With all the coverage in the news about how high tech internet firms are operating in China I was just wondering what your take on the situtation was. So the question is should google and the other internet firms censor themselves in china?
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With all the coverage in the news about how high tech internet firms are operating in China I was just wondering what your take on the situtation was. So the question is should google and the other internet firms censor themselves in china?
It's a funny thing, and I've said this before, that Google will bend over for the red Chinese and censor information but when it comes to helping our gov't they flat out refuse. And keep in mind what our gov't asks for is nowhere near as extreme as what the Chinese have asked for.
Screw Google, I hope their stock tanks.
As reprehensible as it may seem to us, if that is the "Chinese" laws then if Google or anyone else wants to cash in on their booming economy, then they will follow them, otherwise someone else will step in and provide the service they want......it's the American way....
Hopefully after time the society in China will undergo a fundemental change and embrace "Democracy" (it will occur, you cannot continue to censor everything, eventually word gets out) and then at that time everything will be equal...
Don't forget they (the Chinese) are being allowed to Host the next Summer Olympics, as far as I am concerned, based upon their human rights violations, they should never have been allowed to win the bid to host the games in the first place.....but too many people saw $$$$ and will overlook the many warts that China has and instead take it out on Fidel (Cuba, that stonghold of anti democracy, and all things that bug the sh*t out of Americans)......Can you spell H.y.p.o.c.r.a.c.y
Korpdeath,
The big differance is that in the states your right to privacy is protected by the constitution. In China it is not. For me it is not hypocracy (thanks for writing it dalek i would have got it wrong otherwise :D) it is following the law of the land. Also as Dalek points out they are a buisness and I am fairly sure that if they refused to set up in China their shareholders would have a lot to say about it. Also google is not alone in China but it is alone in letting the people know that they are being censored.
Where was the outrage when Microsoft and yahoo gave over information to the Chiness goverment on human rights activist. Then again as you said the goverment asked for the information so it should be given.
In the US they will keep their business and not be kicked out of the country for saying the government is wrong. If they want to keep business in China, they have to follow chinese rules. They are just like any international business, you have to play the right game in every country or you won't last long. In the US, they know that people have a right for their information to be private, and they are trying to respect their customer's rights. In China, the customers have no such rights, therefore, Google simply follows the laws set by the government.
Maybe after we get a dictatorship established here,
people will say "Oh, well, it's the law of the land.
You gotta obey the law" as they haul your next door
neighbor off to prison for voting for the losing party
in the last election.
Why is it that the people ranting about a "Bush dictatorship"
seem to be so casual about real dictatorships elsewhere?
The hypocrisy isn't just in the corporations. It is everywhere.
:cool:
I can't believe that 3 people actually voted for yes. The only two things I stand proudly for is Freedom of Speech and Privacy. Both of which are getting trampled on. The purpose of the censorship is keep the public iggnorant so that they can control (through arcane morals and values) control of the masses. Look at the Catholic church during the mid-evil ages. While China can't burn the books, they have found a way to censor them.
As for here in the ole US of A......people need to quite paying attention to what the hell other countries are doing and pay attention to whats happening at home. Our privacy and civil rates are disappearing at an ever increasing rate and all you ever see is an occasional AP story on it.
I just recently bought a book on the Patriot Act with commentary and you would be amazed at what the hell they are doing. Not to mention whatthey are building up to. Can we say "Police State". I know that might be a little extreme but you have to look at possible evolutions of each decision.
YOUR CIVIL RIGHTS ARE BEING TRAMPLED ON!
Ry
The freedoms we enjoy won't happen over night in China. I wish it would happen quicker, but it's going to take awhile. The absolute worse thing the Red Leaders could have done is have the Olies there. That will speed up the process. And with Google getting their foot in the door....who knows maybe that will help as well. But seriously it will be a decade before we actually see any noticeable results. Regardless it will happen.
cheers
Ignorance of another countries laws will get you a day pass for the local jail.....ignore China for a second, say you are a visitor to oh Italy, and on every second Friday of each Month, it is against the law to pick your nose in Public, now your over there as a tourist, happily snapping pictures and it just so happens that the day you are doing this is the second Friday of the Month and you pause to pick a great big booger out of your nose.......sirens go off and the local cops bust your ass....Quote:
I can't believe that 3 people actually voted for yes
Point of this story is.....you are a guest in this country, however you will abide by our laws.....and if you break them, then have a number for a lawyer handy.You can dislike the laws, but they are their laws....
I respect the soverignty of a foreign nation, I may hate their human rights abuses, but I respect their place on this planet, you and me cannot change the way China conducts itself, it will be done internally and over time....
Google is a business, not a Human Rights organization. Last time I checked, businesses only had profit in mind, not civil issues.
You can respect them as businessmen, but you don't have to respect them as people.
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I respect the soverignty of a foreign nation, I may hate their human rights abuses, but I respect their place on this planet, you and me cannot change the way China conducts itself, it will be done internally and over time....
I have to disagree. This is a country with atrosious human rights violations. Not to mention sacrificing the benefits of the individual to hold onto arcane and overbearing form of goverment. The whole purpose of a goverment, IMHO, is to encourage social and educational progress among its citizens.
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Google is a business, not a Human Rights organization. Last time I checked, businesses only had profit in mind, not civil issues.
This is one of the worst statements that I hear all the time. Do not take this as an attack on you ,only that mindset. Everyone person, goverment, and buisness as a moral obligation the rest of the world. I mean, you truly don't believe this do you?
An example is all these buisness outsourcing to 3rd world countries so that they could pay them a 1/100th of what would they have had to pay here. Some might say that at least their bringing work to these countries. They are taking advantage of the citizens of these countries by exploiting the poverty stricken society.
There are several companies that have taken the moral high road at some profit reduction. Starbucks utilizing the National Minority Supplier Development Council to ensure that profits do reach the growers of their beans. While they surely could have taken advantage of the farmers and forced them to sell @ much lower prices. Instead, of the cost of profit, they pay higher rates per kilo.
So your saying Mao Tse Tung when he started the cultural revolution (mostly to kick out the corrupt foreign business people back then) was wrong......if we are talking about human rights abuses for China then what is state controlled executions?, China does it, Saudi Arabia does it and oh yeah so does the US of A.....Quote:
I have to disagree. This is a country with atrosious human rights violations. Not to mention sacrificing the benefits of the individual to hold onto arcane and overbearing form of goverment. The whole purpose of a goverment, IMHO, is to encourage social and educational progress among its citizens.
I agree governments should be in place to protect and bring their citizens along and benefit from the spoils of their labour.....but that's ideology not reality.....
Why did we (all of us) allow China to host the next summer olympics....."Money" lots of it.....right now, today I heard on the radio that the US is so in debt to foreign money that if (China is one of them) they decided to call in their loans, the US would be up sh*ts creek without a paddle.
So if you want to lay blame around for why China is allowed to carry on the way it does, call up your rep and ask him/her,,,change for China will come about in good time...if anything I applaud Google for at least being up front about it...2 reasons.. 1) they are protecting those individuals who may voice dissent via a blog from themselves, because sure as sh*t the Chinese Governement will demand Google's records. 2) Google is basically protecting their own Butts, in case of any violations by citizens of China (check with their lawyers).
We (the world) have been trading with most countries that have abysmal human rights records with one eye open and the other shut for so long that the big corporations are the ones (lobbyists) that control who goes in and who doesn't...you don't think that Google is not greasing someone's palms as we speak...
Big business is worth more then the actual cost of a human being today.....and the thirld world is ripe for exploitation, has been for years and always will be...
My point about soverignty is valid...you nor anyone else can dictate to me how I may run my country, if I am a madman (Kim.Hussein,Kadaffi,Amin,Ayatollah,etc) then remove me or open my country up to capitalism, eventually I will succumb to the needs of the people (Russia)..If Cuba were opened up to foreign trade, Fidel would be out in a heartbeat, the only reason he isn't is because of the twits in little Havana Miami, who lost land when Fidel took over the country, away from the Mob and illigal land owners.....It's all about coin.....every country has to be able to look in the mirror first before you cast the proverbial stone.....China will become quasi democratic, it's inevitable, they can not, not bring about reforms if they want to be considered a major money player in the world.....
If you think the US is above human rights abuses, then you need to relearn your own history and maybe talk to the original North Americans,(Indians) it's the same here in Canada, and it's the same in Australia....
The Laws of other countries take precedence over whether you agree with them or not.....
A slight flow of capitalistic corporations into a country like china will eventually lead to its dictatorship. If google pulls out of china entirely, the chinese people are worse off in the end.
If we consider it in terms of our standards of human rights and the Universal declaration on Human Rights then they should not be diluted or nulled for comercial reasons. The west is more progressive and a humane society than China, we should not sell our principles and standards to a regime that is perpetually violating human rights.
Are our standards of all men are equal (unless they live in China, Afanistan, Iraq etc) to be sold to the Highest bidder and Tyrants if Google or Microsoft so decide? We either exercise those principles or they become worthless and ineffectual. The oppressed in China must surely feel abandoned when after all our clap trap about the protection of Human Rights we have sold thiers over the internet.
I have this unexplainable urge to comment on this...
Yes, I can - obviously, you can't :pQuote:
Originally posted by dalek
Can you spell H.y.p.o.c.r.a.c.y
China is going to be the center of the world (and more than likely the superpower in a couple of years) - they're screwing us with our pants on and the government keeps giving them bonuses for doing so.
Free-trade agreements, my ass... The Koreans sell cars here (KIA), and they pay 10 times less taxes on importing them than US car manufacturers do exporting their cars to Korea. The same goes for China (expect to see something called the Chery in less than two years, for far less than anything an American company can ever do).
Boeing has great news: "We got a contract for selling planes to the Chinese for $19 billion!" - what they forget to mention is that the contract also stipulates that Boeing is forced to have a bunch of parts made there, worth a lot more than $19 billion.
The trade deficit with China is enormous (probably somewhere around 1/100) - the US government is, with their free-trade agreements, effectively funding the Chinese government. Google would be stupid not to go there, because everybody else is - thanks to all the "free-trade agreements". We're giving them all of our money, we're outsourcing everything, and we're giving them all of our knowledge. And the companies giving them their money, outsourcing there, and giving them their knowledge have to do so, thanks to this government...
Don't blame Google, blame "free-trade agreements" - and rename them to "being-screwed-with-our-pants-on-agreements" - CAFTA, anyone?
For those that scream the government is trampling on our right to privacy, you have to realize that we, as US citizens, have NO right to privacy. Tell me where in the Constitution does it say we have the right to privacy? The only thing we have is the Privacy Act, which is pretty vague in describing what it protects us from and the government knows this and takes advantage of this. What we really need is for the privacy act to be reviewed and revised. Until then there really is nothing stopping the government from doing what they are doing, espeically now since the government has the Patriot Act...
Damn....my spellchecker went on the fritz...thanks for pointing it out... :p I'll be sure to get it fixed...:-)Quote:
I have this unexplainable urge to comment on this...
quote:
Originally posted by dalek
Can you spell H.y.p.o.c.r.a.c.y
Yes, I can - obviously, you can't
Hi, I really don't want to give an opnion on this because frankly, I just don't care.Quote:
Originally posted here by dalek
Damn....my spellchecker went on the fritz...thanks for pointing it out... :p I'll be sure to get it fixed...:-)
But I wanted to throw this out there into the discussion... since spelling was brought up:
Also, I looked into this and it is still true. It hasn't been sensored yet. I did a search on images.google.cn for Tiananmen (correct) and one for Tiananman (incorrect). Take a look, interesting stuff.Quote:
China's Internet-filtering rules block unwelcome search results -- but only if they're spelled correctly.
Found at: http://money.cnn.com/2006/01/30/tech...0130/index.htm
SAN FRANCISCO (Business 2.0) - Google (Research) is getting lambasted online for its new policy of accommodating China's Internet-censorship rules. But with its new Chinese search engine, Google.cn, Google isn't living up to its reputation for technical wizardry. Paul Boutin points out on his blog that if you search for "Tiananmen," you get peaceful photos of the Beijing square -- but if you search for common misspellings like "Tienanmen," "Tianenmen," or "Tiananman," you get photos of tanks. (Full disclosure: Paul's a good friend of mine, but I hadn't seen anyone else make this observation.)
-Deeboe
Sorry for dropping out of topic but put two discs out in my lower back. Anyway, since my post there has been a whole hullabalu about some Danish cartoon sketches, which as wrong or inflamable as they maybe, what is becoming evident is that our right of free speech is being erroded by yet another faction. In the name of god or allah they are calling for massacres and beheadings and all sorts of violent responses, all rather excessive but we are not allowed to say this is imputant and unseemly behaviour, no we are to observe the freaky taboos that others wish to live by and screw our own enlightenment and right of expression. I am not advocating for these cartoons, but its not right that masses of 'god' loving people can march and trash our streets baying for blood and all sorts of gory enjoyments.
My point to return to the china topic, is you cannot reason with the unreasonable and dilute recind or otherwise ignore our own rights and principles. Where is there consideration and respect coming from these quarters for western principles. They want to kill us as infidels or whatever. Well listen up china and the crazy mulahs from the muslim community start respecting our beliefs and then ask us to respect yours we have been too pc with you lot for too long and look at the damage you do with our good nature.
When you were in need we give you asylum, when you were hungry we gave you food, and you blame the west for all your ills. The poor people of the west had it no better but they strived for the freedoms we enjoy and what you want to take from us. Start looking at your own currupt governments and leaders instead of being distracted by them into blaming the west.
dalek you make some good points though that other countries have laws that we should respect --not so ---Germany had once had laws that the rest of the world respected and was the reason given for not giving more assistance to the jews than could have been. We in the west come from various backgrounds and regime that we over threw because their laws were wrong and barbaric. So if some of us did not respect bad laws here is the reason we have our freedoms today so not good logic that we should respect bad laws in other countries, no we should respect those struggling against them not handing them over to be tortured or worse like yahoo did. Thats the kinda respect that I dont repect.
I would also like to thank the spelling police for their watchful eye over the contributors to this forum, your services are so worthwhile. From all of us thank you for taking the time out of your own busy lives to keep our spelling in check. __;)