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Yahoo was accused of providing electronic records to Chinese authorities that led to an eight-year prison term for Li Zhi for subversion in 2003 and of helping to identify Shi Tao, who was accused of leaking state secrets abroad and jailed last year for 10 years.
Full Story [today.reuters.com]
First off, this topic is difficult to discuss without discussing politics, but I think we can discuss it without name calling, calls to action or condemning either Yahoo or China. Let's give it a try.
The first thing I noticed was the title of the story at Reuters. Yahoo accused of helping jail China Internet writer. The author of that title either purposely chose it for the sensationlism or simply overlooked the implications. That title makes it sound as if Yahoo were a willing participant in jailing the writer, or worse, Yahoo were willing and actively helping Chinese authorities find evidence without any requests being made by Chinese authorities.
Let's try another title or two:
Yahoo Complies With Chinese Requests - Dissident Jailed
Yahoo Required to Turn Over Email Records - Man Sentenced to Eight Years In Prison
A little less explosive and certainly not as sinister.
The article goes on for 7 paragraphs with some pretty damning charges leveled at Yahoo, including,
...that Yahoo! is implicated in the arrest of most of the people that we (Reporters Without Borders) have been defending
But wait, in paragraph eight, we find this admission,
But the watchdog conceded that the access code could also have been provided by Li, who is suspected of having been a police informer in the case.
Nearly the entire first half of the article slams Yahoo, then Reporters Without Borders admits that a suspect in the case might be an informer, and responsible for supplying the information Yahoo was accused of supplying.
Something smells bad and it isn't the Kung Pow.
Three more paragraphs toward the end of the article mention profits, principles and the Internet, and of course, Google and MSN.
And there you have it, a perfectly slanted piece, the evil Internet companies, devoid of principles, are in league with the Chinese government that,
... has intensified a crackdown on the media in the past year, sacking newspaper editors, arresting journalists and closing publications..
Given that isolationist policies don't seem to work, (think about Cuba), would it seem that interacting with China might be the only course of action?
Corporations that want to do business inside China must comply with Chinese laws. Where is the outrage over countries that do business with China? The U.S. government gives China NTR status while Senators continue to rant against the 'evil' Internet companies that do business with China and comply with Chinese law. And don't forget the Global Internet Freedom Act- H. R. 4741, which sounds like a good thing, until you realize that it has no teeth. Forcing compliance is akin to forcing China to change its policies.
So where in all the diatribe, does China fall? Yahoo hasn't jailed anyone. Nor has Google or MSN. Yet the publicity has shifted from China's policies, to Internet company policies. Why? I'll leave you with something Disraeli said,
"How much easier it is to be critical than to be correct".
Most media writers use this sort of inflamatory language for most everyting these days. Why should Yahoo be treated differently?
<added>Clarify last sentence</added>
IBM has had a research facility in China since 1995
[research.ibm.com...]
Since opening its doors in 1995, IBM's China Research Laboratory (CRL) has opened new opportunities for a developing country eager to make a global mark on technological innovation, and for a technology giant that's always seeking creative researchers and new markets."For China, CRL is a bridge to the most advanced technologies, a cradle for developing talents in technology and management," says Song Song, senior manager for pervasive computing - a hot area, in a country that could become the largest market for computing away from the desktop.
Fantastic place, most of the time was spent researching beer at the local pub or deciding what we were having for lunch.
