Bill Gates, as a born capitalist, came to the defense of China and criticized Google (its competitor…) in the ongoing polemic.
According to Billie “the Chinese efforts to censor the Internet have been limited; it’s easy to go around and foreigners are expected to respect the laws of China”. Of course he forgot to mention the Chinese government has to respect the law too.
If the West is now obliged to kowtow to the autocrats here, it’s because they harvest what they sowed. The big MNC want profits by selling as much as they can at rock-bottom prices to the Western consumers – who get hooked on cheap goods their countries cannot deliver at that price level. Result: China became the factory of the World churning out cheap goods, creating environmental problems, killing all the competition and financing it all on top of that. Quality might be low but that’s mainly the fault of those MNC. Don’t blame China. You get what you pay for. And the USA has to be nice to its major creditor.
Western consumers are now dependent on the cheap, throw-away goods, as the Chinese were forced to buy opium centuries ago. Sweet revenge!
Billie does not want to ruin his chances for his “Evil Empire”, for Bing and the rest.
What Billie forgot is that for most here getting a decent VPN (paid in USD) is not that easy, “to go around the Wall”; and that so many websites we need are blocked and obviously not because of pornography. The Chinese Constitution guarantees free speech. Small problem, the Constitution here is actually illegal as it cannot be used and is banned from any court.
Yes Billie, next time you land in Beijing, your red carpet is waiting for you, straight to The Great Hall of The People.
Gilbert on the Internet in Global Times
See here the link for the so-called “interview”:
http://opinion.globaltimes.cn/commentary/2010-01/501163.html
Oh well. I told them not to bother me anymore. Or am I too sensitive?
(see previous post with the full interview text)
The Google polemic
Global Times “interviewed” me. Despite the assumption I would have 700 words, nearly all was dumped. Won’t respond to their interviews anymore.
Recent developments make us worried. It’s getting hard to defend China.
See here the full text.
The Google polemic – by Gilbert Van Kerckhove – for the Global Times
(original and edited version – only a tiny part to be published)
“It’s not so Google that’s withdrawing from China, it’s China that’s withdrawing from the world”.
The tone between China and the USA is becoming more confrontational.
China is trying to deflect criticism by demanding respect for its national laws and by playing the victim of repeated cyber attacks.
For people who believe in China and try to counter at least some of the unfounded media and political attacks, it is becoming a tough task.
According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry, “Chinese Internet is open and China has tried creating a favorable environment for the Internet”.
This is a ridiculous statement that tarnishes China’s image, aspiring to become a leading economy through innovation, creativity and the continuous development of its industry and trade.
International security specialists point at indications in software codes and the purpose of the cyber attacks, such as trying to steal data (the recent news on U.S. oil companies that were “tapped”), clamping down on dissidents, controlling journalists and on any “unwanted” information. Invoking the fight against pornography is seen as an excuse.
Google’s move is applauded by those who are tired of the Internet restrictions. Many websites, vital for business and research, are blocked, despite promises for the 2008 Olympics. Even SMS would be subject to censorship, a direct invasion of privacy. But little is done to stop the proliferation of junk messages offering fake invoices and real estate deals.
But the dispute brings into the open the rights of netizens and a debate on censorship.
By erecting the many barriers to the globalization of information, China is sterilizing the local Internet and shows insecurity and self-confidence, making China haters happy as it seems to prove their opinion. Clamping down on the Internet looks like advocating to ban all car traffic because it causes accidents and road deaths.
Said senior White House economic adviser Lawrence Summers:
“It seems to me that the principles that Google is trying to uphold are not just important in a moral or rights framework, but are also of very considerable economic importance,” He said that information flow is central as the economy on the mainland matures and transforms from industrial-based to more knowledge-based.
Liu Deliang, an internet law professor at the Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications:
“It is fair to say that the government’s control over the internet and the flow of information is way too strict, and the way authorities regulate cyberspace will have a negative impact on the people’s confidence in the political and legal systems.”
China has to make a choice to take up a responsible and confident leadership role or to decide if the country should be inward looking, losing out to the new Internet world. Favoring Chinese search engines will affect many serious business people and researchers. Google.com and some of its services (e.g. gmail) will still be available in China, unless China starts blocking them as it did with other services.
It is unlikely that other major U.S. companies will follow Google but they will need to review operations. The USA has strongly appealed to take a position in favor of an open Internet, as explained by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Obama. The issue does not need to be blown up as a massive anti-China strategy.
China should educate its netizens, combat hacking, cooperate with other countries on international cyber attacks, moderate biased nationalistic bloggers and curtail spam SMS.
In the West, a voice is coming up to make it a WTO case because China erects one more trade barrier through its Firewall.
Foreign chambers of commerce increasingly worry about trade protectionism in China. While China claims to suffer from trade protectionism it erects its trade and Intellectual Property Rights barriers to impede fair market access. The recent “Joint circular (Notice No. 618 – Ministry of Science and Technology, National Development and Reform Commission and Ministry of Finance), establishing an Indigenous Innovation Product Accreditation System” is a perfect example, among others like the encryption debate. China would be wrong to think only the USA is losing patience. Europeans could soon follow.
China can buy a radio station in the USA. And here? Foreigners face here many limitations while Chinese companies go abroad and invest in mining, carry out construction projects in a way foreign companies would never be allowed to in China.
Expect a backlash, rather sooner than later. Of course China will appeal to the “nationalistic feelings” of its citizens to get support.
I hope a solution can be worked out discreetly and calmly.
Million trees?
Thanks to our sharp-eyed reader Curt, the previous entry on trees planted by China has been corrected. Millions had to be billions. Thanks to Google, I got the right data, the former data were from a source I forgot…
Beijing’s struggle against pollution
Overall the pollution levels in Beijing remain way too high with the very high levels of PM2.5 – not reported by the BEPB who continues to brainwash us with their blue sky days propaganda.
But contrary to many foreign media reports, Beijing (and China) are taking the environmental mess quite seriously and a lot has been achieved. Here some more positive notes.
China planted two trees for every citizen in the past year
New York/Nairobi, 21 September 2009 – The global public’s desire to see action on climate change was clearly spotlighted today with the announcement that the Billion Tree Campaign has reached 7 billion trees – one for every person on the planet.
Over the past three years millions of people ranging from scouts to presidents and from schoolchildren to city dwellers and corporate heads have been rolling up their sleeves and getting their hands dirty for the environment through tree planting.
Today’s milestone was reached with the news that the Government of China has planted 2.6 billion trees as part of this unique campaign, bringing the total to 7.3 billion trees planted in 167 countries worldwide.
Jia Zhibang, Director of the State Forestry Administration, said China aimed to raise its forest coverage rate from 18% to 20% by 2010 and to 26% by 2050. “Planting trees is the best that China can do to contribute to the fight against climate change,” he added.
Advances in Beijing to combat pollution:
– Introduction of new-car emissions standards to the level of Euro IV
– Massive investments are in the pipeline to introduce hybrid cars and elctric cars.
– More than 4,100 of the 20,000 city buses run on CNG or LPG, the largest such fleet in the world.
– By 2015, the city aims to be running 18 lines stretching 561 km, while the number of passengers will hit 10 million a day, the authority said.
– The oldest, dirtiest automobiles, called “yellow-label” cars, after the sticker glued to their windshields, are banned from the center city.
– In the past years Beijing has converted 60,000 boilers and commercial heaters to run on natural gas instead of coal.
– The city’s four coal-fired power plants have installed state-of-the-art pollution scrubbers.
– Nearly 2,900 gas stations and petroleum storage tanks have been equipped with recycling controls.
– Hundreds of heavily polluting factories have been moved from central Beijing, including a coking coal plant and the huge steel mill that is scheduled to depart by the end of 2010, the unit of the Shougang Group, China’s fourth largest steelmaker; with its move to neighboring Hebei Province, 65,000 Beijing workers will lose their jobs.
While many look at China, the situation in India is not much better. 45% of its geographical area suffers from some form of land degradation; 3 million deaths per year attributed to air pollution; almost 70% of its surface water is contaminated. India with 17% of the global population accounts for 5.3% of global carbon emissions. The USA (under 5% of world population) accounts for more than 20% of the emissions.