China’s youth must face the corrupting influence of Internet porn without government guidance for a brief while longer. The Chinese government said Tuesday it will delay enforcing a new requirement that all new computers sold in the country include Green Dam/Youth Escort Web-filtering software.
Google’s mission, to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible, has once again run afoul of the Chinese government, which has a similar goal, but would much prefer that certain information stay inaccessible. And so, on Wednesday evening, Chinese citizens found themselves once again unable to use Google, Gmail, and YouTube as their government condemned Google as a purveyor of porn.
Yahoo’s public shaming before the House Foreign Affairs Committee last November apparently had quite an effect on Internet companies cooperating with Chinese government censorship and demands for information on dissidents. Less than a year after that brutal Capitol Hill humiliation, during which Committee Chairman Tom Lantos (D., Calif.) lambasted Yahoo’s leadership as moral “pygmies,” Yahoo, along with Microsoft and Google, is introducing a code of conduct that will govern their business practices in repressive countries.
John Gilmore once famously claimed that “the Internet interprets censorship as failure and routes around it.” If he’s right, there’s no reason to worry that an agreement by three of the nation’s largest Internet-service providers to block access to newsgroups and Web sites that traffic in child pornography might have other frightening consequences. If not, well …
I’m pretty proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish in China. Google has a far superior track record than other Internet or Internet search companies in China.”
–Google co-founder Sergey Brin adjusts the company’s informal corporate motto “Don’t Be Evil” to “Don’t be AS evil” for the Chinese market.
So that “isolated” incident of political censorship in AT&T’s live “Blue Room” Webcast of Pearl Jam’s Lollapalooza set? Not so isolated after all.
AT&T initially characterized the deletion of unkind statements about the White House from Pearl Jam’s performance as “an unfortunate mistake” and “an isolated incident.” But after music fans pointed out that the company [...]
Good thing Yahoo’s working with several Internet and human-rights groups to “further advance thinking and practices around the promotion of free expression and privacy,” otherwise its shareholders’ rejection of two anticensorship proposals yesterday might make you want to question its commitment to human rights.
At Yahoo’s annual meeting, an overwhelming majority of Yahoo shareholders voted against [...]
If conversation is a key theme of Web 2.0, then government-directed Internet censorship of that conversation is certain to be a theme of Web 3.0. According to an OpenNet Initiative report issued today, government censorship of the Internet is becoming a global phenomenon–a practice that has grown well beyond just a handful of countries, such [...]
John Paczkowski has been poking fun at the tech industry and the personalities that drive it since 1997. From 1999 to 2007, he wrote the award-winning tech news Web log Good Morning Silicon Valley for the San Jose Mercury News, Silicon Valley's daily newspaper. Read more »
Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.
12:58 AM: Breakfast: Two schools of fish from Tokyo Bay. Calories: 782,000. How I was feeling when I ate this: confused, irradiated, hating my size.
11:37 AM: Exercise: “Taxi Stomp” (alternating legs, for 30 blocks). Calories burned: 148,900,183.
1983. The Beatles announce their first tour in thirteen years, but likewise announce that Michael Jackson will be going on tour with them as a one gigantic mega-concert event.
Best video mashup ever.
A Facebook Memorial
Wow.
Worth it for the Rickrolling photo alone.
Excellent.
Flughumor!
… you vacuous, toffee-nosed, malodorous perverts
Stephen Fry and zoologist Mark Carwardine meet the kakapo — a fat, flightless and very randy rare parrot.
D is unlike any other executive conference. Since its debut in 2003, D has brought to life the energy and excitement of the digital revolution in an unscripted, upfront and unparalleled way. Read more »
Don't miss a post! Sign up for our Daily Email and get AllThingsD.com delivered each day.
Get columns, blogs and video from D and All Things Digital on your iPhone. Download now »
