Google search blocked in China, again; other services partially blocked (update: false alarm, says Google)
By Ross Miller 
posted July 29th 2010 7:44PM
posted July 29th 2010 7:44PM
Update: TechCrunch reports hearing back from Google, who now say this is all much ado about nothing -- or rather, it's a false alarm. Apparently there was "relatively small blockage" last night, but it has since returned to normal.
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Google: "Because of the way we measure accessibility in China, it's possible that our machines could overestimate the level of blockage," the spokesperson said. "That seems to be what happened last night when there was a relatively small blockage. It appears now that users in China are accessing our properties normally."
The real problem which Google has with China is not that chineese see just part of the information. The problem is, that in China you have no source of information other than chineese oficial version. So if a chineese would be in doubt with something that chinese government says, it checks google as "american free source of information" (if you have not lived in comunism, you do not understand this look on information from abroad), and they false realise again the chinese official version. So practicaly google is helping to supprt their regime
The second problem is that fact, that china put many spies to chinese google facility. They wanted to monitor the anti-regime people and steall their multibiolion$$$ technologies. That's why google completely closed it's facility and move to hongkong. And that's why it is better and finaly cheaper for them to not be there, then risk to give their technologies to their competitors and copiers (e.g. bing), who could with HUGE chineese gov support then beat them even on international field
@ThomasK Chinese, not chineese. Communism not comunism. You need to hang out more with Chinese people from China. I am very sure you will be amazed that they understand their plight better than you and that they are very aware of then existence of state "propaganda".
Ever heard of proxies? There is only that much you can do to restrict 1,338,612,968 people's attempt to query for uncensored information before someone eventually figures how to bypass the censorship net.
@Kameltow I'm not english, so pardon how i wrote. It's is great that what i wrote is fully understandable.
I know about proxies, i know that few chineese know it as well and it is great that few of them know about propaganda. How many of that 1.3 bilion people of democratic republic of china? Would it be 0.1% ??? I doubt so. For revolution you need 20 %.
Point is, that if you would actively do some antipropaganda in china, you would be monitored/banned/prisoned/killed. And this limits chances to target masses.
Believe me, you do not fully understand the propaganda if you are live just inside the propaganda and cannot compare. China is not Northern Korea but the principes are the same, Northern Korea is just China 15 years ago.
@ThomasK I am a Southeast Asian of Chinese descent, and English is not my first language as well. Unless you are a PRC Chinese commenting on this, your statements make absolutely no sense. There are a lot of assumptions in your statement. You are suggesting revolution for 1.3 billion people who just went through a few revolutions over the past few decades when they are only just starting to do better ever since the economy started to liberalize and reform i the 1980s. Having uncensored information available to the masses won't change the status quo. Education and having a wealthier middle and working class will. I am very sure if you ask a starving man to choose between democracy or the ability to feed his family, he will choose the latter.
I am not arguing against the implementation of democracy and freedom in China. However, such implementation should be done in a way that is sensitive, taking account of the history and cultural aspect of the Chinese people.
@Kameltow
Chinese, not chineese. Communism not comunism. You need to hang out more with Chinese people from China. I am very sure you will be amazed that they understand their plight better than you and that they are very aware of then existence of state "propaganda".
－－
really? have you ever met a mainland Chinese in your life?
@Kameltow
Yes, there are millions to supress, but fear keeps all but the hardcore at bay, and prisons keep the hardcore from doing any harm.
The Chinese government employs over 30,000 people to police the internet. Day in and day out.
From every internet cafe to online chat to online games to emails, every single keystroke typed is by law logged. Nothing you say online is private.
If you do say anything to "defame" the government, you can be fined to levels that are absolutely destroying to your average wage earner and many journalists have been thrown in jail for periods averaging ten years.
Regular proxies don't work, and how are you supposed to distribute the information to people to use them, when such discussion carries serious penalties, and even universities are blocked.
And anyone remember the "voluntary" Chinese server maintenance day? The government (very politely I'm sure) ordered servers all brought down from June 3rd to June 6th. Interesting date choice, huh?
Face it, rebellion takes serious motivation and networking of protest groups, and most people just care about their jobs and quality of life, not freedom, and networking of people is expertly suppressed.
Chine blocks sites which have something to do with "democracy" or "free will"..
US government block sites that have something to do with "terrorism", "child porn" or "9/11"...
So what should i say? Sharing and receiving information in part of human rights not to be altered by any government, so does it make any difference on that account "why" they are blocking it?
@Enidan - in US you can get those information, and blocked is only absolute minority from suspected terorists, murderers etc. and not because of their political thoughts. You can go on the central square and say anything agains it, you can call a thousands of people and protest, you can wrote about in in the newspaper ... and noone will arrest you or kill you.
@ThomasK
True. At my lower comment I would say that US is on 14:00/2:00 and chine is more like 8:00 / 20:00. But US ain't a saint either.
@ThomasK Just try doing that in England though. Hold a protest anywhere, especially in London, and most likely it will be forcibly broken up and the participants arrested. I think the UK is as much a police state as what China is.
@ThomasK
You so sure about it? People magically disappear in the United States as well. Secret service is there to silence the people that know too much and can do much harm to the government heads that make the money to feed their families as well.
All government is a stick, no matter which way you turn it will still hurt.
It's all the same. Just bunch of people trying to make money either way...
Government is not there to represent me and you. If you believe that good luck to you.
People just need to stop being greedy about power, money, recognition, and etc. Temptation of justifying your existence by means of your wealth, status, and power is just to great for some that's how modern government gotten where it is now.
Authoritarian or Democratic. Capitalist or Communist. All the same shit just different toilet paper. Pardon the pun. There is no more 'Thanksgiving' its more 'Thingstaking'...
@LeonardWashington Couldn't agree more.
@LeonardWashington
Pizza Hut and cyanide are both bad for your health.
But PLEASE do not be so asinine as to pretend there is no difference between the two because of that. The magnitude of suppression between democratic governments around the world and China/N.Korea is just as immense.
Its a mockery of the plight of the oppressed.
"Sense" returned to normal? :p
@HikaKao Seriously, that's awful grammar.
And by the way communism vs. capitalism is like a clock.
At the 12 there is so called "center" which isn't either. More like neutral government which isn't backing up companies neither workers. Does not use extreme measures. At the 9:00 there is communism and at the 15:00 there is "capitalism". And when they both go to extremes (see Stalin and Hitler from wikipedia) they grow like another nearing the 18:00. (or 6:00).
At that clock You can also read the amount of forcing ideals on the ppl. At twelve it is minimalistic and at the 18:00/6:00 it sounds more like killing ppl.
WE NO LIKEY SEARCH FOR POWRN. NO GOOGLE SEARCHY!
I just don't know what all the fuss is about. Most Chinese people just don't use Google, they use Baidu.
If a US corporation chooses to break the laws of the foreign country they're operating in, of course there will be consequences.
@mukatuna
Exactly. But this is Google, where the fanboys still think Google as this innocent and pure-hearted startup that will do no evil, despite the fact that Google is just a business. Google is free to leave China anytime, but they didn't.
China was fine before the Maoist crap started.
@Raffi256
LOL. Do you know any history of China? China was a hell hole before Mao, overrun by western and japanese militaries since late 19th century. And Mao led the communists drive the foreign occupation out, that's why he's still highly respected by vast majority of Chinese today.
@Raffi256 I personally don't think the Mao era was China's finest moment but take 15 minutes to read about China during the Qing Dynasty and the Chinese Civil War before stating something is crap.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=China+Qing+Dynasty
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Chinese+Civil+War
@Kameltow
"I personally don't think the Mao era was China's finest moment "
Wow, really? What a bold statement. Mao's crazy policies killed about 60 million civilians.
Deng Xiaoping is the man, but its all part of the same s*it. Still a one party system, civilians still have no rights. Google's 'OMG SO FREE' website doesn't change that.
@Wesscoast Your point being? Bold statement? Of me thinking that the era under Mao being not only brutal but also demeaning and murderous to the people under the regime then? Then yes, it's a bold statement. There's still many Chinese out there who think that Mao's era was one of China's proudest moment on the world stage. It's not as though I am denying that such an event never happened. The Cultural Revolution was something that should never have happened and should be universally condemned. Many of Mao's policies were utter failure. Is despotism fine? Does having scheming warlords running the most populous country sound like a swell idea? So now, does a civil war sounds good too? I was merely annoyed with Raffi256's statement suggesting that a pre-industrial China with its population consisting of mostly rural starving farmer being all well and fine before Mao.
I am no big fan of the current Chinese government but comparing the current administration to that under Mao is just ridiculous. Last I check, there are no longer village tribunals sentencing people to death sentences for being an intellectual based on the testimony of a jealous neighbour.
@Kameltow
“Bold statement?”
Dude. That was so obviously sarcasm its not even funny. 你才失败啦！
To the government of PRC
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXVOghR7CLU
@oioi So...linking to a racist put up by an ultra-racist mongolian guy, mostly watched by racist japanese and mongolian people makes your case stronger? (read the comments)
If anything it just makes it seem like you're a racist idiot.
@tekdemon an ultra-racist mongolian guy? you are so cleaver. i happen to like Mongolian better than you commies... it's sad but true, but i think IT serves you ppl right :)
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://townipproject.wikispaces.com/file/view/MASSACREHEADS.jpg/34115595/MASSACREHEADS.jpg&imgrefurl=http://townipproject.wikispaces.com/Nanking%2BMassacre&usg=__IKQcQmdxVqXYHXmtaUCssbzUyHY=&h=318&w=579&sz=15&hl=en&start=43&sig2=Qnu7fNvpNDQe7_hJRqyDkQ&tbnid=4-IE-EA_T6fpgM:&tbnh=101&tbnw=183&ei=MVVSTO3ZN4WDnQfa3Ni2Aw&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dnanjing%2Bmassacre%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26biw%3D1024%26bih%3D619%26tbs%3Disch:10%2C1513&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=108&vpy=129&dur=26&hovh=166&hovw=303&tx=151&ty=92&page=4&ndsp=13&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:43&biw=1024&bih=619
It was blocked yesterday？I am now in China,and yesterday I used Google Search for all days without any problem, Is something wrong in Google or another reason?
YouTube and FaceBook and Twitter are all dead in China
@OYangBen You mean I can't play Farmville?
@Kameltow I'm afraid so. But we have something instead
@Kameltow I think you are a guy who is interested about China
there must have been a government sanctioned mass murder that they didn't want up on youtube so the blocked it until they got rid of all the witnesses.
Partial blocked?? no! don't believe that!
People living in china ,such as me, cannot use Google whatsoever.
The truth is, You can search via Google, but as soon as you click search result,you will get blocked!!
what worse is, even you do not click search result,but only flipping result page from page 1 to page 3 will makes China block you!!
you know what, i can open Engadget.com is pure miracle! Engadget has been blocked by china several time~true story
I am a Chinese.I wanna watch youtube and use the google search.
@Jasonsam Me too