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China Slams Clinton's Call For Internet Freedom
CWmike writes "China on Friday slammed remarks made by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton promoting Internet freedom worldwide, saying her words harmed US-China relations. Clinton's speech and China's response both come after Google last week said it planned to reverse its long-standing position in China by ending censorship of its Chinese search engine. Google cited increasingly tough censorship and recent cyberattacks on the Gmail accounts of human rights activists for its decision, which it said might force it to close its offices in China altogether. On Thursday in Washington, DC, Clinton unveiled US initiatives to help people living under repressive governments access the Internet for purposes such as reporting corruption. The US will support circumvention tools for dissidents whose Internet connections are blocked, she said. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu called for the US 'to respect the facts and stop using the issue of so-called Internet freedom to unreasonably criticize China.' China's laws forbid hacking attacks and violations of citizens' privacy, the statement said, apparently referring to the issues raised by Google."
I have a friend in Shanghai, and it sucks because when I send him video links on Youtube, he can't view them because they're firewalled from Youtube.
Kudos for giving countries like this access to freedom of information.
It's like being only allowed to watch State-sponsored TV and government approved books in libraries, and then suddenly being allowed to experience the wealth of the world.
4chan and the dark underbelly of the internet aside, I hope this gives people a taste of culture/information other than what's force-fed down their throats and see what they're missing out on.
http://www.object404.com
or we might use our tectonic weapon on them :O
Originating from China... so that narrows it down to what, one sixth of the worlds population? Can you see any problem with your argument?
The revolution will not be televised... but it will have a page on Wikipedia
Fuck Yeah!
So what "stuff" did you find and what websites were you looking at that were mysteriously blocked?
You must be a very important person!
Dude, KY comes in a bottle.
Then I would have found my new home :P
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Well, that's what Freedom of Speech is all about, isn't it?
No one needs to protect popular opinions. Once you decide "douchebags can't have free speech!" then who gets to decide who's a douchebag?
Well, I suppose we could use a sort of metric like, "percent of income spent on Axe body spray," but that'd have some kinks to work out.
I disagree. I doubt that it would have been possible even in the Clinton era to pass legislation to block free speech online. That's a pretty big assumption.