VoIP Now Technically Illegal In China 181
ironfrost writes "A recent ruling by China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has declared that VoIP services are illegal, except for the ones operated by state-owned telecom operators China Telecom and China Unicom. According to the article, 'the decision is expected to make Skype, UUCall and other similar services unavailable in China,' and is widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits. Here's a more in-depth story in Chinese (Google Translate version)."
Like everything else illegal in China... (Score:1)
Re:Like everything else illegal in China... (Score:5, Insightful)
And there will be ridiculously over-the-top punishments to make examples of individuals who are "disturbing social order".
http://politics.slashdot.org/story/10/11/18/1832240/A-Single-Re-Tweet-Lands-Chinese-Woman-in-Labor-Camp
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She didn't end up in a labor camp for using Twitter. She ended there for saying something the Chinese government doesn't like to hear.
Wow... (Score:2, Flamebait)
Re:Wow... (Score:5, Interesting)
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The primary objective is NEVER profit. There is no point in investing energy and time to acquire money and then never spend it on anything. It's what the money is used for that's interesting.
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You forgot #3 (which doesn't apply to China, but does to western countries): (3) government is ultimately accountable to the People, who have an election periodically to enforce this accountability and remove government members they feel are not working in their interests.
Of course, elections don't help if your citizens are easily-duped morons like Americans and the system is rigged to prevent outsiders from getting into the political system and the people are too stupid to tell the difference, but in other
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I think that's the only thing you've ever said that I agree with. The cheapest mutual fund in the USA is the Social Security Administration (and not by just a little bit, but almost an order of magnitude cheaper than the private choices with similar investments).
Unfortunately, the only thing you've ever said that's correct, you said sarcastical
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The Social Security Administration is not "cheap", and it's not a "mutual fund." Even if you consider it an "investment", it's flirting with bankruptcy. If it's still around 50 years from now, by design only the impoverished will collect more than what they put into it.
Prior to an awful lot of politically-motivated feature creep, it was simply "old age insurance" designed to keep fully half of our nation's elderly from starving to death.
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Whether you agree with how they get the money or who they pay it to is irrelevant to the efficiency of the organization that enforces Congress's will.
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Your irrational personal beliefs about where the money is coming from or going to is irrelevant to the cost of the people administering the fund.
Compare to USPS First Class Mail (Score:2)
What China is doing here is actually making the free competition illegal to favor the government approved telecom.
But is it really much different from the United States' ban on private competition to USPS First Class Mail?
Re:Wow... (Score:4, Insightful)
So even "the commies" are really just tools for the telecom industry.
I presume you are responding to this line in the summary:
is widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits.
If you believe that bit, I have a bridge to sell you.
The thing is the Chinese government would rather be seen as a tool than to lose control of the population.
Although the encryption in Skype has allegedly been broken (some say the voice encryption portion is still intact) the ability to scan packetized voice (let alone encrypted packetized voice) in real time is probably simply beyond the resources available, especially with things like skype finding their own routes for traffic.
Voip to carriers can at least be watched at the carrier's premises.
This has nothing to do with profits. This is the same government that blocked almost every western news site on the event of a dissident receiving a Nobel prize last month.
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Personally I'm sure both play into the whole matter. The
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If you follow the link to the original story it says
The decision is expected to make Skype, UUCall and other similar services unavailable in China.
Also as far as your claim:
dissident blackhats will find a way to record govt communications, and expose to the world the corruption
I haven't seen any sign of dissident black hats in china, let alone any recording government calls. These people tend to end up in re-education camps.
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If you follow the link to the original story it says
I don't get your point here. I was referencing free services like Ventrillo or the like.
I haven't seen any sign of dissident black hats in china, let alone any recording government calls. These people tend to end up in re-education camps.
I'm afraid you got me on that one. Those who don't comply are likely shunted into hard labor or unscrupulous gold farming rings.
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The VOIP restriction appears to only ban computer-to-phone calls not computer-to-computer calls. So skype-to-skype calls are ok but not skype-to-phone calls.
Where do handheld computers factor into that? Devices like the iPod touch and tablets with all the hardware to make a VOIP call, and a similar form factor to a phone, but no access to the cell networks.
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So even "the commies" are really just tools for the telecom industry.
Umm, the telecom industry in China is state owned, so your comment should read: So even the telecom industry is really just a tool for "the commies".
Re:Wow... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yep, it's exactly like the USA. In the USA, there's two political parties, which hold all the political power in the country. One is named "Democrats", as if they have anything to do with democracy. The other is named "Republicans", even though they have nothing in common with republicanism. Instead, they are both actually fascists, who work for corporate interests and only stop to try to fool the voters now and then into making them think they're working for the people, such as by blaming all their corporate-friendly actions on the other party.
In China, there's only one political party, which holds all the political power in the country. It's named "Communists", though, just like the American parties, they don't have anything at all to do with communism. And again, they're fascists, working for corporate interests. However, unlike in America, their actions are helping much of the population through "trickle-down economics", simply because most of the population was so dirt-poor before than the improvements from the new sorta-free-market system seem like a giant leap ahead for them. In America, we're not at a place where trickle-down economics work (mainly because we don't have a gigantic population of dirt-poor serfs), so instead, we're regressing, and experiencing a fast-growing gap between the rich and the poor, with the middle class rapidly disappearing, making us a bigger Banana Republic than any South or Central American country ever was.
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Correct.
I don't understand why people have a problem with this. A government-run company eliminates the profit motive, is more efficient overall, and ensures everyone has service including those too poor to pay the bill. It's universal phone service for every one.
ChinaMobile and ChinaTelecom do not provide universal service; Chinese people who are too poor to pay do not get service.
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A government-run company eliminates the profit motive
Not nessacerally, sometimes governemnts do push for these kinds of things to make a profit which they then use to fund other things but that is largely beside the point.
Without competition the easiest thing to do is to keep everything more or less the same and maybe crank up prices a bit if you think the market will bear it and/or to make up for inflation. Not do radical thinks like realise the cost structure of phone networks has changed and that unmeter
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No actual commie has considered China (or Vietnam or Laos &c.) as a state working to build communism for decades.
If you've got a stomach for reading over-the-top longwinded speeches, Enver Hoxha did a good job of explaining revisionism in the USSR, Yugoslavia, and China.
How to play Chinese Monopoly (Score:4, Insightful)
Though really, it's not all that surprising. China's gone for home-grown 'equivalents' of popular overseas services for quite some time--look at their 'facebook' and their 'google' workalikes, all doubtless with more than enough spyware built into 'em to keep an eye on dissidents.
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Some others prefer the light blue Kuomintang set, as these properties are slightly higher in value than their predecessors, but later groups can still beat them. It costs $1070 to buy and put hotels on all 3 properties here. They rank 2nd out of 10 in payoff percentage, and 6th out of 10 in visitation frequency.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuomintang
http://monopoly.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Light_Blue_Properties
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The orange properties are your best long term reliable moneymakers, although light purple and light blue are not bad either. Red are strong as well, and nearly as landed on as orange, but take significantly more development money for not much more payoff.
late game I find landing on developed light blues to be painful, but usually not fatal. Landing on oranges can often prove to be directly fatal, and even if not, they can often prove to be the beginning of the end. I would often work out a trade with someon
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You try to do something that can endanger their profits, and they will cut you off and you will have no recourse.
No shit? It's almost as if those are.... businesses whose purpose is to.... make money!
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Wow, which ISPs block SIP? Just so I can warn people to stay away from them.
or? (Score:1)
Or so they can record and monitor all calls...
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This.
That the article states "and is widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits" is laughable. This is about China's need to control the lives of their citizens, period.
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Given the generally supine nature of the main competitor, it would, in fact, be wholly reasonable to suspect that this is a pro-incumbent move
In Communist China... (Score:3)
In Communist China,
Competition regulates you!
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That's about it, too. Almost everything in China is illegal. It's illegal to own a butter knife. It's illegal to conduct most business transactions. It's certainly illegal to bribe, which is necessary to get anything done.
But that is what happens in a country that has so many laws. No one respects any laws.
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That would be the formal tableware type.
I love where I live (Score:2, Offtopic)
Re:I love where I live (Score:4, Interesting)
>>>So what do people in China do for fun?
Sex? :-|
I hear those Chinese ladies are, to quote a song, "Ladies in the street but a freak in the bed." You just have to make sure not to get pregnant more than once.
Somebody else wrote:
>>>And despite doing things like this constantly, China is still the darling of all the so-called "free trade" advocates.
Kinda like Fascist Germany, Italy, and Spain were considered marvels by their contemporaries. They were the 1930s boom economies with private corporations under State control. A bit like China today.
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Somebody else wrote:
>>>And despite doing things like this constantly, China is still the darling of all the so-called "free trade" advocates.
Of course, it's just like a Gilded Age America, today! (from a business standpoint at least)
Did you know Coca-Cola set up an office in Somalia?
Gilded Age was for wusses. (Score:2)
Of course, it's just like a Gilded Age America, today!
You realize, of course, that America, today, is in a state of more unbalanced wealth distribution than the Gilded Age robber barons could even have dreamt of?
Dan Aris
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I haven't compared the numbers but it wouldn't surprise me one bit. At least the working conditions and pay are better for the average Joes.
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One big reason why so many praised fascist and Nazi regimes back in the day - before they turned too violent - was because they were perceived as the only viable option to communism. A popular line of thinking was that the low classes, once they would discover that they are a supermajority with many common goals, would take over in any completely democratic society; whereas fascist authoritarianism would keep the "rabble" in line.
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Yes, that is exactly the argument that was used: clearly the "rabble" who did it to themselves and others should not be able to really run the country, democracy be damned. Hence, fascism. Thanks for demonstrating the point so eloquently, while also showing that this thinking is alive and well on the American Right.
On a factual note, the folk who took over in Russia did not do so in a democratic society (it was a monarchy before the February revolution in 1917, and junta before the October revolution). Furt
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Yes, that is exactly the argument that was used: clearly the "rabble" who did it to themselves and others should not be able to really run the country, democracy be damned. Hence, fascism. Thanks for demonstrating the point so eloquently, while also showing that this thinking is alive and well on the American Right.
You mean the American Left and Right. Just look at the actions of the Democrats since 2007, and of Obama: Not significantly different from when the Republicans were in power, sham healthcare "r
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I'm not a fan of any mainstream American politicians in general, but I was talking about one very specific thing there. Namely, that some people cheer authoritarian dictators, so long as said dictators crack down on ideologies they personally don't like (such as communism). For all the authoritarianism of the American Left, I've never heard that kind of rhetoric from them, but hearing apologetics for, say, Franco or Pinochet from right-wingers is very common.
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Fascism is not the only alternative to true democracy. For example, if you are from US and you paid attention in your civics class you would know that we do not have a democracy but a constitutional republic.
I am not from US, and so, thank God, I know that the concepts of "republic" and "democracy" are not mutually exclusive, and that US is a democratic republic.
I would also like to remind that US is not the only country practicing representative democracy, and, indeed, most European countries were also representative democracies (either republics, or constitutional monarchies) back in the day when fascism was popular.
Since you are such a democracy champion, let me ask you something. In your view, if the 51% of the voters vote that the other 49% should be killed that is ok?
No, but when 51% of the citizens really want to kill the other 49%, there's nothing you can do
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I did not equate the American Right with fascism. I said that many right-wingers historically supported, and even today support, fascist regimes cracking down on democratic institutions if said institutions lead to dominance of "undesirable" ideologies such as communism. Good example is apologetics of Pinochet and his violent suppression of democratically elected but socialist Aliende. Many right wingers love Pinochet because of his economic policies and opposition to socialism.
Oh, and American Right = smal
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Good example is apologetics of Pinochet and his violent suppression of democratically elected but socialist Aliende. Many right wingers love Pinochet because of his economic policies and opposition to socialism.
I wouldn't say that people "love" Pinochet but given the two bad options that existed at the time, it is pretty obvious to me that the less bad one had won. Allende may have been democratically elected, but it is pretty well understood now that with Soviet and Castro's backing he was plannin
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Good example is apologetics of Pinochet and his violent suppression of democratically elected but socialist Aliende. Many right wingers love Pinochet because of his economic policies and opposition to socialism. I wouldn't say that people "love" Pinochet but given the two bad options that existed at the time, it is pretty obvious to me that the less bad one had won. Allende may have been democratically elected, but it is pretty well understood now that with Soviet and Castro's backing he was planning to nationalize industry and turn Chile into another Cuba.
Yeah, those dumbasses fucked up Democracy by electing the wrong guy when clearly the one we wanted was better for them, so it's a good thing we shoved our guy down their throats. Tens of thousands of people tortured to death and millions of people unable to enjoy basic political freedoms was really a small price to pay to avoid having to let those people suffer the government they chose, right?
Large secret shipments of weapons from Soviet Union were already on their way to Allende at the time of the coup.
Yeah, those scheming Soviets, how dare they send military support to a sovereign leader elected by his people?
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Well you can argue all day about what would have happened but to me the claim that Allende was planning a coup of his own is reasonably credible, what with a month long visit by Castro, secret Cuban and Soviet weapons caches found in Chile etc. I don't think there was a majority socialist movement in Chile. It was always a heavily divided country politically and Allende only won the election narrowly and could not implement widespread nationalization without imposing some kind of dictatorship. However, alth
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I don't comprehend how you (and others) equate Fascism and "American Right" as being the same thing?
British Fascist Party in the 1930s: After the people democratically elect their leader, he should then have unlimited discretionary authority because he will enact the will of the people by virtue of having been elected leader, whereas having checks and balances will frustrate the will of the people.
Bush Administration of the 2000s: The President has the prerogative to make the entire executive branch do his personal will and bidding by virtue of having been elected President, including turning non-politica
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In actions, the political representatives of American Right practice extension of government, strengthening the government, avoiding and overturning constitutional limitations, and having a strong symbiosis between the state and related industry conglomerates with none of that 'arms-length' liberal stuff.
In words, maybe they are as you say, and maybe their voters do think as you say - but it's irrelevant if they are acting like fascists.
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That’s AIDS: Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.
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Its all for the better (Score:1)
The more they tighten the grip, the less productive they will be.
Either the chinese find a way to soften their government, or they will never be the power they could be.
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They will never soften this government. They will have to wait till they all die off of natural causes.
In 30 years, it will be a different world in China.
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Yes, but what way will it go?
There is a large and dedicated movement of young Chinese, ultra nationalist, Han racial supremacists who are so radical and agressive that even the powers that be inside the CPC have had a hard time reigning them in.
China will change, but I would not blindly assume it will be for the better.
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In thirty years it will be a different world everywhere. Thirty years ago there were no cell phones, no DVDs, computers were mostly consigned to business, CDs were brand new and damned expensive, there was no TSA or DHS, you could smoke a cigarette at your desk at work, affordable VHS was new, the Space Shuttle was brand new.
And there was no way to predict any of the craziness that's happened in the last three decades.
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And there was no way to predict any of the craziness that's happened in the last three decades.
Sure there was: you just had to look at the craziness that had happened in the previous three decades: growing corporate power, the military-industrial complex, the quagmire that was Vietnam, etc. The end of WWII is when things really started going bad in the USA, though the 20s with Prohibition and the growth of organized crime was pretty screwed-up too.
Face it, the USA is really just a 3rd-world country that ba
Protect state-owned biz by outlawing competition (Score:2)
And despite doing things like this constantly, China is still the darling of all the so-called "free trade" advocates.
Re:Protect state-owned biz by outlawing competitio (Score:5, Insightful)
This is exactly the sort of situation that Marx was concerned by. The Bourgeoisie forcing the Proletariat to compete with each other to suppress wages so that the Bourgeoisie could have more money.
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Wow! I never thought I'd see the day when a comment that is so "anti-capitalistic" get modded +5 on slashdot!
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China is still the darling of all the so-called "free trade" advocates.
Ok, can you provide some examples of free trade advocates who consider China their darling?
Shows how badly China owns us (Score:4, Insightful)
Our government and corporations stand idly by while China infiltrates our military, government and corporate networks, commits blatant acts of corporate espionage, places unfair regulations on foreign companies operations within their country and now pulls blatant protectionist laws to stifle competition.
But nothing will be done because China is the largest emerging economy on the planet and no one can afford to pass up a piece of that pie.
Back in the day the US and other nations would be slinging trade embargos left and right and playing hard ball. Today, we're so weak and poor we just bend over and take it.
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Our government and corporations stand idly by while China infiltrates our military, government and corporate networks, commits blatant acts of corporate espionage,
Our government and corporations stand idly by because we have not given them the China-like powers of control to prevent it.
To totally control china you would have to BE like china, and you (yes, I mean YOU personally, l0ungeb0y) would be the first to complain if our government gained such power.
There is nothing about this move that is in any way related to a protectionist stifling of competition. Its all about that level of control over its citizens that you seem to find lacking in western society.
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Putting embargoes and tariffs on China doesn't require control over the citizens, it just requires balls. Right now, politicians are more concerned with keeping Walmart stocked with cheap "stuff".
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I'd say: whose debt is that ?
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/02/chinas-debt-to-us-treasury-more-than-indicated/ [washingtontimes.com]
You can't mess with China. Because if they want, they can ruin US Economy.
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OTOH were they to do that they would majorly piss off most of the developed world.
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If that were the case, this problem would have had to have been solved before you or I were born. China crawling out of the post industrial era has been inevitable since that era began. This isn't something new, economist have been fretting over it since the 1920s. It was simply ignored for the longest time thanks to WW2 and some less than brilliant decisions before, after and during the Great Leap Forward.
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Unfortunately, this has nothing to do with competition.
Any foreign business that wishes to compete in China in any space that remotely has to do with communications must tow the party line. This is about control of information, and not about control of profits.
If Skype agreed tomorrow to create a separate network for China, with all of its hardware on Chinese soil, and Chinese operators able to perform real time intercepts and logging of communication going though Skype, you would see Skype become the #1 c
Ah China.... They have finally grown up (Score:2)
It is so wonderful to see them grow from Communism to Fascism in such a short preiod of time. .... It warms my heart.
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Pretty much the only thing it takes to move from statist communism (i.e. any form of Marxism) to fascism is to allow private property - as that is the only major difference between the two. In that sense, China has been there a long time ago.
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Well, of course there wasn't ever a communist state, because communism is supposed to be a classless and stateless society. Colloquially, we call "communist" those states which declared building a communist society (going through an intermediate socialist stage) as their ultimate goal. In reality, of course, we really mean "Marxist socialist".
Now as far as that goes... Soviet Russia in its early years was a workers' democracy - it was run by the councils, and those councils were democratically elected. So I
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If only Lenin had lived longer or Trotsky beaten Stalin in the power grab.
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Not really. Soviet workers' democracy was a classic example of an oppressive tyranny of the majority, brutally repressing the dissenting minorities. It was Lenin who created VChK, after all, and gave it power to crack down on political dissent - hence Red Terror. And Trotsky never disagreed on that, either. His problem wasn't with applying terror in general, but only with applying it against himself and his followers. So I'm not particularly fond of either guy.
In the grand scheme of things, I'm not even sur
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Pretty much the only thing it takes to move from statist communism (i.e. any form of Marxism) to fascism is to allow private property - as that is the only major difference between the two.
What!? According to right-wingers, economic freedom breeds political freedom. That's one of the reasons why "globalism is a good thing (TM)". The Chinese must not be doing it right!
I think that happened many decades ago (Score:2)
Only the names didn't change.
Two bad tastes that taste awful together (Score:2)
People will use it anyway (Score:2)
Don't shout (Score:2)
With no VoIP, will everyone have to play Chinese Whispers [wikipedia.org]?
either that or.... (Score:2)
widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits
either that or one of the Chinese ruling party had a bad experience on chatroulette.
From Socialism to Fascism? (Score:2)
Mussolini would be proud of how far China has come!
Could not care less what China is doing (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Could not care less what China is doing (Score:4, Informative)
Wait a few years and most of the internet restrictions will be implemented here, too.
I assume you don't live in the US or in France or in Germany or in Italy or in half of Europe.
If you were, you'd know that it has begun a few years ago, and for some countries, we're getting really close.
Just look at laquadrature.net 's articles about French HADOPI and LOPPSI laws, that go even further than China in internet control and censorship, in most western countries it's also illegal to use VoIP with a GPRS/EDGE/3G/whatever data connection, too bad if it's the one you use for your home's internet. (how they advertise you to do nowadays)
The internet is in danger, everywhere. Open your eyes and you'll see that we're almost already fucked.
Those dirty... commies? (Score:2)
According to the article, "the decision is expected to make Skype, UUCall and other similar services unavailable in China", and is widely seen as a way to protect the traditional telecom operators' profits
So how's that Communism thing working out for you guys? Are we beginning to figure out that all economic systems are eventually distorted and manipulated to serve the cause of greater government power?
Who freaking cares? (Score:2)
Seriously.
Does not apply to Skype etc. (Score:2)
The law only covers Phone-Phone and PC-Phone calls. PC-PC and Phone-PC is not affected or arguably a grey area at most.
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One major failure in 8 years is crap?
For the majority of users its a very good (and encrypted) solution to keeping in touch with a crystal clear voice channel.
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1. They have a veto on the security council.
2. They make all the stuff the US uses, so five minutes later you have riots in the US because TVs cost $25,000.
3. There are many countries that like them.
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HAHAHAHA
Yeah let's see the US "lay down the law" and cut itself off from its cheap goods, cheap labor, waste dumping grounds, financial backers, and oil. This should be entertaining. It'll be like an amusement park sealing itself off from the outside world.
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It's both. China is since quite some time now a capitalist's wet dream with some people getting filthy rich. It's also a state wishing for control and monitoring. Actually both companies and politicians from the west stare at China with naked envy.
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Well, one does have to read it pretty much all the way through in order to figure out that it’s not meant to be taken literally. That’s asking a lot of some mods.
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