Ultimately I don't think there is any way we can or should control the information in Wikipedia in such a way that it would be acceptable to the security services of China, nor is there any way China with its unstable political situation can tolerate the information contained in Wikipedia. I am especially concerned that Wikipedia offers the temptation to people who reside on the mainland to speak their mind which can result in crippling consequences for themselves and their families.
Fred
From: Jiong Sheng sheng.jiong@gmail.com Reply-To: Jiong Sheng sheng.jiong@gmail.com, wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 10:44:55 +0000 To: wikipedia-l@wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] wikipedia is big in China six was once blockade again
Shizhao has again made a formal request to the authority for the lift of the blockade. Not sure what's the exact reason yet. There are possibly two reasons: 1) A user called [[User:Yaohua2000]], who was once blocked by zh: for vandalism and was rejected for his apllication for admin, yesterday threatened to report Wikipedia to the government for spreading information related to Falun Gong and Taiwan Independence. We don't know if he acutally did that and it is because of his action that resulted in the blockade.
Another possible cause would be the extensive coverage of the banning of another famous BBS board in mainland that was banned recently. YTHT, one of the most popular BBS boards in China was banned few weeks ago and all other BBS boards were explictly warned not to discuss this issue. But of course zh Wikipedia still has an article on this event and many former users from YTHT now joined us. This could also have exasperated some officials.
I don't know if this time the ban can still be lifted, but the experience tells us that, after the ban in June, we took three months to recover. And when we finally reach the same level in June in term of daily visits, we are banned again.
[[User:formulax]]
On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 08:34:38 +0000 (UTC), shizhao shizhao@gmail.com wrote:
On September 23, the wikipedia is big in China six was once blockade again. [[Zh:user:shizhao]] have already confirmed this news from the cstnet.
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Once when I was a cabdriver in Denver I had a passenger, a Jewish person who had recently immigrated from Russia. When I expressed an opinion she didn't like she threatened to turn me in to the FBI. (A rather useless gesture given my background and the fact that expressing a political opinion is basically a non-event in the United States). But in the Soviet Union turning folks in who annoyed you was an option as it is in China today. Assuming the security forces have common sense and are going to be forgiving about a college student's, or a 13 year old's, posts to the internet is tenuous.
Fred
From: Fred Bauder fredbaud@ctelco.net Reply-To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 05:19:33 -0600 To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] wikipedia is big in China six was once blockade again
Ultimately I don't think there is any way we can or should control the information in Wikipedia in such a way that it would be acceptable to the security services of China, nor is there any way China with its unstable political situation can tolerate the information contained in Wikipedia. I am especially concerned that Wikipedia offers the temptation to people who reside on the mainland to speak their mind which can result in crippling consequences for themselves and their families.
Fred
I wonder whether and what extent W should open a dialogue with the Chinese government to figure out what their content guidelines are, and whether we can help them understand our NPOV guidelines.
I would like to remind people that the Chinese are a very proud people (just like Americans) and don't like to be told what to do. Generally, though, they listen to reason and are eager to look at new ways of doing things.
I think that we can seriously learn from this exchange, and that it will help to avoid this kind of block/not block random yoyo.
Thoughts?
===== Chris Mahan 818.943.1850 cell chris_mahan@yahoo.com chris.mahan@gmail.com http://www.christophermahan.com/
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We can certainly try.
Fred
From: Christopher Mahan chris_mahan@yahoo.com Reply-To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:04:43 -0700 (PDT) To: wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] wikipedia in China
I wonder whether and what extent W should open a dialogue with the Chinese government to figure out what their content guidelines are, and whether we can help them understand our NPOV guidelines.
I would like to remind people that the Chinese are a very proud people (just like Americans) and don't like to be told what to do. Generally, though, they listen to reason and are eager to look at new ways of doing things.
I think that we can seriously learn from this exchange, and that it will help to avoid this kind of block/not block random yoyo.
Thoughts?
===== Chris Mahan 818.943.1850 cell chris_mahan@yahoo.com chris.mahan@gmail.com http://www.christophermahan.com/
Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
While you are discussing this, note that such a dialogue may not be easy to establish. The following is a message posted at zh.wp by Mountain (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:%E4%BA%92%E5%8A%A9%E5%AE%A2%E6%A0%88), (roughly) translated into English as follow:
"The BBS that was recently closed in China is very similar to wikipedia in that it was completely organized and supported by volunteers. I have tried to get some information from some sysops of that BBS; they indeed tried to talk with the government but they can at best do so indirectly through the ISP or the school in which the site is running. No one seems to know or is willing to tell which organization is making the decision. After the blocking in June, Shizhao and I tried to ask our ISPs who to talk to, but to no avail. We are currently talking to our ISPs again and see what we can do. - Mountain 9-23-2004 "
On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 09:04:43 -0700 (PDT), Christopher Mahan chris_mahan@yahoo.com wrote:
I wonder whether and what extent W should open a dialogue with the Chinese government to figure out what their content guidelines are, and whether we can help them understand our NPOV guidelines.
I would like to remind people that the Chinese are a very proud people (just like Americans) and don't like to be told what to do. Generally, though, they listen to reason and are eager to look at new ways of doing things.
wikipedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org