That was fast. Good job Peter.
Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
151–160 of 305 posts
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps you can share the moral justification used by the Chinese government?
To maintain political and social stability.
Well, this is a justification, but not a moral one.
This one can be employed to justify any arbitrary measure applied by any arbitrary authority at any arbitrary point in time.
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
To maintain political and social stability.
Well, this is a justification, but not a moral one. This one can be employed to justify any arbitrary measure applied by any arbitrary authority at any arbitrary point in time.
Morality is relative, to them it maybe very well be the moral thing to do.
>This one can be employed to justify any arbitrary measure applied by any arbitrary authority at any arbitrary point in time
Yes it can but you don't have to agree with it
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, this is a justification, but not a moral one. This one can be employed to justify any arbitrary measure applied by any arbitrary authority at any arbitrary point in time.
Morality is relative, to them it maybe very well be the moral thing to do. >This one can be employed to justify any arbitrary measure applied by any arbitrary authority at any arbitrary point in time Yes it can but you don't have to agree with it
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Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#155Does anyone know the technical details of what Google would have needed to comply with in China? From my understanding, a lot of western companies do business in China via (51% local controlled) "Partners" that ostensibly run their infrastructure for them, and obviously have to abide by local regulation. This includes operating an "Information Security Management System" (a euphemism of a sort) that interfaces with t…
I don't know exactly, but to buy a domain and operate a website in China you need to get an Internet Content Provider license, and a foreign company cannot acquire it.
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
You say China joined the WTO "prematurely" which implies that certain economic conditions were not met, but the real hold-up was political: questions of liberalism vs Leninism, etc. The Chinese people have gained enormously in terms of their standard of living since 2001, and while political repression has not gotten better, it also has not gotten worse.
I think better and worse are subjective. But the thought reconditioning camps, the concentration camps for the Muslims, and the forced propaganda app are in my opinion pretty bad.
Which "forced propaganda app" do you refer to: the Xi Jinping quotation study app that voluntary members of the Communist Party use to demonstrate promotability? https://www.scmp.com/tech/apps-social/article/2186037/chinas...
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#157So corporate censorship (Google search outside of China) is fine but government censorship (Google search inside China) isn't. Also, government censorship by Western governments (UK, etc.) is fine but government censorship by non western governments (China) is not. I don't see much difference myself but it seems others do.
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Any claim that Google would have helped China censor Chinese citizens ignores the fact that Chinese search engines are already censored. So what? That does not make censorship morally acceptable. This would be the same as saying that using slave labor is ok, if you do it in a country that already accepts slavery anyway, and you are treating you slaves better. > And by surfacing better information for queries, it ca…
> I have profound sympathy for the victims of authoritarian regimes, and I absolutely do not believe that the way to help them is to collaborate with the very system that oppresses them. Pretending otherwise sounds like Newspeak to me. I have relatives in China. Censorship is the least of their worries when the current Baidu monopoly is allowing promoted results that are sometimes flat-out evil ( https://en.wikipedia…
I'm heartened by the response, though. Shares fell 14%, the government announced an investigation, and Baidu set aside $150m USD equivalent for people harmed by promoted results. Especially considering that the ad buyer was a government military hospital, that seems.. more just than I'd expect.
I guess it could be all for show, but I've seen worse behavior from Facebook here
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, this is a justification, but not a moral one. This one can be employed to justify any arbitrary measure applied by any arbitrary authority at any arbitrary point in time.
Morality is relative, to them it maybe very well be the moral thing to do. >This one can be employed to justify any arbitrary measure applied by any arbitrary authority at any arbitrary point in time Yes it can but you don't have to agree with it
You say that "to them it maybe very well be the moral thing to do", is that actually the case?
Re: Google's Project Dragonfly 'Terminated' in China
#160As an overseas Chinese (born and grew up in Hong Kong but have relatives in China) I am sadden by this and HN comments. Any claim that Google would have helped China censor Chinese citizens ignores the fact that Chinese search engines are already censored. Because laws in this area are often vague, I can see that dragonfly would apply varying levels of censorships and as a side effect, allow people to access some inf…
This is a weak argument. The base response to a repressive totalitarian regime is non-cooperation, not support them and hope they will be marginally less oppressive. Any support legitimizes their actions and further entrenches their oppression
Yes and yes again. This is so key for people to understand. And this is why google should have never touched this fucking project in the first place. Many continue to push this logic that somehow we should continue to engage with the PRC. I’ve spent a decent amount of time in China, have relatives there...etc, and I’m convinced that this approach is 100% FLAWED. The CCP derives its authority from economic growth--next year will be better than this year, so don't challenge us. At this point in their development, for this growth to continue, it now requires science/tech innovation (see “middle income trap” theory / many of my acquaintances have moved factories elsewhere due to cost in PRC). Any work we do with them in those are areas only make the oppression problem worse, both for Chinese people and for us now/eventually (e.g. Hollywood will never criticize China; not the same with Russia).
EDITS: typo