China Reinstates Wikipedia Ban

Rob T Firefly writes "The International Herald Tribute reports that the lifting of China's Wikipedia ban earlier this week was short-lived. Wikipedia is once again inaccessible from behind the Great Firewall, along with all other Wikimedia projects. Additionally, the URL of Chinese Wikipedia is once again a banned search term. No reason has yet been given for any of it." From the article: "It wasn't immediately clear if Wikipedia was inaccessible due to technical glitches or because government censors had blocked the site again. The Foreign Ministry and Ministry of Information Industry did not immediately respond when contacted for comment Friday. Beijing blocked access to the English and Chinese versions of Wikipedia in October last year, apparently out of concern about entries touching on the country's sensitive spots -- Tibet, Taiwan and other topics."

Excellent tactic

[Akvum]

Let the ban lapse so all the free thinkers and government detractors can post on a popular site, then ban it one week later... sounds like they wanted an easy way to find out who to arrest next!

Re:Excellent tactic

[Anonymous Coward]

A small-scale replay of the Hundred Flowers Campaign that preceded the Cultural Revolution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundred_Flowers_Campa ign [wikipedia.org]

Of course it won't seem so small-scale to the people tossed into the jail...

Re:Reflects the Politics in Beijing

[Vellmont]

When policy changes it's because one side has momentarily gained the upper hand, or believed they had, and ordered the change.

I really have no understanding of how policy is set in China, but I might be able to believe that if Wikipedia was accessible for a month or two, but a major blocking policy like this changing over a few days seems a bit insane. Is there really no one in charge over there that makes decisions that last more than a few days? How the hell can you run a country like that?

Since the change from block->no-block->block was all so abrupt I'd say it's more likely that this was just either a technical glitch in the firewall, or a deliberate attempt at trying to perpetuate the belief inside China that there IS no official censorship and it's all just "trouble contacting some sites".

Re:Tick Tock

[megaditto]

You are wrong (I think).

Rich, well-fed people do not drive revolutions. On the other hand, if you are hungry, cannot get a job, live on the street, cannot cloth your kids... in short, if you have nothing to lose, then all the freedom and democracy in the world will not abate your unrest.

So the fact that China becomes prosperous is a very good news for the Dear Leaders. And very bad for our military.

Re:Tick Tock

[Vellmont]

Rich, well-fed people do not drive revolutions.

Huh. I could have sworn most of the founding fathers in the US were wealthy land owners. I suppose you could argue that they weren't the ones DRIVING the revolution, merely the ones leading it. But I've also never heard about the American revolution being started because the majority of people were hungry or un-employed. From what I've been told it was that people were pissed off that England was imposing draconian controls on trade, freedom of expression, etc.

Technical Glitches

[ProfessionalCookie]

It wasn't immediately clear if Wikipedia was inaccessible due to technical glitches

My guess is that it was accessible due to technical glitches.

Re:Searching vs typing in URL?

[nihaopaul]

i'm in shanghai on china telecoms adsl line, wikipedia is blocked for me, and it was going so well :( i used it for creative research almost hourly..

back to tor i guess

Re:Tick Tock

[DragonWriter]

Huh. I could have sworn most of the founding fathers in the US were wealthy land owners.

The "American Revolution" was a regional separatist movement, which has a bit of a different dynamic than other "revolutions". Still, there is a bit of a point there: both types of revolts are often driven by the at least moderately well-off who see themselves as positioned to be even more well-off if the revolution succeeds, but rely on the plight of the badly off who are easily driven to resent either the physically distant (in the case of regional separatist movements) or socially distant (in other revolutions) ruling class for foot soldiers, though in revolutions other than regional separatist movements, the plight of the poor versus the apparent position of the rich generally has to be very bad, because there is otherwise generally less of a distinct clash of identity between the people revolting and those they are revolting against (though clear differences race, religion, or similar identity between the ruled and the rulers can facilitate in creating a clash that can drive rebellion with less of a visible economic divide.)

Re:Tick Tock

[Vellmont]

Still, there is a bit of a point there: both types of revolts are often driven by the at least moderately well-off who see themselves as positioned to be even more well-off if the revolution succeeds

Hmm.. I sure haven't extensively studied the founding fathers of the US, but it's my understanding that they were quite driven to establish liberty, and not simply driven by greed or a lust for power. If you read what they wrote about (and argued amongst themselves) it becomes quite apparent they weren't just a bunch of greedy bastards looking to make themselves more rich and powerfull.

That's not to say these guys were all perfect and without self interest. Jefferson had frickin slaves. But to simplify the American Revolution down to a few people trying to give themselves more power is simply not true. You only need look at the Bill of Rights to understand they weren't just power-hungry dictators.

Oh, a propaganda or an education.

[imkow]

oh yes? one who doesn't sound like you is a part of propaganda. where is my freedom of speech in your ideology? we born in here, we does not want to overrun our gov't so hard as you do. sure, we just want these mandarins improving,or better evolving. but we dont want it collapses in the path you americans want. So when i see this website tracking china's cersorship in a fashion like following a popular cult, i feel it's ok to tell others some fact.
Please remember, China has already enabled internet. Dont you understand the fact that there is no way to block information exchange as long as there is an internet connection. Here in China there are more than 20 million blog users. we even have our own wiki-style enclopedias. How can a cersorship possibly block them all. Example can be shown in me, i can directly access this site, throwing my no-so-good english with you. sure, the censorship does hinder the access to some websites. but to a senior interenet user, it doesnt exist. besides we all have our life, not every body thinks to be able to read some western "truth" can turn things better, we just want internet for ourselves learning some stuff, playing games, doing business, making a date or such. Knowing those "truths" is pretty much same as reading newpaper on toilet.

My point is:
Firstly, the censorship is just inconvenient, but cannot be zip-up techonically or practically. commoners like me dont like it, but also it's not a monster that shows how evil its master is.
Secondly, i dont trust americans will do all our good by selling their merchandize of free.
Lastly, we are not all asking that "free" daily. at least it's not my daily pursue or necessity for living, through im not rich.