In March, 2010, Google formally announced its withdraw from China because the self-censorship imposed by the Chinese government "contradicts Google's moral principles". Although Google's withdraw may not be simply caused by China's censorship policy, Google's decision to leave has attracted significant attention to the Chinese Internet.
Do Chinese citizens enjoy freedom on the Internet?
No! They can't visit Facebook. They can't watch YouTube. They can't follow people on Twitter. They... they are being watched by Big Brother all the time!
However, I would say, Chinese people do have Internet freedom since the Big Brother is too old to be functional. Although Facebook is blocked, they have RenRen.com, which was pirated from Facebook but is now developed to be more advanced than Facebook. Although YouTube is blocked, Chinese people created Tudou.com which is being watched by more and more Americans simply because Tudou doesn't believe in copyright. Although Twitter is blocked, smart Chinese invented Chinese twitter, powered by SINA.COM, the most popular portal site in China.
We can clearly see an absurd paradox between China's ideological willingness to censor the Internet and its incapability of controlling online opinions. Especially with the launch of Chinese Twitter in 2009, exciting changes are happening everyday on the Chinese Internet. Microblogs have gradually triumphed over traditional Chinese media in news reporting. In recent months, some microbloggers went even further as to report the news that the Chinese government wanted to conceal.
Proudly, one of Professor Gocsik's students, Zimo Zeng, has emerged as one of the most-followed microblogger in China. She established her credential as a famous TV reporter. In her Twitter, Zimo wrote several proactive comments on popular news, which have generated heated discussions among Chinese netizens.
For me, I created this blog to record the social changes that are facilitated by the evolving Chinese Internet. More specifically, I want to utilize this blog as a platform to collect the popular comments from Chinese microbloggers throughout a week. I will follow the posts of 20-30 famous Chinese Twitters, collect their interesting opinions and present a summary and my analysis on this blog.
Interestingly enough, Chinese can use proxy servers to bypass the "Great Firewall of China" VPN or SSH, if they can access servers outside of China work just fine. So, many Chinese users end up using facebook, youtube, twitter, on their own.
ReplyDeleteAlso, did you know that research has been unable to find a link between internet and democracy/liberalization? That is, there is a high correlation because more developed countries tend to have internet and tend to have democracy, but once things like GDP are controlled for, internet has very little causal impact on democratization?
But this is a cool idea, I'm interested to see what comes out of the Chinese web.
I'd like to know more about the research, mentioned by John, that draws a correlation between democracy and the internet. John says that the internet doesn't have a causal impact on democratization -- but does democratization have an impact on the internet? I'm guessing that it does, given the original post.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to know more about China's microbloggers -- including my former student Zimo. What are they blogging about? What impact are they having on the cultural conversation? Are these microbloggers blogging anonymously or publicly? Have any of them faced consequences from the government? Or is the government leaving them alone?
To John:
ReplyDeleteYou mentioned a good point about the the relationship between democracy and the Internet. I totally agree that in developed countries democracy and the Internet tend to happen at the same time, which makes the China's case very interesting. Because as of now, China has enjoyed a booming economy and development in the past 20 years, but it's not yet a fully democratic country. The popularization of the Internet in the past 5 to 10 years has actually pushed the Chinese government's boundaries on the freedom of speech and civilian participation in politics. Whether the Internet will make China more democratic or not, let's wait to see.
To Karen:
ReplyDeleteI think democratization and the Internet has mutual impact on each other in China's case. On one hand, the Internet increased civilian participation in politics and pushed the government's limit on the previous "taboos". On the other hand, the liberal changes happened within the Chinese political structure also allowed the Internet to develop in a more democratic way.
As for Chinese microbloggers, they blog about all kinds of things. But most of them focus more on political or social events and talk less about entertainment or sports. Their impact is becoming increasingly huge because many Chinese netizens follow them and forward the blogger's comments. A lot of them, including Zimo, are considered as e-time Chinese intellectuals. They blog publicly and according to my knowledge, they haven't faced any consequences from the government, at least not yet.
To John- although there might not be a tangible evidence of a link between the Internet and democratization, I believe that is due more to the relative novelty of the user-friendly applications that we have today (twitter, facebook, etc.). If anything, Iran stands to show that despite inconclusive research on the relationship between the Internet and democratization, there is a direct connection: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1905125,00.html
ReplyDeleteYuxiang’s blog however, makes me consider the possibility that Google is in fact moving out of China for economic reasons, but are merely labeling it as “moral reasons.” If China is so independent from the mainstream sites of America, then they undoubtedly have the capacity to construct an effective search engine (if they haven’t already). Google holds direct ties to youtube and indirectly to facebook, among numerous other sites. Google’s interest might have been best served packing up and leaving China, in terms of a cost benefit analysis for the present and future.
I think the internet is such a liberalizing force. I've always complained that Jamaican society seems almost static, because there is little information flowing in from different perspectives... but now, wow! People can no longer ignore GLBT issues for example, for they are well publicized in US news sources and these news feeds are easily accessible in Jamaica. Now people can start discussions, and now we have the possibility of resolution. Invention of the century.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I find it interesting that the Chinese govt goes to such lengths to censor the internet. Clearly, it has perceived a link between democratization and internet access that research has not yet proved concretely.