The new Chinese service at http://www.google.cn will offer a censored version of Google’s popular search system that could restrict access to thousands of terms and Web sites.

Hot topics might include issues like independence for Taiwan or Tibet or outlawed spiritual group Falun Gong.

In seeking to compete more aggressively in the world’s second biggest Internet market — where Google has lost ground to a more popular home-grown search company Baidu Inc. — the company is facing the toughest challenge yet to its corporate mantra of “Don’t do evil.”

In a compromise that trades off Google’s desire to provide universal access to information in order to exist within local laws, Google will not offer its Gmail e-mail service, Web log publishing services or chat rooms — tools of self-expression that could be used for political or social protest…more

It may be the impression of some who look upon the current China-Internet situation that the Chinese government’s strangle hold of the medium happened quickly and recently. Not so.

Here follows some useful background information, courtesy the Human Rights Watch:

Between 1994 and the present, China’s rules and regulations on the Internet became progressively more comprehensive, moving from efforts to regulate Internet business to restrictions on news sites and chat rooms. These regulations give the government wide discretion to arrest and punish any form of expression. For example, “topics that damage the reputation of the State” are banned, but an Internet user has no way of knowing what topics might be considered injurious. As the regulatory framework evolved, the Chinese government shifted primary responsibility for control of the Internet from the Ministry for Public Security to the Internet service providers themselves.

In 1994, one year before the Internet became commercially available for individuals in China, the State Council issued the “PRC Regulations for the Safety Protection of Computer Information Systems” which gave the Ministry of Public Security overall responsibility for supervision of the Internet. According to Article 17 of the Regulations, Public Security is entitled to “supervise, inspect and guide the security protection work,” “investigate and prosecute illegal criminal cases” and “perform other supervising duties.” In February 1996, the State Council issued rules on the connection between China’s domestic network and the international Internet. These regulations began to shift some of the responsibility for control of content to the Internet companies themselves.

Public Security then issued a decree that all Internet users register with a police bureau in their neighborhood within thirty days of signing up with an ISP. Police stations in provinces and cities followed up on this almost immediately. They also set up computer investigation units. In December 1997, Article 5 of the “Computer Information Network and Internet Security, Protection and Management Regulations,” issued by the Ministry of Public Security, states:

No unit or individual may use the Internet to create, replicate, retrieve, or transmit the following kinds of information:

1. Inciting to resist or violate the Constitution or laws or the implementation of administrative regulations;

2. Inciting to overthrow the government or the socialist system;

3. Inciting division of the country, harming national unification;

4. Inciting hatred or discrimination among nationalities or harming the unity of the nationalities;

5. Making falsehoods or distorting the truth, spreading rumors, destroying the order of society;

6. Promoting feudal superstitions, sexually suggestive material, gambling, violence, murder,

7. Engaging in terrorism or inciting others to criminal activity; openly insulting other people or distorting the truth to slander people;

8. Injuring the reputation of state organs;

Other activities against the Constitution, laws or administrative regulations.

Article 8 of the same regulations states:

Units and individuals engaged in Internet business must accept the security supervision, inspection, and guidance of the Public Security organization. This includes providing to the Public Security organization information, materials and digital document, and assisting the Public Security organization to discover and properly handle incidents involving law violations and criminal activities related to computer information networks.

Additional China Internet Censorship Background Information

Earlier this week, The State Council Information Office decreed as follows:

“We need to better regulate the online news services with the emergence of so many unhealthy news stories that will easily mislead the public. The State Council Information Office must give its approval before established news organizations can publish stories from other sources and non-news organizations must also seek permission prior to putting news stories on their sites.”

The China Daily noted: “Sites by news organizations that only carry their own stories must now register at the (State Council’s) main office or provincial information offices. The regulation also spells out that media attached to the central government or directly under provincial governments are not allowed to provide any stories to other online news sites without approval.”

Having already rendered the world’s most populous nation an “Island within the Web” by blocking access to the rest of the Internet, the Chinese Government in 2005 is behaving predictably — following the path of every Totalitarian state before it.

First, you isolate from outside influence, then you homogenize within.

Perhaps, the situation in China is too familiar…

“We’ve seen this all before — no? — just in different places involving different names.

Inevitably, the conflict dissipates, one side (often both) records their righteous victory and commit to their subjective History the virtues of their Cause.

Was not America, herself, once a young Nation, inspired and led by passionate ideals?

It has not escaped my notice… there is such exquisite irony: The United States (Government) is squeezing down on Liberty, afraid of what the Web’s Free Pipes may bring to every home. While, there is China…

… imminently legendary, for understanding better than we ever did, the same Ideals we claimed defined America when we first started out.

Suddenly, I am not so worried for China, or for the prospect of the First Amendment ever being written, ratified, enacted in Chinese.

I am getting quite the vibe, in fact.

I look around — I don’t see anyone so zealous to the exercise of Voice as the Chinese (the Netizens, especially)…

Get some popcorn. Grab a seat. This could be really, really good.

2HP

Shanghai Bans Internet Slang From Classrooms, Publications, Official Documents

SHANGHAI, China Sep 23, 2005 â€â€? So long, “MM,” “PK,” and “konglong.”

The language police in Shanghai, China’s largest city, plan to ban those and other Chinese Internet slang terms from classrooms, official documents, and publications produced in the city, newspapers reported Friday.

“On the Web, Internet slang is convenient and satisfying, but the mainstream media have a responsibility to guide proper and legal language usage,” the Shanghai Morning Post quoted city official Xia Xiurong as saying.

” 在网, 互è?â€?网俗è¯?是方便和满æ„?, 但主æµ?媒介有责任引导适当和法定语言çâ€?¨æ³• ”

Internet chat and instant messaging are hugely popular with China’s increasingly computer-literate youth, who employ an ad-hoc vocabulary of invented, abbreviated and borrowed terms such as “MM,” meaning girl, “PK,” or player killer, for one’s competitor, “konglong” or dinosaur for an unattractive woman.

Despite the move, Xia said there was no reason why the terms shouldn’t be used in other settings.

“Our nation’s language needs to develop, but it also needs to be regulated,” said Xia, chair of the education, science, culture, and health committee under the Shanghai People’s Congress, the city council.

” 我们的国家的语言需è¦?并ä¸â€?显现出, 仅它需è¦?被调控 ”

Xia didn’t say how the ban, spelled out in new language regulations being drafted by the congress, would be enforced.

A random survey of Shanghai newspapers on Friday appeared to show the congress had its work cut out.

“Zhang Yaqin goes to Beijing to ‘PK’ Lee Kai-fu,” the China Business News said in a headline referring to competition between the new heads of Microsoft Corp.’s and Google Inc.’s China operations.

Magic Kingdom comes to China
With an eye on huge market, Disney opens Hong Kong park

By Reuters | September 13, 2005

HONG KONG — Walt Disney Co. officially opened its new Hong Kong theme park yesterday, exporting a piece of the Magic Kingdom to China’s doorstep in a bold bid to gain a bigger foothold in the vast Chinese market.

As a blanket of smog covered the territory, Chinese lion dancers in gold and red emerged from Sleeping Beauty’s Castle to chase away evil spirits and bring good luck to the new business.

‘’China is an important area for us to move forward in and building a Hong Kong Disneyland will certainly introduce everyone to who we are,” Robert Braunstein, senior show program manager for the park, told Reuters. Both the company and the government have high hopes for the park, Disney’s first in China and its second in Asia after Japan.

more china disney story >>

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From a recent Businessweek interview with Hu Zhiguang, founder of Blogcn, one of the leading blog services in China.

Q: What do you think is the biggest difference between the blogosphere in the U.S. and in China?

A: The difference between China and the U.S. is quite large. The U.S. has many famous bloggers, and they have a big influence. In China, because of the political environment problem, it’s not possible to have that sort of thing.

So [Chinese blogs are] more lifestyle- and entertainment-oriented. But Chinese bloggers are more willing to express themselves than American bloggers. Because elsewhere in America there’s more freedom, so the methods of expression are more [varied].

Q: But, as you say, the political environment in China means there’s a lot that people can’t express in their blogs.

A: Sometimes there are people who write about Taiwanese independence and the Falun Gong.

Q: And what happens when they try to do that?

A: We set up keywords for our programs, like “Falun Gong,� and when you type in those keywords, you cannot post them. It just shows up as stars. Everybody has that.

Q: People can avoid using those words, though.

A: The problem exists, but it’s not a big one. We can immediately fix it, and it’s not a problem. Maybe there are some words that aren’t in the keywords, but if they’re published, they don’t fit the content. Then the Internet police will call us, and we will delete it within 24 hours. If it lasts on the site too long, then maybe it will make some trouble. Maybe I will have to go to the police station.

Q: How often have you had to do that?

A: That has never happened. The phone calls seldom happen -– only four or five times in two years. We have a specialist who takes care of this. These people [who post the forbidden things] are not real bloggers. They know it will be deleted.

Q: There has been a lot of talk in the past few months about the Chinese government requiring bloggers who don’t use sites like yours to register their real names and contacts if they want to keep on blogging. How difficult is it for Blogcn users to set up their blogs?

A: To set up a blog you have to give your password, e-mail address, blogger name, and choose a template. It’s very easy. We don’t need their phone number, their address, their ID number. [The environment] is much better than before. Step by step, it’s getting more open.

Suuuuuure.

Well, this may shed some light on the Sister Furong Jiejie Story.

And it helps me (an American wholly unacquainted with censorship — lol) understand what it might be like to be at ideological odds with the State.

Furong Jiejie Picture Gallery

2HP

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I’m not sure why. But, I feel optimistic, all of a sudden…

I really do have the highest hopes for this Incredible Medium.

I think if we can overcome our fear of “open doors” — if we permit ourselves simply to “go through” — we will come out the other side much more than we were going in, much more than we are now.

We have come again to a Frontier. And, as many times before in our human history, when faced with an Uknown Territory, the world is divided. Those who want to go / Those who want to stay. Those who want things to change / Those who want them to stay the same.

For over a year, I have been working with all my energy to keep the Internet as open and free as possible. I work in an industry that owes its existence to the First Amendment — to Free Speech. All the research I have done, but more importantly, my instinct tells me the Web is going to transform our species in a very positive way. If we have the courage.

To my eyes, the signs are everywhere. I see us (as groups and as individuals) finding Identity and Voice online, for there being online a kind of Freedom we wouldn’t otherwise have in our lives.

I have never been to China, nor am I in any way a student of China.

But I feel something happening there. I feel their anxious excitment, their eagerness to rush through the door. It has had a powerful effect on me, for which I am very grateful. This blog is my way of expressing that gratitude, of extending a friendly hand

Welcome.

I also want as much as possible to make this site an “Outpost of Free Speech“. Think of it as a little shack I am building far away from what is familiar to me. I’m going to spend some time here everyday, and simply be present here — with many of my favorite ideas in tow, but with a readiness to acquire new ideas as well. Please visit me.

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我相信互�网也许创造一新自�为人

我认为互è?â€?网扩大什么它æ„?味是人的– ä¸?æâ€?¶ç¼©å®ƒ

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美妙事

2HP

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