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Chinese Internet Firms Punished For Permitting Spread Of Political Rumors
First time accepted submitter rover42 writes "Major Chinese sites Sina and Webo 'have been legally punished for permitting the spread of unfounded rumors. Specifically, the report cites unfounded rumors that were spreading like wildfire on Sina Weibo of an attempted coup d'etat happening in Beijing.' The source is the state-run Xinhua." Sadly for the people of China (even if they like it this way), this seems to be in line with the Chinese government's general attitude toward the Internet.
So now not only do they have to police for content, they have to police for truth?? Yikes.
-- Let us endeavor so to live that when we pass even the undertaker shall be sorry. -- M. Twain
Good luck monitoring all traffic on Tencent's networks.
As of almost three years ago, they showed upwards of 990 million registered users, with a peak concurrency of 6.13 million. Somehow I think that number will have risen since, not fallen.
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
...or even news to you, then you have not been paying attention.
And it is not just in line with the Chine government general attitude towards the internet. It is in line with their general attitude towards any public exchange of information. Internet did not change the attitude, it just made it more difficult to enforce.
Now, start looking for some of the same attitude elsewhere. Lots of people want to control information and define the truth. It is just that the Chinese are more obvious about it and more successful than most.
No one would be able to smugly post, "Citation?", after each rumor! Or post a Wikipedia link with an article to the contrary.
The Internet has always been a collection of unfounded rumors. Ever since Al Gore did not claim to not have invented not a non-significant part of it.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
- Someone phoned me and said there's a revolution!
- Quick! Punish the phone company!
That would be like closing MegaUpload because their users shared illegal content.
"Weibo" is the name of Sina's microblogging service ("Sina Weibo") and also the Chinese word for "microblogging." Tencent Microblog and other sites have also come under fire and restricted commenting today.
The crackdown has been a long time coming, as Sina and Tencent, among other online microblogging sites, have basically said that they would be laxer than the government would like in cracking down on online discussion, mostly as a way of building their user bases.
More information about the crackdown and the reaction is at http://www.rectified.name/2012/03/31/and-the-reaction-becomes-the-story/.
The public has no opinion. You might as well point out how many people voted for Saddam Hussein... I think it was over 98 percent.
How likely do you think it is that 83 percent of Chinese people actually agree with internet censorship? And what does that even mean? That something should be censored? I mean, most people are not found of horse-porn or whatever horrible mind searing abomination could conceivably be dredged up by the folks at 4chan. But there is a world of difference between not wanting to see child porn everywhere and agreeing with the systematic domination of all public discourse.
That domination is complete in China. Everything is censored, controlled, tweaked, threatened, bullied, or groupthinked into "order"...
The chinese neither like nor dislike it. They have no right to an opinion either way.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
In other countries, I could talk about a faux coup d'etat all day long (although not necessarily about planning one) and the government would not care a damn.
Different country, different concepts of acceptable censorship.
And I guess we both get to laugh at each other's expense.
America gets high and mighty about another country censoring the Internet. Next it will start criticising other countries for their dependence on fossil fuels, their dysfunctional systems of government, and invading other nations.
There is heavy unrest at the elite level China now, and the authorities are handling it in the typical full-retard fashion with which authority typically handles things in general.
Two weeks ago, Bo Xilai was removed by Wen Jiabao. This conflict has been buzzing all over the news here, and it is profoundly important.
Xilai was a classic Chinese Marxist (think "Cultural Revolution" posters) who was steering Chongqing towards a social democracy. His major contributions included deposing the mafia, which angered the businessmen, and offering low-income housing. Wen Jiabao, on the other hand, is very similar to Deng Xiaoping in that he espouses the newer vision of a "free-market" China, where invisible hands reign and free market is the best path to their prosperity.
The Marxist side of China has been raging ever since, and much of these people have been put on a "terrorist watch list", so to speak.
On the other hand, China still very much has an underground internet presence. You just haven't heard of it. As someone who is living here, I assure you, discourse is far from stifled.
The top 10 countries with the best HR records are
Norway
San Marino
Canada
Belgium
Luxembourg
Sweden
Finland
Denmark
Iceland
New Zealand
Slovenia
I doubt that even all 10 of them put together export as much as China. I think we just would have to stop buying at all.