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China Blocks WhatsApp

nytimes.com

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Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#151

Post by thriftwy »

Certhas wrote: post #117
chaostheory wrote: post #40

What the long-term effects will be: China's ruling class further cement their power at the cost of China's innovation and future growth. Interesting and useful things are made when people able share and consume information. e.g. Jack Ma's US visit exposed him to Yahoo. Ma Huateng was clearly inspired by his exposure to ICQ. The list goes on. The same thing happens in the West but it happens a lot more often since the…

Alternative: Innovation happens within the context of Chinas censorship and political regime. Blocking of entrenched western competitors allows home grown solutions to spring up, and local technological know how to develop faster. Capitalism and innovation turn out to work within the context of an illiberal society just fine. Especially as China avoids the mistake of closing itself off to the rest of the world, but s…

But you are also blocking innovators.

> optimize for political obedience

And put innovation in a grave. Without a gravestone.

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#152

Post by threatofrain »

bad_user wrote: post #116
micaksica wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The people who will get ahead in China in the future are the ones who are somehow able to live outside of China to experience new ideas. So in other words, the ruling class continues to rule, as they will be the only ones with the sanctioned political freedoms to study abroad, etc. > China's fate as being relegated to being the world's giant copy machine is sealed unless things revert China being the world's giant…

China might build their own products and I can see them building WhatsApp alternatives, but I won't install Chinese alternatives to WhatsApp on my phone, which means the Chinese won't be able to talk with me, an European, all the while I'm communicating without issues with acquaintances from all over Europe and the U.S. This means that the Chinese are living in a bubble. This isn't news of course. But the other issue…

I don't think it'll be a contradiction for China to create a special city with more liberal values to attract liberal talent, or if China permits liberalism in a controlled context. Tech talent such as Andrew Ng already go to work in China knowing the political context surrounding China. I'm sure some HN people go to work in Dubai, which I'm sure has some contradictions to western cultural values.

I'm also not sure if the perceived ingredients for collective creativity are all that obvious or as critical as you seem to say. Perhaps competition is the most important ingredient, as opposed to freedom of political speech. And perhaps a well-educated aristocracy can nurture technological competition without also being afraid of it.

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#154

Post by stephengillie »

barkingcat wrote: post #12
EGreg wrote: post #4

How does the blocking actually happen? What if people used a decentralized service, that worked over https?

The mechanism of blocking is the Internet firewall with deep packet inspection and protocol sniffing, together with lots of human intervention and tracking.

VPNs stick out like a red flag in Wireshark. Instead of a variety of small packets going to ports 53, 80, 443, and the occasional 22 or 3389, coming from random 5-digit ports - all you see are big packets over port 500.

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#155

Post by dukoid »

I don't get how China can have WTO "Market Economy" status. It's not just blocking western internet companies, also forced joint ventures and technology transfers don't sound much like "Market Economy" to me.... :-/

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#156

Post by amadvance »

I interact daily with colleagues from China, and I think it's a lot more problematic to have work resources blocked than WhatsApp.

They cannot even do a simple search with Google. It's frustrating for me, I can only imaging how is for them. I'm even worried to raise the issue to not jeopardize their jobs.

Really sad.

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#157

Post by jimmies »

ben_jones wrote: post #87
Jerry2 wrote: post #65

TechAltar made a video few days ago about censorship in China and what their goals are [0]. He also talked about lengths to which Mark Zuckerberg went to try to get Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp unblocked in China. It was quite shocking. [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swuir_7YIPs

The 5 points according to the video: 1) Married Priscilla Chan 2) Learned Mandarin 3) Joined Tsinghua University 4) Befriended Xijinping 5) Offered to let Xijinping name firstborn Personally I have trouble believing 1 and 5 were to get Facebook products into China unabridged. 5 sounds like a joke at a dinner party.

#5 is really low. I cannot believe someone who did that is a great person.

This guy's baby is just another tool huh?

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#158

Post by samlevine »

rubatuga wrote: post #62

It makes sense, as a country you wouldn’t want US companies taking over your social media. It’s only alarming from a US centric view.

> It makes sense, as a country you wouldn’t want US companies taking over your social media.

Not having to build your own Facebook (and WhatsApp, etc.) means that you can build something else that can (eventually) compete internationally.

China isn't being irrational here, but there is a tradeoff between growth and security.

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#159

Post by kccqzy »

EGreg wrote: post #45
barkingcat wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The mechanism of blocking is the Internet firewall with deep packet inspection and protocol sniffing, together with lots of human intervention and tracking.

What if a common enough encrypted protocol is used to carry all communication, such as https TLS protocols?

It’s not just about protocols it’s also about the pattern of the data: the sizes and timing and other statistical characteristics of your packets. Tunneled traffic looks very different from normal web browsing even if you can’t read the content.

Re: China Blocks WhatsApp

#160

Post by mads »

Big news. Which one are safe now (in US and China)? Telegram??

I remember back in the days, when you wrote "fuck" in Skype from China and it would get censored. Which one is a trusted messenger these days?

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