How the Chinese Wikipedia Differs from the English 193
bulled writes "News.com is running a story on differences found in Wikipedia's Chinese site content, as compared to content on the same subjects from the English site. The article goes into a discussion about how the 'sanitized' information is so prevalent in Chinese education that it is seen as the 'truth'." From the article: "[Some] say the object should be to spread reliable information as widely as possible, and that, in any case, self-censorship is pointless because the government still frequently blocks access to Wikipedia for most Chinese Internet users. 'There is a lot of confusion about whether they should obey the neutral point of view or offer some compromises to the government,' said Isaac Mao, a well-known Chinese blogger and user of the encyclopedia. 'To the local Wikipedians, the first objective is to make it well known among Chinese, to get people to understand the principles of Wikipedia step by step, and not to get the thing blocked by the government.'"
Also of note... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Also of note... (Score:5, Funny)
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hmm (Score:3, Funny)
An easy example: On the english site, we can learn that the population of elephants has tripled in the last six months. On the chinese site, we can learn that the population of elephants has tripled in the last 12 solar terms.
Entry for USA (Score:4, Funny)
The USA, a decadent, capitalistic society, that enslaves its people through corporations, and calls itself a Republic, is in North America, between Canada and Mexico. Their Government is run by decadent wealthy politicians who use their political power for more gain. Unlike your illustrious leaders here in China, they do not care about their constituants.
It is recomended that all Chinese citizens ignore these people for they have been corrupted by their capitalist owners. And also beware, they will tell you lies about working in sweatshops! They are lies told by their proletariat in order to keep their position in their society and to convince their workers that they are paid the best in the World. Ignore them! You are paid best in the World!!
Beware of the Americans!!! They are liars!
How the Chinese System of Government is the best in the World - elected by you, the people of China:
All of the memebers of Government are freely elected by the people of China. Being a Democracy of the highest order, China.....
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Entry for China (was: Entry for USA) (Score:2)
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time last week. Save for his face on the money and his portrait in
Tiannenman square, Chairman Mao is nowhere to be seen. Japan is
the bogeyman there. Contrast this with Vietnam (at least in Hanoi)
where Ho Chi Minh and the Party is everywhere. It's far more subtle in
China.
Re:Entry for USA (Score:5, Funny)
>its people through corporations, and calls itself a
>Republic, is in North America, between Canada and Mexico.
>Their Government is run by decadent wealthy politicians who
>use their political power for more gain. Unlike your
>illustrious leaders here in China, they do not care about
>their constituants.
Hey, wait a minute, that's not a Chinese Wikipedia entry - it's every third post on Slashdot!
Brett
This post... (Score:1)
We have our own socially effected censorship (Score:5, Interesting)
A career-ending offense exicts in this country too, but just on different subjects. Try publicly saying that whites are smarter than blacks, or that teenage girls should have have hands-on sex ed in junior high, or that ice floes are a good way of relieving the social security crunch, and see what happens to your career. ( The previous three ideas or - similar forms of them - have been considered obvious truisms in other places and times. I'm not expressing these opinions myself, just mentioning them as examples )
Try putting any of these on english Wikipedia, and see how long they last.
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there is no 'Social Security Crunch' it is a lie spread by republicans since the creation of social security.
Just so you know, the baby boomers will never be the largest demographic. In fact the largest portion of the population they will have is 21%.
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Those are not obvious truisms, they are subjective opinions. Those do not belong on wikipedia, and would rightfully be removed.
On the other hand, I am guessing if you went to articles about race, sexual education, or social security, you could find discussion on those vie
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That was exactly my point. They are mere opinions TO YOU, in this culture and age. They were obvious truths to people in other cultures at other times.
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That said, I'm sure we've got a few "truisms" today that are little more than ill-founded supposition.
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An example of a positive statement would be: providing hands-on sex education will reduce teenage pregnancy. This is positive because it talks about facts and (in principle at least) it can be tested. Whether it's suitable for Wikipedia would depend on ha
Re:We have our own socially effected censorship (Score:4, Interesting)
or that teenage girls should have have hands-on sex ed in junior high
Well, the question is, hands-on whom? ;)
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> > or that teenage girls should have have hands-on sex ed in junior high
> Well, the question is, hands-on whom? ;)
Other girls, of course. :)
Re:We have our own socially effected censorship (Score:5, Insightful)
I see the point but those are really not good comparisons. An academic in the US could say Mexicans in California have a historical basis for asserting independence from the US and not really much would happen. Take Noam Chomsky, an MIT prof who says if the Nuremberg standards were applied, every US president would have been hanged. Didn't affect his career at all. And even if it did, the government in the US has no standing in dictating what academics say. That's the difference between the US and China and that's the point I think that's being made.
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Re:We have our own socially effected censorship (Score:5, Interesting)
The wiki article on "Race and Intelligence" has, at the top of an article, a graph of IQs of different races. Whites, on average, are shown as scoring higher than blacks.
The article discusses the amount (if any) of difference in the average intelligence of the different races and possible reasons why there would be a difference.
Re:We have our own socially effected censorship (Score:4, Informative)
Here [wikipedia.org] ya [wikipedia.org] go [wikipedia.org].
Yeah, none of these are opinions, they're stated objectively; that's what Wikipedia's about, isn't it? Surely the difference is that the Chinese Wikipedia (or other information sources) are censoring *objective* facts?
Hah. You think you are better? (Score:5, Insightful)
HAH! I love all the discussion about Chinese censorship. The argument is that we are free, and see things objectively---but that is not true. We are merely free to choose the censorship we prefer.
I do not mean that we don't have access to "uncensored" information. Nor do I mean that it is forced upon us by anyone. I mean that we prefer censorship; we prefer to see things through filters that support what we want to believe. If you do not think this, just spend a week on Digg, or other "self-policing" sites. People do not want objectivity, they want the prominence of their own subjectivity.
The Chinese government merely provides this as a government service, so the widest possible audience is sated. It's not worse. It's not even different. Consider first whether people are really, truly unhappy.
(Note, I don't actually believe we should have government-sponsored censorship. There is some hyperbole here by design. But really, this is not as far from reality as you may think.)
people prefer placid lies to ugly truths (Score:4, Interesting)
however, this self-censorship, whether by individuals or cliques, is a different subject matter than censorship by a government entity. one is organic, from below, for the purposes of protecting the ego. the other is artificial, from above, for the purposes of maintaining power
Re:people prefer placid lies to ugly truths (Score:5, Insightful)
This is, in fact, my first point.
This comes back to our own self-censorship (and, really, our own cultural/governmental censorship). We see through the "authoritarian censorship is bad" filter, which ironically comes from an authority itself.
My second point is simply that neither one is better. They are both censorship. To criticize for one and accept the other is hypocritical.
2+2 does not equal 5, even for very high values of 2 and very low values of 5.
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Try doing that in China and then tell me how much your example applies to that form of censorship.
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Country #1 where people have free access to information and some choose to self censor that access?
Country #2 where the government censors information and unapproved distribution of censored information is a crime?
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Country #3, which is like Country #2, but the punishment of unapproved distribution is dressed up as "copyright infringement" of someone's "valoooable innellecdual properteeeee"?
Country #1 sure isn't the USA or Europe right now!
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Please choose:
Be an adult and don't change the subject, please answer #1 or #2.
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I think that based on what I know I would rather choose to live in the US than in China. However, both have their good sides. In a sense I would prefer to live in a country where people know they are being indoctrinated than in one where the news sources are as ridiculously biased as they seem to be in the US and where the people think they are getting the truth because they feel they live in the most free and best and almost perfect society.
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It is also rather well written, unlike if I tried to write it.
kudos
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I'm honestly not sure I follow. Are you suggesting that it's somehow just as bad to be able to choose how one filters one's information as it is to have somebody else impose such filtering on you? That seems a little like saying that spending your money and having somebody steal it are ethically equivalent.
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Well no. They censor to promote the idea that their monopoly of power is seen as legitament. They censor to promote the belief in their policies are unerring. That they know best. That they have the populace's best interests at heart, for the populace is incapable of acting in their own best interes
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Simple (Score:5, Funny)
it's in chinese? (Score:2, Funny)
Most Chinese wikipedia users are not from mainland (Score:4, Insightful)
Note, most of the articles on Chinese Wikipedia are in traditional Chinese script (used in those places) as opposed to simplified, used on the mainland.
Re:Most Chinese wikipedia users are not from mainl (Score:4, Informative)
It's a choice (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, China can't block/censor everything without ruining their prospects to shift away from a manufacturing-based economy
understand the principles of Wikipedia (Score:1)
I don't think the average (western) user of wikipedia understands "the principles of Wikipedia"
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They shouldn't give in (Score:4, Insightful)
The way to defeat state censorship of this kind I think involves getting as much information as possible out there. If they want to ban access to it, let them. Web-savvy Chinese will find a way to get to it. The word will spread. The truth is more persistent and resilient than cockroaches. Once it gets out it is difficult to stop.
I sure would hate to think the Tiananmen Square Massacre, or "June 4th Incident" as it is known in China, will go down in history with a Chinese-govt spin on it.
Already the English version of wikipedia calls it the Tiananmen Square Protests of 1989 [wikipedia.org]. I wonder what they call it on the Chinese version? Tianenmen Square - nothing happened, don't ask perhaps?Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Better to start slowly and end well -- Confucius. Do I need to go on (and on, and on, and on, like Slashdot)? Give it a rest will you.
Re:They shouldn't give in (Score:4, Interesting)
"June 4th Incident", also called "'89 Minyun" [short for Democratic Movement], , "'89 Xueyun" [short for Students' Movement], "June 4th Massacre", "June 4th Wave", "'89 Democratic Movement", "'89 Students' Movement", "Tiananmen Massacre", "Tiananmen Incident", etc, officially called "The Disturbance", "Counter-revolutionary riot", and in recent years "the Political Turmoil between Spring and Summer of 1989" by the PRC government, hereafter abbreviated to "64" [June 4th].
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Same Problems Here (Score:1, Informative)
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This discredits wikipedia (Score:2, Troll)
If the Chinese people want a wikipedia that won't get banned, they should make their own. It's a shame to see the wikipedia name get so discredited.
No information is better than false information.
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The only reason I can think of is that wikipedia is a wiki, and the end decision will be made by community discussion.
I agree with your post though, it is definitely an act of 'sucking up', and hopefully those companies that do so will regret their actions some day.
Sarcasm beats censorship (Score:4, Funny)
Beating China's oppressive regime is pretty easy when you think about it
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What the Chinese government should do (Score:2)
Taboo, but the truth. (Score:5, Insightful)
OK. I went to American schools. Growing up, I was, in so many ways, encouraged, forced or "educated" into think those Soviet bastards were communist scum bent on nuking the good'ol USA.
Cold War ends. I become seriously involved with a Russian model, her mother and father was given a free ride to the US on some kind of genius grant. Speaking to her father, everything Americans were taught about the Soviet Union was mirrored in Soviet schools about America. Down to the common bed-time anxiety of wondering if tonight you'll have to use your bomb-shelter (which lots of Soviets also had in fear of an American preemptive strike.) And so, while neither country ever really had that many nuclear weapons, what the corporations/state did have was massive public opinion inline for support to develop more and more on claims that "they" had ten or twenty more nuclear weapons. Arms race... come time to use the arms, we find we only have two and so do they. The irony of it all.
Point is, American education is no less bias/brainwashing/false/misleading than China's. This might be a big bite to chew for many of us, but it's true. Let's take for instance...
What do you know of World War II? It might come to a surprise to many of us... but unless you have to have a nurse help you defecate, odds are you don't know anymore than what was TOLD TO YOU. Faith of compliance, and from lack of critical, cold and cruel analysis presents no options for the guy next to you. Germans were the bad guys... do I know that for fact? No. I strongly assume so, because as far back as I remember, that's what I was told; and if I differ from public opinion, then I'll be an idiot.
The force of ignorance is so strong and compelling, that it's no wonder that those who veer successfully from the flow stand out so much and always have a aura about them that would permit one to predict they would "change the world". For the better, for the worst... depends on their opposing force and if they win or lose. If you win, patriot, revolutionary, resistance... all beautiful titles to hold to be sure. During your efforts, your a terrorist or criminal... if you lose, those titles stick. Doesn't matter your cause, doesn't matter your agenda. Powerful people, are just that, powerful and they aren't going to give up their crown, right or wrong, just because you're walking down the hall.
The English analysis points out where Chinese wikipedia is "wrong". It's points ONLY assume it's wrong, basing their assumptions on the fact their wording is not as harsh/critical/favorable to the way WE want China to look. Who is right? Americans? Chinese? Most logical tendancy I have... if I want a German opinion, I'll talk to a German. Why would America have any more accurate information on China than China itself? (But this is where people will try to claim they have controlled information sources... as if the information in America isn't equally controlled. At least Chinese leadership have the dignity to admit their concern for the information given to the public. Americans are left to realize that anything printed and sold in Barnes and Nobels is pre-approved and must conform the a social agenda and anything that won't will either be black-listed, banned or edited to hell and back by publish-house editors.) Any fool that thinks Fox News isn't controlled..... bottom line, China knows China better than America does. Don't kid yourself.
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Are students encouraged to become proficient in the use of primary sources? Yup
Just because a textbook might be censored (a better word for most of them would be "incomplete") doesn't mean you can discredit the entire educational system.
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Here we are allowed to disagree, be critical of, and demonstrate. In China you cannot say anything the government doesn't allow you to say, PERIOD.
Look at the masses of AMERICANS who hate Bush and Cheney. Americans openly criticise them, without any fear of being locked up or shot. You tell your Russian model girlfriend to go back to Russia and say something bad abou
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Re:Taboo, but the truth. (Score:5, Interesting)
I call it the "Fox censorship". No it ain't just Fox.
So, there's no such thing as censorship... (Score:2)
I think that for you to appreciate the difference, you would need to live in China for a
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I was at the Public Records Office just the other week (at Kew, in London) there you can see the original documents from the government departments from the time, as well as the information we had about the Germans and there are some news reports which they thought were important. I suggest that this information
Tianamen (Score:2, Interesting)
Is the English version any better? (Score:4, Interesting)
In the Chinese Wikipedia, the government's bias censors the text; in the English Wikipedia, editorial mobs are glad to use their own bias to censor it.
Amen to this sentiment (Score:4, Interesting)
That said, I have been successful in making some rather substantial changes in some articles explicitly by showing the paper tigers for which some of those POV biases can be seen. And given enough time and eyeballs, most of these problems do eventually get ironed out. But it takes time and much of what you see on Wikipedia is a work in progress.
In defense of the Chinese Wikipedia, they are a couple of years behind and a fair bit under-represented in comparison to the Chinese speaking population to what the English Wikipedia has going for it. That and "official actions" by the PRC that tends to discourage participation on Wikipedia. Those that do participate operate under a "Sword of Damocles [wikipedia.org] that could be lowered at any time by the PRC government. As I've pointed out myself on many occasions, it would be an incredibly inept Chinese government that would not know exactly who the major Wikipedia participants are, even those who don't necessarily live in China proper (like being a Chinese speaker in the USA, as an example). I'm talking the full names, addresses, and other identifying information about these people. The use of psuedonyms does not hide this information from the Chinese government.
There is justified concern in term of avoiding prison or even losing their life if they try to push too hard for the NPOV that the English Wikipedia enjoys. As for the U.S. government keeping track of its citizens, I'm sure that happens as well, but there would be a nearly instant and major outcry if there were such a similar crackdown within the USA. I'm sure the
my brother in China (Score:4, Informative)
Do I really have to be the first to say it? (Score:2, Offtopic)
China's government denies its citizens their God given rights. It is therefore illegitimate. It is the duty of every man and woman who would be free to work towards its dissolution and the subsequent creation of a new government founded upon the principles of individual freedom and public accountability.
Lee
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Neither is the source of man's God given rights.
Wikiality? (Score:2)
Difference in culture more than censorship (Score:4, Insightful)
Likewise an article about homosexuality written in a hypothetical English Wikipedia from the 1930s would likely have a very different angle on it than we have today, even without any active government censorship.
If the Republican party had its own Wikipedia written by its members and the Democratic one its own, no censorship would be needed for them to have very different articles on president Bush. A similar difference would apply for the hypothetical state Wikipedias by Massachusetts and Utah residents on Bush.
Neither do Korean and Japanese Wikipedias always agree on what is accurate information when it comes to history.
The great thing with Wikipedia is that it makes it so much easier to see what is written in other languages about a subject. Just click on the link in the lower left for the language you want. Some differences will probably stay for ever, but the easy access to other languages to some extent diminishes national misunderstandings.
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Truthiness (Score:2, Interesting)
Wikipedia is based on the principle of "relevance by consensus". While there is a requirement for providing references, there is no mechanism for objectively accepting or rejecting a reference or a theory. This leads in many cases to fringe theories of some interest group getting more attention than they should. The english wikipedia has the benefit of being internatio
In that case the UK and US are censored too (Score:2)
Does this mean the English wikipedia is sanitized and modified to remove all that sensitive information? Is the DoHS or GCHQ actively removing aspects of technical articles so we don't turn into a nation or two of hackers and bomb-builders?
Come on this is just bullshit. An Encyclopedia is meant to be comprehensiv
English not better (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:I wonder what it feels like to be suckered (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes the U.S. has plenty of corrupt leaders. Yes the U.S. has plenty of lazy and apathetic people who do not think for themselves.
BUT:
We found out that we were lied to.
We have people on national television and in national publications expousing as matter of fact that we were and are being lied to and misled.
It is commonly reported public knowledge that more citizens disapprove of the current regime than approve of it.
The competence of the administration is openly ridiculed in national broadcasts and publications.
WE VOTED OUT THE PARTY IN POWER. I hope you appreciate how important this. In some countries past and present this is the thing of revolutionary dreams.
Why do I care that people appreciate how good they have things here? Not because I want them to be nationalists or even to be proud of what we do have. But rather because if people do not see the great freedom and opportunity they have, they may fail to take hold of it and use it to better themselves and our society as they can and should.
You do not think we are in a position to criticize suppression of freedom in other countries? You aren't if you can't see past your own problems. You aren't if you are more concerned about your own national pride than you are about freedom at home and around the world. Start standing up for your fellow human beings, and stop limiting yourself by your national pride or shame. I don't know about you, but my nationality is human being.
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No you didn't, you just voted in the understudy.
Before we get on the high horse here... (Score:1, Interesting)
How many homosexual rape HOWTO entrees are there? Just how detailed are the Wikipedia's meth cooking/ricin making manuals?
When was the last time our Govt declassified a blueprint for a nuclear warhead?
A detailed travel schedule and the layout of alarm circuits in dubbyas house perhaps? No?
What, those are all illegal in US, you say?
Well, in China, all politically subversive public speech is illegal.
We all have our reasons for outlawing certain
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I do. They are not just. Yes, different governments censor different things. Does this mean there is no difference between them and we must throw up our hands and refrain from making any judgements? Of course not. Reasonable people can reasonably differ about which censorship is raesonable. But when a major focus of a governments censorship rules is to outlaw criticism of than government, I gotta say: What are
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Well, apparently some twat thought the red dot looked like a laser sight, and dropped a dime on her. Imagine what they'd do today.
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what, you mean nothing like this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland_cement#Produ ction [wikipedia.org]
Irrelevant, as I've shown, there are very good reasons that those things are/aren't in Wikipedia (and not all of those things are illegal).
I am sure some Good Chinese is reciting Good reasons why the Tank Square isn't in the Chinese wiki.
The point being, certain things are not acceptable to certain communities (legal, moral, other reaso
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As their economy there is improving it's getting harder and harder to censor. Because of a shortage of workers, companies over there are having to offer better and better benefits to attract workers. It takes a massive workforce to supply the rich with everything they want. Keep th
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Good point. In fact, the false image that most people associate with China is quite indicative of censorship and misinformation in Western cultures. Just because misinformation is distributed and presented differently in the West than in China does not mean the information is any more accurate, and anybody who has been on the Net for a while can attest to the misrepresentation of tech issues such as DRM and "hacking" -- or more recently, net neutrality -- by the Western media.
However, I must contest
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First of all, contributions to many of not-so-controversial entries (and that's usually the majorities of entries anyway) are often written or being written by translation. See for example, this entry for Perturbation Theory [wikipedia.org]. So The differences between the two wikipedia are often small for most of my search/contribution need (I study physics and mathematics, and often contributes to both of these subjects in English and Chinese).
Of course, there are also controversial topics such as Mao, representative g
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When one of those parties is the government, it isn't compromise anymore, it's a veto. It isn't about interpretation of facts, the issue is the facts themselves. The cens
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Might it be useful/reasonable in some cases to have "direct translation" pages in additional to the two native language pages?
What I am thinking for example is there being the regular Wikipedia English language article on Tiananmen square, the regular Chinese language article on Tiananmen square, PLUS a Chinese page strictly traslating the English page PLUS an English page strictly translating the Chinese page.
In theory the only acceptable edits to the transl
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Agreed. This is exactly what made me suggest that native Chinese do the translation from Chinese to English, and Americans do the translation of English into Chinese. That way any translation difficulties and tendency towards bias would tend to be in line with the point of view of the native version.
Unfortunately my translation abilities are effectively nonexistant, unless Wikipedia suddenly pops up new versions for various computer programming
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Look, I'm no conspiracy theorist or libertarian nut, and I realize that browsing the news at aljazeera.com probably isn't Gitmo material. But, does anyone here have trouble believing the government might be using some kind of monitoring not unlike bayesian spam filtering, where simply sharing similar browsing patterns to known terrorists (or known residents of Gitmo) lands you on the watch list?
You mean something like this [aclu.org]?
has a point (Score:1)
It takes both fighting from the outside and from the inside. Fighting from the inside has different rules, requires somewhat of a concilliatory approach, involves understanding things from a different point of view, provides different opportunities for corruption.
(And, yes, fighting from the outside does have its own opportunities for corruption.)
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This is nothing more than a fallacy. First of all, you assume that all the people writing articles on Chinese Wikipedia were born in or live in Mainland China. If you have walked around town -- anywhere in the world -- recently, you would realize that there are a lot of C
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The whiners cometh... (Score:2)
Just because you got modded down for supporting Naziism doesn't mean that they're censoring your opinions.
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Opposing Marxism makes me a supporter of Nazism?
Bravo! You're a well poisoning genius!
*clap*
*clap*
*clap*
*clap*
*clap*
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- Have political beliefs that add up to Naziism.
- Speak with such horrendous grammar that reading the post is horrendously hard.
- Forget how to use paragraphs, making your posts unreadable.
And back before about 1940 the only people who weren't fucking worshipping Hitler and Mussolini were the fucking Communists.Re: (Score:2)
* Have political beliefs that add up to Naziism.
* Speak with such horrendous grammar that reading the post is horrendously hard.
* Forget how to use paragraphs, making your posts unreadable.
Then criticizing Wikipedia must be something like Nazism, because I get modded down a lot for taking on th
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Just what is it about Wikipedia that makes it immune to criticism? It can't be anything to do with the quality of the articles.