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Google Reported Ready To Leave China April 10
A number of readers including tsj5j and bruleriestdenis wrote to alert us to this CNET story: "Google is expected to announce on Monday that it will withdraw from China on April 10, according to a report in a Beijing-based newspaper that cited an unidentified sales associate who works with the company. 'I have received information saying that Google will leave China on April 10, but this information has not at present been confirmed by Google,' the China Business News quoted the agent as saying. The report also said Google would reveal its plans for its China-based staff that day."
So they close up shop there. They are an INTERNET COMPANY!
As long as they aren't blocked, they can still serve those users in China. And if they aren't blocked, they can still charge for advertising to non-Chinese customers.
I asked this before, and everyone said something to the effect of "THERE ARE BILLIONS OF CHINESE" as a reason why Google should stay. But I'm still not seeing it. Google can operate from anywhere. A local presence provides them very little unless they intend to expand some China-specific business/technology, which they haven't done at all (for any country they are currently in for that matter).
I'm a bit worried about workers in China regardless of who they work for.
--Ryvar
Who wants to raise funds to send this guy there?
Official language at Taiwan is mandarin, and the language called Taiwanese is the same dialect used in south of Fujian province. So the most part of spoken language is ok. The writing system is the problem. Taiwan use traditional character set, and mainland China use simplified character set.
There is a spark in every single flame bait point.
GP is justified in his concern. Over a tiff over Australian-Chinese ore trade, China arrested four employees from the Australian firm Rio. Australian officials are banned from the proceedings.
See:
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE62I18V20100319
Google didn't come to this decision because they found their moral compass all of a sudden--otherwise they wouldn't have agreed to play censor for the government in the first place.
Alternatively, like any individual or group, they may have felt, at the time, that they could do some good by operating in China, and then realized, in retrospect, that that simply wasn't the case.
But you're right. It makes way more sense to ascribe sinister, greedy motivations to them. No company can possibly make a mistake...
It's less about greed on Google's part and more about the usual cost-benefit analysis of doing business with China's repressive government. Google just stayed until the disadvantages outweighed the benefits.
(insert witty/esoteric/dumb quote here)