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Google announced last Wednesday 24 Mar 10 that they would no longer voluntarily censor Internet searches at the direction of the Chinese government BBC News - Google stops censoring search results in China. On the Google blog Official Google Blog: A new approach to China: an update David Drummond Googles chief legal officer stated that instead they would redirect searches from the main Chinese google interface to Hong Kong Google domain and servers Google sends China users to Hong Kong for uncensored results. Hong Kong has operated under a less restrictive political regime since the end British rule. David Drummond (the lawyer) emphasized in the post that this move left them entirely in the clear regarding Chinese laws. In a recent post I had questioned Googles commitment to a stand on principle to violations and abuse of their network. They had suggested they would do so, but they also had strong reasons to paper it over with Chinese authorities. To make some symbolic gesture and carry on. They seem to have made a rather clear break and settled in for the long haul Google to stop censoring search results in China - washingtonpost.com. Criticism for the moment seems unwarranted. And to be fair, so far it wasn't Google among search engine companies willing to aid Chinese authorities in identifying dissenters but Yahoo Google China move puts pressure on Microsoft, Yahoo / The Christian Science Monitor - CSMonitor.com:. China registered their outrage immediately and began the task of blocking and re-censoring the Hong Kong severs, web segment by web segment Mainland China service availability - Google.com . Specifically they seemed aggrieved that Google had violated certain unspecific past "promises". The Chinese authorities had gained little sympathy by weeks end. Someone commented in a Metafilter thread: that Google was not giving up much because it did not have a leading share of the Chinese search market, Someone else immediately pointed out how much money is involved in the forty percent share it did have
Sun Tzu would be proud | MetaFilter. Moreover that looks past the now uncertain place of Google platforms in the burgeoning mobile market and that is a lot of money.
During the decade long rise of China western companies generally did nothing to challenge China's rules. The American Chamber of Commerce not least among them. Until they began to get the idea that China was organizing its newly created markets for its own use and benefit. Some now believe a sea change at hand, not in Chinese outlook but in the calculations of those western corporations set into the Chinese business world Google's decision signals change in Western businesses' approach to China - washingtonpost.com. Go Daddy, Network Solutions ceased registering domains in China due to new intrusive registration procedures. Which they point out would have a "chilling effect" on many who might desire to register Network Solutions, GoDaddy cease registering Web sites in China - washingtonpost.com. Scaring customers, not ordinarily a strategic business model.
Some of the thinking on this situation tries to keep a distinction between passive and active control of the internet and population. Between censorship and punishment. The control of information a society feels necessary to maintain order and unanimity. And detainment, intimidation and coercion of dissenters -- those of other than central opinion. Critically this affects the role western technology companies play in identifying those dissenters to authorities. Google may have made the determination that its key asset is its reputation. Its reason for being is information in motion. That it is in a prime position to act as a gatekeeper (profit from) is misleading. Google is the facilitator of the open society. If it allows itself to be made a stringent guardian the stage goes dark and the play folds.
Not only the the usual subjects China, Burma, Vietnam, North Korea, Iran, Russia, Cuba, increasingly Venezuela are attracted to suppression of information. No state is really immune from it. Western states even the United States. The recent news focus on those trying to break Wiki-leaks demonstrates that few like whistles or whistle-blowers, and many cannot regard such an organization having purpose. However; secrecy will be deployed not only for national security but for the absence of scrutiny in general. Even further, many who consider themselves libertarians and lovers of freedom would have little trouble regarding that freedom as being the freedom from public inspection of that which desires privacy. In that notion a world of data (and public good) disappears. The collusion of private officers with public officials. Existence of various manufacturing procceses, products, by-products toxic and otherwise, and profits. Unless you are a shareholder signed to non-disclosure and read into the program it's none of your business how much Exxon-Mobile made last year or how. Industrial complexes would merge slowly out of sight. Some would question what right anyone has to know what anyone else does. Half the internet would come down the next day. Whatever that would be; it would not be the open society.
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