China is trying to police what people are saying about it around the world
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Here's a cite for the Disney story. I've read about Chinese censors reviewing films, and Hollywood self-censoring, but I don't have time to find those cites.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/15/business/international/ch...
However, let's think about this situation for a moment, as rational adults. And if you can, then try to think about this from the other side.
There is a lot of bad blood coming out of American media about China. It's in the news, the movies, the TV shows, the literature, it's everywhere. Unless you are dense, then I think this can be established as a fact. China is continually being painted as the big bad scary commie, that's out to eat your children (or something like that), or at least, they're taking your iPhone assembling slavery jobs.
A movie like this, would add more fuel to the fire. You, as an intelligent individual may be able to distinguish that Red Dawn is a fictional movie, with good and bad guys. And this sells tickets. And Americans love this! They want a big bad evil enemy, that their country can destroy. And right now, China is it!
However, can you guarantee that another American, of lesser educational intelligence than yourself, can distinguish such a thing? That this is pure fiction, and not a proxy of reality.
Nobody wants to be painted as the bad guy. Americans movies will certainly never paint America as the bad guy, despite the fact that millions have died at the receiving end of American weapons. In fact, I can't recall any media where America is painted as the bad guy.
The Chinese people certainly don't want to see themselves as the bad guys. Especially not when it's a historical fact, that they have been severely dominated by Western nations. And hundreds of millions of their people have suffered and died. And to this day, there are certain white people, that are proud of what their race did to China in the 1800s. And if you find this shocking, please let me know. You can find this perception all over the internet, and you can poll your close friends, and ask them what they truly think.
Anyways, movies are political statements. When you make it too real, then it hits too close to home. And there are certain dangers with that kind of propaganda. And it will certainly upset the people on the receiving end of it.
Stick to making movies about aliens and their probing devices, zombies, and superheros in tights. Or killing the evil German Nazis. Nobody will question these kinds of movies.
I'm not American but this suggests you have experienced very little of the variety of American movies or general media? There are not only plenty of American movies and media critical of America and American policy but there is a long history of such. Without going back too far in history, the media presentation of the Vietnam war, for example, may be something of a cliché but it's a valid example.
> Americans movies will certainly never paint America as the bad guy
Wow.
> There is a lot of bad blood coming out of American media about China
The paranoid, we're-picked-on perspective.
Much of the comment is directly from the rhetoric of the Chinese Communist Party and government:
> Anyways, movies are political statements. When you make it too real, then it hits too close to home. And there are certain dangers with that kind of propaganda. And it will certainly upset the people on the receiving end of it.
Everything is political. Avoid politics that challenge the Chinese Communist Party for reasons of public order, which just upsets people - the public doesn't want to think about politics and become upset. Promoting Chinese Communist Party-approved politics is ok, because that increases public order.
> Stick to making movies about aliens and their probing devices, zombies, and superheros in tights. Or killing the evil German Nazis. Nobody will question these kinds of movies.
Uh, I'll try to keep that in mind. We wouldn't want to make a movie that anyone questioned!
You can't even acknowledge that my positions may have some merit.
And that's the problem with trying to have a rational discussion on sensitive things like this. You get people like this guy, that only sees it from his angle. And this whole thing just becomes another echo chamber.
You should consider reading this:
https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/03/the-social-media-ech...
At this point, you can have your say. And we can agree to disagree.
EDIT: Deleted response to personal comments.
Zuckerberg wants to be in China in such a bad way. He's learned Mandarin, plays up his family connections (via his wife's family), and puts on the charm when visiting China. He's created relationships with officials at every level. His representatives have talked with companies which may be partners or acquired at some point.
It does not surprise me one bit that Facebook will bend over backwards to accommodate officials on censorship demands. This is the cost of doing business in China for a tech company. Media companies learned this decades ago - read up on how Rupert Murdoch was able to operate there, it's quite fascinating.
Now it's Silicon Valley's turn, especially companies that specialize in communication -- social networks, phone manufacturers, companies that sell networking hardware, etc. The Chinese government's survival depends on information control, and if they can't do it themselves, then they force local and foreign companies to do it for them.
Don't think that this issue will be limited to human rights activists. It doesn't matter who you are -- your social media comments, family relationships, WeChat and Facebook messages, work connections on LinkedIn, and other digital footprints that reflect your attitude or influence will be used to build a social media score that determines your level of access to the country and ability to do business in China.
The scary prospect is that other countries will do the same thing ... if they haven't done so already.
(If he didn't, then of course Facebook should, first, not suspend his account to appease China, and second, not lie about why they did.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinophile
> A Sinophile or a Chinophile is a person who demonstrates a strong interest and love for Chinese culture or its people.[1] It is also commonly used to describe those knowledgeable of Chinese history and culture (such as scholars and students), non-native Chinese language speakers, pro-Chinese politicians, and people perceived as having a strong interest in any of the above.
That the combining form -phile is also used for perverted things doesn't negate its rather benign meaning.
In any case, I don't think it matters. China and Chinese is like a hobby for Zuckerberg that he is interested in. I don't think getting Facebook into China is a huge concern at all for him, he's just using his position to do what he wants.
Fetishizes is a pop-psychology term.
If he was doing that for the money, you'd think he would consult first with someone who actually knew better.
The guy is the CEO of a multi-billion dollar behemoth. He was always awkward, but he is also very calculated. He wants in on the Chinese market.
>If he was doing that for the money, you'd think he would consult first with someone who actually knew better.
And do what differently?
That is of course the only possibility Chinese can think of, while Americans just think he is being awkward.
> And do what differently?
Not do a bunch of cringe worthy stuff like asking Xi to name his child or jogging in Beijing smog.
Well, I'm not Chinese, and I think those who think he's being awkward are naive.
>Not do a bunch of cringe worthy stuff like asking Xi to name his child or jogging in Beijing smog.
Cringe-worthy to whom? Because the Chinese audience will probably eat-up that kind of soapy stuff, the same way Americans cherish the cliche stuff performed by people coming into the US and seeking their business (businesses, actors, etc).
He even positively blurbed Xi's doorstop of a book: https://www.amazon.com/Xi-Jinping-Governance-English-Languag...
> Facebook suspended Mr. Guo’s account. In a statement, the company said the account published the personal information of others without their consent, which violated the platform’s policies.
One way to test the truthfulness of Facebook's claim is to see whether or not they suspend the accounts of users who make corruption claims about US officials. Surely there were a lot of such claims involving personal information about politicians during the last election cycle. Did Facebook suspend those accounts?
Its a delicate situation and hopefully the government will not be afraid to deal with it, whilst not turning it into a xenophobic support point.
I'd love to know what sorts of things are going on in Africa.
It's nice to see the mainstream finally starting to wake up from their long slumber though, perhaps there's hope yet.
I don't understand from your comment whether you're referring to the Australian govt or the Chinese government as having bought all the press. And who "they" are when referring to disrupting lectures.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/dec/12/sam-d...
I don't think this is that hard of a decision, is it? Just say no and cut ties with efforts for China as a market. Any profits there are not worth jeopardizing all of the privacy and precedents that are being slowly pushed.
Because they have a fiduciary duty to, obviously.
Meanwhile since Google was pushed out of China, they have become a near trillion dollar juggernaut. Since fiscal 2009, Google has grown from $23b to $109b in sales. They're about nine to ten times the size of Baidu and growing as fast. That's the cost of being stuck inside of China, while Google is stuck outside of China.
This is why Apple doesn't sell away your data, why every city is filled with local and organic restaurants, etc.
The market does select for moral positions, you just might not like those positions.
Counterpoint: Scrooge-McDuck-Money-Bin.gif
Chinese authorities have also successfully persuaded Google to pull down content that had been available around the globe.
How do they use those standing desks without a spine?
The myriad of issues of the present era seem chaotic, but I'm starting to believe I see the defining theme, the one that will characterize it in history books, and I see the story in the article as merely a part of it: The contest between democracy and liberty on one hand, and wealth and power for an elite on the other. People like Thiel say "freedom and democracy" are not "compatible" with "capitalism".[0] Similarly, the Chinese government (and Russian, and others) is a wealthy elite that keeps the power from its citizens and the bulk of the wealth to itself. It's aristocracy: The belief that power should be controlled by the elite and inherited, not delegated by a vote of universal peers with equal rights.
It's not really "capitalism" that that Thiel advocates, but economic power for the currently wealthy unrestricted by the democratic wishes of other citizens (i.e. simply more power for himself, the oldest, most base political instinct - again, see China). He has fellow advocates in the current US government: For example, the Secretary of State (another business elite) and others have openly said the US shouldn't sacrifice making money for human rights, and openly support brutal, oppressive dictatorships. In the US courts, conservatives have given corporations and wealthy far more power over the democratic will of the people - corporations have gained Constitutional rights of real humans; they and the wealthy have gained unlimited, anonymous financial influence in politics and elections; and they've gained protections from the courts themselves (class-action restrictions, arbitration requirements, etc.). Another example is one vein of extreme anti-regulation dogma that says, on principle, economic powers should not be limited by the will of the majority (I'm not saying all arguments against regulation are problematic, only the principle that the issues shouldn't be decided democratically).
At times there truly is an immediate tradeoff. Daimler-Benz, Google, Hollywood, and others have to deal with this real problem in China and it will affect their bottom lines. But from an historical perspective it's nothing new and is a minor sacrifice. Few of those companies would exist in their current state or enjoy their wealth if not for the massive sacrifices of life and wealth made by prior generations; there are 18-year-olds still at the bottom of the English Channel who never even set foot in France or fired a weapon. What are the corporations and we doing for the next generation? Will we be merely parasites that consume the benefits bestowed on us and pass on less, rather than invest in and expand freedom as our ancestors did? The U.S. Declaration of Independence ends "we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor" for liberty. It wasn't the opposite: they didn't pledge to give up their liberty for greater fortunes - but that's what Thiel, et al want.
In the long run, it's not a tradeoff. Giving freedom and opportunity to more people makes them more productive; it's a wonderful, mutually-reinforcing phenomenon between democracy and freedom on one hand and prosperity on the other. It has made the democracies the wealthiest, most free countries in the history of the world. It has given hope and liberty to more than a billion people; today's wealthy were yesterday's poor. It's worked throughout the world, from Japan to Latin America to Taiwan to Europe and the US to many more places.
But at times there are immediate tradeoffs and sacrifices that we must decide to make: Will we give up wealth for democracy and freedom? Do we want democracy and freedom (and long-term prosperity), or unbridled economic wealth and power for a nascent aristocracy? It seems like an easy choice to me once you think about it that way.[1]
[0] https://www.cato-unbound.org/2009/04/13/peter-thiel/educatio...
[1] Of course, it's even easier when I frame the question that I answer!
Instead of run by the state, governments could choose to give out vouchers redeemable only at social platforms that charge users directly for their services instead of relying on the advertising and data-sales game.
I also believe that such a platform is the quickest path towards incorruptible technocracies, slowly but surely through referendums being opened up through the platform (small, local decisions at first).
If this does not occur in the public sector, then I view governments as the taxi industry to capitalism's uber, and it will be the free market (controlled by increasingly intelligent public demand more than lagging legsislation) that starts to provide more 'pure democracy' behaviors. (As an aside, I wonder whether we shall start to see more interestingly structured IPOs)
The cynic in me sadly suspects that socialism just isn't fast enough, and that the free market will be the dominant tool for change - But that slowly but surely, public voice will become a more ethical one - In this era we are in which is surely a second age of enlightenment. Hopefully this will sculpt the free market to be more aligned with the commons, and less brutally and bluntly aimed at collecting $.
the "Best Korea" has the fastest socialism in the world - heck it even has its own "social networking platform"
...and it's also "democratic" (in its own way, of course)
And that implies we can't solve the issue with technology alone. Moderation needs to be possible, but we have to figure out a way to prevent abuse.
Disruptive users do get shadow-banned, but it's trivial to create new ones. With accumulating karma, there is some pressure to self-censor. But overall, I like it better than StackExchange or reddit, for example.
Edit: I just noticed that this submission about Bitcoin energy use has been raised from the dead: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16498776
While such an extreme scenario is, needless to say, unlikely, the idea of centralizing the majority of social media under the control of a government that has shown increasing interest in mass surveillance remains something I am exceedingly dubious about.
Most major social media collaborate so well with their country's elites, governments and national interests, that they might as well be run by their state.
I do agree with your thesis that we need social platforms immune to arbitrary censorship, however.
I think the solution is some sort of trustless P2P system, where no one entity exercises ultimate control, and censorship is impossible, or at least very difficult. Of course that means that the platform won't be beholden to any nation's laws, irrespective of whether those laws are, in my opinion, just (criminalizing distribution of child pornography, for example) or not (criminalizing open political dissent, for example).
However, if I have to choose between absolute free speech and government- or megacorp-controlled, surveilled, and mediated social interaction, I choose absolute free speech.
90% of the time everyone here seems to support censorship and control over social media. Then the story is about china and everyone is against it.
"After U.S.-Based Reporters Exposed Abuses, China Seized Their Relatives"
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/01/world/asia/china-xinjiang...
"Chinese Police Are Demanding Personal Information From Uighurs in France. Officials have threatened to detain relatives of those who don’t comply."
http://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/02/chinese-police-are-secre...
And about takedown requests to Google etc. MPAA and other "rights holders" do this frequently. Indeed, the US government uses DNS poisoning to censor sites that it considers illegal. Or requests that other countries raid hosting services, and impound servers. Has China done that?
Anyway, just sayin'. I do believe that everything should be takedown-proof, for what it's worth.
https://www.google.com/search?q=swedish+citizen+china&source...
I would hope that you avail yourself of this wonderful resource in the future, saving time both for yourself and for others.
0) https://thediplomat.com/2018/02/the-strange-and-sad-case-of-...
You don't have a free speech right to post the copyrighted material of others, just sayin'.