Wikipedia Explodes In China

eldavojohn writes "The Chinese have recently been allowed to enjoy the Chinese version of Wikipedia now that the ban has been lifted. And the result is an explosion in use after being banned for a year. From the article, 'Activity on nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation's Chinese Wikipedia site has skyrocketed since its release, which Internet users in China first started reporting on Nov. 10. Since then, the number of new users registering to contribute to the site has exceeded 1,200 a day, up from an average of 300 to 400 prior to the unblocking. The number of new articles posted daily has increased 75% from the week before, with the total now surpassing 100,000, according to the foundation.' No one's sure how long this will be available to the People's Republic of China but hopefully the government will recognize that at least a significant part of the populace enjoys a Wikipedia community."

Comments

Censorship is a bad thing

[BadAnalogyGuy]

If the Chinese government doesn't see the threat that Wikipedia poses, I can only assume they already have filters in place to block objectional content.

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[Hijacked Public]

And if the filters don't do the trick, rifles.

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[RailGunner]

I'd be interested in what the Chinese wikipedia article says (if anything) about the Student Massacre at Tienanmen Square...
For example, would they use the PRC Body count (23) or the Student Association's and the Chinese Red Cross body count? (2000 - 3000, as many as 10,000 injured).

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[OmnipotentEntity]

It's right here: Original Page Google translation.

As noted at the top though, People behind the Great Firewall may not be able to access it.

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[Sinbios]

Actually, the page is locked due to vandalizing and a dispute notice is put up, just like any other controversial article. And just like other articles, the article itself is pretty objective. As for the death toll specifically, the article says that the number of deaths is disputed; it cites one of the protesters Chai Ling as saying in a recording: "Some say there are about 200 dead, but some claim there are more than 4000. I am not sure of the exact numbers, either." Again, just like any "free" wiki article - explains the controversy and cites an objective source instead of making groundless assertions.

So yeah, I really wish people would stop making snide remarks as if the Chinese wiki is the government's parade ground, without even taking a look at it. Controversial topics aren't really censored, and it operates pretty much like the rest of Wikipedia when it comes to these topics. You have to remember that in the end, it's still managed by Wikipedia moderators, who ideally will try their utmost to ensure that articles are accurate and objective.

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[stud9920]

It's right here: Original Page [wikipedia.org] Google translation. [64.233.179.104]

Why do idiots keep using numbers as domain names ? It's annoying and demands lots of attention to type over. Words (service.sld.tld ) are way easier to remember !

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[just_another_sean]

Maybe before you respond next time you'll stop for a second and ask yourself; What was that whooshing sound I just heard?

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[davidsyes]

There are at least TWO ASIAN, non-Communist, democratic, friends-of-the-US countries that had student dissident uprisings after 1960, and their death counts were HIGHER than at Tienanmen Square. Yet we rarely get ANY press or writing about this. Always Mainland China the evil, oppressive, censoring one. Whipping boy for politicians and cozy buddy for on-the-cheap foreign manufacturers and foreign politicans and foreign tax collectors. I don't see why PRC/China hasn't decided to ease up just based on THIS.

Oh, and yeh, there are a LOT of foreign nationals who work in China and vastly under-report their earnings. Effectively committing tax evasion, just like they would if they could back home. (Not sure about this part, but I also understand that the tank did NOT run down that man, but he was under the body cavity area, uncrushed. If THAT is true, then there are a lot of opportunistic and sensationalistic jerks in the media who need to be brought up/flogged...)

I wonder if China's Wikipedia site will report about the foreigners there who are exploiting the system.

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[The One and Only]

Your first assignment is to name these two countries and provide sources for your assertion. Your second assignment is to explain whether this excuses the PLA's actions, and why.

Re:Censorship is a bad thing

[davidsyes]

Jesus H. Christ, man! Korea and Taiwan. In BOTH cases the USA/CIA IMPLICITLY gave the local forces permission to (or looked the other way when approach for input) use their MILITARY units against students.

It was a bloody, SAD even in the history of each, but relatively speaking Tienanmen, by many accounts, was NOT as bad as in South Korea and in Taiwan. These happenend. The western news likes to IGNORE IT. (Where are YOU from? There are any NUMBER of esteemed, unreproachable authors (not myself) and historians who can rip you on that topic.)

Nevertheless I deeply respect Admiral Zheng He's fleet for NOT ravaging, mowing, down, conquering, or otherwise imposing any "China Will" upon the rest of the world. I believe what goes around comes around, and SOMEDAY China will rightfully challenge (not open the first shot, but merely challenge by presence) the USA or the flag-waving USN. It will just be equilibrium in the spheres of influence. NO ONE COUNTRY deserves, nor has some implicit privilege or right to run everything.

(That bit was a bit off topic, but if you and your assigning ME homework instead of just elucidating for the audience what I alluded would have helped. I dislike the misplaced, selective media amnesia... Do YOU?)

Your assignment is to do the rest. Find out WHY the US is footdragging in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. If you lack imagination: The US wants to keep China from gaining more traction. It keeps Korea from reunifying. It keeps Taiwan from being overrun, supposedly, by PRC. PRC isn't going to INVADE anyway-- the KMT and local officials already ALLOW/ED enough businesses to de facto turn over the tech to the mainland. Chinese nationals have direct access to the plants used/owned/built by/for Intel, AMD, IBM, Cisco, and the rest. So much smoke and mirrors are at play, most of this is about which country has the biggest balls to stare down the other and which can take the most control from its citizens and STILL look good at the end of the day.

But....

[varmittang]

How many of those people signing up are government agents there to just delete and change everything to what the government wants.

Re:But....

[ajs]

Well, they probably do, but the main benefit, I'm sure, is being able to track who contributes what. Don't just censor history, censor the historians... it's an old trick, but a damn effective one. :-/

Re:But....

[owlnation]

That's a very good question. I suspect many contributors and editors will be Government agents.

There lies the true danger and the power of wikipedia, and the reason why no-one must ever take wikipedia seriously. I think this can't be stressed enough - never ever trust wikipedia, nothing on wikipedia is necessarily true. That should be recited like a mantra. Wikipedia is fine as long as everyone always remembers that and doesn't try to elevate it to anything even approaching truth.

I must say though that I think the last thing the Chinese need is yet another dubious source of information. They need objective reality not wikiality.

I, for one, don't personally see this as progress towards human rights and democracy. I think there's a very real danger this will be exploited and cause more problems than it will solve. Honestly, the Chinese (and all and every other Government for that matter) would be foolish not to exploit the apparent truthiness of wikiality.

Would you trust a MySpace fact? Why do you trust a wikipedia one? There's little difference other than perception. They may be written by the same person.

Re: Wikipedia Explodes in China

[gEvil (beta)]

I hope nobody was hurt...

What's it Like?

[Pantero Blanco]

I can't read Chinese, so I really can't go check this myself. How accurate is the Chinese version of Wikipedia in respect to events and topics China's government sees as threatening? Do "Party-approved" versions of articles win edit wars over other ones?

Re:What's it Like?

[daranz]

I heard the benevolence of the Communist Party of China tripled in the last six months.

Re:What's it Like?

[ComaVN]

This page seems to be about the 1989 protests, and it contains the tank man picture (the one mysteriously absent from images.google.cn)

It also seems to be protected because of vandalism...

Re:What's it Like?

[jonwil]

Is this
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tiananmensquare .jpg
image accessable inside the great firewall?

Re:What's it Like?

[fuzheado]

No it got blocked halfway through loading the HTML page. Likely the filename was caught by the great firewall filter. But if you named it Pokemonactionfigure.jpg it would have made it fine.

Re: Wikipedia Explodes in China

[NinjaFarmer]

That title sounds like the climax of a bad erotic novel.

Is it about people enjoying it?

[aicrules]

Other than a loose metaphor between the intellectual socialism of wikipedia and the communistic regime that is China, the government will only keep it available for as long as it takes for "unseemly" articles about government tyranny to make there way on to the site. Make no mistake, China's government is allowing this solely for its own benefit. Who knows what that benefit is, but when the potential costs begin to outweigh those benefits, suddenly participation will be down to zero.

Re:Is it about people enjoying it?

[db32]

If you were the "decider" and had a nasty problem of finding dissenters what would you do? Make it difficult to be a dissenter and rely on spying programs to try and root them out at great cost and effort? Or maybe make it easy, let them out themselves, build up a nice hefty database of potential leads, hunt them all down, expose them for the 'traitors' that they are and a threat to the good people,then destroy them to serve as a warning to any others.

Not that I'm really saying that this is what they are doing. But it is certainly a valid possibility. So many decry this type of thing as paranoid and conspiracy, but the fact of the matter is people with power and control will do anything they can to remain in power and control. This has been proven countless times in human history. It really irritates me when people fail to admit that this type of thing could happen at home or abroad...America had to fight a war to remove ourselves from tyranny. Do people think that you really only have to do that once?

What's Chinese for "wikiality?"

[Rob T Firefly]

Did you know that the number of Tiannenmen Squares has tripled in the past six months?

Uh huh...

[djupedal]

"No one's sure how long this will be available to the People's Republic of China"

Just as long as it takes to build a representative statistical sample pool of the individuals doing all the recent updates...once that's ready - OH! ...and the guys are done clubbing dogs. THEN we're gonna see some real head-banging :)

Helpful unit conversion

[$RANDOMLUSER]

1 Library of Congress == 6.19 * 10^17 fortune cookies

Tienanmen Square

[Darvin]

Very interesting to see the Tienanmen Square wiki in Chinese. Already it has been locked down due to 'vandalism'

Heh.

See it zh.wikipedia.org/

Re:Tienanmen Square

[Sinbios]

Link

For those who can't read Chinese, the article is pretty objective in nature and cites multiple sources with varying opinion on topics such as the death toll.

Population Bomb

[Doc Ruby]

Activity on nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation's Chinese Wikipedia site has skyrocketed since its release

How about donation activity? OK, it's only 5 days into the popularity explosion. But if Chinese support of the nonprofit doesn't also explode by, say, Feb 18, 2007, then how will Wikipedia accommodate the huge demand increase that Chinese popularity represents?

Will the "capitalists" now paying to operate Wikipedia have to give the "Communists" a free ride? Just how does Chinese Communism cooperate with global nonprofits when their government isn't managing the process?

Re:Population Bomb

[estarriol]

I see no evidence to suggest that the people of China will be unable to donate to Wikipedia for any reason. What makes you think that they won't? The concept of charitable donation was not created by, nor is owned by, Capitalism.

Ain't seen nothin' yet...

[djupedal]

The number of new articles posted daily has increased 75% from the week before, with the total now surpassing 100,000

You gotta love scale. Imagine what will happen once they get genuinely interested in the West and start checking out something more than just college entrance fees...

Maybe this will finally get people outside China to start showing a bit of awareness when told they have no reliable/previous experience with the shear scale of things China brings to the table.

Maybe, just maybe, a few outsiders will get a clue and stop thinking they can judge China according to how they go about their (statistical) lives every day. More than one business model is going out the window, I can promise that much :)

ChinaWikipedia entry for Freedom of speech

[shirizaki]

This article has been marked for deletion. Reason: "Doesn't exist".

Another day, another protest

[brian.glanz]

I'm not so sure about assuming the quality of Chinese censorship. If you're only watching mainstream news feeds, it looks like "another day, another protest" in China. In the Washington Post via MSNBC this morning, it's One-dog policy resisted in Beijing crackdown where in these near-daily articles, juicy quotes like this one are increasingly common, too:

"More and more people own dogs. It is pointless to restrict dog-raising. The stricter the government is, the more people will love to own a dog," said Liu Tao, 26, who was at the unauthorized protest Saturday. "We are not blocked from the outside now. With the Internet, we can see how Western countries treat dogs well. It's hard to stop us from communicating with the outside."

Aside from the groundswell of Western ideals changing China, and back to their Wikipedia: Chinese officials might believe they can handle it. In addition to the drumbeat of articles in our free press indicating their people's increasingly free access to information, I also have known many friends and colleagues in China who have effectively unfettered access. Party-types might think they can handle it, but I would not assume they actually can. BG

Re:Another day, another protest

[LindseyJ]

Seems like a perfectly operational misdirection campaign to me. Why worry about people maybe getting sent to prison for saying something the government doesn't like when, look! we can all have as many puppies as we want now! The government can allow meaningless protests like this one to go on unopposed to take the spotlight off of other, more nefarious things they may be up to.

Actual statistics and charts

[fuzheado]

Strangely, the WSJ article does not mention any links or references to where to find the raw data.

It was based on charts and research I did from Beijing.

Cheers.

Wikipedia Explodes in China -- Recall ordered

[retrosteve]

Sony has recalled all their batteries used in Wikipedias in China. Sony stock fell another 3.75 on the news.

Google Translation of Tiananmen Square Page

[dbabbitt]

Here is the text of http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%85%AD%E5%9B%9B%E4 %BA%8B%E4%BB%B6 above the Table of Contents translated by http://translate.google.com/translate_t (white space reinsertion attempted):

Due to the recent frequent sabotage half of this page has been protected, anonymous users or users can register new editor. And if that entries can be obtained for the revised use of the discussion page, or for the discharge of the protection. (Protection is not an authorized version of the current page. In addition, notices of the template was used. To protect the pages please request. ), the latter sections or paragraphs, some of the information is not confirmed or suspicious sources failed at all.

Page confirmed discussions have relevant discussions and courage injected Source! Disputed the accuracy of this article.

The editors need to hang up this template pages illustrate the accuracy of the controversial dialogue, in order to allow the editors to discuss and improve.

Produced by the Beijing Central Academy of Art's "Goddess of Democracy" statue, and later became a symbol of the democratic movement in China in 1989.

Original destroyed, in Vancouver, San Francisco and other cities have copies of legislation in public places. Amplification produced by the Beijing Central Academy of Art's "Goddess of Democracy" statue.later in 1989 became a symbol of the democratic movement in China. Original destroyed, in Vancouver, San Francisco and other cities have copies of legislation in public places. June 4, also known as the 1989 pro-democracy movement (Democratic Movement), the 1989 student movement (Students), the June 4 massacre, the incident. 1989 democratic movement, the 1989 pro-democracy movement at Tiananmen Massacre, the Tiananmen incident, the Chinese government has called the unrest, counter-revolutionary rebellion.The recent political turmoil has renamed the turn of spring and summer, referred to the June 4,it is April 15, 1989 to June 4 and the day after the political events taking place in mainland China.by the mass of students, and public processions and demonstrations Movement. However, during the negotiations between the government and the student body failed to reach consensus and political compromise,Finally, the government convened caused some military force to suppress (exact numbers are unknown - exists from several hundred to several thousand of view) the general public and students end up casualties. The center is generally believed that Beijing's Tiananmen Square incident. Besides Shanghai and many other cities are also the expression of different political views during the demonstration. General political commentators say that this incident led to the People's Republic of China since 1978 after the pace of political reform to stop or even reverse it. Today the many controversial incidents which have not been resolved.

Wikipedia Explodes in China!

[teflaime]

30 Million people dead! News at 11! :p

Tianennemnemanenen rhomboid

[MS-06FZ]

For example, would they use the PRC Body count (23) or the Student Association's and the Chinese Red Cross body count? (2000 - 3000, as many as 10,000 injured).

It'd go something like this...

- Original article would cite the 2000-3000 number.
- Another visitor would edit this to say 23.
- Authors would re-edit back to 2000-3000.
- Another edit changes it back to 23.
- Irate users re-edit again back to 2000-3000.
- Talk page would get filled up with debate over the issue. Number would be tagged with "citation needed" and the language would be softened to make the figure seem less reliable and acknowledge the 23 figure.
- Vandal would replace the whole article with various rude comments about foreigners.
- Sneaky bastard would claim to be reverting the article to undo the vandalism - but sneak in a change that makes the 2000-3000 figure sound completely unbelievable.
- New vandalism would go unnoticed for some time - even in future vandalism/revert cycles by other editors.