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China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

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Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#111

Post by netcan »

ekianjo wrote: post #71
netcan wrote: post #37

Blocking the greatest encyclopedia that ever existed is the best example of what this kind of censorship is .

Since Wikipedia can be dumped onto a memory card I am not sure how effective the ban is supposed to be. It will constrain its spread but it is very hard to block all means of transmission of information.

"it is very hard to block all means of transmission of information."

I think this is something to understand about modern political information manipulation/restriction.

The 1.0 version totalitarian censorship aimed for full information control. This is what the soviets and pre-1990s CCP tried to do. It's difficult because (as you say) information is hard to control.

The 2.0 version is about enough control. You can use a vpn (or memory stick), but most won't. This gives one version of events a major advantage over the others. Easy-to-find praise for the government, difficult-to-find dissent.It's about dominant influence, not absolute control. When needed, regimes can temporarily increase control, like erdogan did during the last turkish coup attempt.

A soft paralel is social media "bubbles." They don't "control" the information you can access, but they are enough to influence your opinions in a direction. There are lots of exceptions, but on average, these have a big influence on who we think the good and bad guys are.

Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#112

Post by netcan »

JacksonGariety wrote: post #72
henryaspegren wrote: post #49

A favorite quote of mine “The best way to build an authoritarian regime is not to indoctrinate someone but to convince them that there is no such things as truth”

Who wrote that? (Asking out of curiosity.)

Sound like Orwell, maybe paraphrased.

Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#113

Post by vnorilo »

vaylian wrote: post #93
CallMePK wrote: post #66

I still remember that last year during my internship in Mainland China, clone git repository from GitHub and GitLab is a pain and my professor even have to use VPN too. China is basically hell for developers. I am afraid the new generations in China will no longer know about the real Internet. *sigh

Interesting comment. You make it sound like the real internet happens to be US-centric. Yes, many important projects are hosted on Gitlab and Github, but there are also other ways to share code. And these alternatives might not be that well known to us developers in the western world.

Well, at least I don't think our governments would actively stop us from finding and using them.

Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#114

Post by barry-cotter »

EForEndeavour wrote: post #104
vaylian wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting comment. You make it sound like the real internet happens to be US-centric. Yes, many important projects are hosted on Gitlab and Github, but there are also other ways to share code. And these alternatives might not be that well known to us developers in the western world.

For a software developer (or student thereof), the useful parts of the internet are indeed quite US-centric. Off the top of my head, losing access to any of the following platforms will hamper your professional development: Github, Stack Overflow, cloud services leaders (AWS, GCP, MS Azure, etc.), Coursera, Udacity, Youtube, Khan Academy, Google Search, Google groups, Slack. At best, you'll have to use a VPN, or mayb…

Udacity has a local Chinese version. Slack works, kind of. Google groups is a shuffling zombie abandonware project outside China so I fail to see how the lack of access within China will impact anything there.

Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#117

Post by keepmesmall »

netcan wrote: post #111
ekianjo wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since Wikipedia can be dumped onto a memory card I am not sure how effective the ban is supposed to be. It will constrain its spread but it is very hard to block all means of transmission of information.

" it is very hard to block all means of transmission of information. " I think this is something to understand about modern political information manipulation/restriction. The 1.0 version totalitarian censorship aimed for full information control. This is what the soviets and pre-1990s CCP tried to do. It's difficult because (as you say) information is hard to control. The 2.0 version is about enough control. You can…

Doesn't the "enough control" part come from the Internet's addiction factor?

As in, wouldn't software designed to work just as well without constant Internet "solve" this?

Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#118

Post by Funes- »

ekianjo wrote: post #67
paulgerhardt wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience zh.wikipedia.org is largely authored by Taiwanese residents. The quality is high but local narratives are often written with some bias not entirely unlike what one would expect from a displaced population resulting from a fairly recent civil war.

The English version of Wikipedia is not free of bias either. Wikipedia is not a source of truth for everything out there.

I only use Wikipedia as a reference guideline for specific subjects I am not knowledgeable in. It does a fairly good job at providing that kind of information.

Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#119

Post by EForEndeavour »

barry-cotter wrote: post #114
EForEndeavour wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a software developer (or student thereof), the useful parts of the internet are indeed quite US-centric. Off the top of my head, losing access to any of the following platforms will hamper your professional development: Github, Stack Overflow, cloud services leaders (AWS, GCP, MS Azure, etc.), Coursera, Udacity, Youtube, Khan Academy, Google Search, Google groups, Slack. At best, you'll have to use a VPN, or mayb…

Udacity has a local Chinese version. Slack works, kind of. Google groups is a shuffling zombie abandonware project outside China so I fail to see how the lack of access within China will impact anything there.

I listed those platforms (some of which still work in China) just to illustrate that a lot of developer resources are indeed based in, or at least developed in, the USA.

PRC have proven repeatedly that they can and will arbitrarily block foreign services without notice. Slack works today, but how long until they decide that Slack facilitates too much discussion about Falungong, Tibet, Xinjiang, Taiwanese independence, or Tiananmen?

Re: China is blocking all language editions of Wikipedia

#120

Post by StreamBright »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #50
StreamBright wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes communism is bad because of other reasons, and because it failed every single time it was tried. Btw. China is not a communist state for a long time.

Just run by a party that happens to identify themselves as the Communist Party China (CPC). Also the kids that still have to take Marxist and Mao theory in high school and university wish the country would admit to no longer being communist also.

Yeah but naming can be safely ignored. Examples:

North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea

East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic

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