Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft in China
This Sunday's New York Times magazine will have a article by Clive Thompson on activities by Google (and Yahoo and Microsoft) in China. The story is on the Times site now, and it's a long but exceptionally rewarding read--one of the best pieces of technology-related reporting I've ever seen.
(Time out for a moment of full disclosure: IDG, PC World's parent company, is a major, venerable publisher of magazines in China, via a joint venture with the Chinese government; among our publications there is a Chinese edition of PC World.)
All three of these American Internet titans are doing business in China and bowing to that country's restrictions on free speech. That can mean censoring search engine results (the Times story is largely devoted to examining how and why Google created a China-specific engine that, for instance, erases much information about the Falung Gong sect). It can involve pulling down a political blog that the government disapproves of (which Microsoft did). Perhaps most chillingly, it can involve turning over a dissident's e-mail to the government for use in a trial, as Yahoo has been accused of doing in three instances.
Why would a company aid censorship of political content and repression of dissent? The standard explanation is that it must follow the laws of the countries it does business in. That also holds true in western democracies such as Germany and France, where pro-Nazi propaganda is illegal and eBay can't permit auctions of Nazi memorabilia.
It's not, of course, remotely that simple. American companies could refuse to enter China under circumstances which involve lending a helping hand to free thought. (Thompson's piece says that Wikipedia has refused to create a censored version of its encyclopedia, despite the fact that Chinese geeks are beseeching it to do so, saying that some information is better than none.)
There's also the issue of censorship done to please the Chinese government flowing across international boundaries, leaving us all with an Internet that's a little less free. As Thompson explains, the blog which MSN took down lived on a server in the United States; Microsoft's fear of the Chinese government's wrath eliminated the ability for anyone, anywhere to see it.
Google chose to respond to Chinese restrictions by creating a China-specific, filtered version of its search engine. But the censorship isn't silent--when a search has eliminated links that might be illegal, it includes a disclaimer stating so. And the company also continued to permit Chinese Web surfers to visit its standard engine, although the government's "Great Firewall of China" prevents users from getting to certain sites and pages. (The Great Firewall is distressingly effective at blocking free speech from the rest of the world: I used Google in Beijing in 2004, and I was unable to get through to some China-related pages...and Googles Blogger service was only half-usable at best.)
Google's approach here is decidedly controversial, and there are plenty of folks who think the company is cynically tossing its "Don't be evil" mantra in favor of monetizing all those Chinese Internet users. But I think it may well be that its actions are short-term compromises that will serve a long-term good. Near the end of the article, Thompson says:
"For most Americans, or certainly for most of those who think and write about China, there are no half-measures in democracy or free speech. A country either fully embraces these principles, or it disappears down the slippery slope of totalitarianism. But China's bloggers and Internet users have already lived at the bottom of the slippery slope. From their perspective, the Internet — as filtered as it is — has already changed Chinese society profoundly. For the younger generation, especially, it has turned public speech into a daily act. This, ultimately, is the perspective that Google has adopted, too. And it raises an interesting question: Can an imperfect Internet help change a society for the better?"
That's a neat summation of the basic question here; too bad there's no way to answer it with such clarity. As with virtually everything about the astonishing era of change going on in China, nobody knows for sure what the upshot will be, and it might take decades before it plays out. For the sake of China, the rest of the world, and the Internet we all share, here's hoping for the best.
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I can't believe it. Business doing business with a government that systematically oppresses its people - a fact already proven. What are we becoming? If we stay silent on this fact and allow ourselves to participate by our silence then we are all accountable for playing a small role in oppression. Try that one on!!!
While what Google does is still debatable, Yahoo's activities are completely shameful.
One small step for the chinese people.one long term goal for man/women kind.
Unfortunately, it's the way things are. China is too big to simply be ignored, and just like anywhere else, they need to follow the laws of the land.
The fact that Western companies are breaking into a pseudo-communist regime is great. It's inevitable that it will fall.