Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China • Hacker News Board

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#121

Post by akavi » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 7:54 PM UTC

Mikeb85 wrote: post #103

Cerium wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People may be dissatisfied with the government in the west, but the context is different. People in China have fresh memories of shortage and hardship. My wife is 26 years old and remembers a childhood where meat could only be bought once a week. The people do not want to loose the prosperity of the last ten years.

Again, not much different than here. Meat prices have skyrocketed in Canada, as have produce prices, and the prices of everything else. We're in a recession. There's hardly any employment opportunity for recent grads. Almost all my family has gone to the US. On the plus side, my 1.5 hour commute (each way) is now 25 minutes.

To think the two are comparable requires a complete lack of perspective.

The scale and degree of poverty in China now, let alone 20 years ago, are just a tad bit worse than trouble finding jobs and long commute.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#122

Post by SCAQTony » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 7:57 PM UTC

newjersey wrote: post #69

codeisawesome wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm based in India and you make me want to hide.

I don't think China has any intention of attacking and occupying India. I'm sure they are more than capable if they wanted to but there is just no incentive.

I suspect they want totalitarian control over the south "China Sea" like Turkey practically has over anything leaving the Black Sea via their naturally formed strait, the Bosphorus.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#123

Post by dheera » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:00 PM UTC

justinclift wrote: post #111

mavdi wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't exclusive to China. Many western countries have followed suit.

References?

This is pretty close to the situation in the US with patent law.

It's technically illegal to make something with a round corner because that's Apple's patent. If you piss off Apple, they'll try to enforce it. If you don't piss them off, they won't care. The law will side with Apple because they have better lawyers than you do.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#124

Post by jbmorgado » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:04 PM UTC

SCAQTony wrote: post #36

I am not a sociologist, political scientist, or an economist. It appears that China is too big to govern and has become a diseconomy of scale. China has 160 cities with over 1-million people in them (US has 10 cities) and I think it's a miracle that the lights still work and they have running water. When you double the size of a plane it it becomes 4-times heavier (Observe what it takes to fly a B-52). The PRC seems…

Historically, too big to govern would apply not to the number of citizens but to the time information needed to cross the empire.

Hence the famous Rome roads, the Nile for the Egiptians or the excellent communication system of the Incas (there are quite a few other examples) that made those empires possible.

China might have been historically to big to govern with some stability, but with the high speed communication networks of the present that might have changed.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#125

Post by zdean » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:05 PM UTC

n0us wrote: post #106

bsder wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Harsh enforcement also causes their revenue to drop. Several of the towns which depended upon speed traps for their funding found out that the Internet is a good resource for letting people know to avoid an area. This will be interesting when self-driving cars don't ever disobey traffic laws.

This happened near where I live. There was a small bridge under construction in an otherwise unremarkable county where it is common practice to speed 10 over on the highway, so 65 mph actual speed. They dragged on the construction for more than a year making barely any progress so that they could keep the construction zone open. (2x fines) The bridge was crossing a ravine at the bottom of a hill so they just kept a c…

This was a problem in Texas, so they passed a law to curb the abuse. The small towns affected got smart and worked around the law anyways:

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-613081

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#126

Post by natch » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:07 PM UTC

ripdog wrote: post #108

natch wrote: post #92

There are some qualifiers around this alarming headline. According to this story [ http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/china-set-to-ba... ]: 'This ban covers words, pictures, maps, games, animation and sound of an "informational and thoughtful nature" -- unless they have approval from the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television.' Still it's very onerous but not a complete shutd…

Uh, exactly what part of a foreign-invested news site would NOT fall under those criteria? The site map? This is a wholesale ban.

You're only focusing on news sites, which of course are important. And yes it's (effectively) a ban on news sites, but not necessarily on non-news sites.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#127

Post by duaneb » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:09 PM UTC

jmccaf wrote: post #97

Mikeb85 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2, 3 and 5 are illegal in Canada (disclosing state secrets, inciting ethnic hatred/violence, and slander).

Additionally, above the bullet points it states that only companies 100% owned (and operated) in china can publish . This self-centered North American still reads al-jazeera, Guardian , and Der Spiegel .

Is there any idea how long al-jazeera america will continue to publish online? I'm sad to see them go.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#128

Post by troebr » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:11 PM UTC

PakG1 wrote: post #101

_snydly wrote: post #99

Will Hacker News be blocked? It looks like it's currently available: http://www.blockedinchina.net/?siteurl=news.ycombinator.com

Based in China. There are occasional times I'm unable to access HN without VPN. No idea if that's because it's being blocked or packets just aren't being given priority. Admittedly, China's pipes to the rest of the world are not very large.

They don't block foreign VPNs?

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#129

Post by Mikeb85 » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:11 PM UTC

akavi wrote: post #121

Mikeb85 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, not much different than here. Meat prices have skyrocketed in Canada, as have produce prices, and the prices of everything else. We're in a recession. There's hardly any employment opportunity for recent grads. Almost all my family has gone to the US. On the plus side, my 1.5 hour commute (each way) is now 25 minutes.

To think the two are comparable requires a complete lack of perspective. The scale and degree of poverty in China now, let alone 20 years ago, are just a tad bit worse than trouble finding jobs and long commute.

The point is perspective.

Yes, a country that started further behind in development is objectively 'worse' than a developed country.

But China today is objectively better than 20 years ago and will likely continue development. Meanwhile western countries aren't a panacea.

My wife comes from a 3rd world country where people immigrate to China from. A country that constantly sees its population decline from the exodus, where you can drive through entire abandoned neighborhoods. A country that's behind China on basically every metric you can think of, and where the only development that happens is paid for by China, who constantly forgives their debts. There's always going to be someone that's better off, and worse off than you.

The point isn't to shit on anyone or say China's great, but only to say that different countries have different levels of development, and the 'grass is always greener' mentality leads nowhere good. In 2000 everyone said China wouldn't continue its growth for various reasons, but it did. Today we're saying the same thing, with no recollection of past failed predictions of doom.

China is too big, too educated and too dynamic to stop developing. Yes quality of life isn't that of Canada or the US, but that doesn't mean they're not on a good path.

Just because X country is poorer today than Y country doesn't make X a shitty place.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#130

Post by Mikeb85 » Fri, Feb 19, 2016, 8:13 PM UTC

refurb wrote: post #113

Mikeb85 wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You're not including everything. And you're not including the first words of each bullet point, which clearly ARE illegal here. - disclosing state secrets, endangering national security, or harming national honor and interests Illegal, possibly illegal, and while we don't have a concept of national 'honor', going against national interests can be illegal, depending on context. - inciting ethnic hatred or ethnic dis…

I think you missed my point. I was highlighting the parts you left out . You said "Point #3 is illegal in Canada" when in fact, it isn't. Only part of it is. I'm familiar with common law and I wouldn't compare common law in Canada will the law in China.

I left it out? I put a brief rundown of the bullet points in 1 line between parentheses.

Fact remains, we're shitting on China for banning things that are already banned in many non-totalitarian countries.