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China Blocks YouTube Over Tibet Videos
Posted by
Zonk
on Sun Mar 16, 2008 04:07 PM
from the stopping-the-signal dept.
from the stopping-the-signal dept.
Screaming Cactus writes "Internet users in China were blocked from seeing YouTube.com on Sunday after dozens of videos about protests in Tibet appeared on the site. 'Chinese leaders encourage Internet use for education and business but use online filters to block access to material considered subversive or pornographic. Foreign Web sites run by news organizations and human rights groups are regularly blocked if they carry sensitive information. Operators of China-based online bulletin boards are required to monitor their content and enforce censorship.' The blocking added to the communist government's efforts to control what the public saw and heard about protests that erupted Friday in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, against Chinese rule."
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Human Rights and a Code of Conduct for China's Web 108 comments
Ian Lamont writes "Human Rights Watch is preparing a code of conduct that specifies how major Internet service providers and portal operators should deal with Internet censorship in China. An officer for the group expressed concern that the Chinese government is 'setting the standard on control of the Internet' and also singled out international companies working in China for preemptively blocking access in 'anticipation of requests from the government' rather than waiting for orders from Beijing to block access. China has recently blocked YouTube following the posting of videos about the Tibetan protests, but has been unable to completely stop the flow of Tibet-related information in and out of China, thanks in part to bloggers and others using spam tactics to bypass Chinese filters."
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New "Iron Curtain" for Russian Internet 239 comments
Dionysius, God of Wine and Leaf, points out a story about the Russian government's interest in expanding anti-extremism laws to include the blocking of websites and ISPs. The laws would match those already in use for the country's print media. Russian internet users may soon be forced to deal with the same issues facing Chinese citizens. Quoting:
"An official at the Russian prosecutor's general office, Vyacheslav Sizov, told the Russian-language newspaper Rossiiskaya Gazeta that any web site that is determined to host what he terms 'extremist material' would be blocked from being accessible from within the Russian Federation. Given the Putin government's history with the media, 'extremist material' may be very broadly interpreted as any content unfriendly to the interests of the Russian government."
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Apple: China Blocks iTunes 325 comments
eldavojohn writes "If you like iTunes and you are one of the billion people residing in China, you may have noticed that you no longer have access to the eight million songs on it. An album, 'Songs for Tibet' was downloaded more than 40 times by Olympic athletes as a sign of solidarity for Tibet's cause. Ironically, this compilation had songs criticizing the 'Great Firewall of China,' and that is the very thing that prohibited these songs from reaching the Chinese public. Artists on the compilation include Alanis Morissette, Garbage, Imogen Heap, Moby, Sting, Suzanne Vega, Underworld and others."
Additional coverage is available at Computerworld. Earlier this year, China blocked Youtube and other video services for similar reasons. More recently, the Chinese government detained a technologist who planned a pro-Tibet demonstration.
[+]
China Blocks YouTube, Again 127 comments
cryfreedomlove brings news that YouTube has once again been blocked in China. The Google-owned video site was censored in China last year because of videos about the protests in Tibet, and that may be the impetus behind this latest restriction. According to a New York Times report,
"'The instant speculation is that YouTube is being blocked because the Tibetan government in exile released a particular video,' said Xiao Qiang, adjunct professor of journalism at the University of California, Berkeley... Mr. Xiao said that the blocking of YouTube fit with what appeared to be an effort by China to step up its censorship of the Internet in recent months. Mr. Xiao said he was not surprised that YouTube was a target. It also hosts videos about the Tiananmen Square protests and many other subjects that Chinese authorities find objectionable."
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How long... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:China = Muslim? (Score:4, Insightful)
So just like any sane person from a modern free democracy, there is no fear that the autocrats ideals 'won't hold water', there is an absolute certainty that the autocrats ideals 'don't hold water' and the only way they can hold back freedom and democracy is with carefully managed lies and the point of a bayonet.
The current Chinese governments insists it has the right to use military aggression to maintain and obtain dominance over countries based upon the flimsiest of historical ties, so Tibet, Taiwan, and even Korea as well as some other regions suffer under oppression or the threat of future aggression.
That the Olympics should be held in autocratic countries at all, points to that fact that Olympic sized profits and marketing deals take precedence over the ideals and values of amateur athletes from the past. Although it already appears that some athletes are bowing out rather than taking the risk of exposure to carcinogenic pollutants prevalent in the Beijing environment.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
btw, a greeting from the Red China
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
the news on it is not up-to-date like here..and commentors also are fewer than here. that's why it not well known to many of my folks.
psiphon (Score:3, Informative)
http://psiphon.civisec.org/ [civisec.org]
Is blocking even necessary? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Is blocking even necessary? (Score:4, Interesting)
Take the example of Russia: the elections were cheated (some small towns were 105% pro government...), but even perfectly fair elections would probably show that a majority (like 55%) think Putin was a good leader. But thinking that 95%, of the country agrees with the government will make you more prone to agree yourself, whereas at 55% you'll start beleiving that alternatives exist.
I could also speak about Fox in the US, and the necessity for antiterrorist laws.
Parent
Re:Is blocking even necessary? (Score:5, Insightful)
You may consider it propaganda, but nobody is forcing you to watch it, and nobody goes around shutting down liberal stations, arresting liberal TV sponsors, or shooting liberal journalists. If anything, Fox is against the kind of socialist media controls and regulations that would allow the Russia-type abuses in America.
How you think Fox News resembles anything in Russia is beyond me.
Parent
Re:Is blocking even necessary? (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re:Is blocking even necessary? (Score:4, Interesting)
As I talked to people in China while I lived there 2003-06, most people know about democracy of the Western world; they do complain their country's lack of democracy, but at the same time, they believe it does not necessary make things better and it is only something good to have in the future when the country gets prosperous. Think about it, they do have a point. Which of the following democratic countries (at least more so than China) are much better off than China: India, Mexico, Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, and many easter European countries? These countries are not doing better in terms of corruption, equality, development, environment protection, education, health care, etc.. How do they fare comparing to Singapore and Hong Kong, both of which have little democracy to speak of?
Their belief is that democracy won't work unless the country has reached higher level of prosperity -- i.e. massive middle class, otherwise democracy could be damaging.
Parent
Re:Is blocking even necessary? (Score:5, Interesting)
China is barking huge, and its population is equally on the large side (Ha! Fear my accurate numerical statements...). They can't just be mostly sheep with a few wolves running things.
I've known quite a few Chinese students, courtesy of the US making it harder for Chinese students to study there. This is great, it's brought vast, vast amounts of cash in from China to universities in the UK, thanks for that one guys..
Anyhoo, these Chinese people, while here, have just the same net access as anyone else, and they are for the most part, belonging to the middle to upper classes in China. Just the sort of people you'd think they'd want to keep ignorant (middle class people have started all revolutions in modern times), and yet they make no effort to do so.
Doesn't quite map, does it...
It seems to me we have a large amount of 'we don't really understand what the fuck is going on in China', that frequently gets combined with a bunch of preconceptions which are probably quite inaccurate.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This story from the International Herald Tribune [iht.com], while specifically about Hong Kong, seems to illustrate the concept:
Re:Is blocking even necessary? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ok then, can it be argued that the way the US treats Cuba is in any way still appropriate? How much have the people of Cuba suffered because the US won't relax its embargo?
I mean, yes, they fucked up... IN THE SIXTIES!!!111one.
Seriously, shouldn't we be able to move on?
If you ask me, that's what's kept Castro and his friends in power for so long.
The point is, China isn't alone in acting stupidly towards other countries. It doesn't excuse them, but lets keep a sense of proportion about this.
Parent
Absolute Moral Consistency Is Not A Prerequisite (Score:4, Insightful)
More to the point, no one is blocking Texan access to the net, or anything else for that matter. Texans, and Mexicans, are fully aware of their history. The Chinese people are not aware of Tibet's recent history because the government controls the media and their access to the net.
Besides, Mexico acquired Texas by force from Spain, which had acquired it by force from any number of indigenous peoples, who, in turn, were often at each other's throats. How far back do you want to go? Few of us, if anyone, live on land that was not forcibly taken from someone else at some point in history.
Parent
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I think some of it is down the fact that you can get by pretty good in China these days, if you keep your head down. If you get involved in politics, you may end up facing retribution, sometimes exposing your family. Chinese politics is often frighteningly bloody, perhaps because the stakes are so high; governing 5x as many people as live in the USA must weigh heavily.
The missus, well she displays total apa
you probably talked to Han Chinese (Score:4, Informative)
As you might expect, you get different views on this issue if you talk to Han vs. non-Han Chinese citizens.
Parent
Then think about it more (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
GooTube (Score:2)
More proof of chinas real goals (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:More proof of chinas real goals (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
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This is true. However, short of having the Olympics in Scandinavia every time, it's really hard to see where better alternatives exist. The next Olympics are in London. The UK has more breaches of the right to privacy than any other country on Earth. Theoretically it has a free press -- bu
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Try reading the Olympic Charter [olympic.org] - there are principles (idealistic perhaps) that everyone connected in any way to the Olympics has to agree to: "respect for universal fundamental ethical principles"
The Olympics might not always live up to the ethical standards it sets itself, b
At least it's competent blocking (Score:2)
urgh (Score:4, Interesting)
Read all three parts of it, the author summarizes both sides of the issue in order for people to see that the Tibet issue is much more than just a communist regime bullying an occupied region, for example:
I know I might be modded offtopic but the discussion of Chinese censorship of Tibet videos will no doubt lead to the discussion of Tibet vs China itself. I'm just asking everyone to please form their opinion after looking at both sides of the issue, and how each side feels about it. Try not to base your opinion solely on just what you hear news.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
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I don't get your point. (Score:3, Insightful)
Store and forward peer to peer over bluetooth (Score:5, Interesting)
Walk past someone in the street and your phone syncs it's "newsgroups" with the other phone. The smartphones around these days are coming with 2Gb of storage and 300MHz processors. More than 100,000 are being purchased per day in China.
Unimpressed (Score:2, Informative)
craziness (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone want to help me mod these comments down, and rate these videos up?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Anyway, did my modding there, now I have to wait.
Re:craziness (Score:5, Interesting)
One of the reasons I am wary of this whole Tibet issue is that China happens to be the West's main economic rival, and now it is convenient for Western governments to support the Dalai Lama's cause. The Dalai Lama is not a democratically elected leader, and pre-1949 Tibet was not exactly the merry free independent country you see in Hollywood depictions. Most of the Tibetans were serfs and enslaved in all but name, serving the religious aristocracy of the Lamas.
As long as China was an ally of the US against the Soviet Union, you did not hear much about Tibet or the Dalai Lama. Gone the Soviet Union, grown the Chinese economy, and hey presto! Here is a flurry of Hollywood movies designed to show just how ugly and mean the Estasians are, since Eurasia has always been our ally—right?
See, one of the downsides of reading "Manufacturing consent" by Chomsky is that I start to see unsettling patterns like this one: a piece of news is convenient for the government, that piece is spun in the best possible way for the government by the same press that should be the government's watchdog. Of course it happens as well in China: I read some CCTV Web pages with the predictable pro-China spin.
Now, where is the truth anyway? Well, obviously some Tibetans are quite angry. Some Tibetans have been assaulting Han Chinese [guardian.co.uk] (so much for the Buddhists who never raise a finger in violence), because of the rivalry between ethnic groups. So, as far as I can see, this is an issue of a group of people not liking another group of people, spun by every external party in their favour: the US say the Chinese are evil and the Tibetans are peaceful protesters, the Chinese say they are only criminals, and everyone else says whatever is most convenient for them.
China has encouraged immigration of Han Chinese into Tibet for a long time, and the privileged Han are an obvious target for racial hatred for the underprivileged Tibetans. What the Chinese should have done is to follow the good old way to deal with separatism: throw money at the problem. Tibet has a ludicrously small population compared to China (not even three millions), and China could afford to subsidize separatism to death. That's what Italy did to fix the terrorism problem in South Tyrol, and, guess what, it worked just fine.
Parent
any chinese comments? (Score:4, Interesting)
("if we get some chinese comments, perhaps people here can translate them")
Re:any chinese comments? (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:any chinese comments? (Score:5, Interesting)
Being a chinese , the life is very tough.
,
the fact i can still get on the internet is something gratefully granted by the gov. i wouldn't dare to raise a trouble.
in china, any public voice that does not sound "harmonious" will be "harmonized". everything is for building a "harmonious society".
,
many websites has been "harmonized", which have become a common practice..
youtube,
through some technical means the youtube site can still be reached, but that's only to geeks like me.
Parent
i have written something , but they became dots. (Score:5, Funny)
i take it as a censorship
Parent
Re:any chinese comments? (Score:4, Informative)
Someone already did [blogs.com]:
The above info, plus a great deal of other material well worth spending the time to read, was aggregated [boingboing.net] by boingboing's Xeni Jardin, who since this situation has erupted in Tibet has kept a close eye on the whole thing and provided some very good info like the above mentioned post.
Parent
Olympics (Score:3)
Re:Hiding something? (Score:5, Funny)
I'd encourage everyone to simply null route China's netblocks and enjoy the sudden decrease in criminal activity.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You are over simplifying things. Western provinces can't survive without the East, why do you think so many people from the West travel to the East for work. If they become separate and independent, say goodbye to an open border.
As for Taiwan, they're just as bad as the PRC. Taiwan asserts ownership over all of mainland China (actually this view varies depending on which political party gets elected). Taiwan with its democracy is more corrupt than the CCP, just look at Chen Shui-bian. He would be under ho
Re:Hiding something? (Score:5, Insightful)
I've lived in both China and Taiwan. I was also a Chinese major, speak, read and write Chinese, and have a fair amount of friends from mainland China (both peasants and city dwellers) and Taiwan. I also have a number of friends that are members of the CCP. Does this qualify me to comment?
> As for Taiwan, they're just as bad as the PRC.
Have you lived in Taiwan before?
Taiwan is nothing like the PRC. In the PRC, corruption permeates to even the most petty of bureaucrats, who must be bribed for simple things like marriage licenses and being allowed to continue to farm your own meager plot of land. Seeing the money wasted by mid-level party officials at their 3 hour "liquid lunches" in Beijing (and hearing about it from my friends in the party) was stomach-turning, knowing what the families of my friends were going through as peasants. (My friend's younger sister -- 13 years old -- worked 15 hour days, 7 days a week in a windowless factory to help support her family, and made herself sick in the process.)
Taiwan does not assert ownership over the mainland -- what sloppy thinking! The Nationalist Party asserts that it is the rightful ruling party of all of China, and so desires unification. Other parties' desires and opinions vary.
When the Nationalists retreated to Taiwan, they massacred quite a large number of people they feared were leftists. This was probably Taiwan's greatest human-rights tragedy. But that has been acknowledged and apologized for, for what little it's worth. Don't expect that kind of acknowledgment in the PRC, though, where Tibet has always been a part of China, China never invaded Vietnam, the Korean war started when the US invaded North Korea, and serious human rights violations never happen.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Taiwan's policy of asserting ownership of all China is strictly for polit
Re:thistimei have no sympathy for local mobs in Ti (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why only Tibet? (Score:5, Insightful)
The Tibetans have a charismatic, articulate and eloquent spokesman in the Dalai Lama. Here in the US he's probably the most venerated spiritual leader in the US outside of the Pope or the conservative protestant movement. He's almost the chief rabbi for large swath of American intellectuals who think of themselves as "spiritual" but not aligned with a conservative religious movement and who eschew formal theological dogma.
So, in a way the Chinese leadership is right on the mark when they talk about a "Dalai Clique".
The thing that makes him a tough opponent in this game is that he's so darned reasonable and mild mannered. He's not calling for armed uprising. He's not even insisting on national sovereignty. He refuses to act angry, or even wronged. He just insists that the Chinese leadership should talk, and listen with an open mind.
The thing is, there's a lot about the old Tibetan system that is ugly and bad -- along with much that is admirable and good. The Chinese would love people to think about the abuses of the old monastic system when they think of Tibet. But can't oppose somebody like the Dalai Lama without being nakedly blunt about their own unreasonableness and brutality, which makes everything they do an international embarrassment to their country. And that makes this news.
You're absolutely right, we should be concerned with other places where minorities are oppressed for their religious, cultural, racial or linguistic characteristics. But you can't focus on all the tyrants in the world at once. You focus on the ones that can be made representative of tyranny, in the hope that they some day they will become representative of the futility of tyranny.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
What is wrong with that? Are you saying it's not reasonable for someone to defend themselves?
And interestingly, he apparently wants to kill off retarded children:
Of course, abortion, from a Buddhist viewpoint, is an act of killing and is negative, generally speaking. But it depends on the circumstances. If the unborn child will be retarded or if the birth will create seri
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tribal_sovereignty_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]
Native American tribes have their own land, and can make/enforce their own laws.
I am not sure if other countries you mentioned have similar setups, and of course the deal is not as good as some of the Natives would like it to be, but there is nothing like this in Tibet. China denies that Tibetans even want to be free. Even now they are blocking CNN and Youtube, along with countless other news sources. The goal is not t