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This is so pathetic, why do the Chinese government think they can tell users what they should and shouldn't be looking at. I agree that this type of measure sho

This is so pathetic, why do the Chinese government think they can tell users what they should and shouldn't be looking at. I agree that this type of measure should come into play if there was a guaranteed way of stopping people looking at child pornography or something like that but it almost always appear to be political. I have not been on the Tor network before and I do not plan to but it should be the persons choice of whether they access it or not. China are like the dick head IT manager who turns off javascript at network group policy level, just because he can.

PakG1 15y ago
You're expecting a relatively new Communist government, formed only about half a century ago and currently governs 1.3 billion people, to change its core philosophies overnight. It's not so easy. I don't support this stuff, but I recognize that it's not easy. I bet you it's harder than changing a country's dependence on oil as an energy source (assuming that viable alternatives are available). You have to change the world's largest population's philosophies, governing structure and infrastructure, expectations, etc.
- vorg 15y ago
  India and Japan generally don't censor foreign websites, and their governments survive OK. It's a big loss of face for the present leaders to change their policy. But we keep on hearing the phrase from within China: "Perhaps the new generation of leaders taking over in October 2012 will have different ideas about web censorship". If the policy is going to change, it'll be soon after this time when no government leaders "lose face". The US and EU are also preparing to challenge China at the WTO claiming the Great Firewall violates free trade. If the US and EU can get their timing and level of prodding right, the Firewall might be dismantled. China's already given their web businesses such as Baidu enough startup advantage from the Firewall, and will probably find other ways to give advantage to subsequent startups. But... the infrastructure's already there in China to block foreign websites. Anything that exists but isn't used will be used again sooner or later by some politician, so thanks to Cisco et al the Firewall will always exist even if "dismantled" under WTO enforcement. Just like the US military is there to defend the integrity and borders of the Union, to be used as a last resort, but gets used to invade Iraq for cheap oil.
  - PakG1 15y ago
    I think you misunderstood what I'm trying to say. I don't think it's about losing face. Nor about whether the government survives. It's about cultural momentum. Look at how hard it is to change policies in any government. Look at how long it took the US to get socialized health care, despite people clamoring for it for decades, and even then, that could be repealed by future administrations, as some GOP folks are demanding. For the same reasons a startup is nimbler than a big corporation for changing things, larger countries are slower than smaller countries for making significant change. India is lucky because it's had a tradition of democracy and freedom for quite some time. They already had cultural momentum in that direction, so they don't need to change anything to align with what you want. Similar for Japan. China, you're asking them to reverse the pull of gravity. I've worked in teams that were focused on creating big vision cultural and organizational change in big corporations. I can't even begin to imagine how difficult it would be in a big government, especially one of China's size, and one where there is no easy allowance for diversity of opinions. For example, China's central government is huge on trying to stamp out corruption. However, despite the number of executions they continually carry out for corruption matters and the dissatisfaction of the populace, it is logistically impossible to keep a handle on all of the regional and local governments. It's a huge complicated machine, and I'd warrant that it's even more complicated than the US government's operations, judging from what I've seen living in China.
  - j45 15y ago
    From what I've heard India totally has their equivalent of their Great Firewall, blocking VOIP calls and more.
drivebyacct2 15y ago
>I agree that this type of measure should come into play if there was a guaranteed way of stopping people looking at child pornography or something like that but it almost always appear to be political. No offense, but you seem to miss the point. You've just cited a different political bar at which [government] censorship is okay. I'm not saying child pornography is okay, but it's just a different line in the sand.
- chrislomax 15y ago
  I am making a point about the levels which they go to. I would happily let our government block content like that. There should be more policing on the internet as a whole, I just don't agree with how far they go. When they banned Google search months ago, that was because of political agenda over user censorship.
  - drivebyacct2 15y ago
    I still don't think you're getting what I'm saying. Where do you draw the line? I don't like images of extreme gore any more than child pornography. Should we let governments censor it too? How would we accomplish that anyway?
    - chrislomax 15y ago
      Well I think there are some obvious assumptions you can make. Child pornography being one of them. I do understand what you mean, I just think there can be clear cut boundaries you can draw. It's also not a matter of preference but a matter of what is right and wrong?
      - snowwindwaves 15y ago
        what is right and what is wrong is different for different people
      - pavel_lishin 15y ago
        > It's also not a matter of preference but a matter of what is right and wrong? Who defines right and wrong? Is it right or wrong to look for abortion clinics? What about just doing research on abortion? How about stem cells? Should I be able to use bit torrent? After all, I can torrent Ubuntu releases, or copies of mp3's, or child pornography - and there's no way to tell the difference. Is it wrong to look up information that makes your government look bad? How about someone else's government?
kahawe 15y ago
> This is so pathetic, why do the Chinese government think they can tell users what they should and shouldn't be looking at You are measuring a totalitarian regime against your own values of freedom and call their actions "pathetic" because they don't allow personal choice of having encrypted traffic? You must have no understanding of China and its politics and the meaning of their censorship and their Great Firewall... that's like saying "Hitler was a real dork because he did not allow free speech and freedom of art which are totally awesome and everyone should be allowed to draw what they want!".
- chrislomax 15y ago
  Yes I am because they are deciding at a government level what everyone should be looking at. People are using VPNs to bypass the firewall therefore the people inside of China do not want the restriction so it's obvious that the people inside do not want to be restricted. So yes, I deem what they are doing from a government level pathetic as it doesn't stand for what the whole nation wants. So it's not MY values of what I call freedom but my understanding of what a majority of the people inside China actually want. If people didn't want that then there would be no need for encrypted traffic to connect to sites that the firewall would class an inappropriate.
  - piotrSikora 15y ago
    > my understanding of what a majority of the people inside China actually want. Do you really think that the majority of Chinese citizens use VPNs to bypass the firewall?
    - chrislomax 15y ago
      If there was not a massive demand for this then the service would not exist. Also, if a lot of people were not doing it then they would not have rolled out software at ISP level to combat such a service. So I would say yes, a lot of people are using a VPN to bypass the firewall
      - 15y ago

PakG1 15y ago

You're expecting a relatively new Communist government, formed only about half a century ago and currently governs 1.3 billion people, to change its core philosophies overnight. It's not so easy. I don't support this stuff, but I recognize that it's not easy. I bet you it's harder than changing a country's dependence on oil as an energy source (assuming that viable alternatives are available). You have to change the world's largest population's philosophies, governing structure and infrastructure, expectations, etc.

vorg 15y ago
India and Japan generally don't censor foreign websites, and their governments survive OK. It's a big loss of face for the present leaders to change their policy. But we keep on hearing the phrase from within China: "Perhaps the new generation of leaders taking over in October 2012 will have different ideas about web censorship". If the policy is going to change, it'll be soon after this time when no government leaders "lose face". The US and EU are also preparing to challenge China at the WTO claiming the Great Firewall violates free trade. If the US and EU can get their timing and level of prodding right, the Firewall might be dismantled. China's already given their web businesses such as Baidu enough startup advantage from the Firewall, and will probably find other ways to give advantage to subsequent startups. But... the infrastructure's already there in China to block foreign websites. Anything that exists but isn't used will be used again sooner or later by some politician, so thanks to Cisco et al the Firewall will always exist even if "dismantled" under WTO enforcement. Just like the US military is there to defend the integrity and borders of the Union, to be used as a last resort, but gets used to invade Iraq for cheap oil.
- PakG1 15y ago
  I think you misunderstood what I'm trying to say. I don't think it's about losing face. Nor about whether the government survives. It's about cultural momentum. Look at how hard it is to change policies in any government. Look at how long it took the US to get socialized health care, despite people clamoring for it for decades, and even then, that could be repealed by future administrations, as some GOP folks are demanding. For the same reasons a startup is nimbler than a big corporation for changing things, larger countries are slower than smaller countries for making significant change. India is lucky because it's had a tradition of democracy and freedom for quite some time. They already had cultural momentum in that direction, so they don't need to change anything to align with what you want. Similar for Japan. China, you're asking them to reverse the pull of gravity. I've worked in teams that were focused on creating big vision cultural and organizational change in big corporations. I can't even begin to imagine how difficult it would be in a big government, especially one of China's size, and one where there is no easy allowance for diversity of opinions. For example, China's central government is huge on trying to stamp out corruption. However, despite the number of executions they continually carry out for corruption matters and the dissatisfaction of the populace, it is logistically impossible to keep a handle on all of the regional and local governments. It's a huge complicated machine, and I'd warrant that it's even more complicated than the US government's operations, judging from what I've seen living in China.
- j45 15y ago
  From what I've heard India totally has their equivalent of their Great Firewall, blocking VOIP calls and more.

drivebyacct2 15y ago

>I agree that this type of measure should come into play if there was a guaranteed way of stopping people looking at child pornography or something like that but it almost always appear to be political. No offense, but you seem to miss the point. You've just cited a different political bar at which [government] censorship is okay. I'm not saying child pornography is okay, but it's just a different line in the sand.

chrislomax 15y ago
I am making a point about the levels which they go to. I would happily let our government block content like that. There should be more policing on the internet as a whole, I just don't agree with how far they go. When they banned Google search months ago, that was because of political agenda over user censorship.
- drivebyacct2 15y ago
  I still don't think you're getting what I'm saying. Where do you draw the line? I don't like images of extreme gore any more than child pornography. Should we let governments censor it too? How would we accomplish that anyway?
  - chrislomax 15y ago
    Well I think there are some obvious assumptions you can make. Child pornography being one of them. I do understand what you mean, I just think there can be clear cut boundaries you can draw. It's also not a matter of preference but a matter of what is right and wrong?
    - snowwindwaves 15y ago
      what is right and what is wrong is different for different people
    - pavel_lishin 15y ago
      > It's also not a matter of preference but a matter of what is right and wrong? Who defines right and wrong? Is it right or wrong to look for abortion clinics? What about just doing research on abortion? How about stem cells? Should I be able to use bit torrent? After all, I can torrent Ubuntu releases, or copies of mp3's, or child pornography - and there's no way to tell the difference. Is it wrong to look up information that makes your government look bad? How about someone else's government?

kahawe 15y ago

> This is so pathetic, why do the Chinese government think they can tell users what they should and shouldn't be looking at You are measuring a totalitarian regime against your own values of freedom and call their actions "pathetic" because they don't allow personal choice of having encrypted traffic? You must have no understanding of China and its politics and the meaning of their censorship and their Great Firewall... that's like saying "Hitler was a real dork because he did not allow free speech and freedom of art which are totally awesome and everyone should be allowed to draw what they want!".

chrislomax 15y ago
Yes I am because they are deciding at a government level what everyone should be looking at. People are using VPNs to bypass the firewall therefore the people inside of China do not want the restriction so it's obvious that the people inside do not want to be restricted. So yes, I deem what they are doing from a government level pathetic as it doesn't stand for what the whole nation wants. So it's not MY values of what I call freedom but my understanding of what a majority of the people inside China actually want. If people didn't want that then there would be no need for encrypted traffic to connect to sites that the firewall would class an inappropriate.
- piotrSikora 15y ago
  > my understanding of what a majority of the people inside China actually want. Do you really think that the majority of Chinese citizens use VPNs to bypass the firewall?
  - chrislomax 15y ago
    If there was not a massive demand for this then the service would not exist. Also, if a lot of people were not doing it then they would not have rolled out software at ISP level to combat such a service. So I would say yes, a lot of people are using a VPN to bypass the firewall
    - 15y ago