge of self-censorship, turned against the people wielding it: the fear of running afoul of the government will cause the mass removal of otherwise non-infringing content and leave the space behind the Great Firewall a vast wasteland.
For bonus points and delicious irony, a Chinese botnet could run this scheme. In fact, if they're monitoring incoming traffic, this may even be necessary.
Note: technically, above I said imagine...
You cannot truly appreciate Dilbert until you read it in the original Klingon.
... in regards to "unhealthy content". Right now personally I am quite effectively battling all the filth that it is there, but I am talking about our kids, naive (in terms of good and evil, but, alas, quite shrewd in they ways of harming themselves) teenagers that they are.
Complete freedom is an easy way to financial success. Once the value of morality relative to value of wealth and other worldy things will start to grow, more and more businessmen will choose self-policing, God willing.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
It's about time someone tell you something. Let me start with US genocide against native Americans; For current human right issues in American, you can just take a look at what happened after 2003.
9 90510/interview3.html
I'd like to remind you the Master of Falungong, Mr. Li, publicly stated that computers are invented by aliens among us whose ultimate goal is to replace human with alien offsprings.
http://www.time.com/time/asia/asia/magazine/1999/
What do alien look like? "One type looks like a human, but has a nose that is made of bone. Others look like ghosts. At first they thought that I was trying to help them. Now they now that I am sweeping them away."
The only way to avoid the horrible future of mankind is to join FLG. Now tell me you think of FLG?
Organ harvesting? Pleeez, you need extrordinary proofs to support extrordinary claims.
http://news.google.com/news?q=falun+gong+organ+har vest&hl=en&lr=&sa=X&oi=news&ct=title/
Government Agent 1: *Web browsing for 'bad' content'* Oh look, agent 2.
Government Agent 2: *responds* What did you find?
Government Agent 1: *grinning* A website full of 'bad content' such as documents about the UN bill of rights, contraceptives, atheism, capitalism, GPL software, (CC)'d music, independent blogs with no recognizable identity, and philsophy.
Government Agent 2: *grins as well* Oh yes, we caught ourselves a really bad boy....
What we need to do is get about 20-30 of us on an open source style project (Creative Commons) and create a short clip that will appeal to Joe Sixpack, and educate him on why his freedom is important. Why can't we slashdot start a project to educate our fellow citizens? All Joe Sixpack knows is Fox News and the local newspaper, and most likely doesn't know any better or different. We still have the ability to create free media, and we still have free speech, so lets use it while we still can. Instead of sitting back and bitching on a forum about it, lets create something in a presentable and distributable format that Joe Sixpack can see, and show to all of his friends? I know that 911: Loose Change is spreading, but not fast enough as most Americans don't have time to watch a two hour video, and while it does a good job at LARTing most Americans, some still need more thorough adjustments. After showing my mom the Child Porn Act on slashdot a couple days ago, she stops and thinks, "Wait! I get it! They aren't going to really look for child porn when they do that." My girlfriend, after watching Loose Change still thinks it is OK for the government to view all internet traffic. The point is, the media is a powerful tool that we still have control of, and we need to embrace and implement it for the masses. We already have ourselves convinced, now lets do it to the normals.
Sig: I stole this sig.
but the internet is for porn:4 6981554735098778&q=the+internet+is+for+porn&pl=tru e"
href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-44
for the communists in china ? the email address of say the chairmen or the rest of any of the gang ? i mean i email folks directly when i get pissed off . may not do any good on there end but it helps my anger issues
"A slew of Chinese web portals have pledged to self-police even more, after signing on to a Beijing plan to 'clean up the internet'. Google and MSN have not joined the group."
Time for 50+ posts explaining to us how, if it's not a government doing it, it's not censorship.
Political aberrations are far more harmful to humans than pornography.
Politicians unleasing different forms of repressions, like Communists have been in the past should be treated with the same strict rules as pedophiles.
Just kidding.
I think FLG sounds as bat shit crazy as any other religion. We have Mormons, Scientologist, and Christian Scientist who all expose views that in the context of normal modes of thinking are utterly insane and flagrantly self-destructive in some cases.
Hell, even your average and boring vanilla Christian sounds crazy if you were not raised to accept their views as normal. Their religion is built around a Jewish cult leader who they are utterly convinced was killed, was raised from the dead, ascended to a magical utopian paradise with a being of pure love, and they believe that this person will return to Earth brining an apocalypse that will shatter humanity. That is a pretty fucking crazy view to hold if you are not brought up with it.
Further, if you listen to what FLG advocates, what they are doing makes perfect sense. They have done the same thing every other religion has done. They have taken some old religious beliefs (a form of old Chinese mysticism in this case), modified them, and used them to explain the things in this world that they don't understand and don't believe that there is an rational explanation for. In the case of FLG, they have developed a mystical explanation as to why the Chinese government is so brutal, the environment is degrading, and why people don't feel self fulfilled. Is their explanation insane? Sure, it is as insane as any religious explanation. Are the things they are trying to explain insane? Hell no.
In the same way an early Jew or Christian might blame demons, the devil, or God for things that we later have come to accept as having rational scientific explanations, these people have done the same. They worry about government corruption and repression, the degradation of the family, the environment, and the downward spiral that they see humanity in. The only difference between the FLG and any other person who worries about these things is that the FLG have assigned a mystical (aliens in this case) explanation to why things are going as they have.
If you take a step back and replace the word "aliens" with the more familiar "demons", then their beliefs suddenly become absolutely no more crazy sounding then some extreme Christian religions. Arguing that "demons" are ruining the world is hardly a new thought. They have just modernized it by replacing the word "demons" with "aliens".
Look, I am not saying you should go sign up for FLG. They are, in my opinion, utterly insane. That said, they are no more insane then any other religion out there. Just because you and I find their beliefs crazy doesn't mean that their followers should be chased down, imprisoned, repressed, and in some cases murdered by the Chinese government. I don't want to see FLG persecuted any more then I want to see Mormons, Scientologist, and Methodist persecuted.
Further, the actions of the Chinese government just incite these people into believing their dogma. If you held the belief that aliens (replace "aliens" with "demons" if that makes you more comfortable) are corrupting humanity, and suddenly the government starts to brutally repress you despite the fact that FLG is pretty damn peaceful and benign in what it advocates, would that might not affirm your beliefs that aliens/demons are out to get you?
they really are.
I guess if they are peaceful as they said nobody would care. There are many many QiGong orgnizations in China for many many years; Most of them are peaceful and loosely orgnized. The chinese people have no problem with them at all.
The fact is FLG is a well-orgnized mind-controlling sect. The ultimate goal is to accumulate cash for Master Li. In the beginning FLG attracts people to practice QiGong for health benefits. Well all QiGong has its traditional roots in chinese medicine theory and passed on by generations. FLG is just invented by Master Li one day. Many early partitioners later said they found no health benefits at all. In order to control people's mind. Master Li tried to explain if you don't believe his books you won't really be healthy. His books are sold for cash and are intented to be mind controlling. He said in the book that everyone's life is in danger and aliens are taking over. Your only way out is to join FLG.
Many FLG partitioners committed suicide. Many are forced to give monthly fees. Once you are in FLG, they are doing everything they can to prevent you get out. FLG is selling "truthfulness, benevolence, and forbearance" but in reality it is just a bunch of lies, cheats, and mind controlling.
None of the "news" from FLG and its newspaper epochtimes.com can really be proved. They are using the anti chinese sentiment in most westerners to "produce" news stories. None of this sells in China nowadays any more. Master Li said he can fly to anywhere in the world in a split of second, but in fact he still needs support from US sources and he still needs a green card.
FLG is a pure political orgnization.
Self-policing is the primary means of censorship in the Chinese media. This bit of news just means that Chinese websites are adopting the same practices as the print media. The new consortium may just be a CYA type move to prevent any one site from being singled out by the government.
China's government may be aggressively bullying ISPs into blocking content they don't like their own citizens to read or see, whether it's political or religious or sexual, but they don't seem to have taken any significant action against spammers, either the SMTP senders or especially the Spamvertised Web Sites and phishing sites that suckers respond to. So they're still annoying the rest of the world with their content. Maybe they beat up an occasional spammer in public, but mostly it seems to be left alone.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Remember David Koresh? You sure showed the American attitude toward cults in Waco, didn't you? Do you think there is any difference between the Branch Davidian and Falun Gong? Read up, boy.
Political prisoners? How about Gitmo? Those prisoners are prisoners of war, but not treated as prisoners of war, being denied their right to an attorney. Or in Abi Grail, the sheer torture has made the world shocked over how brutal the Americans are. They came to Iraq to liberate the people from Saddam's torture, only to continue the torture themselves.
How about the cleaning up of your own TV? Janet Jackson shows a nipple (a fucking nipple!) on TV, and the US goes nuts.
You guys think you are so much better. But why?