I'm no expert on China, but this fits the pattern of them making extreme laws (ie death penalty for corruption) and then selectively enforcing them. Laws are tools for the party to use when it feels it might benefit, not universal rules.
It just means they can jail or shutdown who they want. Of course they could and have done that before, so really there is no change. Law isn't what paper says, but what the ruling party decides.
Freedom of Speech, and Right to Privacy all the way from "here" (pick your own "here") to a dark, cold, chinese prison cell (and not back, nothing escapes from that).
A man from Jieshou county of Anhui province was frustrated by traffic police, who had established a late night checkpoint for drunk driving. In a chat room that he created, he wrote: “Are they nuts? Checking in the rain? [They are] a bunch of assholes who just want money.” As the insulting comments created negative social impact within his circle, the man was detained for five days for picking a quarrel.
At this point, it would seem the cost of running a chat room would be a bit too high if that's the punishment for "negative social impact" for the writer. I would expect the owner to be just as on the hook.
Makes me so happy to live in what is probably the country with the most freedom of speech. The USA may be behind other countries in some things but not freedom of speech!
If you live in a country with such draconian (and increasing) measures, there is only one thing to do:
Use encryption. If only a few people use it, then they are targeted. If merely 10% of people use an encrypted protocol, it may be blocked. But if EVERYONE uses it, it will be computationally infeasible to decrypt everyone's messages. And banning eg TLS or SSH would be very hard to do.
In addition to this, DECENTRALIZE ALL THE THINGS. When there is no single server, there is nothing to shut down. There is no central owner to intimidate. People will have to go back to the bad old days of "tattle tales" and KGB spies among the regular people.
And seriously, if democracy works at all in these countries, all lawful means must be taken to defend what is left of freedom of speech. Who are these people who are actually making these laws, anyway? Every time they break them, it should be publicized.
> The USA may be behind other countries in some things but not freedom of speech!
And that's why it's important to fight those who would introduce Chinese-like censorship to the west in the name of combating "hate speech" or whatever else tickles the moral panic of the day. Efforts like Google's Conversation AI seriously worry me: they have the potential to shape thought the same way that the Chinese approach does.
In a sense, it doesn't really matter whether it's the government or a big corporation that performs automated censorship. Either way, your life can be adversely and drastically altered because some god damn neuron tripped over its activation function and called you a monster.
lawful means must be taken to defend what is left of freedom of speech
...and some may argue, even unlawful means; including one of the founders of the USA:
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." - Thomas Jefferson
It's surprising how extremist that quote sounds today --- ask a random US citizen what they think of it, without revealing its author, and you'd probably receive some pretty disappointing answers.
The USA doesn't have freedom of speech in any meaningful sense. You only have to look at the way peaceful protestors are treated to see that. The Occupy Wall Street protesters were treated horrifically.
As more and more formerly public places are privatised and the veneration of private property as an ideal above all others continues, the USA is simply running out of places where you're even allowed to protest. And that's not even considering so-called 'free speech zones', as if free speech is limited to a fucking place.
There really isn't that much difference between US free speech and other western democracies' free speech, despite the first amendment. Yes, it's a little better if it makes it to court, but compared to something like what's going on in China, it really isn't that much different.
However, there's still plenty of limitations on free speech in the US. Look at obscenity laws, for example - nudity is much more acceptable in Europe than in the US. Or if you're a 'freedom of expression' fan rather than just 'freedom of speech', why is sex work still illegal? It's not in plenty of other western democracies.
As a non-American, it just gets tiring hearing the Americans constantly crap on about how much freer they are than everyone else, when there's really not that much difference.
Their bottom up innovation will come to a screeching halt. They will export more young utility focused entrepreneurs fed up and not wanting in to that domineering state whacking their friends. We had a different colonial trajectory, but our own McCarthy era had disastrous cascading outcomes. "Rights to be forgotten" is another peculiar notion popular in some TV propaganda driven Western countries loving makeovers. Keep on rocking in the free world while it lasts.
Don't underestimate the nationalism of young Chinese.
And I very much doubt the CP is going to go after administrators who on-the-whole moderate with a pro-Beijing slant because they took 5 minutes too many to delete a comment.
Making assumptions that all young people hate the CP and would betray their country to the west at first opportunity sounds like one of those classic mistakes the West makes when it projects it's own sensibilities onto the world.
You see, even if "young utility focused entrepreneurs" don't like what CCP says, they can pretend they likes it and help spread it. It's called Lying, but people do it all the time. After that, when those entrepreneurs made enough money, they can live outside China and become a citizen of a country they like.
And lying is enough for CCP (or any government I assume) as long as that lie can keep most people loyal to them.
Also, "Young" is just a nature status, it's mean nothing about people's ideology. Lot's of young people joined Nazi in the old days, don't forget that.
>"Rights to be forgotten" is another peculiar notion popular in some TV propaganda driven Western countries loving makeovers. Keep on rocking in the free world while it lasts.
Right to be forgotten isn't peculiar and neither is it at all related to "makeover" TV programmes or freedom.
Right to be forgotten is about have a right to your own information. Collecting information doesn't give you a right to it. Something being publicly available doesn't make it actually public.
There is fair amount of really smart people inside China (in tech scene and otherwise) that probably want out [of the country] but don't know a clear path for doing so, I think efforts should be made to that clear path; to work on companies outside China [where they don't fear for their life if someone made a anti-government comment on their site]. Due to censorship by the national dictatorship such online effort must be done using randomly generated domains (known by word of mouth), hard to censor texts (eg. text inside images that use weird fonts; as intro inside pirated comics/movies/videogames, private messages inside Alibaba and other platform that the Government won't shot down)
There are also a fair amount of really smart people outside of China (in tech scene and otherwise) that want in [to the country].
Almost half the people I've met are trying to go to China to start one thing or another.
I would say over a quarter of my Chinese American friends have moved to China to start a company, while an even larger portion fly back and forth quite often.
Yes, feasible, but what makes large-scale censorship so apparently desirable, or at least so widely desired? The first obvious thought is that there are repressive governments around the world who wish to keep power. And this is true. But it can't be the whole explanation since plenty of relatively free western democracies and businesses are enthusiastically embracing censorship, laws about 'hate speech', and so on.
My guess is that a clue lies in the censorship going on much closer to home, in our own minds. Thoughts which contradict our ideas about who we are and what we should do are suppressed all the time. They fail to reach the light of consciousness. In other words, like the individual mind, it seems the hive mind must eventually develop an ego.
Jesus that's so repressive.
And I'm sure the laws are pretty subjective as well or at least not something the average chat admin is fully up to speed with.
Essentially the outcome of this will be to kill chats or send it underground to tor or something.
In Spain, you as a website admin can be found liable for unlawful messages left by your users too. So it's not like this is unexpectedly repressive for me.
Comrades don't need to indoctinate when is way easier for them to just censor by making illegal everything they don't like. Didn't Maduro in Venezuela told its minions a month ago to prosecute twitter users who expressed dissent? He even inspired them to put them 30 years in jail. What we are seeing here is the instantiation of that strategy in internet messages. That doesn't mean that it is not their normal for every other aspect in society. Remember this the next time that The Economist, Time magazine or New York Times tries to talk about "the wonders" of communism.
The Communist Party does not practice communism - it never has.
They are no more communists than the DPRK is democratic.
Communism was co-opted very early on and became just another form of authoritarianism.
>Remember this the next time that The Economist, Time magazine or New York Times tries to talk about "the wonders" of communism.
Could it be that, if they talk in favour of it, they have a different idea of Communism to you? Modern Communist academics do, we must investigate the ontology of Communism; a good read on this is from Badiou, The Communist Hypothesis. Most modern academic Communists believe that we must search for what happened, how to prevent it and how to move past it, to say nothing of the various splinters and brothers in the Communist family tree - anarchism, Communailsm, democratic Socialism, etc.
If you do reading on Communist literature since about 1950 you'll see they have occupied themselves with this investigation, the very one you are accusing them of ignoring.
Ah yes. India has this law as well. I am part of a whatsapp group from my old school. They decided to make all members administrators. Nice solution except that the person who implemented it is the one who sends most of the crackpot controversial messages. Planning to leave the group, especially since I dont really interact on it.
and all it takes to be in this thought prison is to be unlucky to be pushed out of your mothers vagina on that particular plot of land. even if you don't want to have anything with the gov that essentially owns you...
And there was some news that Chinese would start trading crypto coins on telegram and other chat messengers. I believe that will be really hard now, too much risk.
How typical on HN for a Chinese perspective to be downvoted to the bottom of the thread while everyone else flagellates themselves for how "free" the USA is.
[+] [-] brd|8 years ago|reply
Effective 8 October, the following types of content will be prohibited in chat groups on China-based messaging platforms:
1. Sensitive political content 2. Rumors 3...
Holy shit. What is this going to do to the Chinese tech scene? The liability being created here is crazy to consider.
Lets all hope these practices aren't looked at as successful by other governments, I'd hate to see other countries following suit.
[+] [-] scottLobster|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] StreamBright|8 years ago|reply
https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/30/15898386/germany-facebook...
[+] [-] klokoman|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] revelation|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stcredzero|8 years ago|reply
There are activists basically asking for this in the US and western countries.
[+] [-] HenryBemis|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] protomyth|8 years ago|reply
At this point, it would seem the cost of running a chat room would be a bit too high if that's the punishment for "negative social impact" for the writer. I would expect the owner to be just as on the hook.
[+] [-] EGreg|8 years ago|reply
If you live in a country with such draconian (and increasing) measures, there is only one thing to do:
Use encryption. If only a few people use it, then they are targeted. If merely 10% of people use an encrypted protocol, it may be blocked. But if EVERYONE uses it, it will be computationally infeasible to decrypt everyone's messages. And banning eg TLS or SSH would be very hard to do.
In addition to this, DECENTRALIZE ALL THE THINGS. When there is no single server, there is nothing to shut down. There is no central owner to intimidate. People will have to go back to the bad old days of "tattle tales" and KGB spies among the regular people.
And seriously, if democracy works at all in these countries, all lawful means must be taken to defend what is left of freedom of speech. Who are these people who are actually making these laws, anyway? Every time they break them, it should be publicized.
[+] [-] quotemstr|8 years ago|reply
And that's why it's important to fight those who would introduce Chinese-like censorship to the west in the name of combating "hate speech" or whatever else tickles the moral panic of the day. Efforts like Google's Conversation AI seriously worry me: they have the potential to shape thought the same way that the Chinese approach does.
In a sense, it doesn't really matter whether it's the government or a big corporation that performs automated censorship. Either way, your life can be adversely and drastically altered because some god damn neuron tripped over its activation function and called you a monster.
[+] [-] stevenwoo|8 years ago|reply
Though the article says what happened after she laughed is why she got convicted. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/03/us/code-pink-sessions-lau...
I think even in the UK parliament the opposition makes fun of and laughs at each other without fear of prosecution.
[+] [-] userbinator|8 years ago|reply
...and some may argue, even unlawful means; including one of the founders of the USA:
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." - Thomas Jefferson
It's surprising how extremist that quote sounds today --- ask a random US citizen what they think of it, without revealing its author, and you'd probably receive some pretty disappointing answers.
[+] [-] alphaalpha101|8 years ago|reply
As more and more formerly public places are privatised and the veneration of private property as an ideal above all others continues, the USA is simply running out of places where you're even allowed to protest. And that's not even considering so-called 'free speech zones', as if free speech is limited to a fucking place.
This is free speech: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hikoi#/media/File:Hikoi_FS.JPG
In the USA these people would be arrested for blocking a road.
[+] [-] vacri|8 years ago|reply
However, there's still plenty of limitations on free speech in the US. Look at obscenity laws, for example - nudity is much more acceptable in Europe than in the US. Or if you're a 'freedom of expression' fan rather than just 'freedom of speech', why is sex work still illegal? It's not in plenty of other western democracies.
As a non-American, it just gets tiring hearing the Americans constantly crap on about how much freer they are than everyone else, when there's really not that much difference.
[+] [-] Chiba-City|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smegel|8 years ago|reply
And I very much doubt the CP is going to go after administrators who on-the-whole moderate with a pro-Beijing slant because they took 5 minutes too many to delete a comment.
Making assumptions that all young people hate the CP and would betray their country to the west at first opportunity sounds like one of those classic mistakes the West makes when it projects it's own sensibilities onto the world.
[+] [-] nickrio|8 years ago|reply
You see, even if "young utility focused entrepreneurs" don't like what CCP says, they can pretend they likes it and help spread it. It's called Lying, but people do it all the time. After that, when those entrepreneurs made enough money, they can live outside China and become a citizen of a country they like.
And lying is enough for CCP (or any government I assume) as long as that lie can keep most people loyal to them.
Also, "Young" is just a nature status, it's mean nothing about people's ideology. Lot's of young people joined Nazi in the old days, don't forget that.
[+] [-] sushcount|8 years ago|reply
China didn't have much innovation coming out to start with. China mainly did the steal/force transfer/borrow technology thing.
[+] [-] alphaalpha101|8 years ago|reply
Right to be forgotten isn't peculiar and neither is it at all related to "makeover" TV programmes or freedom.
Right to be forgotten is about have a right to your own information. Collecting information doesn't give you a right to it. Something being publicly available doesn't make it actually public.
[+] [-] notgood|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] toronson|8 years ago|reply
Almost half the people I've met are trying to go to China to start one thing or another.
I would say over a quarter of my Chinese American friends have moved to China to start a company, while an even larger portion fly back and forth quite often.
[+] [-] omarforgotpwd|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] roceasta|8 years ago|reply
My guess is that a clue lies in the censorship going on much closer to home, in our own minds. Thoughts which contradict our ideas about who we are and what we should do are suppressed all the time. They fail to reach the light of consciousness. In other words, like the individual mind, it seems the hive mind must eventually develop an ego.
[+] [-] swsieber|8 years ago|reply
There will be false positives and negatives. Lots.
But, this is a really good insight . Why play whack a mole when you have a mole recognition guided bazooka. No more moles.
[+] [-] nickthemagicman|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] marian0_|8 years ago|reply
A verdict that shows so: http://www.asesoriayempresas.es/jurisprudencia/JURIDICO/1959...
[+] [-] mirimir|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sebastianconcpt|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yarg|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] saryant|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ue_|8 years ago|reply
Could it be that, if they talk in favour of it, they have a different idea of Communism to you? Modern Communist academics do, we must investigate the ontology of Communism; a good read on this is from Badiou, The Communist Hypothesis. Most modern academic Communists believe that we must search for what happened, how to prevent it and how to move past it, to say nothing of the various splinters and brothers in the Communist family tree - anarchism, Communailsm, democratic Socialism, etc.
If you do reading on Communist literature since about 1950 you'll see they have occupied themselves with this investigation, the very one you are accusing them of ignoring.
[+] [-] tushar-r|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thewhitetulip|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adrenalinelol|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] indemnity|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] odiroot|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ihateneckbeards|8 years ago|reply
Join a large WeChat group
Offer to sell some drugs or talk about corruption of the party in the group
Basically send any group manager to prison... Just from your couch!
[+] [-] ttflee|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mm4|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] studentik|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vit05|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zebraflask|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Mithaldu|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Accacin|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ringaroundthetx|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] evolighting|8 years ago|reply
There are laws but we don't care, we live as we wish and we don't need other's permission.
However when it come to a group, or a company, you are right, there are laws just right for you.
[+] [-] cooper12|8 years ago|reply