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China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

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Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#91

Post by Ntrails »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #63
tinfoilman wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Valid point lets go with instead Alpha (“the upper class”) Beta (“the second upper class”) Gamma (“the middle class”) Delta (“the second lower class”) Epsilon (“the lower class”) Double-Plus (“the superior subdivision among Alphas”) Plus (“the superior subdivision among Alphas, Betas, Gammas or Deltas, but inferior to Double-Plus”) Minus (“the inferior subdivision among Alphas, Betas, Gammas or Deltas”) savage (“a pe…

Gamma is not "the middle class", it's "blue collar". You don't really need deltas and epsilons in the long run. Unless they are very cheap to have, robots are going to replace them.

I'm pretty soon you can just break it down into 2 groups. Morlocks and Eloi...

Unrelated, this does make me want to watch Gattaca[1] again :)

[1]http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119177/

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#92

Post by rapind »

Red_Tarsius wrote: post #22

This is madness. I thought I was reading a fake article. > the system is 'very ambitious in both depth and scope, including scrutinizing individual behavior and what books people read. It's Amazon's consumer tracking with an Orwellian political twist.' What a coincidence. Recently I had to decide whether to buy books on politics for kindle. I didn't like the fact that it tracks everything I buy, what sentences I high…

Is it wrong that the first thought in my mind is how to influence their ratings at scale? "Diaper stuffing" while humourus is probably not far off the initial reputation optimization schemes that have probably already commenced.

I'd say there's a good chance you'll be able to buy your way to a top score while the poor become the geocities of citizens.

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#93

Post by rmxt »

rhino369 wrote: post #84
osazuwa wrote: post #57

This is bad. But before judging China, people need to ask themselves if the hold their own government to the same standard of criticism. As an American, I feel if the US government had similar plans and someone had leaked them on Wikileaks, there would be more conversation about the leaker's girlfriend than outrage about the plans themselves.

The reason why people are not interested in the alleged US government over reaches is because we still fundamentally trust our government to do the right thing. Americans just don't give a shit if the government has access to your data, because so far it doesn't use it. This is why the John Oliver segment a few weeks back showed that when people thought their sexts were actually able to be viewed, they were outraged.…

Please speak for yourself, instead of relying on what "we" or "the people" want for apparent authority. Sexts are actually able to be viewed, and have been in the past:

http://www.businessinsider.com/most-nsa-abuses-are-self-repo...

You are right that people generally do take offense only when presented with gross and abject violations of their privacy, but to say that people shouldn't care about what the government is doing because the government doesn't (currently) do anything with it, is passing the buck along to future generations. Why even allow for such a massive potential for abuse to arise in the future? And again, documented abuses have already occurred, to say nothing of ones swept under the rug. Why collect the data in the first place if the government "doesn't use it" as you put it?

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#94

Post by LLWM »

pjc50 wrote: post #26
thebouv wrote: post #12

What I wonder about when I read things like this: How did they get to this point? What goes on in the mind of the person sitting in the "idea room" when they first thought of this? Are they just the product of an already oppressive government and therefore see this as completely and totally fine? Or do they know that it is oppressive, but since they're already a cog in the machine, they pitch the idea up and get prai…

China has long been a "face" orientated society. This is traditional to varying extents throughout the world, with (parts of!) the US probably being at the other end in terms of extreme individualism. Once you keep dossiers on people, it's natural to want better dossiers. This is just an extension and a centralization of technology that in the was is used to mould people's consumerist behaviour by rating their purcha…

Talking as if "face" and individualism are opposites simply proves that you have no understanding of one or both of those concepts.

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#95

Post by fuzzywalrus »

31reasons wrote: post #81
Red_Tarsius wrote: post #22

This is madness. I thought I was reading a fake article. > the system is 'very ambitious in both depth and scope, including scrutinizing individual behavior and what books people read. It's Amazon's consumer tracking with an Orwellian political twist.' What a coincidence. Recently I had to decide whether to buy books on politics for kindle. I didn't like the fact that it tracks everything I buy, what sentences I high…

>>It's funny to imagine social hackers buying tons of diapers to get on top of the rankings. In that case government might release guidelines by which buying diapers without its need become criminal offense.

There's some factors aren't numerically quantifiable: Respect for elders? How does one metric that? Time donated to charitable services for the elders?

What this will create is real life level grinding, and a glut of half-assing a lot of socially desirable "traits". This could get very ugly, very fast if this article is accurate, creating a society where corners are cut in the interest of upping their score. It's like profit motive but for every day interactions.

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#96

Post by vorg »

osazuwa wrote: post #57

This is bad. But before judging China, people need to ask themselves if the hold their own government to the same standard of criticism. As an American, I feel if the US government had similar plans and someone had leaked them on Wikileaks, there would be more conversation about the leaker's girlfriend than outrage about the plans themselves.

Countries such as the US and Australia already implement much of what the article describes: credit rating, criminal record, financial assets, standarized test scores, educational and employment records, residential history, searchable online presence, with the greatest weighting given to financial assets of course because how much money someone has trumps all.

The main differences with the announced Chinese plan are:

* it will aggregate many various ratings and makes them available publicly on all citizens, something that's done only privately for some residents in the US

* it extends the system to social criteria, something only done privately through sports clubs, religious groups, etc in the US, and dilutes the importance of a person's financial assets in calculating a person's "worth"

* it's using technology from the ground up, intead of slowly automating a paper-based system that's already been developed over the years

So the main differences are those of degree.

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#97

Post by xnull6guest »

daymanstep wrote: post #75
fown9 wrote: post #71

China has an authoritarian government that produces pollution that threatens the entire world, uses the great firewall to attack tech companies in other countries, ignores human rights and free speech, and supports dictators in Russia and Africa. If China gets anymore powerful, the world is doomed. We need to curb commerce with China.

Is this a joke?

Probably not.

The US superpower status has been hollowing out and China has begun to be able to project power in very impressive ways. The US sees China as its major threat right now. What the US government would like to do is 'contain' China by keeping it a regional force - so that it can't complete as a global power.

In anticipation of future conflict there has already been a large amount of anti-China sentiment creeping in America - suddenly all of the news about China has a negative spin. If they land on the moon its portrayed as scary rather than impressive. If they build islands in the middle of the Ocean (legally) it's a 'great mound of sand' rather than an incredibly impressive engineering feat. China's selling of air defense systems that thwart the US and the collisions of and mutual reconnaissance of our naval vessels aren't covered much - basically few real facts but lots of spin.

The US doesn't know whether it will be able to beat back China without having to resort to violence. If you watch the presidential speeches between candidates and Washington thinktanks they all have a stance on how they will deal with 'the China problem' (China is ambitious and there ain't room enough for the both of us). Jeb Bush basically said military might - Clinton wants to follow in line with (her) TPP.

There will be more anti-China slant. The interests of China and the US are at odds and becoming ever more so.

This poster is either part of a spin machine or has fallen for the naive and simplistic narrative of good-versus-evil.

All in all though, by all accounts, China and the US are set to butt heads and already have been.

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#98

Post by Red_Tarsius »

fuzzywalrus wrote: post #95
31reasons wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>It's funny to imagine social hackers buying tons of diapers to get on top of the rankings. In that case government might release guidelines by which buying diapers without its need become criminal offense.

There's some factors aren't numerically quantifiable: Respect for elders? How does one metric that? Time donated to charitable services for the elders? What this will create is real life level grinding, and a glut of half-assing a lot of socially desirable "traits". This could get very ugly, very fast if this article is accurate, creating a society where corners are cut in the interest of upping their score. It's lik…

It's something I have pointed out in other threads as well: extrinsic rewards destroy the intrinsic motivation. "Why should I do something that doesn't raise my score?" This is very clear in traditional schools: few students go beyond the assigned tasks and readings, popular kids mock the ones who study for their own benefit and cheating is rampant.

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#99

Post by tomjen3 »

rapind wrote: post #92
Red_Tarsius wrote: post #22

This is madness. I thought I was reading a fake article. > the system is 'very ambitious in both depth and scope, including scrutinizing individual behavior and what books people read. It's Amazon's consumer tracking with an Orwellian political twist.' What a coincidence. Recently I had to decide whether to buy books on politics for kindle. I didn't like the fact that it tracks everything I buy, what sentences I high…

Is it wrong that the first thought in my mind is how to influence their ratings at scale? "Diaper stuffing" while humourus is probably not far off the initial reputation optimization schemes that have probably already commenced. I'd say there's a good chance you'll be able to buy your way to a top score while the poor become the geocities of citizens.

If anything that simply proves you have the mind of the hacker, which is good for you and for society.

Re: China rates its own citizens – including online behaviour

#100

Post by CodeCube »

adventured wrote: post #60
osazuwa wrote: post #57

This is bad. But before judging China, people need to ask themselves if the hold their own government to the same standard of criticism. As an American, I feel if the US government had similar plans and someone had leaked them on Wikileaks, there would be more conversation about the leaker's girlfriend than outrage about the plans themselves.

I don't know a single person that doesn't have a very low, highly critical opinion of the US Government already. That includes essentially universal skepticism of Congress. So yes, I think Americans criticize their government almost as a professional sport. Non-stop 24/7, everywhere. Even for things the government isn't responsible for. I'd argue the only thing Americans are guilty of is too much complaining and crit…

You must not know a lot of people ;)

That was a mostly joking jab ... but seriously, have you looked at a demographics map of the US? In between just about every blue city/urban center, there are broad swaths of rural red. Many of these folks are of the opinion that what the government does is right, and we shouldn't question cause they know best. Which is ironic given their love of "small government" ... but when the police, military, or otherwise "security" related organization is concerned, it's all yes all day.

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