I saw the following in a Slashdot post, and couldn’t resist posting it here:
http://images.google.com/images?q=tiananmen+square (”International” Google)
http://images.google.cn/images?q=tiananmen+square (Google China)
See for yourselves…
I actually don’t blame Google for this. It was either accept the government censorship, or not do business in China at all. And would the Chinese gain anything by that? It’s not as if what they already have there is uncensored…
Some people on Slashdot said that Google should have taken a stand and not be in China at all, that the Chinese would become more aware of the censorship because the world’s no. 1 search engine wasn’t available. The thing is, Google is not number one in China. Its market share, there, is quite low - about 25%, from what I’ve read. It simply wouldn’t have worked.
And no censorship is perfect. It’s still possible that Google will make it possible for some Chinese to become more aware of the truth about their regime, and of what the rest of the world is like.
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i’m uncertain about this. one the one hand, you have a lot of people upset about google bowing to the coercive censorship pressure of the chinese government… but then you made the point yourself - the chinese government is going to do what it wants to do, whether google is there or not. at least they can lead the chinese people to some web content that is perhaps “unsavory” (in the minds of the chinese government) than none at all, and provide a valuable service besides. on the other hand, it’s hard to hold in high regard a company that will provide ANY service this valuable to a government that is not interested in protecting the basic human rights of its citizens. but then going back the other way, considering hte chinese record of intellectual property right infringement, there’s nothing to say the chinese wouldn’t just steal the google technology and do it on their own if their hand is forced.
it’s a complicated issue. i tend to grant google the benefit of the doubt in this one for two reasons - (1) they’re a corporation, with a responsibility to their shareholders. they’re looking out for #1 and since when is that a crime? and (2) out of all of the major search engines in THIS nation (USA - i know you’re from somewhere else, i think france?), google was the ONLY major search engine to DENY the US government access to their records, which gains them a big helping of respect in my book.
anyway, take care!
Total control is the heart of “state properties” dogma.
Ass kissing is a pillar of “capitalist” dogma.
Ass kissing controllable google is the result of adaptation. Face it!!
I’ve worked in a company that was trying to do business in China and it was basically impossible unless we were government affiliated with Japan.
Now China, being the fastest growing economy in the world right now, might seem stupid for not just going along with Google, THE best search engine. But I think that China is basically clinging to the fact that they ARE the fastest growing economy, and they just don’t want to change ANYTHING about that.
What struck me was that no one questioned the censorship done in the US or other western countries… That we accept as “proper” censorship…
If I were a betting man, and expected to live a long life, I’d personally bet of China for two reasons:
1. They are moving towards freedom while the west is moving away from freedom at a breaknexk pace.
2. The chinese largely ignore their government, and different levels of governemnt ignore higher levels of government. When asked in private about some law we are told about here, you will find chinese often answering “That is government. It has nothing to do with me.”