Some Chinese bloggers have said that they were able to set up Chinese language MSN Spaces blogs using the “forbidden” political words. To clarify the situation I tried to set up my own freedom loving Chinese blog. I went into the MSN Spaces Chinese interface at: http://spaces.msn.com/?mkt=zh-cn, and tried to set up a blog titled 我爱言论自由人权和民主, which means “I love freedom of speech, human rights, and democracy.”
SCREENSHOT DETAIL:
I got the following error message: 您必须输入您的共享空间标题。标题不能包含禁止的语言，例如亵渎的语言。请键入一个不同的标题。Which means: “You must enter a title for your space. The title must not contain prohibited language, such as profanity. Please type a different title.”
SCREENSHOT DETAIL:
I guess Microsoft considers “human rights,” “democracy,” and “freedom of speech” to be profanity.
This censorship can be circumvented with Bennet Haselton's Freedom Hack Instructions. Using the instructions I was successful in creating the Chinese blog called “I love freedom of speech, democracy, and human rights.”
Portnoy in Taiwan has translated the instructions into Chinese.
FURTHER UPDATE:
I played around with the freedom & democracy blog I created through the hacking instructions and was able to create posts with politically sensitive headlines like “don't forget June4th 1989″ and “Falungong” without trouble:
So the filtering of MSN Spaces China appears limited to the blog's title only. Titles of individual posts and within the body of posts do not appear to be filtered.
71 comments
Why is this [Chinese censorship via software) an issue? I believe in the ratchet effect. Once someone figures out how to implement it, it won’t be before long someone in Congress will recommend imposing it on blogs during the next election. Or hasn’t anyone here been listening to Democrat sniveling about the role of blogs, and that they need to be controlled?
Microsoft is partly to blame, where are the servers located, mostly in the US,
They might be looking out for their bottom line, but they should still not have
most of this as prohibited language.
Sirthinks wrote: “I don’t often stick up for Microsoft, but in this case they are simply following the laws of a country in which they are doing business.”
Except that there is no law in China limiting freedom of speech. The censorship that occurs in China is not based on any law on the books. It is completely extralegal.
Sirthinks—you might have a point if it were actually illegal to use those words. Only it’s not. Microsoft is not simply complying with the law—they are going much further than that in the corporate equivalent of shoving their nose right in the center of China’s derriere.
What’s the point of testing whether you can do it? Does it help anything? Will it change anything in the positive direction? Could it have a negative impact that you haven’t thought far enough ahead about?
I received the following on my little, seldom-visited forum the other day. It’s why the testing is worthwhile.
Nothing will change unless someone takes the initiative to change it. China would be falling backwards without Microsoft- it’s not like there is a strong competitor. By not standing up for freedom and democracy, Microsoft is showing that it doesn’t care about these things. Money, money, money, money, money, who cares about human dignity?
[quote]a lot of people in China know about tiananmen massacre but they daren’t say it,and Chinese government hide everything don’t let anyone know it.
I was even there at 1989 and saw the procession of the students and I was a kid at that time,but I don’t ever know about the massacre till a few days ago,coz they banned everything and deleted everything about the event,on chinese sites if you try to search the keyword you can’t find anything,the sites mentioned it were all deleted,they denied it,and no one dare to say a word cause if they do they will be puting into the prison immediately and be called ‘agitation’,now after 15 years seems like no one fights for it anymore,so many people tried to tell the truth they’re persecuted by Chinese goverment,some of them are still in the jail right now and some are just dead Chinese people are very righteous just being ruled by monsters.
china is much darker than you think,even now I post this stuff here I’m afraied of being found by chinese ‘net policeman’ by checking out my ip address and then arrest me,you think it’s ridiculous but this is china,I wish I don’t even know about the massacre my lifetime,it’s much better than you feel unfair and unjust but just can’t say a word[/quote]
Yes, this is infact true. But then consider how the Chinese differ from Westerners and ask yourself why they haven’t stood up to this “monsters” as a people(Like what Fidel Castro did in Cuba).
The Chinese prefer it that way. It is a big embarrassment for them, just like other major events in Chinese history. They prefer not knowing anything than to be humiliated by the sold truth, which is normally that they weren’t prepared for something of good caliber.
As for the article:
Ofcourse it’s the Government that implemented this filter. And it is nothing new. The Chinese Goverment has been censoring EVERYTHING ever since the Communist Party felt threatened.
[quote]
For another, it is useful to know that freedom-loving Chinese people can find a way around the wall that Microsoft and their tyrant friends have built. Shameful.[/qoute]
*sigh* Read above.
And it isn’t accurate to say MICROSOFT AND TYRANNY GOES HAND IN HAND. They obviously just implemented a filter in between Microsoft proccesses. I haven’t heard of ONE case where Microsoft offered their code to be changed.
Microsoft, being the capitalistic company that they are, probably just want business. So they are not going to let some request for a filter interrupt their business in fastest economical growing country in the world.
Oh wow, the evil Microsoft.
So what U.S. corporation is it exactly that cares about something other than money? Please name one. I’m not saying they don’t exist. I’ve just never heard of one.
While I think this work-around is great, I also think Mike has some valid questions.
This will change _very_ little in China. If you want to do something useful, talk to the representatives of your respective governments (en masse), donate time/money to organizations that are trying to change Chinas. Putting out a work-around to an MSN filter amounts to spitting at a forest-fire.
Bill Gates is an evil man who will do anything for cash. No morals, no limits… nothing. And he’s making the world a more dangerous place by supporting Chinese authoritarianism. Congrats, Mr Gates–now eff off!
Every company which wishes to do business in a country must obey its laws. I am really frustrated to see
anti-microsoft comments — what has microsoft got anything to do with this law? Blaming microsoft for this
filter is like blaming the prison guard for the conviction of an innocent person.