Blogosphere, place of vulnerability
Over the last week, the Washington Post has been doing a series of articles on how the use of e-mail, Wikipedia, Google, chat rooms, and blogs in China is transforming and challenging that society.
This is a link to the first of the three articles, which also contains links to the ensuing two.
Some interesting aspects of those stories are how the Chinese government monitors e-traffic not just through actual surveillance of the cyber world, but also through the creation of an army of informal, unofficial informants (Cultural Revolution-style) among the general population as well as through having official, obligatory, weekly meetings between representatives of all major Chinese web-portals and officials of some Chinese ministry that basically handles information. It seems that there are just as many regular Chinese web surfers that support state control of their cyber-activities as there are free-thinking folk that are trying to bring about progressive reforms, and it looks as if instances of one cybernaught turning another in for things like anti-Chinese thinking are a daily occurrence over there now.
One reads these things with a certain aloofness, saying to oneself, "Poor guys, allowed a little leeway, but at the end of the day always having to kowtow to their oppressive masters." But do we really have any reason to feel so confident about our own standing in this regard? Or is it possible that we do nothing more in our so-called free world than inhabit a bigger, shinier, 3-dimensional, humanoid-adapted gerbil maze than they do? We are more free to speak our minds than the Chinese are, for the most part, but we are also kept extremely busy with the matter of making ends meet as well as entertaining ourselves. Busy enough to miss a lot of what's happening around us.
And as for controlling the thoughts of a nation, just how much easier is it for any government any where to keep tabs on who thinks what among it's most educated citizens now that we all use e-mail, chat rooms, groups, and blogs constantly? Well, it's a whole hell of a lot easier. It's actually a gold mine for anyone that wants to come up with new ways to influence us. My previous blog entry talks about an article describing how the military has endorsed a free online video game that effectively primes young men for battle from a very young age. How many other things are there out there like that?
Don't get me wrong, I'm perfectly happy for the authorities to use the internet to catch all the violent criminals that they possibly can. More power to them in that pursuit. But I am worried that catching criminals is not the only thing that authorities are doing with their newfound window into the thoughts, tastes, worries, etc. of anyone and everyone on-line anywhere.
Anyone?
This is a link to the first of the three articles, which also contains links to the ensuing two.
Some interesting aspects of those stories are how the Chinese government monitors e-traffic not just through actual surveillance of the cyber world, but also through the creation of an army of informal, unofficial informants (Cultural Revolution-style) among the general population as well as through having official, obligatory, weekly meetings between representatives of all major Chinese web-portals and officials of some Chinese ministry that basically handles information. It seems that there are just as many regular Chinese web surfers that support state control of their cyber-activities as there are free-thinking folk that are trying to bring about progressive reforms, and it looks as if instances of one cybernaught turning another in for things like anti-Chinese thinking are a daily occurrence over there now.
One reads these things with a certain aloofness, saying to oneself, "Poor guys, allowed a little leeway, but at the end of the day always having to kowtow to their oppressive masters." But do we really have any reason to feel so confident about our own standing in this regard? Or is it possible that we do nothing more in our so-called free world than inhabit a bigger, shinier, 3-dimensional, humanoid-adapted gerbil maze than they do? We are more free to speak our minds than the Chinese are, for the most part, but we are also kept extremely busy with the matter of making ends meet as well as entertaining ourselves. Busy enough to miss a lot of what's happening around us.
And as for controlling the thoughts of a nation, just how much easier is it for any government any where to keep tabs on who thinks what among it's most educated citizens now that we all use e-mail, chat rooms, groups, and blogs constantly? Well, it's a whole hell of a lot easier. It's actually a gold mine for anyone that wants to come up with new ways to influence us. My previous blog entry talks about an article describing how the military has endorsed a free online video game that effectively primes young men for battle from a very young age. How many other things are there out there like that?
Don't get me wrong, I'm perfectly happy for the authorities to use the internet to catch all the violent criminals that they possibly can. More power to them in that pursuit. But I am worried that catching criminals is not the only thing that authorities are doing with their newfound window into the thoughts, tastes, worries, etc. of anyone and everyone on-line anywhere.
Anyone?
Posted at 2/22/2006 08:17:00 PM UTC
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1 Comment(s):
While information is power and those that control information have the power, I remain skeptical that internet censorship in China can work. There are just too many cracks to patch and too many holes to plug. Yes people will be caught, but many others will not.
This is not being optimistic, just realizing the difficulty of the task. I don't have to use a search engine to find information.
As for our own freedoms being restricted by our own freedoms, that's somewhat true. However, I think a study of the matter would still show that the more informed of us are also the most busy of us, at least in the sense that we are also considered busy when we hunt down information and educate ourselves (as opposed to considering, say, a jobless person who doesn't nothing but that, as not busy).
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