Crazy rumors are swirling this morning about Wang Lijun, a Chongqing vice-mayor who may or may not have attempted to enter the US embassy in Chengdu and request political asylum. This story exploded on Weibo, and this morning I have witnessed a very bizarre pattern of censorship there. When a story this sensitive goes viral, Sina generally blocks searches for relevant search terms so that while people can still talk about the issue and don't feel like they're being censored, it's impossible to get the big picture of what folks outside ...
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Feb 6 2012
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Facebook Still Looking at China as it Files for IPO
Facebook’s IPO filing this past week notes that the company is still indeed looking at China as a possible market for its popular social network, despite being currently blocked. While there have been no shortage of rumblings about about Facebook’s possible jump into China, when we asked representatives back in October), they were mum on the topic. But in the recent filing does explicitly mention China more than a few times, perhaps most notably in this remark: We may enter new international markets where we have limited or no experience ...
Jan 13 2012
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India High Court on Google, Facebook: Like China, We Will Block All Such Websites
Back in December we told you about India’s intent to ban offensive online material, and how internet companies like Google and Facebook were being asked to control the content distrubuted on their platforms. And just yesterday, according to The Hindustan Times, Justice Suresh Kait of the Delhi High Court ominously warned: Like China we will block all such websites. The initial complaint against the internet companies was filed by journalist Vinay Rai, and subsequently representatives of 21 internet services, including Facebook, Google, and Yahoo were summoned to court. Here on PO ...
Dec 6 2011
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As India Pushes For Ban on Offensive Content, Facebook Responds
India’s communications minister Kapil Sibal today affirmed the nation’s intent to ban offensive online material, after making requests to internet companies such as Facebook, Google and other internet companies to control their distribution. The AFP quotes Sibal as saying: Three months back we saw that Google, Yahoo!, Facebook had images which could be an insult to Indians, especially religious-minded people … We told them to find a way that such insulting images are not uploaded. We gave them some time … but there was no response. He added that the internet ...
Dec 6 2011
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Looking for an Internet Job in China? No Skills? Become an Internet Commenter
Everyone knows that the Chinese internet is censored. What's censored? All kinds of things! But these days the net moves too fast to censor everything. That's why the government hires "internet commenters" to make pro-government posts and influence public opinion. Among net users, these posters -- along with anyone else expressing pro-government opinions regularly -- are known derogatorily as the "fifty cent party," a reference to their alleged payment (0.5 RMB per post). Today, the image at right (click to enlarge it) is circulating on Sina Weibo. Originally posted by a user ...
Dec 2 2011
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Hey G+: Your China Infographic Kind of Sucks!
Let me start this post off with something nice: we're very happy that major Western tech blogs are finally paying attention to what's going on in China. That's good. That said, please hire someone who knows what they're doing because otherwise shit like this happens. I should point out that article on Mashable is almost entirely based on the infographic by G+ (not to be confused with Google Plus), which is apparently "a community for professionals, academics & entrepreneurs." So perhaps it's not fair to blame Mashable for this. Anyway, let's ...
Nov 22 2011
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Global Times Attacks Ai Weiwei, Calls For Authorities to Crack Down on “Illegal” Microblogging
Avant-garde artist Ai Weiwei is no stranger to microblogs, or to controversy. Nor is Hu Xijin, the outspoken editor of the state-run Global Times, who was recently profiled in a piece on the Global Times in Foreign Policy. Hu also maintains an active Sina Weibo account and has over 1.4 million followers, although if the comments on his posts are much indication, plenty of them are following just to argue with his points. Back in April, when Ai was first detained (and before authorities had acknowledged his detention or made ...
Nov 18 2011
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US Congressional Panel Tackles China’s Great Firewall, Seeking a WTO Intervention
The US Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) held a new hearing in Washington yesterday to discuss the “human toll and trade impact” of China’s censorship of the web - aka it’s Great Firewall (GFW) system. It comes at a time when the US is asking the World Trade Organization (WTO) to press China for greater transparency in its GFW, which blocks a lot of foreign social media as well as general sites that contain views and material that Beijing authorities consider ‘sensitive’ or ‘inharmonious.’ The CECC hearing, chaired by Senator Sherrod ...
Nov 8 2011
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Ai Weiwei and Politics on Weibo
Ai Weiwei's name is a banned search term on Sina Weibo. His account is blocked. And yet, Sina Weibo is still talking about him. Take, for example, this post by Hu Xijin, the editor-in-chief of the Global Times and the man who likely penned the op-ed in that paper calling Ai's online fundraising campaign into question (that campaign, by the way, has raised nearly $1 million so far). Hu wrote China needs people like Ai and his supporters because China is a diverse society, but that it also needs to suppress ...
Nov 7 2011
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Sina Blocks Weibo Accounts in Wake of Ai Weiwei’s Fundraising Campaign
Last week, we reported that dissident artist Ai Weiwei -- who had just received a tax bill from authorities to the tune of $2.4 million -- was using Alipay and social networking sites to solicit and collect donations, in essence crowd-sourcing his taxes. Since then, he's raised a bundle of money -- over $550,000 according to the New York Times -- but the campaign does appear to have caught the attention of authorities, and not in a good way. Reports on Twitter are saying that Ai Weiwei's Sina Weibo account has been ...
Nov 4 2011
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Netizens Using Alipay to Give Money to Dissident Artist Ai Weiwei
Ai Weiwei, China's firebrand modern artist, has never been one to shy away from controversy, or away from a fight with the government. His iconoclasm brought him to the edge this spring, when he was arrested and detained for nearly three months for initially mysterious reasons. Eventually, he was accused of tax evasion. His arrest became an international incident, and his loyal army of Twitter followers was up in arms until he was finally released early this summer. Now, Ai has been hit with a $2.4 million tax bill, although he ...
Dec 30 2011
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NBA Player J.R. Smith Not a Fan of Chinese Net Censorship
As the NBA lockout continues on, shooting guard J.R. Smith is spending his time in China, having recently signed with Zhejiang of the China Basketball Association. But according to Sheridan Hoops, he’s finding the rules of the internet game in China are not quite what they were at home. After trying to update Twitter, he discovered that it wasn’t working. But eventually he found he could send tweets using his Blackberry. .bbpBox{background:url(http://a0.twimg.com/profile_background_images/348403928/x2_8d3cba2.jpeg) #C0DEED;padding:20px;}Dear china the fact that u won't let me work my Skype on my desktop or twitter ...
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