Chinese Censorship: Bad News and Good News
From RConversation:
Latest censorship news: Wikipedia has confirmed reports from bloggers and others that the online peer-produced encyclopedia has been blocked in China. At the same time …. podcasting is taking off like crazy in China. Censorship and information crackdowns on one hand, proliferation of user-generated online content in China at the same time. What gives?
“What gives” is that, for the moment, there is another outlet for personal expression the government hasn’t figured out how to suppress. A tentative hat tip to Steve Jobs and Apple for perhaps helping to undo what Yahoo! and others have wrought.
She paints the Chinese big picture nicely (but darkly) at the end of the post:
….. a business and regulatory model is emerging that enables censorship to work in a way that is actually tolerable for most Chinese internet users (except for political dissidents who are - to put it mildly - out of luck). As a result, China’s extensive system of censorship and internet controls doesn’t hold businesses back when it comes to innovating and making money from products and services that enable users to create media (blogs, podcasts, etc.). We are also looking at a future in which soft censorship will be “baked” into a new generation of software and online services coming out of China. And these products and services will prove very attractive not just for the Chinese government but for many other governments - including some that call themselves democratic.
Here is where the heavyhanded Wiki blackout could end up being good news. It could tip off, and tick off, Chinese Internet users who are normally apolitical to what their government is really up to. And those of us in places “that call themselves democratic” need to stay vigilant.
