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Censorship The Internet Your Rights Online

China Shuts Down 8,600 Cybercafes 57

Posted by timothy from the welcome-to-china dept.
ThatGuyAZ writes "China has shut down over 8,600 internet cafes in the last two months as a part of a new crackdown on "underage" internet use. The crackdown has also limited access to blogs, and forums, and requires video surveilance of cybercafe patrons. Only in China would a reduction of internet access to the public be called an "education campaign"."
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China Shuts Down 8,600 Cybercafes More

China Shuts Down 8,600 Cybercafes

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  • yeah.. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by hookedup ( 630460 )
    Only in China would a reduction of internet access to the public be called an "education campaign

    Yeah, and in america they call it 'securing your freedom'

    • Re:yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by the morgawr ( 670303 ) on Wednesday April 28, 2004 @03:32PM (#8999771) Homepage Journal
      Yeah, and in america they call it 'securing your freedom'

      Except, fortunately for you, you don't get arrested, tortured, and imprisoned for saying it. Such a situation would not be so if you were in China.

      • Except, fortunately for you, you don't get arrested, tortured, and imprisoned for saying it.

        Allegedly

      • Re:yeah.. (Score:1, Troll)

        by gstoddart ( 321705 )
        Not yet anyway. Some people are wondering about the consequences of some of the current administrations policies though.

        (yeah, call me a troll, whatever)
        • Yup. The current administration holds US citizens and foreign nationals as 'unlawful combatants' supposedly outside of the sway of any court on the planet, and my above posting gets marked as a troll.

          didn't see that one coming, did I?

      • Re:yeah.. (Score:2, Funny)

        by gcaseye6677 ( 694805 )
        Come on now, don't spoil a good anti-American rant with facts.

    • Re:yeah.. (Score:3, Insightful)

      by meta-monkey ( 321000 )
      I suppose they might, if it actually happened. But since Bush's stormtroopers haven't invaded any cybercafes just yet, your freedoms might be safe for a few days more. You might want to go ahead and take your tinfoil hat in for servicing, just to make sure you're ready.

    • Yeah, and in america they call it 'securing your freedom'



      What does this mean? Have their been any actions take in the US to limit internet access, public or otherwise? I'd love to hear a single example.

      • Re:yeah.. (Score:4, Informative)

        by L-Train8 ( 70991 ) <Matthew_Hawk AT hotmail DOT com> on Wednesday April 28, 2004 @07:31PM (#9002483) Homepage Journal
        Um, how about the PATRIOT act? According to the American Library Association's website [ala.org], the law now permits the FBI to compel libraries to produce library Internet use records without a warrant.

        While it doesn't directly close down those library terminals, it is certainly comparable to the Chinese practice of requiring video surveillance of cybercafe patrons. And that goes a long way toward discouraging use of the internet for anything that the government doesn't like.

        • Um, how about the PATRIOT act? According to the American Library Association's website, the law now permits the FBI to compel libraries to produce library Internet use records without a warrant.

          this is a COMPLETELY different issue, as I'll explain below.

          While it doesn't directly close down those library terminals, it is certainly comparable to the Chinese practice of requiring video surveillance of cybercafe patrons. And that goes a long way toward discouraging use of the internet for anything that t

          • Let's also be clear--browsing records are still largely anonymous--at least at all the public libraries I've used computers at--maybe you have a different experience?
            In the King County library system in Seattle, you have to enter your library card number to log onto a library's internet terminals. I don't know what kind of logs the servers store, but there is no anonymity if you have to enter an personally identifying number.

            The difference is PUBLIC and PRIVATE. A library funded by the government is PUB
      • Get your Google cache here [66.102.9.104] and no more limited access :)
  • I realize that China is a repressive government and all. I can understand not letting kids gamble and wanting to keep them away from porn. I even see why they want to restrict acess to non-government controlled media. But what good does keeping those younger then 16 off of the internet entirely accomplish?

  • A Tools of Empire-building (Score:5, Insightful)

    by TwistedGreen ( 80055 ) on Wednesday April 28, 2004 @03:34PM (#8999801)
    "Get 'em while they're young."

    Age restrictions on Internet usage really means limiting the access of dangerous (or unpopular/undesirable) ideas to those who have not yet been conditioned. Like it or not, public schools are an excellent way to instill cultural ideas into a nation's populace. In fact, schools are perhaps the only way to reliably build a nation of any size and maintain a sense of cohesion.

    Schools definitely have their own inherent benefits, but the accessibility of such young citizens is just too good a chance at perpetuating the country's ideals to let pass. I'm not saying that there's a massive and finely calculate effort to 'brainwash' children, but it is undeniably a useful tool of empire-building. This article is an excellent example of that. While China's actions are rather more extreme than anything you'd see in the West, don't think it isn't done here either. It is a very commonly used tool in every 'civilized' nation.

    How many times have you pledged your allegiance?

    • How many times have you pledged your allegiance?



      I went all through public schools--we did it in 2nd or 3rd grade--only one, and as I remember, it was the teacher, not the school. I can't really remember doing it at any other time.

      Besides which, the pledge is a pretty innocuous thing (sans 'God' reference..). liberty and justice for all? I'm ok with that.

  • U.S.A. to China: (Score:5, Funny)

    by Giant Ape Skeleton ( 638834 ) on Wednesday April 28, 2004 @03:35PM (#8999819) Homepage
    "Just for that, we're not going to let you play on our Space Station!"

    :-p

  • I don't let my foolish kids online.

    China tries to limit the number of foolish people online.

    Sounds good to me.

    The way I see it, if you limit Internet use then people will treat it like a preminum, which is what traditional computer usage was, a preminum to be used wisely.

    We should enjoy the "relative" freedom we have now, because the more people who are educated by the FBI and other 3-letter agencies in the United States and around the world, the more people should try to understand the situations (pira
    • Yeah, I know, IHBT.

      Still:

      There are plenty of good reasons for using the Internet. There are plenty of bad reasons for using it.

      The cafe's aren't being closed because of how the Internet is used -- at least, not along the traditional "bad use/good use" lines. They're being closed to keep kids from being able to access the Internet period, plain and simple.

      Most kids aren't hackers. Most kids just want to have the freedom to communicate with other people around the world, and do research. That would be goo
      • I'm not a troll. I'm not anonymous either.

        Seriously, the research that "kids" need to do should be in learning how to use a library. Go ask your local k12 student to find something in the library without a computer. Try not laughing as their eyes glaze over. Ask them to explain the Dewy Decimal system. Clueless little buggers have to be re-educated when they get to college on so many things it's no wonder the average 4 year degree takes five or even six years to complete now.

        Need an electronic searchable

        • Re:They are using the right word (Score:5, Interesting)

          by greenhide ( 597777 ) <jordanslashdot.cvilleweekly@com> on Wednesday April 28, 2004 @06:35PM (#9001998)
          Seriously, the research that "kids" need to do should be in learning how to use a library. Go ask your local k12 student to find something in the library without a computer. Try not laughing as their eyes glaze over. Ask them to explain the Dewy Decimal system. Clueless little buggers have to be re-educated when they get to college on so many things it's no wonder the average 4 year degree takes five or even six years to complete now.

          I had the good fortune to talk to someone whose degree was in library science. Their final assignment in college was to find a picture of a specified resource (It was a sculpture by an artist, but the name of both the sculpture and artist escapes me). The dozen or so students worked together, pored through the library resources, searched indexes and were finally able to uncover information about the artist and the sculpture, but were in the end unable to find any photo of the sculpture. This was in the 1970s or thereabouts.

          A few weeks ago, he went to google, punched in the name of the artist and of the sculpture. The first three results had photos of the work.

          For better or worse, the Internet has completely transformed the way that we find information. To deny people that tool is to ultimately make them impotent.

          A DVD contains a limited subset of information; the Internet has a much larger set of information. So a DVD may or may not have the information you really want; the Internet almost certainly will.

          I would be the first to agree that computers are overhyped and overtaught.

          Allowing the government of China to control the behavior of their citizens is not going to keep the burgers and corn syrup away.

          While I would agree that there are an increase of cases involving children and computers, consider for a moment the introduction of the automobile in widespread use during the 50s and 60s. No doubt a large population of children/young adults were all of a sudden being arrested for crimes related to driving cars: too fast, recklessly, etc. Many of them were illiterate with earlier modes of transportation -- they would be unable to ride a horse, for example. Nonetheless, I would say that the introduction of the car was overall a beneficial thing, and that allowing young adults to drive is also a good thing.

          It sounds to me that your main issue is that individuals in the United States are increasingly likely to be jailed for performing actions online that don't harm anyone else and which are considered illicit only because they are happening through a computer. While this is a tragedy, it is ultimately unrelated to China's decision to close down the cybercafes and to the effect that this decision will have. China is not performing this function to save its citizens from being arrested by the state, anymore than the United States is allowing cybercafes to remain open so that it can have a steady supply of inmates for its prisons.


          Our freedoms are not what China needs. Our freedoms aren't freedoms, they're "privledges", and we pay dearly for them.

          Our freedoms *are* freedoms, not privileges. We have the right in the US to protest, and if we feel our freedoms are being limited it is our responsibility to voice our opposition to that limitation. As Utah Philips once said:

          The state can't give you free speech, and the state can't take it away. You're born with it, like your eyes, like your ears. Freedom is something you assume, then you wait for someone to try to take it away. The degree to which you resist is the degree to which you are free.

          The problem in the United States is not that our freedoms are limited; the problem has become that people have put too much emphasis on their "pursuit of happiness" and not enough on their liberty.

          Online activity is monitored and every ISP in the country is ready and willing to lift their skirts for every court order rubbed lovingly against their cheek.

          I know that ISPs keep trac

          • I agree with you on many points. However, I would still hold that the Chinese are performing a dilligent service to their citizenry by seeking greater accountability of their networks.

            In the United States, where we like a perception of freedom, overt control of our Internet Access would be highly unpopular, so all the control is hidden behind corporate facades and supoenas and 4am visits by local and federal authorities.

            In an Cybercafe, a virus, or an emailer will be quickly noticed because there's not mu
    • The way I see it, if you limit Internet use then people will treat it like a preminum, which is what traditional computer usage was, a preminum to be used wisely.

      Computer usage used to be a premium because it was too expensive for the common individual to afford. It has now become relatively inexpensive and widespread, so much so that it is within the reach of the middle class (such as it may exist) of China.

      The same used to be true for reading and writing, and general learning and education.

      During the
    • Nice apologetic, a lot of fascists would be quite proud of your logic.
      • I work with the "Internet" daily, and we're still living on the frontier of what the Internet will eventually be like. The Internet is not ready for business. Companies that do business on the Internet are victimized all the time. Merchants suffer beneath the lash of the "Charge-back". The "Internet" isn't freedom. It's a crappy global network. In an environment where information can get you hurt, using the Internet is like leaning over a vat of mild acid to see yourself. I'm not sure I was aiming for an

  • Don't forget to thank . . . (Score:3, Insightful)

    by vegetablespork ( 575101 ) <vegetablespork@gmail.com> on Wednesday April 28, 2004 @04:29PM (#9000483) Homepage
    . . . your "buddies" at Cisco and Yahoo for providing the customized routers and consulting services that are helping this evil regime tighten the noose on it's subjects.
  • Why exactly are we wasting efforts trying to find one guy in a sand dune somewhere in the middle east, when the same resources could be used to spank this grossly uncivilized government into playing fair with their own citizens ?

    Around here, if a certain group of individuals isolate themselves in such fashion and severely restrict their knowledge and mindset, it's called a religious sect, definitely a bad thing. Over there it's called government, it's called a country. It's called legalized disregard for

  • China is in the midst of industrialization, a process which it must complete effectively before A) its population demographics "go grey," and B) it ends up like post-Soviet Russia. Slashing the internet access of a generation of children will only hamper the formation of a workforce well-educated enough to function in the high-tech industry of the coming decades.

    China doesn't have to go the way of Russia, but if it continues down this road, it probably will.

    • China's becoming an industrialized nation but it is not built on the backs of its intelligentsia but upon the backs of its exploited workers. Having a well educated workforce is not a priority, yet. Once capitalism takes a firmer hold upon China, the children of the capitalists will be the ones well-educated enough to function in high technology markets.
  • Has anyone WarDriven China? That would be cool, I wonder how many open APs there are ... makes the whole concept of an Internet Cafe sort of moot.
  • We aren't welcoming them into the fold. [yahoo.com]
    • They're not being welcomed into the fold to keep the balance of power in a status quo. The power being the ability to get into space outside the earth's atmosphere. China is on the forefront of being a stronger superpower than the USA and EU. They have a surplus of trade and produce most of the world's manufactured goods from IC and microchips, from toys to steel, and clothing to electronics. What holds China back are lack of oil resources which the USA has secured so nicely and access to space.

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