Wikipedia Won't Bow to Chinese Censors 504
truthsearch writes "Jimmy Wales has defied the Chinese government by refusing to bow to censorship of politically sensitive Wikipedia entries. He challenges other internet companies, including Google, to justify their claim that they could do more good than harm by co-operating with Beijing. Wikipedia has been banned from China since last October. Whereas Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo went into the country accepting some restrictions on their online content, Wales believes it must be all or nothing for Wikipedia. 'We occupy a position in the culture that I wish Google would take up, which is that we stand for the freedom for information.'"
Defiance Versus Inability (Score:5, Insightful)
Considering China's regulations [hrw.org] I don't think it'd be possible for Mr. Wales to accomplish censoring all of Wikipedia from what's on the list from China's Article 19 of censorship policy. This that China requires to be censored:
In other news all Chinese residents will see a new homepage for Wikipedia [hrw.org]. Just another reason why Tor should stay up and the recent news about it being used as a child pornography shield is terrible.
*All information in this post was gathered via irony [wikipedia.org].
Hasn't Google already justified it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Business or Foundation (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a great belief, but... (Score:2, Insightful)
I'd sure call that freedom of information!
Bravo... if it holds up. (Score:5, Insightful)
My only concern is that, once Wikipedia makes its stand, the Chinese government decides that, well, yes, in the interest of freedom of the Internet, it will let Wikipedia continue to operate - and then start "correcting" Wikipedia's entries to the point of anything that disagrees with "official" truth is useless.
One big difference between wikipedia and others... (Score:5, Insightful)
So while wikipedia can take the high ground and just not exist in China, for-profit companies have to justify this to their shareholders. If you were invested in Google and heard they decided not to expand into the large & growing market of China... well you can see how one could begin to question if the company's leadership had the shareholder's interests in mind.
Information repository vrs information search tool (Score:5, Insightful)
However, Wikipedia is more than a tool for finding information. It IS information, and one of it's highest goals needs to be accuracy. (let's not debate accuracy vs. Wiki's here tho)
If they were to censor information that is valid... well it would be incredibly wrong. You can't have just a 'little' bit of censorship of information in an encyclopedia, it violates the whole spirit of the thing.
Easy to do when not a public company (Score:3, Insightful)
what? of course it does. (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, yes, it's the right thing to do to rescue princesses, but lets not be throwing the word 'heroic' around for no good reason.
Then Google need to google. (Score:2, Insightful)
They need to google "False Dilemma"
Re:Business or Foundation (Score:3, Insightful)
You know, I'm a leftist, and I have a better impression of capitalism than most of the Reagan-era "libertarian" idiots here.
Re:Hasn't Google already justified it? (Score:5, Insightful)
How wonderful it is to act nobly when one has not simply nothing to lose but actually nothing to gain.
Re:That's a great belief, but... (Score:4, Insightful)
And hopefully that *nothing* will help to spur social change for the Chinese, rather than putting a bandage over the problem by allowing censored content.
Re:Business or Foundation (Score:3, Insightful)
The reality is that shareholders only sue corporations when managers do something egregiously bad or fraudulent. The managers of a corporation make decisions all the time, some of them good and some of them bad, if you're a shareholder and you don't like what the corporation is doing you can sell and invest in some other corporation -- that's the whole point of a public company! It would be trivial for Google to justify not providing filtered results in China as a show of good will that engenders brand loyalty among the rest of its users. Arguably this is very reasonable since, as I understand it, Google is not very popular in China anyway.
Pretty simple there Jimbo (Score:3, Insightful)
He challenges other internet companies, including Google, to justify their claim that they could do more good than harm by co-operating with Beijing. Wikipedia has been banned from China since last October
Yeah, I think the second sentence pretty much gives him the answer to the question in the first.
What is the issue? (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:That's a great belief, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Wikipedia does NOT block access to Chinese users.
China's government blocks access to Wikipedia. I would not be surprised if China's government blocked access to Slashdot.
Does that mean Cmdr Taco should prevent posts from people who are commie bashing? I think not.
*Giggle (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not if he's being intentionally dense, or if he honestly belives that the Chinese government is interested in neutrality.
If so, I'd ask Mr. Wales to compare the following three links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_pro
http://www.google.cn/search?hl=zh-CN&ie=UTF-8&inl
http://www.google.com/search?q=Tiananmen+Square&i
Just a thought...
Flip It (Score:4, Insightful)
Donaters shy away from a non-profit that DOESN'T take the higher moral ground.
As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:That's a great belief, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Your points may all be true, but it doesn't make it right to help a government censor information.
The Wikipedia approach VS. Microsoft/Google (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem here is that Wikipedia's approach accomplishes nothing - although neither does it compromise the organization's stated principles. Microsoft and Google's approach of censoring on request has still created a raging torrent of information within, into, and out of China, one that the Chinese government can only barely police. Wikipedia's outdated reactionary protest model will not coax China to change anything, after all, China has the resources to churn out competing products with ease. Microsoft and Google are showing China the rest of the world, and giving Chinese dissidents great, albeit limited, tools for proactively attacking totalitarianism.
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Defiance Versus Inability (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Business or Foundation (Score:3, Insightful)
I challenge you to provide an example where a corporation made an ethical choice that wasn't required (or thought to be soon required) that cost more than a trivial amount. I can't show you the consequences of a choice when no one made that choice.
Re:Hasn't Google already justified it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:what? of course it does. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Easy to do when not a public company (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm trying to understand what your point is. Is it OK for Google to do bad things, because it is "less easy"? Does it being "easy" for Wikipedia mean its actions have less merit?
It's a strange set of morals you appear to be describing. We should live our lives based on what's easiest? Is that what you are saying? If doing the right thing is difficult, it's OK not to do it?
Many people find it hard to resist sexual temptation. So, is it OK to have an affair, and then lie to your wife about it, because it's easier than telling the truth or not having the affair?
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:what? of course it does. (Score:3, Insightful)
Secondly, I didn't make any assertions about Google's behavior.
Re:Which one of those two (Google and Wiki) is a.. (Score:2, Insightful)
Jaysyn
have you considered.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Wikipedia, obviously, by its nature is not beholden to these interests.
Re:Defiance Versus Inability (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:2, Insightful)
If you consider what the U.S. did in this case to be bad, then consider what Europe does about hate speech.
Re:Business or Foundation (Score:3, Insightful)
He asked for examples (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:5, Insightful)
BTW the US has become a police state on the issue of Israel. You cannot criticize the Israeli government without being labelled anti-semite which is probably the worst disservice to to the larger Jewish community as I have met many Jews both inside and outside Israel who do not agree to the Israeli governments policy of de facto apartheid. Most secular Israelis who have lived in Israel for generations would have no problem giving the Arabs equal rights but they are outshouted by the vocal minority which migrated recently from the USSR and who have been granted land in the settlements. Of course these settlers (most of whom were dirt poor before they got free grants of land ) dont want to leave the West Bank and go back to a life of poverty in Israeli cities. If it was a choice between my family being poor and Arab families being poor I would make the same choice.
But the external world should understand these issues and realize that Israeli society is not a monolith. Just like we try to promote change in Iran by supporting the reformers we should try to promote change in Israel by supporting the Labour and other pro peace parties (if needed with covert funds - it would be still cheaper than having to spend billions on defending a small country in an hostile neighbourhood)
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:2, Insightful)
Personally i feel the world is going the wrong way with the two state solution. We should instead be promoting one man one vote and an unified Israel and West Bank where Jews and Arabs can live together in mixed communities with no discrimination. I mean partitioning a state based on religion in the 21st century??? What will we do next have feudal lords???
Re:Hasn't Google already justified it? (Score:3, Insightful)
How much more noble would it be for those (Yahoo!, Google) who have much to lose ($$$) but relatively little to gain to Do The Right Thing?
Re:Hasn't Google already justified it? (Score:1, Insightful)
Google may as well change their motto to "Do no evil pro bono".
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:4, Insightful)
Holistic medicine is a voluntary and chosen practice, people who choose to practice it do so upon their own beliefs and choices, you can no more claim it to be murder than to say companies that sell butter or cars are killing people because they cause increased rates of heart attacks or car accidents.
Your contention that goverments inherently attempt to censor information contrary to their intrests holds weight and is exhibited consistently throughout history, one has only to look at wars to note how often... and important the practice has been used.
the real question is extent and content. No system can be completely "good" and/or "benevolent" as the very act of censorship restricts the rights of some for the benefit of others, however speech in concerns that render grave or immenent and real danger to a multi-tude of people are commonly restricted under what is generaly understood to be a common sense and practical public safety concern.
When the public safety aspect is over-extended beyond the real of "real" danger we begin to see the abuse... which is nearly inevitble, but the issue is the extent. China is without much question a hallmark of severly over extended censorship which goes ridiculously further beyond the bounds of reasonable public safety in comparison to the US.
To put the two on equivilent terms is spurious and intelectually insulting.
Hezbollah and other organizations like it, or closely affiliated with it... actively procure funds and engage in violent attacks without forwarning on civilian populations againts the wishes of their domestic populations. While they enjoy support of their respective publics as a symbolic resistence to the west, their methods are generally NOT supported and regularly denounced by those communities.
Falon Gong simple DOES NOT COMPARE.
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:2, Insightful)
"It's not a separate state"
Hence the inconsistency. Either Palestine is a separate state, or citizens who live in the part of Israel called "Palestine" should be able to vote in Israeli elections.
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:2, Insightful)
That's the most retarded comparison I've ever heard. The point of the legislation is to make it illegal to fund terrorist groups by way of business transactions. For instance, you are a terrorist and I want to support you so I pay you $50 million to make a tv show. The CNN example you've given is not related to that scenario at all (unless you are trying to say that Fidel Castro has a financial stake in CNN?). It has nothing to do with the very subjective issue of determining which websites or tv stations "offend our friends". It is about the very objective list of who participates in business transactions with groups on the Terrorist List. (Now, the issue of who deserves to be on that list may be subjective.)
Re:What is the issue? (Score:3, Insightful)
This isn't an issue of people in America imposing their beliefs on China. If the Chinese government had their way, Wikipedia would allow itself to be censored -- essentially China wants to impose their values on Wikipedia. Naturally Jimmy Wales didn't comply, and why should he? It's his site, in his country, founded on his values. China can take it or leave it, and they've chosen to leave it.
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:3, Insightful)
And then you talk about things sometimes being "black and white"? Your Hezbollah fog isn't just "nuanced", it's a deranged lie. I'm curious what you have to say about the "few bad apples" among Americans torturing Iraqis in Abu Ghraib.
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:As if the US doesnt censor internet (Score:5, Insightful)
Give me a fucking break. "McArthur era"? Don't you mean McCarthy era? Which is yet another bullshit comparison.
Even that Mandela (who you can't even spell) comparison is bullshit. You want the ultimate form of your bullshit? The American revolutionaries who ditched the British were "terrorists", too. There is a difference between terrorizing civilians and terrorizing military or political leaders. And Hezbollah is terrorist of the worst kind.
And you are helping them with your bullshit. Don't hand me some more bullshit about how that fact is somehow something I saw on CNN. Just because Bush has equated the Terror War with anything he wants to do doesn't mean the reality he's hijacked isn't still true. Saying that Hezbollah is just some "bad apples" is a disgusting lie that ignores their sworn mission to kill everyone who stops them from taking over Israel, Lebanon, anything they think god told them is theirs. And you are working with them in their campaign to gain political success. You're sick. And you won't get any more help from me validating you by arguing with you, when you can't even get simple facts straight and make outrageous lies about Hezbollah terrorists.