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Apple Removes NYTimes App in China, Shows How Far It Is Willing To Go To Please Local Authority (theguardian.com)
Apple has removed the New York Times app from its store in China after a government request, in an example of how far the company will go to please the authorities in its third-largest market. From a report: China operates what is thought to be the largest internet censorship regime in the world, blocking thousands of foreign websites viewed as a threat by the ruling Communist party. Google, Twitter, Facebook Youtube and Instagram are all inaccessible. Apple removed the English and Chinese-language versions of the New York Times app on 23 December, although it was not immediately clear why. "We have been informed that the app is in violation of local regulations," said Carolyn Wu, an Apple spokeswoman. "As a result the app must be taken down off the China app store. When this situation changes the app store will once again offer the New York Times app for download in China."
Whilst Apple and Apple fans love to portray themselves/the company as doing the right thing it's been very clear for a long time they are solely chasing after their bottom line. Their products have for years now been designed to please the largest share of the market with the least possible work or expenditure. The fact they are willing to do anything needed to please a government which could potentially block off a large portion of their market is to be expected.
Who reads NYT anyway..
Just another propaganda machine.. No better than most media outlets in China. We here learned that from the last election, didn't we!!
I would like to understand from Tim Cook why he feels privacy rights need to protected even in the case of terror investigation (I agree they do) but access to information and a free and independent press does not require protection?
Is he simply a legalist, we have laws like the 4th amendment here in the US that protect privacy, but China has no laws preventing the government from acting as a censor so it is fine? There are valid philosophical cases to be made on those lines but I did not hear that rhetoric from him around the time of San Bernardino.
Maybe he is a racist or a nationalist an Chinese people are simply less deserving of basic rights in his opinion?
Maybe his only real guiding principle is money and he simply says and does whatever the situation demands in order to make more of it?
Really though I don't want to dump on Tim Cook and Apple, I could ask the same questions and more of just about every company, and individual that does business in main land China. I think as Americans we need to be asking ourselves some hard questions about why we have been willing to prop up and do business with a nasty, oppressive, lawless, violent communist regime for the past 60+ years?
I think we need to ask not why we have a one China policy but why that one China is not the one with its capital in Taipei! As a citizen of the US I am damn tired about hearing about how great our role in the world is why we sit by and not only tolerate but enable the very worst actors! You can't claim to support freedom and human rights while shoveling money into the coffers of Communists and Islamists.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
They had a real choice. They had, and have, a choice in almost every nation, and definitely WRT doing business in China.
If a country does evil, by law or custom, and further, makes you complicit in that evil, then you don't have to do business there (and you shouldn't, obviously.) The fact that you do means that you have decided that your own goals are more important than whatever the evil consists of. In this particular Apple's v. China v. people case, they want money a lot more than they want freedom of speech. They have laid those cards out quite plainly.
Also, speaking of Apple, they do plenty of "not in our app store" discarding / refusing various applications based on their own biases. This isn't in any way new behavior for them. The only questions really on the table are, (a) is a person aware of this? and (b) will a person tolerate it?
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The NY Times is nothing but a liberal propaganda mouth piece, they have every right to ban it. The NY Times has done everything to hype up their is some HUGE conflict coming between the US and China, which there won't be.