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China to Regulate Internet Map Publishing
hackingbear writes "After text, pictures, and videos, China starts regulating Internet map publishing (here is the google translation.) The government believes that Internet maps can represent the state's sovereignty and its political and diplomatic positions in the international community — and consequently, inaccurate maps could harm national interests and dignity, produce bad political influences, reveal national secrets and harm national security, in addition to harming consumer interests. So from now on, publishing maps would require approval and (yet another) license from the state survey bureau. That means Google, Yahoo, etc., need to remove China from the map; or maybe they just pay up some officials and their agents to acquire yet another license. And our newest 80Gbps DPI monsters need to be upgraded to identify maps together with porn."
priceless!
Can a country do this? Why are on-line maps different from printed maps? Seems a bit unlikely to me.
As Google maps are satellite based, how inaccurate can they be?
simon
Does Google need to pay to use the map that China produced, or to even show the country on a map that anyone produced? Are they licensing the map itself, or the representation of China's IP of the shape and layout of the country itself? If it's the latter, that's just... ill.
What happens if they just ignore their weirdo regulations and continue to publish the maps? How about just not in China?
Now how am I supposed to get from my house to Shanghai? I need those directions dammit.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely. indymedia
I wish I had tracked this a little more closely, but for a couple of decades ordinary maps of Kentucky in atlases like Rand McNally and Hammond did not indicate the existence of the city of Fort Knox, despite showing far smaller cities.
It was actually a little bit exciting to see the map in Ian Fleming's novel Goldfinger, showing the United States Bullion Depository located at the intersection of Bullion Boulevard and Gold Vault Road. In those days before Wikipedia and Google Earth, this gave at least one reader frisson of forbidden information. I wondered whether Fleming would be the target of any mysterious reprisals for publishing it.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
It's nice to see that the Chinese Government have learned from their western counterparts that anything you do in the name of "protecting consumer interests" becomes allowable. Their next lesson: "think of the children".
Forgive me if I'm stating the obvious, but it looks to me like the intention of this is to prevent Chinese citizens from seeing any map that recognises Taiwan or Tibet. Any one remember Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri? - Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.
Sad, but unsurprising.
-- Note to Mods: There is a good reason there's no "-1 Disagree" option. --
If people get used to seeing "The Republic of Taiwan" instead of the "Shitty, Upstart Province of Formosa (or China's name for it) that Dares Act Independent," then that would give people the expectation that Taiwan is a sovereign country. If China goes to war, then it's not to reclaim a break-away province that has been acting like a renegade, but rather just another conquest like Iraq on Kuwait.
Maps do have real political value behind them. There are a lot of people in Mexico that would love to see the reconquista of the Southwest, and the Mexican government has said in the past that expanding its territory back into the original territory is its goal. That's actually why the map that Absolut did in their advertising campaign was so controversial in the U.S.
A much better option than going along with what China wants them to publish. Sometimes the best course is to let jackasses make jackasses of themselves.
rj
Basically, they do not want any maps to be available on the Net to their own people (or anyone else, but that is impossible) which contain such counter-revolutionary ideas such as an independent Taiwan(even if only de facto).
They aren't doing it more, they're just being caught doing it more often.
CCTV's English language service ran this article a couple of months back: http://www.cctv.com/english/20080410/101774.shtml
They want to kinda wall themselves from the world but still be part of it.
If we had governments representing people, then the UN would would have told China to where to go a long time ago and China would have become something Cuba could laugh at.
But instead, we have governments representing corporations. (we elect them but the corps control them) To ignore china because of their fascist ways is not good for the corporate bottom line and the CEO's annual bonus. So the corps will bend and jump through hoops until they control China as well. When that happens, we will have become Star Trek's Ferengi race. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferengi)
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
This link has more info: http://tech.sina.com.cn/i/2008-03-25/21362099485.shtml
Google licensed PRC geographic data from Beijing United Map Technology Limited (just a guess translation) who has a electronic map service license from the National Survey Department (apparently the prime driver for the regulatory initiative). The reporter speculates that the regulatory initiave may be related to the competition between Beijing United Map Technology with its duopoly competitior, Beijing Map Advanced Technology.
The official reasons given by the Deputy Director of the National Survey Department are:
1. Inaccurate boundaries show parts of PRC as soil of other nations
2. Omission of south sea islands (disputed islands with Japan)
3. Omission of Taiwan or labeling of Taiwan as independent
4. Inaccurate boundaries between administrative regions and dissemination of important geographical data
5. Annotation of sensitive, nonpublic, or national security information on the map.
(Think of Dick Cheney's house...)
Part of Google's objection is that there are no clear laws pertaining to online maps in PRC. Thus the regulators are not acting on a solid foundation. There remains wide spread confuson on what exactly is required by these regulations.
As for Google's choices, they are actively protesting this initiative. But unless they prevail or pull out of China they would be subjected to their laws and likely to adapt to publishing only authorized versions of PRC maps.
It will push the artificial intelligence field of image recognition to unthinkable heights.
Blind people around the world should praise China for their invaluable help.
If they can find China in any way of map representation it should surely be easy to discern among different types of porn.
From a purely algorithmical point of view, of course.
"On this spot in 1989, nothing happened".
Argentina streets aren't in Google maps either. I've heard tons of versions regarding why practically every southamerican country but Argentina don't show up there. Including, and this one came from a Google employee, that the military/goverment didn't want to give "sensitive" information (Read: The bribe wasn't good enough). So they were looking for third party mapping companies to buy the data from (Read: Unhappy employee)
MSN Live has streets but it seems they've used very old data as they show streets that don't exist so don't rely on them too much.
Don't know about Yahoo.
...the US gov would just get one of the ministers in sweden to lean on their mate in the police force and raid their offices there.And thereby show that the US IS as bad as china and that, yes, other countries DO tell other companies what to do with online maps. The US government has problems, but can somebody explain to me why stories that have absolutely nothing to do with the US government still attract US gov flames? This story is about China's oppression and mentions the fact that it may have an impact on a couple of US businesses. How is the US government involved any more than Holland's or France's? Yes, most of Google's censored map areas are in the US, but other countries have made similar requests and had them granted. I'm sure China could too. But that's a whole different ball game than requiring licensing and approval for posting maps...
Ugh - Maybe I should just filter out ACs...
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Tibet has always been part of China. Just as Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
Best Slashdot Co
The South China Sea all the way to Malaysia and Philippines as being a part of China. Needless to say, the map treats all other seas, gulfs, and bays on the globe as being international waters.
Chinese culture seems to me to still be in the 19th century in many regards, and unable to engage in self-criticism. I've never met a Chinese person who could admit opposing points in relation to Tibet for example, notwithstanding that these people are all intelligent and decent in other regards.
I'd be able to feel more sorry for Tibet if the exiled government wasn't stuck in the middle ages though.
It ended up in part, causing a war with India http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino_indian_war
A lot of China's posturing and paranoia seems to almost make sense if you look at the history of how they have been treated by other nations.
So let me get this straight. Your idea of promoting an encouraging openness (which you and I agree is a good thing) is by completely shutting down China.
That doesn't make much sense to me. I think if you spent even 20 minutes reading about Chinese history in the last century you would be far less ignorant of world affairs and specifically Chinese affairs. I am in no way defending totalitarianism or censorship. I just want to point out how rediculous your "solution" sounds.
If you actually load up wikipedia and read for 20 minutes you might find out about the enormous amounts of strife China as a nation has endured over the last 150 years. Then you would see how it has only been 30 years since the end of the Cultural revolution, and just how much the nation has turned around in the blink of an eye.
Now you advocate destroying 30 years of progress? You want 1.3 billion people to go back to living in abject poverty (even though hundreds of millions are still in abject poverty). All because they draw their maps a little differently from the way we do? You would rather force them into submission than help them grow?
Fuck China? Fuck you.
"how can they call it a MINE if everything here is THEIRS?!?!" -Straight Jacket
Ahh... but if we remove China from the map, we can actually have an excuse to put "Here, thar be dragons" on the map!
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb