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The article says the lift is only for foreign visitors, and because they plan to turn those parts of Hainan into free-trade zones. Could this be a trial for rol

by lainga 8y ago

The article says the lift is only for foreign visitors, and because they plan to turn those parts of Hainan into free-trade zones. Could this be a trial for rolling out the same thing in other places (i.e. SEZs) where foreigners concentrate? Then they could get the benefits of domestic censorship without foreigners loudly posting about how they can't reach Facebook for the next 2 months, and making China look bad.

mc32 8y ago
It’s probably not so much about not looking bad and more about enabling productivity. I’m sure they are getting pushback from many companies which interact with foreign nationals whose work is affected by the GFoC.
- 394549 8y ago
  > It’s probably not so much about not looking bad and more about enabling productivity. I’m sure they are getting pushback from many companies which interact with foreign nationals whose work is affected by the GFoC. Anecdote time: I once met a mainland Chinese software engineer who told me that his department pays for a VPN subscription so they can access the uncensored internet for work.
  - realusername 8y ago
    I can imagine it's impacting productivity in a negative way for software. The VPN isn't going to work 100% of the time and when it does not work you will have half of the docs you need not replicated enough on the local internet.
  - seanmcdirmid 8y ago
    They could also just lease a line directly out from China telecom.
  - vfulco2 8y ago
    I was told by someone high up in IT, 99% of wealthy mainlanders all use V-P-N. Not going to fool or pull wool over eyes of the intelligent with big money.
- mikeash 8y ago
  I visit China every couple of years. I used to work remotely while I was there, but these days I’ve given up on the idea. It used to be easy, just ssh tunnel to a friendly server and you’re all set. Now they block every technique I can come up with and fuck up the entire connection if you make a wrong move. There are specialist VPN services that still work, but it’s a real pain to figure out which ones work and which ones used to work and are now broken, and you can’t count on anything continuing to work.
  - css 8y ago
    With the risk of sounding like a shill, I have been using HMA Pro for almost 5 years now to connect to social networks and Apple's messaging services. Aside from power/local internet outages I have not had issues connecting to "blocked" services.
    - mikeash 8y ago
      I don’t care if you are shilling, I’m glad to know about more stuff that might work.
      - css 8y ago
        Amusingly when I go to their homepage Chrome hits me with NET::ERR_CERT_AUTHORITY_INVALID. All I know is that I use it and it works, albeit slowly.
  - rfolstad 8y ago
    Mosh over any vpn worked when I was there.
    - monocasa 8y ago
      They're currently cracking down hard on VPNs from what I've heard.
  - qudat 8y ago
    I was just in China, this worked most of the time although slow: https://getoutline.org/en/home https://getoutline.org/en/home

by lainga 8y ago

mc32 8y ago

It’s probably not so much about not looking bad and more about enabling productivity. I’m sure they are getting pushback from many companies which interact with foreign nationals whose work is affected by the GFoC.

394549 8y ago
> It’s probably not so much about not looking bad and more about enabling productivity. I’m sure they are getting pushback from many companies which interact with foreign nationals whose work is affected by the GFoC. Anecdote time: I once met a mainland Chinese software engineer who told me that his department pays for a VPN subscription so they can access the uncensored internet for work.
- realusername 8y ago
  I can imagine it's impacting productivity in a negative way for software. The VPN isn't going to work 100% of the time and when it does not work you will have half of the docs you need not replicated enough on the local internet.
- seanmcdirmid 8y ago
  They could also just lease a line directly out from China telecom.
- vfulco2 8y ago
  I was told by someone high up in IT, 99% of wealthy mainlanders all use V-P-N. Not going to fool or pull wool over eyes of the intelligent with big money.
mikeash 8y ago
I visit China every couple of years. I used to work remotely while I was there, but these days I’ve given up on the idea. It used to be easy, just ssh tunnel to a friendly server and you’re all set. Now they block every technique I can come up with and fuck up the entire connection if you make a wrong move. There are specialist VPN services that still work, but it’s a real pain to figure out which ones work and which ones used to work and are now broken, and you can’t count on anything continuing to work.
- css 8y ago
  With the risk of sounding like a shill, I have been using HMA Pro for almost 5 years now to connect to social networks and Apple's messaging services. Aside from power/local internet outages I have not had issues connecting to "blocked" services.
  - mikeash 8y ago
    I don’t care if you are shilling, I’m glad to know about more stuff that might work.
    - css 8y ago
      Amusingly when I go to their homepage Chrome hits me with NET::ERR_CERT_AUTHORITY_INVALID. All I know is that I use it and it works, albeit slowly.
- rfolstad 8y ago
  Mosh over any vpn worked when I was there.
  - monocasa 8y ago
    They're currently cracking down hard on VPNs from what I've heard.
- qudat 8y ago
  I was just in China, this worked most of the time although slow: https://getoutline.org/en/home https://getoutline.org/en/home