Slashdot Mirror
Can Zuckerberg Leap the Great Firewall of China?
Hugh Pickens writes "The Guardian reports that Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg is in China and has met with Robin Li, the head of Baidu, as he toured the facility of the biggest search engine in China. Zuckerberg has made no secret of his desire to expand in China, where Facebook has been blocked by the government censors' Great Firewall since 2008. On a recent global map of Facebook users, China appeared as a black spot, though it has a bigger internet population than any country on earth. 'How can you connect the whole world if you leave out a billion people?' says Zuckerberg. China already has two Facebook imitators: Kaixin, with 80 million users, and Renren, with 150 million, but these lack the economic clout and global reach of Zuckerberg's company although they do have the advantages of language and cultural awareness, as well as the protection of the Great Firewall. 'If Facebook wanted to enter China, it would not have to change its function, because netizens here are used to copycats already, but it must, like other international internet companies, obey Chinese laws and regulations,' said Hu Yong, a professor at Beijing University's School of Journalism and Communication."
Facebook allows way too much communication and freedom. Both are dangerous to their regime.
Mark ZuckeNberg?? How the hell did so many spelling mistakes slip through the net?
"How can you connect the whole world if you leave out a billion people?"
China's response will probably be something along the lines of "How can you modify Facebook so that we are not only able to censor it but violators are automatically reported to a government agency?" Time and time again it's been demonstrated in China: if you can play ball, you're in.
The quote following the above is pretty indicative of what Zuckerberg fails to understand:
"Our theory is that if we can show that we as a western company can succeed in a place where no other country has, then we can start to figure out the right partnerships we would need to succeed in China on our terms."
So naive. It's that simple, huh? You weren't paying attention when Google went in, made friends with scholars and scientists and was promptly put in their place when the government tired of their novelty?
You're the copycat now, Mark. You are going to go into China thinking that you're are going to turn the tide and you're going to be met with the same immovable wall anyone who has sought to change the PRC has faced. But what you are going to have to do is look at how the Facebook copycats have served up private data and fingering individuals for putting the wrong number in their status update. And you're pretty much going to be told what to do and either you're going to do it or you're going to be back at square one. You're an outsider coming into China so you might as well drop the whole "This is how it's going to change" attitude. You're just going to be embarrassed when you find out that any deviation to their laws and customs puts your right to host a website at risk in their country.
"A western company can succeed in a place where no other country has?" So what are you going to do different? Congratulations, you made friends with Baidu. All that means is now someone can tell you the optimal way to achieve vertical height when the CCP screams "JUMP!"
My money is on you going in there thinking you're going to relax censorship only to find out that you're going to be one of their ultimate tools to enforce it. And then there's going to be this massive pile of money on the table and you can either take that and expand in China by wiping your ass with morals and ethics or you can walk away. I bet you get on your knees and bark like a dog while spinning it as a 'Western company succeeding!' And if you want the most money, that's exactly what you should do!
My work here is dung.
Changed his name, did he?
Yes someone hacked his original facebook account
I know scores of people in China that use Facebook on a daily basis . . . .
Since when does being a Socialist mean 'someone who has a different opinion than me'?
I used to live in China, so I personally know quite a few Chinese people. And loads of them have facebook accounts (and use them regularly) And these aren't people necessarily tech-savvy enough to work around the firewall with proxies, etc...they just use facebook.
So, while I doubt this story is completely wrong or made up, I don't understand. Do they block it in some places and not others? Do I just know a few weird outliers that somehow managed to view it despite it being blocked? Is there something more to the story? I don't get it.
Replying the AC that you might not see due to a score of 0:
Perhaps the great firewal is part myth and FUD spun by capitalist media and governments to suit their own ends and backed up by the chinese who want to show the illusion of control?
No, it's real. When I lived there, there were definitely sites that were blocked. I do (or more correctly, DID) homebrew gameboy advance development, and the best site for GBA homebrew development (http://gbadev.org/), was among the sites blocked, which drove me crazy (really? Why is THAT site blocked?) Various blogs and such were also blocked. As far as I can tell, the firewall is there.
As far as I know, facebook wasn't banned until the 2008 Tibet riot, when facebook was used to rally people to anti-government demonstrations. As said in the summary, a facebook clone, Renren, is extremely popular in China with 150 million users, among other social networking sites such as dating-oriented ones. It has pretty much all the fancy features of facebook plus its own innovations, but it's NOT censored, because i) Most of its users are Chinese. What Chinese government really fears is the connection with foreigners in the case of Facebook and Twitter. Though it sounds paradoxical, most people calling for more democracy and freedom in China are foreigners and Chinese expatriates in western countries, rather than people within China who tend to be rather indifferent. ii) Renren is the product an indigenous company in China. Therefore the government naturally expects that the company is more cooperative and controllable. LinkedIn is obviously also not banned, because its scope is limited to professional activities. It's not likely that people will use it to promote anti-government demonstrations. In short, social networking is big business in China and censorship is very selective.
What you don't understand.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
Furthermore, "two Facebook imitators"!? I'm sorry, have you completely forgotten MySpace and Friendster? Do you consider Wolfenstein a "Doom-clone"?
Try visiting one of the imitators mentioned in the summary and see if you can figure out what makes “Facebook imitators” different from MySpace and Friendster.
Hint: they’re shamelessly copied off Facebook, with different logos.
Distributed Denial of APK: It takes 15 seconds to reply to him anonymously, but wastes tons of his time if we all do it.
"Someone makes a buck and so they must be a god."
Well maybe not a god, but someone to imitate - if you are into buck making.
Zuckerberg wants to get into the Chinese market, but he also wants more cooperation with search engines. Through a cooperation with F*c*book, Baidu could expand outside of China. Double win for Zuckerberg, he always had problems with "don't be evil".
I believe the Chinese government would love Facebook: all those people offering up the intimate details
Perhaps what they'll like most is to get access to some data that is *not* from Chinese citizens. Anyway I don't see how things with China and the West will end well, with both having contradicting rigged rules of the same rigged game, and mountains of weapons and no good intentions. Most companies, and slowly countries, just end up as controlled suppliers of skills, technology, a few parts, all the customers, and a lot of money. "Open markets" were always a rigged game, and just became a fool's game when China plays with their rules.
Build your own energy sources from scratch. http://otherpower.com/