Google Kowtows

The first week of the semester is always hectic. This one was no exception. Of course I heard about the news that Google had kowtowed to the demands of the Chinese government and agreed to censor its search results. Hence, the graphic that I created above. Early Thursday morning finds me looking for a decent round-up on this matter. Since I can't find any, I guess I'll have to create one. Here goes.

First, an exceprt from a source document: "Google to censor sensitive terms in China" by Eric Auchard and Doug Young of Reuters.

Internet search giant Google Inc. will block politically sensitive terms on its new China site, bowing to conditions set by Beijing in return for access to the world's number-two Internet market.

The voluntary concessions laid out on Tuesday by Google, which is launching a China-based search site as it officially enters the market, would parallel similar self-censorship already practiced there by most multinationals and domestic players.

Homegrown giants like Sohu.com Inc. and Baidu.com Inc., along with China sites operated by Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO - news) and Microsoft, all routinely block searches on politically sensitive terms such as the Falun Gong spiritual movement and Taiwan independence.

"In order to operate from China, we have removed some content from the search results available on Google.cn in response to local law, regulation or policy," Andrew McLaughlin, Google's senior policy counsel, said in a statement.

"While removing search results is inconsistent with Google's mission, providing no information (or a heavily degraded user experience that amounts to no information) is more inconsistent with our mission."

By way of Pajamas Media, The Colossus performs the obvious experiment. First (s)he searches Google.com for "Tiananmen Square" and gets these results. Then (s)he does the same on Google.cn, the Chinese google search engine and gets this. There's no surpise that the results are different. But even allowing for the fact that the defaults might be set to different languages or that the Chinese government might have a hand in what does or doesn't stay on the web, one is still shocked at the disparity in both quantity and quality.

Instapundit has a one sentence summary and four brief updates. One of them is from Publius Pundit who notes the obvious hypocrisy in Google first refusing to comply with a subpoena issued last year for records about child pornography searches and then rolling over for the Chinese government request to limit access to politically sensitive search terms and sites, including blogs.

Another link from Instapundit is from NRO's "The Corner" where Editor-at-Larger, Jonah Golderg concludes that Google's motto, "Don't be Evil" is nothing more than a marketing ploy. I disagree. This remark comes on the heels of a column about an excellent column on Google's non-compliance entitled “Oogling My Googling”, one he finished just before the news about Google and China broke.

A third blogger included in Instapundit's updates is Rebecca Mckinnon of Rconversation. Her post, Google in China: degrees of evil, sums up nicely the objections that the blogosphere has with google's decision:

So it has happened. Google has caved in. It has agreed to actively censor a new Chinese-language search service that will be housed on computer servers inside the PRC.

Obviously this contradicts its stated desire to make information freely available to everybody on the planet, and it contradicts its mission statement: "don't be evil." As Mike Langberg at the San Jose Mercury News puts it: their revised motto should now read "don't be evil more than necessary."

Most valuable about her post, however, is her update that indicates that Google is somewhat on the defensive concerning their decision and that it "seems to be trying to minimize it's evilness in several ways." One of its steps, the third in Rebecca's list, is Google's decision to not provide blogging or email services, something that many observers have noted would enttail obtaining specific user data from web surfers living inside and under Chinese jurisdiction. This means that Google would

avoid having to turn users over to the Chinese police as Yahoo did or to censor bloggers as Microsoft does. Will they stick to this choice or will the lure of business draw them deeper into evilness?

Rebecca's summary draws what I think is a crucial distinction here, one that is going to be debated for some time to come:

I don't like the fact that Google is censoring in China at all. Google spokespeople liken what they do in China to the filtering they do in France and Germany - censoring porn and Nazi sites in compliance with their laws. I do not believe you can compare compliance to laws in democratic societies to what they're doing in China. In France and Germany, there is some connection between the laws and the user's consent. People in those countries have the ability to vote out of office the politicians who make unpopular laws. Chinese users have no way of punishing their government for its censorship policies by voting the current group of leaders out of office. But now that Google is censoring, I think we need to watch very closely to see how transparent it will be about what it's censoring and why: how honest it is going to be with Chinese users?

The fourth of Instapundit's updates comes from David Pinto of Baseball Musings. His words are short and, depending on where you come down on the issue, either sweet or sour:

I've removed Google AdSense from my website due to their agreement to censor searches in China..

More than a few of his readers are claiming that they will do the same. While I don't expect anything like an avalanche of people to follow his lead, I do admire that he has the courage of his convictions.

Another nice find is a very long and detailed post by Danny Sullivan in SearchEngineWatch that places into context many of the ideas being floated elsewhere and that challenges much of the early conventional wisdom. While I take issue with several of his arguments, particular his likening of following censorship laws in China to doing the same in Germany or France, the post is definitely worth a read for anyone seriously interested in the topic. be forewarned that you'll need to set aside 15+ minutes to read the whole thing. Here's the opening paragraph, followed by an excerpt from the body:

Oh, the irony. Less than a week after we hear that Google is ready to fight the US government in part to defend its users, now comes news that Google will cave into the Chinese government's demands for its new Google China web site. However, the issues aren't directly comparable. Moreover, while I'm no fan of Chinese censorship, I like some of the way Google is reacting to the demands. Come along, and we'll explore the entire censorship situation in China, the US and some other places you rarely hear discussed, like France and Germany.

Today's news is a fundamental shift. Google isn't running for the cover of protecting the user experience by omitting some news sites. It's flat out saying that the Chinese government wants it to do censoring in news search, web search and other areas and that Google will comply.

Via Technorati, I found several other fascinating posts. I'll close this post with excerpts from a few of them and then provide a short commentary.

Andrew Sheih of Stanford University has penned an "Open Letter to Google" wherein he describes what he sees as wrong with Google's policy and, more importantly, what they should do about it:

1. The minimum that Google must do is to show the "Local regulations prevent us from showing all the results" disclaimer on the top of the search results, rather than hiding it away on the bottom. Everyone who is receiving censored search results deserves to know that the results are tainted.

2. In addition to the disclaimer, Google.cn could promote anonymous web browsing proxies such as Tor, so users in China can view the uncensored web rather than the filtered and often deceptive results that Google.cn displays.

3. Google could further expand the disclaimer, by describing precisely what criteria are used to remove sites from the Google.cn search listings. If Google is filtering sites based on government regulations, it shouldn't be afraid to show us the criteria it is using. I'd personally like to see a list of sites that government regulations are forcing Google to remove; it would be far more interesting than Wikipedia's list of terms blocked by search engines in China.

4. Google should continue to allow users in China to access the Google.com site, rather than forcing China IP addresses to be redirected to Google.cn.

Google claims "Don't be evil" as their corporate motto. Will they live up to it by making these changes?

General Lee D. Mented is sympathetic to Google's decision, offering an argument of what reminds me much of the Reagan administration's "constructive engagement" argument with South Africa in the 1980's:

Google had a choice. Either stay out of China, which contrary to popular belief would not have resulted in a political statement against censorship that meant jack squat in said country, or provide a limited service compliant with Chinese laws. They could either do nothing, or do something less than ideal. I seriously doubt they made their choice without a huge amount of internal debate among some of the finest minds in the world. Ideals are nice, but they rarely accomplish anything without actions, and it's really hard to work against a system purely from the outside. You can stop claiming they've "compromised their morals", because they haven't. Something is still better than nothing, and is easier to improve later.

While I understand and appreciate the "don't let the perfect stand in in the way of the good" argument, I can't for the life of me figure out why Google can't be this pragmatic when the Justice Department, involved in a lawsuit against the ACLU over finding limits to child porn on the web, requests anonymous search data.

Alton Thompson of Conductor's Notebook, gives Google's "sell out" two thumbs down. He's not just carping, however. Like the aforementioned Andrew, he's got a positive suggestion or two:

I support the idea put forward by Reporters Without Borders: international businesses should band together and resolve to abide, in every country, by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Most pertinent to the present case is Article 19:

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Corporations like Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft should make their determination on this matter clear to the government of any country in which they operate. As a member of the United Nations--with a seat on the Security Council, no less--China can have no legitimate complaint. Its government should be supporting the rights set forth in the Declaration already.

Over at Internet Salsa is a post that is mostly a recap of of what has been said elsewhere. What I like about it, however, is the question posed in the title and the question that appears at the end. The one in the title is " 'Is Google Sticking up to their Motto "Don't be Evil?' " As I stated above, this question is going to be debated for a long time. The last question is one I haven't seen raised yet and is the one with which I already intended to end this round-up: "So do you think China can control Internet?".

This is the question that I think more people should be asking. So far it would seem that "The Great FireWall of China" is having the effect that Chinese government wants: to block objectionable, outside information from coming in. Two other things seem apparent. First and foremost, the Chinese government needs outside help to keep that firewall, or filter, in working order. Secondly, there are clearly plenty of companies willing to do the work. And so long as this state of affairs continues, I think the Chinese can and will exercise tight control over that part of the internet that they deem objectionable.

Google would have us believe that compromising their own mission and willingly participating in the widescale suppression of access to information is the lesser of two evils. To my mind, the only way such a "lesser of two evils" strategy can be justified is when some greater good can be foreseen to result. I've tried for a few days now and I can't figure out what that greater good is. Can you?

Update 1: MacStansbury's post entitled "Google, Politics" was listed as one of Truth Laid Bear's "Top Posts" yesterday. In it he links to a post entitled "Google Denies Communist Censorship Will Alter Search Results" at Point Five that has a clever graphic of his own. Check it out here.

Speaking of clever graphics Michelle Malkin has one of her own in her post, Google Bows to China.

Update 2: Michelle Malkin is collecting the new Google "protest logos" that several bloggers have developed in the wake of the company's agreement with China. I have asked that mine be included. Here is where to see the present list. Pajamas Media continues to follow the story, now with a link to a post by Marathon Pundit entitled "Google: 1.3 Billion Chinese Can't Be Wrong."

Update 3: In a post entitled "A Dangerous Opprtunity" Dympha gives voice to the "Camel's nose inside the tent" hypothesis:

So there’s the other side. Some believe that Google’s decision to work within the limits imposed by the Chinese government is just the foot under the tent. As with all the West’s previous dealings with China, the latter will become more Westernized and more open as a result of the contact. Thus, we ought to welcome the idea since it means China becomes less a threat to us.

Don’t forget that China is full of young, intelligent and well-educated men — far more than it really knows what to do with since its population control policies have included the unintended consequence of millions of aborted female fetuses.

These intelligent, bored “youths” take great pleasure in hacking, just for the sheer fun of getting away with it. So guess what many of them will be doing once China has Google on board. That’s right: they’ll make Google’s entry into China the widening point of an already-growing chasm between young and old, bureaucrat and individual, son and family.

This is the kind of thing to which I alluded when asked what was the potential greater good outcome. While I find this line of thinking plausible, to be sure, it is too remote and dependent upon too many other factors out of Google's control to make their decision acceptable in my mind. Even though its searche engine may end up playing a role in subverting Chinese authority, Google has also placed a tool in the hands of those authorities, and a powerful one at that. Yes, Dympha, these are interesting times! PS: If I were to bet on what millions of young male netizens living in a country with a shortage of women will be doing on the web, it would be something other than hacking.

Google spokespeople liken what they do in China to the filtering they do in France and Germany - censoring porn and Nazi sites in compliance with their laws. I do not believe you can compare compliance to laws in democratic societies to what they're doing in China. In France and Germany, there is some connection between the laws and the user's consent. People in those countries have the ability to vote out of office the politicians who make unpopular laws.

Google is correct, there is little difference between Google censoring Nazis for France and Germany and censoring for China. If you buy one you can't really object to the other. The hogwash about people having the ability to vote out politicians is nonsense, it ignores the fact that free speech is an individual right, and it doesn't matter if it's removed by a dictator or the mob.

It should be understood that the collaberation Google is involved in with the thought police of Red China goes far beyond merely deletion. From what I understand, for instance, searching for "Christianity" in Red China's Google will get you redirected to government dogma re: the danger of cults.

This perversion of the stated goals of Gaggle, Google, Googoo, whatever they called themselves, will be and must be condemned by all good men and women of conscience and for God's sake, now is not the time to do nothing.

What google did is what all corporations do: follow government orders or get out of Red China.

I remember Bill Gertz telling a KSFO radio audience that U.S. corporations are required to pay for Washington lobbyists to do the Chi-Coms' bidding in Washington.

How long before google has to hide from U.S. users, or put at the bottom, such "running dogs of imperialism," "anti-worker" sites as Free Republic? Do it or lose the permission to do business in Red China.

I just can't get worked up about this. Google's explanation makes sense to me. Google.com is unavailable in China about 10% of the time, and Google.cn let's users know when their results are being censored. Once they see that notice, they can try using the same search terms on Google.com. A censored Google is better than no Google at all for the Chinese people, and really, those are really the only two options.

It's only a matter of time before Commodore Shu Perry Ban sails his fleet into an American harbour and insists you open your markets to the Chinese Republic.

Then we'll just "Shogun", and they will go away!!

:)

You need to understand how the Chinese think. They know that their time is coming and they will take back Taiwan and parts of Siberia the Soviets took after WW2 and, for all the hooray, America will give in to the Chinese.

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