Posted on 06/05/2008 10:33:17 AM PDT by brityank
China's Netizens Aid Earthquake Relief
Christopher Thomas 06.03.08, 3:30 AM ET
A few hours after the devastating earthquake on May 12, a People's Liberation Army rescue helicopter landed on a hillside field near Wenchuan, the epicenter of the earthquake. It was one of the first to arrive as rescue teams made their way to the remote site.
The landing site was not chosen from military maps or guided by emergency response teams. Instead, the site was determined from an instant message posted on popular local messaging services Baidu Post Bar and QQ. The poster, a Wenchuan native, gave the location and topography of the field and an urgent plea to "please pass this on to the right authorities." Dozens of people did so, creating an Internet daisy-chain that eventually reached the regional command post.
Historians may one day look back at this monumental tragedy as a watershed in Chinese history. It demonstrated Chinese compassion beyond traditional family ties. It exposed a government that was amazingly responsive to the needs of its people. Yet this pivotal moment was shaped by China's 200 million Netizens using the Web to communicate the tragedy to the world and enlist help.
The Chinese Internet teems with CGC--consumer-generated content. Within one week of the earthquake, the top three blog sites in China garnered more than 250,000 posts and 2 billion page views. Thousands of home videos were posted on Tudou.com and other sites. The Internet content touches on every aspect of the disaster, from self-created volunteer teams sharing information on traffic around Chengdu to expressions of grief and pride in being Sichuanese to urgent pleas for donations.
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But it was more than that. Netizens set the pace and tenor of the reporting of the quake, snip
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Ping.
“In this case, China’s Netizens used the Internet overwhelmingly for good. They gave the world a view of a tragedy on a scale rarely seen, spurred government to act with a speed rarely seen and prompted a compassion rarely seen. Who knows what will happen next time there is a major event in China? Netizens may again be the central players. In China, the Internet has stood up.”
Agree; they did good.
Ping. Well done!
What in the world is a “Netizen”?
LOL. You resemble that remark! (Me too.)
FR China is born. In other words, what the article is saying is that reporting of the event by individuals provided more and faster news than regular channels...just like here on FR.
Now I am sure there are some that will say, it can’t be so. It is all just a Chinese plot...
This is about you!
I hope so. IIRC Jim started FR after kicking around on CompuServe in the late 80's early 90's, and it took a while for it to build -- for which I and a lot of others are grateful. But bear in mind, we're in a free society compared to the very restrictive world-wide internet. China does and can block content and/or access at any time for any reason, but they can't keep it all out. Just like DU; the CCP will try to slither in, but I think most will glom onto them fairly quickly.
Very true, considering that the CCP has a very strong hold on dissemination both within and without their network access points. Plus the swift willingness of US-based corporations to kow-tow to CCP demands to censor their activities; eg: Google and Yahoo.
But the ubiquitousness of cellphones with text and cameras, plus anonymous proxy access points, will get around some of it, and we should be able to help in the dialog. Maybe Jim can open a Hong Kong office. :^)
There has been a huge change in news reporting in China, and not just with the internet.
Chinese people have noticed that for the first time they are getting detailed reports about Army involvement, involvement in the rescue and aid efforts. This did not used to be the case.
Before it was word of mouth from relatives and friends that knew of those that were called to go serve.
China can not put the information genie back in the bottle. They can and do block sites. They can not block all of them. And even if they could, anyone can pick up a copy of Time, Newsweek, New York Times, Washington Post and a gazillion other Western publications. FR is freely accessed. Foreigners live and work in China in very large numbers, freely discussion politics.
The only way to cut off information now would be to put society in a total lock down. To think that is going to happen is rediculas and rediculously uninformed.
Can China put building regulations in effect, inspectors on sight that will make sure a job foreman is not throwing an extra shovel of sand into the cement mix to pick up a little extra change? That is a tough undertaking.
At any rate, it is interesting and a bit ironic that this quote made it all the way around the world, even as some - including this woman - wonder if it made it to Beijing and the central committee. They read it just like we are reading it here. Her message got out.
I don't know. We did it here.
They read it just like we are reading it here. Her message got out.
True. But if it gets to everyone in the world except the authorities who can make some changes it doesn't do much to change things.
They know about the shoddy construction. They know why the schools collapsed. They know they collapsed. They know about the quake.
Unfortunately, we have in this country a vast left-wing conspiracy that would LOVE to institute controls -- check out Clinton and her many comments on setting up Gatekeepers for everything for peon access to anything.
I’m happy that you ping’d our FRiends in China. I’m so proud that the people are realizing that the power IS the people! Very much luck and success to them all!
Then I guess they’ll be fixing the problem. /s
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