Looks like you're responding to the first sentence of my post. Take a deep breath, relax, and consider my actual argument for a moment:
a) As I mentioned earlier itself, the Chinese constitution itself talks about free speech, and that, legal definitions notwithstanding, free speech as a moral value as isnt alien to Chinese jurisprudence. In practice, it might be, but as a value it isn't; the preamble explicitly talks about it, albeit with restrictions.
b) I am not saying that corporations should enforce morality or break local law, however unacceptable it might be. Rather, my point was that while Yahoo has little choice but to comply with Chinese law, it should nevertheless have made some gesture to explicitly show where it stands vis-a-vis oppression. There is a definite gap between abject capitulation and acting under duress; Yahoo was, I believe, in a unique position to make a strong comment on Chinese authoritarianism, while eventually conforming to law. Rather disappointing that it didn't tell us where it stands on the whole question of freedom. After all, Google did so, while operating within Chinese law.
Bottomline: as I've said earlier itself in the thread on Google, I really don't expect technology, or by extension, corporations, to really bring about effective social change, that'll have to come from within. I however, do expect corporations to have a stand on discomforting elements around them, even if they are powerless in bringing about change.
Now, you apparently being American and all that, you aren't, presumably, open to such a possibility as yet, but for most of us out here on the other side of the world, not everything legal is morally correct.
Were Yahoo's actions legally proper? Of course they were. Were they morally correct? Not a chance. Were they morally correct in a Chinese context, assuming that free speech is one of those catchphrases from the decadent West? Now, that's the most interesting bit here; you see, free speech isn't a right enshrined under the US Constitution alone, but more or less a universal right recognised by most of World's constitutions, including, as you might discover with a bit of a googling, the Chinese one.
Now, I don't know what a company could do to help effectively in the situation, I really don't, and I still support world participation in the Chinese economy, just as I supported Google when it opened up google.cn, but all the same, to presume that helping oppress those who fight for freedom in China is correct just because it is legally required, is definitely not something I can agree with. The least Yahoo (as opposed to a generic nameless company being threatened by the Chinese market) could do was to offer some sort of a protest gesture or something, you know, some sort of a sign telling us that while they support free speech, they have to abide by Chinese law. Google did that; they have refused to open up blogger.com and gmail.com in.cn.
Korea uses CDMAOne. Japan (and other i-Mode networks) uses W-CDMA: FOMA. I subscribe to W-CDMA: UMTS, and to the notion that I'll someday figure out how to use my mobile properly.
Okay, I'm almost out of my depths here:-D, but if I'm not wrong, there's CDMAOne, CDMA 2000and then there's W-CDMA. One of them is the NTT DoCoMo thingy in Japan, the other the network in Korea, and the third, what my SIM-card-enabled, GSM-compatible mobile in Singapore uses. Alas, I don't know for sure which is which; the way I understood it, W-CDMA == DoCoMo, CDMAOne == network in Korea, and CDMA 2000 == 3G in Singapore. But don't go on my word for it.
I'd say it's about the same story here in Singapore, although we're obviously talking of salaries of a significantly less magnitude. I'd say the reason is primarily because.net projects are so niche; while there are a lot of Java projects out there, there are also a lot more Java developers..net, otoh, is still up and coming; it's more targetted, and the community is significantly smaller, so you can always negotiate for more.
Remains to be seen how the situation will fare in the near future.
Replace American/non-Christian with Indian/Hindu in the above post. Sheesh, way to spoil anotherwise self-righteous post. Oh mighty caffeine, where art thou?:-|
Just thought I'd point out that Hindu marriage rites actually allow for same-sex marriages; it's called gandhara vivaha or something like that, and requires only two consenting adults without pretty much anything else. Bears mention, though, that regular marriage, Brahma vivaha, apparently takes precedence over it. That is to say, if you've had a gandhara vivaha and then have a regular, plain-vanilla mangal-sutra marriage, the second one takes precedence. (Or so that Vikramarka fable says, if I remember correctly)
There have been cases of same-sex marriages and cross-dressing gods in the scriptures of course; Ayyappa was born out of the cosmic union between Shiva and Vishnu (both male gods, for those who aren't up to speed on the Hindu Pantheon), and didn't know this until a quick google search, but Bhagiratha, the god-king who brought the Ganga to earth, apparently had two mothers. (source)
(Different matter that the Indian Penal Code is still confused about sex between two consenting adults; in fact, it's one of those interesting cases being fought in Indian jurisprudence today.)
You now know where my sympathies lie; while we can agree to disagree on whether we individually approve of same-sex marriages, the question is this: seeing as it is, that you are not American, as you said, but Indian, does evidence of a general tolerance of same-sex relationships in ancient India change anything about the social structures and civilization that you were talking about?
Incidentally, Google has publically stated that it won't host blogspot in China, because of an apparent fear of reprisals.
Realistically speaking, I doubt if you could say that Google is censoring the internet, seeing that you can, as a matter of fact, search on Google.com from within China, even if your search results might be blocked. To me, Google is just responding to its apparent committments to Chinese law, while at the same time, not quite censoring itself. This is a crucial point, I don't know if American audiences get this, but it's big out here in Asia; consider what Bloomberg and the International Herald Tribune have done in response to muzzling attempts by another Asian government.
Actually, I'd say Google's *written* policy, or at least the way they put it on their blog, is much more responsible than Microsoft's. Google has publically stated that it won't open up blogspot or gmail in China; to me, it shows a well-thought plan to not put itself in the same position that Yahoo was, when it released information to the Chinese authorities that directly contributed to a Chinese dissident's arrest. Microsoft has had no such policy, even as it, apparently, censors its search results just as Google does.
While I agree with you in a broad sense on China's appalling human rights regime, our point of mutual disagreement is here:
Like the article said, the Internet was something new, something that was a new medium that might help bring about a change and bring to light these things
I'd argue that it isn't so. The Internet and other forms of New Media might be revolutionary and subversive, but only in a technological sense, not necessarily in a social sense; always bears to remember that Estrada was thrown out in the Phillipines by, not text messages, but by people on the road wielding those mobile phones. Essentially, technology per se can't bring about social change in any society; it could be an eventual factor, but the core reasons for change have to be necessarily the people themselves. In that context, I'd argue that Google's participation, or the lack of it thereof, would have no effect on freedom in China at all; rather, by not participating, it is definitely hemorraging space to upstarts like Baidu.com, which, I'm sure you've heard, has become one of the top five Internet companies in the world by just focussing on the Chinese market.
However, that said, I think Google can do something about this; I think the right way ahead for Google is to make a customised sort of a search product for people behind oppressive firewalls. Surely, there's some brilliant Chinese dissident on Google's payrolls who, in his 20% project, could work on somehow subverting the PRC's filters? Not knowing exactly how China regulates the net, I can't be specific on the details, but ideally, it'd be something small, quirky and hard-to-catch, perhaps some sort of an automated proxy-server re-router that taps in to useable proxies without governmental censorship.
Incidentally, funny you should mention Yahoo in this context; bears to remember that one of the Yahoo founders is, like most of the other foreign investors in China, Taiwanese. I'm not that familiar with the dynamics of cross-straits politics, but surely, if there's anyone outside China who would be most affected by the Communist Party's authoritarianism, and have had the power to do something about it, it'd be these Taiwanese businessmen?
'coz we publish the largest number of books in English? 'coz we've been speaking English for about as long as you guys have in the US? 'coz there are about 11 million or s people in India who count English as their first language?
I'm saying you seem to be assuming that India's science happens at the expense of other more pressing needs. I happen to think that's not the case; because, we discuss science and science-policy out here on Slashdot to the preclusion of, say, discussing India's bad infant mortality rates, international observers might get that impression.
We're the first country to use satellite technology to improve our agricultural standards. The INSAT series of satellites spawned an entire telecom revolution; we're one of the fastest growing markets for television and mobiles. We also had, what was until sometime back, the most powerful spy satellite in the world; apart from presumably using it for security, I know for a fact that they're used in urban planning.
I'd love to hear more about this inherent "dishonesty" of Indian organisations and how they lead to malfunctioning rockets.
And most of all, ISRO's yearly grant is barely a blimp in the National Budget; I'd be more concerned about wastage in the Public (food) Distribution Scheme than I would be about spending a few extra zeroes for some worthwhile science.
Now then, Slashdot being a tech news site and all that, you'd naturally expect only tech news related to India. For policy discussions on economics or poverty, you'd want to go an economics blog site, or a South Asian news portal; other parts of the site linked here, Rediff.com, have lots of material on that. You could also go to Indian Express, which often has very informed commentary on what you call as third-world issues.
Wait, you didn't think making satellites was all that we were doing, did you?
That said, speaking as an Indian, the positive spin over ISRO is nauseating at times; the Indian press, in particular, loves to fawn over those guys for no apparent reason. I suppose every country needs its heroes and positive-news-generators.
Photography of planes on runways is illegal in many other countries as well, not just India. It is illegal here in Singapore, for instance.
There has been some let-up in the rules regarding aerial photograph though, but I don't know exactly what that is. I understand you can take pics from a plane now, but under certain conditions.
That is after a test, not before. In 1995, the US saw heightened activity in and around Pokhran, and warned India to back off, mostly through a leaked Wa-Po report.
There's more on this in the book Weapons of Peace if you're interested.
Sure, of course; my views on this matter were basically that, while I don't really believe in security through obscurity, there's no reason why India shouldn't be allowed to obscure some imagery, just as the US has been able to. I wasn't really commenting on the story as such, just made a tangential point.
You know, it just occurred to me reading your post, but that's exactly what the Indian army did during the Pokhran II blasts! They studied sand dune patterns in the Thar desert and actually mimicked them during the 20 or so days they were testing nuclear weapons in 1998. Apparently, it was highly successful; unlike 1995, we caught American spy agencies completely unaware of what's going on.
In that context, it is indeed a historical irony that India has had to actively form a security group on this matter.
Slashdot Mirror
a) As I mentioned earlier itself, the Chinese constitution itself talks about free speech, and that, legal definitions notwithstanding, free speech as a moral value as isnt alien to Chinese jurisprudence. In practice, it might be, but as a value it isn't; the preamble explicitly talks about it, albeit with restrictions.
b) I am not saying that corporations should enforce morality or break local law, however unacceptable it might be. Rather, my point was that while Yahoo has little choice but to comply with Chinese law, it should nevertheless have made some gesture to explicitly show where it stands vis-a-vis oppression. There is a definite gap between abject capitulation and acting under duress; Yahoo was, I believe, in a unique position to make a strong comment on Chinese authoritarianism, while eventually conforming to law. Rather disappointing that it didn't tell us where it stands on the whole question of freedom. After all, Google did so, while operating within Chinese law.
Bottomline: as I've said earlier itself in the thread on Google, I really don't expect technology, or by extension, corporations, to really bring about effective social change, that'll have to come from within. I however, do expect corporations to have a stand on discomforting elements around them, even if they are powerless in bringing about change.
Yup, which, incidentally, is also Flock's business strategy, apparently, only they have a tie-in with Yahoo.
Were Yahoo's actions legally proper? Of course they were. Were they morally correct? Not a chance. Were they morally correct in a Chinese context, assuming that free speech is one of those catchphrases from the decadent West? Now, that's the most interesting bit here; you see, free speech isn't a right enshrined under the US Constitution alone, but more or less a universal right recognised by most of World's constitutions, including, as you might discover with a bit of a googling, the Chinese one.
Now, I don't know what a company could do to help effectively in the situation, I really don't, and I still support world participation in the Chinese economy, just as I supported Google when it opened up google.cn, but all the same, to presume that helping oppress those who fight for freedom in China is correct just because it is legally required, is definitely not something I can agree with. The least Yahoo (as opposed to a generic nameless company being threatened by the Chinese market) could do was to offer some sort of a protest gesture or something, you know, some sort of a sign telling us that while they support free speech, they have to abide by Chinese law. Google did that; they have refused to open up blogger.com and gmail.com in .cn.
Korea uses CDMAOne. Japan (and other i-Mode networks) uses W-CDMA: FOMA. I subscribe to W-CDMA: UMTS, and to the notion that I'll someday figure out how to use my mobile properly.
Okay, I'm almost out of my depths here :-D, but if I'm not wrong, there's CDMAOne, CDMA 2000and then there's W-CDMA. One of them is the NTT DoCoMo thingy in Japan, the other the network in Korea, and the third, what my SIM-card-enabled, GSM-compatible mobile in Singapore uses. Alas, I don't know for sure which is which; the way I understood it, W-CDMA == DoCoMo, CDMAOne == network in Korea, and CDMA 2000 == 3G in Singapore. But don't go on my word for it.
I found it strange too, for the few days I was in Korea.
Remains to be seen how the situation will fare in the near future.
Replace American/non-Christian with Indian/Hindu in the above post. Sheesh, way to spoil anotherwise self-righteous post. Oh mighty caffeine, where art thou? :-|
There have been cases of same-sex marriages and cross-dressing gods in the scriptures of course; Ayyappa was born out of the cosmic union between Shiva and Vishnu (both male gods, for those who aren't up to speed on the Hindu Pantheon), and didn't know this until a quick google search, but Bhagiratha, the god-king who brought the Ganga to earth, apparently had two mothers. (source)
(Different matter that the Indian Penal Code is still confused about sex between two consenting adults; in fact, it's one of those interesting cases being fought in Indian jurisprudence today.)
You now know where my sympathies lie; while we can agree to disagree on whether we individually approve of same-sex marriages, the question is this: seeing as it is, that you are not American, as you said, but Indian, does evidence of a general tolerance of same-sex relationships in ancient India change anything about the social structures and civilization that you were talking about?
Realistically speaking, I doubt if you could say that Google is censoring the internet, seeing that you can, as a matter of fact, search on Google.com from within China, even if your search results might be blocked. To me, Google is just responding to its apparent committments to Chinese law, while at the same time, not quite censoring itself. This is a crucial point, I don't know if American audiences get this, but it's big out here in Asia; consider what Bloomberg and the International Herald Tribune have done in response to muzzling attempts by another Asian government.
Actually, I'd say Google's *written* policy, or at least the way they put it on their blog, is much more responsible than Microsoft's. Google has publically stated that it won't open up blogspot or gmail in China; to me, it shows a well-thought plan to not put itself in the same position that Yahoo was, when it released information to the Chinese authorities that directly contributed to a Chinese dissident's arrest. Microsoft has had no such policy, even as it, apparently, censors its search results just as Google does.
However, that said, I think Google can do something about this; I think the right way ahead for Google is to make a customised sort of a search product for people behind oppressive firewalls. Surely, there's some brilliant Chinese dissident on Google's payrolls who, in his 20% project, could work on somehow subverting the PRC's filters? Not knowing exactly how China regulates the net, I can't be specific on the details, but ideally, it'd be something small, quirky and hard-to-catch, perhaps some sort of an automated proxy-server re-router that taps in to useable proxies without governmental censorship.
Incidentally, funny you should mention Yahoo in this context; bears to remember that one of the Yahoo founders is, like most of the other foreign investors in China, Taiwanese. I'm not that familiar with the dynamics of cross-straits politics, but surely, if there's anyone outside China who would be most affected by the Communist Party's authoritarianism, and have had the power to do something about it, it'd be these Taiwanese businessmen?
'coz we publish the largest number of books in English? 'coz we've been speaking English for about as long as you guys have in the US? 'coz there are about 11 million or s people in India who count English as their first language?
I'm saying you seem to be assuming that India's science happens at the expense of other more pressing needs. I happen to think that's not the case; because, we discuss science and science-policy out here on Slashdot to the preclusion of, say, discussing India's bad infant mortality rates, international observers might get that impression.
Attempts at levity apart, point taken, but all I can say is, welcome to Slashdot and Rediff! :-D
I'd love to hear more about this inherent "dishonesty" of Indian organisations and how they lead to malfunctioning rockets.
And most of all, ISRO's yearly grant is barely a blimp in the National Budget; I'd be more concerned about wastage in the Public (food) Distribution Scheme than I would be about spending a few extra zeroes for some worthwhile science.
Wait, you didn't think making satellites was all that we were doing, did you?
That said, speaking as an Indian, the positive spin over ISRO is nauseating at times; the Indian press, in particular, loves to fawn over those guys for no apparent reason. I suppose every country needs its heroes and positive-news-generators.
There has been some let-up in the rules regarding aerial photograph though, but I don't know exactly what that is. I understand you can take pics from a plane now, but under certain conditions.
There's more on this in the book Weapons of Peace if you're interested.
Sure, of course; my views on this matter were basically that, while I don't really believe in security through obscurity, there's no reason why India shouldn't be allowed to obscure some imagery, just as the US has been able to. I wasn't really commenting on the story as such, just made a tangential point.
In that context, it is indeed a historical irony that India has had to actively form a security group on this matter.
11 public holidays + (1 off-day + 1 day medical leave ) every month. Frankly, I'm not happy; will re-negotiate at the first possible oppurtunity.
At least you got the name of the language right, and didn't call it "Hindu" or "Indian" or some shit like that. :-)