The shot across the bow of internet companies - Jeremy Goldkorn

Jeremy Goldkorn

After weeks of flying rumors on the internet, China's authorities moved in to curtail stories on disposed leader Bo Xilai and even about a coup d'etat. Internet watcher Jeremy Goldkorn guides us in The Guardian through the political minefield.

The Guardian:

"The underlying problem is that you can't get the truth out of the government, so you might as well believe stuff flying around on the internet," agreed Jeremy Goldkorn, who runs the Danwei website on Chinese media. "But what this does is remind everyone who is in charge … Sina and Tencent are going to be pretty cautious and I think will be stepping up censorship: this is a shot across the bows." 

Some have asked why rumours about senior political leaders – particularly Bo – have circulated for so long recently, given that censors are usually quick to delete such speculation. 

"I do get the sense that some things have been tolerated that perhaps in other times would not be. Certainly, it seems it's been allowed that enough has been circulated about Bo Xilai to blacken his name," said Goldkorn.

More in The Guardian.

Jeremy Goldkorn is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers' request form.

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How internet users avoid key word filters - Jeremy Goldkorn

Jeremy Goldkorn

China has a wide range of filters on its internet, but Chinese users have developed a set of tools to circumvent the censorship of certain banned words, tells China internet watcher Jeremy Goldkorn in The Brisbane Times. Premier Wen Jiabao as teletubby.

The Brisbane Times:

''Teletubby'' is code for Wen Jiabao, who chided Bo publicly before his ousting - the Chinese version of the children's TV show, Tianxianbaobao, shares a character with the Premier's name. The popular instant noodle brand Master Kong is known as Kang Shifu in Chinese and stands in for Zhou Yongkang, who is reportedly supportive of Bo. 

''Tomato has retreated; what flavour will Master Kong still have?'' asked another user. 

In keeping with the food theme, the former Chongqing party boss has been dubbed ''tomato'' or ''xihongshi''. 

''It's the classic way that people have evaded keyword filtering: using puns, homonyms, abbreviations or English acronyms of Chinese names,'' said Jeremy Goldkorn, founder of Danwei, a website on Chinese media. 

''Some are pretty standard, like zhengfu [government] becoming ZF. But a lot of the ones in the last few days are new. With this last round - like Master Kong - you would have to be following internet chatter [regularly] to really get them.'' 

Offbeat China, a blog that spotted the spate of references, said at one point ''Master Kong'' was the seventh most searched-for term on Sina's popular Weibo service.

More in the Brisbane Times Jeremy Goldkorn is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers' request form.

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What the censors did not allow - Tricia Wang

Tricia Wang

Yesterday That's Shanghai published Tricia Wang's much praised story on the life of migrants. But because it is a China based publication, censors need to have a look at it first. Not much went missing, she reports on her weblog. only the part on the Chengguan, local law enforcers with a pretty bad reputation among migrants.

The censored part:

 "Officially know as City Urban Administrative and Law Enforcement Bureau (城市管理行政执法局), it is not really clear what the chengguan are supposed to do. But what they are known for doing is making migrants' live miserable in cities across China. There are many stories of chengguan beating vendors, smashing their products or food, and taking bribes. It is also common to hear about chengguan killing street vendors. A recent incident in Guizhou led to a riot when a chengguan killed a disabled migrant. Stories of chengguan exploitation of power are so pervasive that appeasing them with bribes becomes the key to a street vendor's success. Giving bribes is a matter of life or death. But for migrants who do not have enough money to bribe, they have to constantly be on the run. Constant running means that a street vendor cannot establish a business in the long term. So for a street vendor like this family I am with, finding a place to set up a cart in a chengguan-free site is a matter of survival and success. A stable place to sell food would give them a stable income to expand their business or go into another line of work."

I am grateful that the censors only cut out that section, they were quite flexible on the other stuff I wrote. Another lesson learned about China, it's important to learn how to write between the lines; keeping it ambiguous is sometimes the best strategy.

More on Tricia Wang's weblog.

Tricia Wang is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers request form.

More on Tricia Wang's research into China's migrants' life on Storify.  

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Real internet crackdown might backfire - Tom Doctoroff

Tom Doctoroff

Silencing the unruly voices at the internet might be high on the government's agenda, but an effective crackdown would only backfire, tells Tom Doctoroff in the Internetevolution.com

The internetevolution:

“The [Communist Party] leadership is very nervous,” says Shanghai-based Tom Doctoroff, author of the coming book, What Chinese Want. Fuel for anxiety is that, in midyear, China’s president and premier are scheduled to step down, and, says Doctoroff, “There is a lot of jockeying for position.”...

But:

“The government knows the people need ways to let off steam and that the Internet is an avenue for that,” he says. He elaborates that the Chinese-language Web is awash with “free pornography sites and violent video games,” and the government, in effect, pointedly ignores these outlets... 

Right now, vocal anti-government sentiments are largely limited to a tiny minority of disaffected youth, whose opinions do not matter that much. And yet the extraordinarily active microblogs give the government a clear window on the level of dissent -- and were they to truly censor postings, they would lose that. Says Doctoroff: “In the end, this [real-name requirement] may backfire for the government because they now listen to online grumbles before grievances turn into major protests. Now fewer people will dare to raise their voices, and the government will be denied a ‘polling device’ and exacerbate alienation from the people.” 

That is why many experts increasingly believe that the microblogging crackdown will be analogous to China’s faltering crackdowns on indoor smoking -- there will be plenty of noise, right up to the regime change, and then suddenly the issue will simply cease to be discussed. Until then, says Doctoroff, “I can’t imagine the government will be aggressive in enforcing any of this.” 

The smoking ban has resulted in Chinese people smoking wherever they please. And very probably, they will continue to microblog as they please, too. Besides, adds Doctoroff, for the overwhelming majority of Chinese microbloggers, 

“People are blogging not to protest, but to show off. They want to show they are cool people.”

More in the Internetevolution.com 

Tom Doctoroff is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting of conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers' request form. More details about Tom Doctoroff and his upcoming book at Storify.

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The economic damage of internet filters - Marc van der Chijs

Marc van der Chijs

The slowdown of China's internet filters is costing internet entrepreneur Marc van der Chijs the equivalent of three working weeks per year, he estimates on his weblog. It hurts the country's international competitiveness.

Marc van der Chijs:

Tonight I was particularly frustrated when I was trying to test a website hosted on Amazon, and each time I was trying to check something the connection timed out. I got so upset that I even tweeted about it. Fellow entrepreneur Alex Duncan then replied with a blog post that he had written out of similar frustration 2 months ago. 

In this post he calculated that at the US multinational he used to work for, the staff spent an average of 30-45 minutes extra per day because of the slow Internet. That means a full 3 weeks of lost productivity (plus added stress and frustration) per year! Can you imagine the macro impact of this in a country like China? Of course only a relatively small number of people regularly uses the foreign Internet, but still the total effect must be huge. 

Alex mentioned that he might eventually consider to leave China because of this. Naturally I have pondered about that as well, but for me the advantages of China generally (still) outweigh the disadvantages of the terrible Internet. But at times I am so frustrated that I can’t wait until my next trip outside the Great Firewall.

More on Marc van der Chijs' weblog


Marc van der Chijs is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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Why censoring the "Super Girl" show does not help- Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

China's broadcast authorities cancelled recently a hugely popular Idols-like TV show called the 'super girls'. Author Zhang Lijia explains on her weblog why those heavy handed censorship methods do not work anymore.

China has greatly relaxed its control in many ways. Back in the 80’s, I failed to get any promotion partly because of my curly hair – I am one of the few Chinese who have natural curly hair but my boss thought I wore a perm. In those days, only people with bourgeoisie outlook in life would curl their hair. I didn’t have the correct ideology therefore didn’t deserve a promotion. Today’s young girls feel free to curl their hair or dye their hair purple or blonde, as quite a few of ‘super girls’ do. But the leaders still keep a watchful eye on the culture, which has always been used as a tool for propaganda, for setting moral examples and educated the masses. 

There’s always generation gap. And the gap between China’s young generation and their parents is wider than ever before. They are far more worldly, opinionated and harder to be brain washed and they are increasingly individualistic. In fact, one of the selling points of ‘Super Girl’ was that it encouraged girls to be awesome, be yourself and using this opportunity to express your individuality. The heavy-handed way the ‘Super Girl’ was dealt with may not work with the youngsters. The authorities can pull the plug of the show but can’t pull them away from the love songs in English and to embrace the revolutionary songs in their own tongue. 

Once Mao’s straight jacket has been unbuttoned, no one really wants to get back into it.

More at Zhang Lijia's weblog


Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. When you need her at your meeting or conference, do get in touch.

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Fast internet key for innovation in China - Bill Dodson

Author Bill Dodson muses in his hot pot podcast whether real innovation in China is possible when the internet has the slowest possible speed and keeps information away from the people who need it. He believes the censored internet curtails innovation.

 Here you can listen to his podcast.

Bill Dodson is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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Dam-story censored by China Daily - Bill Dodson

Bill Dodson

Foreign experts can have their say, now and then, in China's state-owned media. But then you should not writes about its dams, discovered energy specialist Bill Dodson when asked to write for the China Daily, HK edition, he reports in his weblog. Bill Dodson gave in.

The Hong Kong edition of The China Daily recently invited me to contribute an article about China’s renewable energy development trends and the country’s relationship with southeast Asia. So I wrote about all the dams China is building in the south, southwest and west of the country it’s neighbors are unhappy with.The editor didn’t like the story. It might be Hong Kong, I was told, but it’s orbit is very close to Beijing’s, after all. So I wrote another story, about how the subsidies for solar power in China will lead to even more (over-)production that will drive down the costs of photovoltaic technologies even further – a natural for archipelago nations like Indonesia, which have islands of people unable to hook into a national grid.

More in Bill Dodson's weblog Bill Dodson is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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Baidu: not a branch of the Chinese government - Kaiser Kuo

Image by Fantake via FlickrKaiser Kuo, rock musician and spokesperson for China's largest search engine Baidu sits down with Andy Atkins-Krueger of Search Engine Land to discuss six myths on Baidu, worth to dispel. Here, on Baidu's relationship with the Chinese government. Andy Atkins-Krueger:

Who owns Baidu? The Chinese government perhaps? And does the Chinese government make it so much easier for Baidu to succeed than Google? It would be fair to say that Kaiser Kuo was particularly vexed on behalf of his company that people might genuinely believe the Chinese government was “tilting the field in favor of Baidu!” He explains, “There’s no government shareholding, there are no communist party executives placed in charge of things here, no shadow board – Baidu operates fully at arms length from the Chinese government in just the same way as any typical western company would.” He adds, “There are actually two state-owned search engines which compete with us – so we definitely aren’t getting special favors.”

More in Search Engine Land, on intellectual property rights, censorship and the company's business practises. Kaiser Kuo is also a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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How does media censorship work? - Jeremy Goldkorn

Jeremy Goldkorn

Media watcher Jeremy Goldkorn discusses the elaborate way media censorship works in China. Yes, the official censorship is very much in place, but both internet users and journalists have ways to deal with it - within limits.

Jeremy Goldkorn is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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Weibo stopped toeing the party line after railway crash - Jeremy Goldkorn

Jeremy Goldkorn

China's successful microblogging service Weibo ignored the party line, as the online anger about the railway crash near Wenzhou exploded. Internet watcher Jeremy Goldkorn explains in CNN the government is trying to put the ghost back into the bottle. Yang Feng, who lost family in the crash, became an overnight hero.

CNN:

While [the official broadcaster] CCTV shunned him, Yang became an overnight hero in the eyes of Chinese netizens who were riled by the government response to the accident, especially the perceived ineptitude and arrogance of the railway ministry. Less than 24 hours after he posted his first message on Weibo, China's equivalent of Twitter, Yang has gained more than 110,000 followers.

"The closer you get to the centrally controlled media, the more they toe the Communist Party line," explained Jeremy Goldkorn, a long-time Chinese media observer whose Danwei website monitors the industry. "For this accident, Weibo posts have been so far ahead of official responses."...

For Weibo users, however, any sense of vindication may prove short-lived. Analysts say Internet censors have already begun deleting more posts as netizens became critical of not just the scandal-plagued railway ministry but also of the flaws of the political system.

"They are trying to shove the genie back in the bottle," media observer Goldkorn said. "Weibo is such an effective amplifier of people's dissatisfaction that it is worrying the government a lot."

Now Yang has turned uncharacteristically quiet. Pleading for his supporters' understanding, he alluded in his most recent Weibo posts that he was under tremendous pressure to keep a low profile for the well-being of his family -- including his father-in-law, who survived the train crash.

More in the aftermath of the railway crash at CNN.

Jeremy Goldkorn is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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Government no talking partner in hacking issue - Jeremy Goldkorn

Jeremy Goldkorn

Why would you want to talk to the Chinese government on Google's hacking issues, when there is no proven link - to put it mildly - between the government and the hacking, wonders internet analyst Jeremy Goldkorn in VOA.

Jeremy Goldkorn on the potential hackers:

"The hackers who are alleged to have committed this latest attack on Google users, on gmail users, may or may not be government employees. I would be very surprised if the people who  did the hack actually worked for the government. It doesn't mean that their not in touch with the  government, it doesn't mean that their somehow not associated with the government. But they may very  well be citizens either acting on their own or in some kind of loose collaboration with one or  another government agency. It makes it very difficult to understand who they are [and] pin them  down. And it makes it very difficult to talk to the Chinese government about what's going on."

And on the question whether Google has a future in China:

"Google has had a very difficult time adapting to the local conditions in the Chinese market. And a big part of that is because the government regulates or interferes with Internet companies to very great degree in China. SoInternet companies are responsible for self-censoring their content. And if you're not willing to self-censor, you will not get a license to operate in China. Google eventually came to the point where they announced they weren't willing to carry on doing that. It is a very tough market by itself. It's not an easy market  to operate in as a business. In addition to the problems of creating a successful Internet business here in a very competitive landscape, you also have the problem of a very great amount of government scrutiny and regulation."

More, including the viewpoint of Hillary Clinton, in VOA.

Jeremy Goldkorn in a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. When you need him at your meeting or conference, do get in touch.

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Humor as a tool against the authorities - Jeremy Goldkorn

Jeremy Goldkorn by Fantake via Flickr

An active and vibrant internet culture trying to push the limits, describes internet expert Jeremy Goldkorn in this video produced by the Asia Society. Humor as a tool against censorship.
(Jeremy's comments after the cartoon).

Jeremy Goldkorn in a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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All foreign books to be banned in China? - Bill Dodson

Image by Fantake via Flickr

Bill Dodson

Celebrity author Bill Dodson just discovered by accident that his succesful book China Inside Out has been taken off the shelves of a book store in Suzhou. It might be the start of more, he reports at his weblog. In the end all foreign books might be banned in China.

China Inside Out apparently caught the attention of the Fahrenheit 451 brigade in Suzhou. I’d gone down to the local branch of the Bookworm this past Sunday to kick-off a Royal Asiatic Society author’s talk on Edmund Backhouse’s Decadence Mandchoue, as bawdy an historical narrative as one will ever find. A friend at the shop told me my book had caused a bit of a stir a few days before with the local F451. I thought he was kidding.
The proprietor confirmed after the Decadence talk that, indeed, F451 had been to the shop, saw the nice little display for the book set up at the front bar; and politely asked that the book be removed. In all fairness, it’s not the first time the shop has been targeted. And it won’t be the last time, either. Apparently, F451 will shortly be requiring ALL books written by foreigners be taken down from the shelves.
Regime change has central and local authorities more brittle than at any time in twenty years.
The country just can’t seem to break out of some cycles.

Bill Dodson is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him (and his books) at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch.

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Facebook should be in China - Kaiser Kuo

Kaiser Kuo via Flickr

Baidu spokesperson Kaiser Kuo triggered off many comments, as he wrote during the visit of Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg to Beijing, that the largest social platform should also come to China. Zuckerberg visited Baidu's headquarter and had lunch with its CEO Robin Li.
Kaiser Kuo (in the Q&A Answer service Quora, here quoted in Forbes)

…a Facebook entry into China would be fraught with challenges but personally I believe that having Facebook in China, even if it were compelled to abide by China’s strict censorship requirements, would still be better than not having it here. I believe that it would be a net positive for China’s Internet users. More connectivity is better than less. I felt the same way when Google entered China and acquiesced to the demands of censors: Even though they were censored, they nevertheless helped to expand the information horizons of Chinese Internet users, and I’m very thankful that some compromise was arrived at.

He admits such a move would not be without problems, in the debate that follows:

But yeah, I agree that it would be difficult. And if they did something like this it would bring down a major storm of condemnation from rights groups

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Kaiser Kuo is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. When you need him at your meeting or conference, do get in touch.

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The sensitive words on the internet today - Jeremy Goldkorn

Jeremy Goldkorn by Fantake via Flickr

Jeremy Goldkorn of the media site Danwei explains to CNN how China's domestic internet companies deal with sensitive issues, to prevent them from getting into trouble with the internet censors.

Internet companies in China are treating Chinese characters for "Liu Xiaobo," "Nobel," and peace prize as "sensitive words," said Jeremy Goldkorn, editor of Danwei.org -- a website about Chinese media and Internet. Acting on government instructions, the companies are deleting text containing those words, preventing such text from being uploaded, or returning no results on searches for the words, he said.

"I think the main aim is to reduce the chances of Chinese citizens seeing that the Liu Xiaobo Nobel Prize is big news internationally, and to make it more difficult for articles sympathetic to Liu Xiaobo and photos of him to be copied and circulated inside China," Goldkorn said.

Many foreign websites hit the international filters of China's censors, or are block altogether. As is Goldkorn's website Danwei.

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Jeremy Goldkorn is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. When you need him at your meeting or conference, do get in touch.

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Censorship does not help Baidu against Google - Kaiser Kuo

via CrunchBase

Google has been complaining that censorship in increasing their cost as a foreign player, but Kaiser Kuo, international communication director of its domestic competitor Baidu says in the New York Times that censorship is not giving Baidu a competitive advantage.

Kaiser Kuo, the director of international communications for Baidu, said that it was wrong to suggest that China’s controls on the Internet were unfairly helping his company.

“Google no longer incurs the costs of censorship that we continue to incur; those costs include not only hardware, software and manpower but most importantly the time of our very senior managers,” Mr. Kuo said. “We should not labor under the illusion that censorship is some sort of competitive advantage to Baidu.

More in the New York Times on Google's accusation China's internet controls are against the WTO rules on internet access.

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Kaiser Kuo is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. When you need him at your meeting

Kaiser Kuo via Flickr

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Internet censorship as an economic indicator - Paul Denlinger

Paul Denlinger  via Flickr

Business analyst Paul Denlinger makes at his weblog China Vortex a smart connection between the recent upsurge in internet crackdowns and the expected economic uncertainty caused by an expected economic downturn and China's leadership swap in 2012. China's leaders turn to more control in times of economic uncertainty:

When you put this into the Chinese context of domestic politics, and see that the Chinese leadership will be handed over to a new president and premier in 2012, what is happening on the Internet makes perfect sense. The current leadership of President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao are due for retirement then, and will hand over leadership to a new leadership team. With two years left in their term, it is safe to say that world markets look unstable, with another wall of debt about to hit the US and Europe in the next year, further dampening consumer spending in the west. How can they manage a smooth handover without things getting unstable?

More at the China Vortex.

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Paul Denlinger is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. When you want to share his insights at your meeting or conference, do get in touch.

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More internet blocks abolished

In China, when you predict trends, you always keep your fingers crossed, but this time I seem to have been very much spot-on.
My analysis said last week that ahead of the Olympics, the internet censorship would become much more subtle and illustrated this with a few new features. That trend has now continued as also Wikipedia, blogspot and others are unblocked. Danwei does not believe yet it will stay, but unless the new censorship system is an obvious failure (a partly failure would not be that bad, since the system has never been flawless) the url-blocks will be gone.

How to detect nonsense in articles on the Chinese internet

The Washington Post made a very sloppy article on this intriguing subject: how are the Chinese authorities going to control the internet and mobile communication? It started with a little anecdote that was new for me, but when I read this I knew I was losing my time:

It hasn't been for lack of trying. The Public Security Ministry, which monitors the Internet under guidance from the Central Propaganda Department, has recruited an estimated 30,000 people to snoop on electronic communications. The ministry recently introduced two cartoon characters -- a male and female in police uniforms -- that it said would pop up on computer screens occasionally to remind people that their activity is being tracked.

The urban myth of those 30,000 police officers monitoring the internet is the official benchmark that we are leaving serious journalism. The number has never even been proven and - it has been argumented before - on 162 million internet users that is actually a very low number. That number - if true - only proves China does not take controlling the internet very serious.
For the ministry of Public Security it might be news that they are under the guidance from the Central Propaganda Department. There is a committee of about 17 government departments who try to discuss how the government should deal with the internet, but none of those departments takes the overhand.
Of course, the cute cartoons - what a way to crack down on the internet users - were not introduced by the ministry, but by the Beijing public security. It is a very local affair, but Western media try to make small things big by declaring them wrongly into national issues.