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VoIP Now Technically Illegal In China
ironfrost writes "A recent ruling by China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has declared that VoIP services are illegal, except for the ones operated by state-owned telecom operators China Telecom and China Unicom. According to the article, 'the decision is expected to make Skype, UUCall and other similar services unavailable in China,' and is widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits. Here's a more in-depth story in Chinese (Google Translate version)."
such as Twitter and other forms of social media, they will find a way around to be able to use it...
So even "the commies" are really just tools for the telecom industry.
Now that's a happy little situation right there. I'm glad the FCC just stated, flat-out, that telco operators wouldn't be able to pull that particular shenanigans with services like skype here.
Though really, it's not all that surprising. China's gone for home-grown 'equivalents' of popular overseas services for quite some time--look at their 'facebook' and their 'google' workalikes, all doubtless with more than enough spyware built into 'em to keep an eye on dissidents.
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
Or so they can record and monitor all calls...
In Communist China,
Competition regulates you!
So what do people in China do for fun? According to the news they aren't allowed to do anything. Not meant as a flame, just wondering because we never hear anything good.
The more they tighten the grip, the less productive they will be.
Either the chinese find a way to soften their government, or they will never be the power they could be.
NO SIG
So there's two things established governments do best: protecting and expanding their own power, and protecting the financial interests of the rich and powerful.
Here the Chinese government can protect their ability to surveil all voice comms, while simultaneously protecting the state telecoms' profits.
It's like killing 2 girls with 1 cup!
And despite doing things like this constantly, China is still the darling of all the so-called "free trade" advocates.
Our government and corporations stand idly by while China infiltrates our military, government and corporate networks, commits blatant acts of corporate espionage, places unfair regulations on foreign companies operations within their country and now pulls blatant protectionist laws to stifle competition.
But nothing will be done because China is the largest emerging economy on the planet and no one can afford to pass up a piece of that pie.
Back in the day the US and other nations would be slinging trade embargos left and right and playing hard ball. Today, we're so weak and poor we just bend over and take it.
It is so wonderful to see them grow from Communism to Fascism in such a short preiod of time. .... It warms my heart.
who said that monopolistic corporate greed and paranoid government spying on citizens had to be mutually exclusive?
One major failure in 8 years is crap?
For the majority of users its a very good (and encrypted) solution to keeping in touch with a crystal clear voice channel.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
1. They have a veto on the security council.
2. They make all the stuff the US uses, so five minutes later you have riots in the US because TVs cost $25,000.
3. There are many countries that like them.
>> One major failure in 8 years is crap?
two actually
uptime wise, I would say it is acceptable, tho. The number of times I get busy signals when calling a non busy phone is not. I've had "skype in" for a couple years now and doubt very much i will renew it, as the availability is unacceptable, at least in my area.
I like skype. I don't mind sharing a bit of bandwidth peer to peer wise to make it work. it isn't quite up to speed, tho
No government is stupid enough to throw someone into jail just because he made some calls through some cheaper operator which was only recently declared illegal in some obscure announcement.
but even then i'm shocked by the blatant attempt at money grabbing in this.
reminds me of a recent (chinese) movie called "let the bullets fly". there's a scene very fitting to this news. the head of a bandit camp chides his men, who just raped a woman in front of her husband: "even i would put out the lights when i do this!" the chinese government didn't feel the need.
With no VoIP, will everyone have to play Chinese Whispers?
Take Nobody's Word For It.
HAHAHAHA
Yeah let's see the US "lay down the law" and cut itself off from its cheap goods, cheap labor, waste dumping grounds, financial backers, and oil. This should be entertaining. It'll be like an amusement park sealing itself off from the outside world.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
It's both. China is since quite some time now a capitalist's wet dream with some people getting filthy rich. It's also a state wishing for control and monitoring. Actually both companies and politicians from the west stare at China with naked envy.
Actually, making the last mile a local utility has a lot to recommend it - no locked in monopoly, easier entry for competitors, and better services for consumers. You can also conceivably run servers at home without jumping through insane hoops. Comcast et al. would still exist as service providers of various stripes.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Because free trade isn't about free trade so much as it is a tool with which the rich can bludgeon the poor into working for less than their labor is worth.
This is exactly the sort of situation that Marx was concerned by. The Bourgeoisie forcing the Proletariat to compete with each other to suppress wages so that the Bourgeoisie could have more money.
widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits
either that or one of the Chinese ruling party had a bad experience on chatroulette.
The primary objective is NEVER profit. There is no point in investing energy and time to acquire money and then never spend it on anything. It's what the money is used for that's interesting.
China is still the darling of all the so-called "free trade" advocates.
Ok, can you provide some examples of free trade advocates who consider China their darling?
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
Soon there won't be anything legal in China other than dying.
Well, one does have to read it pretty much all the way through in order to figure out that it’s not meant to be taken literally. That’s asking a lot of some mods.
Distributed Denial of APK: It takes 15 seconds to reply to him anonymously, but wastes tons of his time if we all do it.
Only the names didn't change.
Deleted
Of course, it's just like a Gilded Age America, today!
You realize, of course, that America, today, is in a state of more unbalanced wealth distribution than the Gilded Age robber barons could even have dreamt of?
Dan Aris
Fun. Free. Online. RPG. BattleMaster.
You forgot #3 (which doesn't apply to China, but does to western countries): (3) government is ultimately accountable to the People, who have an election periodically to enforce this accountability and remove government members they feel are not working in their interests.
Of course, elections don't help if your citizens are easily-duped morons like Americans and the system is rigged to prevent outsiders from getting into the political system and the people are too stupid to tell the difference, but in other countries (esp. smaller ones with very high education rates) it seems to work pretty well.
Mussolini would be proud of how far China has come!
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Western countries are not better. Wait a few years and most of the internet restrictions will be implemented here, too. The excuses will be different and of course it will be a total different thing since were are the good by definition.
Like the Google saga started when one Chinese upper echelon member of the Communist Party found a search on his name revealed unsavoury information and declared war on Google - another member may have found their child using VoIP and decided this discount voice comms thingy wasn't going to threaten his personal 80% stake in China Telecom.
According to the article, "the decision is expected to make Skype, UUCall and other similar services unavailable in China", and is widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits
So how's that Communism thing working out for you guys? Are we beginning to figure out that all economic systems are eventually distorted and manipulated to serve the cause of greater government power?
Seriously.
Wow! I never thought I'd see the day when a comment that is so "anti-capitalistic" get modded +5 on slashdot!
The law only covers Phone-Phone and PC-Phone calls. PC-PC and Phone-PC is not affected or arguably a grey area at most.
What China is doing here is actually making the free competition illegal to favor the government approved telecom.
But is it really much different from the United States' ban on private competition to USPS First Class Mail?
When I go to China I turn on the VPN on my iPhone and tether to my laptop, skype, facebook and twitter away :P
Three isn't a provider in China and the 3skypephone uses the phone provider's network to route calls through Skype. If the provider doesn't support Skype's call routing via special numbers, it doesn't work.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
And this matters, why?
Works for me with other VoIP software. Maybe you just don't know how to use Skype services properly?
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.