China Wants to Close Down Google

Along with Australia, The U.S. and Europe, the Chinese want to clean up the internet.

The Chinese authorities have published a list of 19 sites which have "failed to heed requests to get rid of unsuitable material." While most of the sites on the hit sites, such as Baidu, Sina, Sohu, Netease and Tianya, are Chinese, the second on the list is Google.

"We will continue to expose, punish or close down websites that have a lot of vulgar content," said Cai Mingzhao, speaking on Chinese Central Television.

Google China's spokesman Cui Jen replied to the threat, saying, "If we find any violation, we will take action. So far, I haven't seen any examples of violations."

As is usual in these cases, many people believe that ulterior motives are also behind the decisions, especially as Tianya frequently publishes a fair dose of anti-Governmental criticism.

Source: BBC

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They are censoring fascists. They sweep their problems under the proverbial rug and try to gloss everything over to keep a world image.

I didnt realise that google actually had any of thier content actually on their site, dont search engines just provide links and take short text extracts and pictures from other sites and therefore those are the ones that need taking down and not google.

savandicus:
I didnt realise that google actually had any of thier content actually on their site, dont search engines just provide links and take short text extracts and pictures from other sites and therefore those are the ones that need taking down and not google.

Yes...but governments are stupid

wow.. no google. How ever will we find another search engine?

PSSSSHHH.
That is all I have to say on this matter

Somehow I'm not exactly shocked by them for this.

As if. If they do this every single hacker on earth is going to through a hissy fit and crash the internet. Then what will they do!?

We all switch back to Ask Jeeves and Yahoo.

Google is not a site. It is a search engine. It can be used to find bad sites, but dogs can do bad things as well, like sniff peoples balls.

Hey, let's ban dogs now shall we?

The BBC article also says that they want to get rid of porn. My reaction to that: NOOOO!!!!!!!!

But seriously, governments are becoming more like 'The Party' in 1984. We discussed this in our History class, saying that security cameras and the like aren't really for saftey, they're to keep an eye on us.

China censors anything from internet to stock market crashes so no news here.

I thought that Google had reached an agreement with the chinese government to censor "inappropriate" search results. I'm sure I read that sometime on Slashdot.

In the long run, the Chinese government is thwarting itself. The loss of freedom goes hand in hand with freedom of thought, expression and therefore also creativity and ingenuity.

Danny Ocean:
As if. If they do this every single hacker on earth is going to through a hissy fit and crash the internet. Then what will they do!?

We will rebuild.

Simply insane. I don't know what to say.

...& so the gulf between those who get the internet & those who dont expands a little winder. Shame its those that dont who seem to have the power to turn it off :-(

Well this is typically Chinese.

"We dun like what they say. Let's close them down!"

Begs the question why they don't just track down the people responsible for the sites and disappear them. You know, the thing the Chinese are famous for...

NoMoreSanity:
Google is not a site. It is a search engine. It can be used to find bad sites, but dogs can do bad things as well, like sniff peoples balls.

Hey, let's ban dogs now shall we?

Haha, that's the funniest thing I've seen in the last year.

No, but seriously, dogs are bad.

Ban a search engine? Ok, here's what you do, go into every single person's home, get access to their router with your Super-Mega-Fascist powers, and then go Donkey Kong on it's ass.*

*Going Donkey Kong on a router's ass may require extensive use of Shigeru Miyamoto, batteries not included

china needs to realize and everyone else that the hackers will drain their bank accounts destroy their rep and completley annihalate them.

Silly China free-speech is for everyone.

Did the chinese Goverment decide this by themselves or did they actually give to people of China a chance to vote on it?

Hankage:

Abolished:
"Did the chinese Goverment decide this by themselves or did they actually give to people of China a chance to vote on it?"

...he says with a straight face...

TBF, as mentioned, neither Europe, the USA or Australia have. The UK is even allowing the Police to hack.

Crowghast:
We all switch back to Ask Jeeves and Yahoo.

No we won't. Never.

Google has no inappropriate content whatsoever on it's own site, A search engine is bound to link to some dodgy stuff.

Once again the people in power never cease to amaze me in how out of touch they are with how the Internet actually works.

Danny Ocean:
As if. If they do this every single hacker on earth is going to through a hissy fit and crash the internet. Then what will they do!?

I'm sure they would love nothing more than to see the internet go away.

the funny thing is that even if they do pull a miracle out of a very uncomfortable place(see:ear) and get rid of google, another search engine is just goint to pop up and take over googles throne, and if they get rid of the sites, more sites are going to pop up, and if they get rid of the internet(which would be next to impossible) then another version of the internet would pop up, such as the Timmy.

The Chinese government shutting down people that say bad things about them? When did this happen?!

plagueflames:
the funny thing is that even if they do pull a miracle out of a very uncomfortable place(see:ear) and get rid of google, another search engine is just goint to pop up and take over googles throne, and if they get rid of the sites, more sites are going to pop up, and if they get rid of the internet(which would be next to impossible) then another version of the internet would pop up, such as the Timmy.

What? No, the Timmy won't happen until we perfect time travel, go to the 70's, and convince Bill Gates to make it.

Crowghast:
We all switch back to Ask Jeeves and Yahoo.

My personal favorite, besides Google, is Dogpile, but to each their own.

bluerahjah:

Ban a search engine? Ok, here's what you do, go into every single person's home, get access to their router with your Super-Mega-Fascist powers, and then go Donkey Kong on it's ass.*

*Going Donkey Kong on a router's ass may require extensive use of Shigeru Miyamoto, batteries not included

That made me laugh a good deal, as did your avatar of Scruffy the Janitor.

AceDiamond:
Once again the people in power never cease to amaze me in how out of touch they are with how the Internet actually works.

First thing to come to mind was "...a series of tubes."

The Chinese government want to shut down Google, but there's no way that they're going to be able to. There isn't a government out there that can get enough programmers working on their side to counter the attempts of the various people on the other side of the debate. Let us not forget that most programmers and hackers (plus crackers, although they're hardly an asset) are on the side of net neutrality and decreased restrictions.

And so the governments begin to work to destroy all the true information their citizens might learn about them. Anyone who knows the truth, and displays it shall be cataloged and find consequences for this knowledge later on when the government has more control over everyone...