China in the house that Jimmy built
By Alfred Romann November 17th, 2006Jimmy Wales built it and they came… eventually.
Wales founded Wikipedia – for those who live under an information rock www.wikipedia.org is “the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit” – and refused to remove articles on controversial subjects in China like the Tiananmen Square events in 1989. The big American internet companies like Yahoo, Google and Microsoft all compromised and self-censored content to get into the market.
Wales stood firm.
Granted, the stakes for Wikipedia are less. The site is run by a non-profit organization that has the luxury of being able to shrug its shoulders at China’s rules. Profit-driven companies – particularly those with shareholders – can’t do that.
The Chinese government has denied censoring the internet but Wikipedia, among other sites, have often been impossible to access. A little more than a year ago, authorities began putting blocks to Wikipedia. These blocks were spotty and some people in some places had some access but generally residents of China could not get on.
Last month, the English version was reportedly unblocked and Chinese users reported access last week. Although some articles in Chinese – Wikipedia has more than 100,000 Chinese articles, the New York Times reported – on sensitive subjects like high-level politics were reportedly still blocked.
“The community in mainland China is basically telling us that they’re able to access,” Wales told the Boston Globe.
Sources to the paper theorized that maybe the officials figure Wikipedia’s modus operandi would allow them to present their spin.
Maybe. Hopefully. That’s what openness is all about.
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November 17th, 2006 at 1:42 pm
Blogger Andrew Lih has some interesting thoughts on why the government uncensored Wikipedia (quoted from Danwei at http://www.danwei.org/internet/why_did_china_unblock_wikipedi.php):
I believe it was because of the argument Jimmy Wales and fellow Chinese Wikipedians have consistently put forth — Wikipedia has a neutral point of view at its core, with no activist or subversive agenda to the site. In the end, I believe consensus among the authorities determined the benefits of Wikipedia far outweigh the risks…
…More importantly though, this provides insight on how to effect change in the PRC, something I’ve been emphasizing for years - encourage China to approach the table, to join the benefits on their own motivation, and allowing them to “tap in.” Unfortunately, this has often not been the approach of Western governments or NGOs.
What doesn’t work? Pushing China solely on issues of freedom of speech, civil liberties for the sake of human rights. It’s just too easy to dismiss these as meddling, imperialistic Western viewpoints used as wedge issues. Do not forget, China was the victim of imperialistic designs which still have a deep effect on the psyche of Chinese leaders and issues of trust.
November 18th, 2006 at 4:00 pm
Woops! Looks like we all spoke too soon. The Wikipedia ban — on both the English and Chinese-language versions — is back in effect (subscription required):
http://china.scmp.com/chimain/ZZZPCJM47UE.html
“Barely a week after Wikipedia users were able to access the website - after a year-long ban - they reported yesterday that it had been blocked again in several parts of the mainland.
Mainland web surfers and free speech advocates had earlier welcomed the apparent lifting of a ban on the English and Chinese versions of the site that provides free information written and edited by its users, although sceptics had voiced fears the lifting of the ban would be temporary.
“It was great news for us,” said Yuan Mingli, 33, a software engineer in Shanghai who has contributed articles on computer science and Chinese historical figures to the site. “China’s internet users are not different from other countries’ users. Wikipedia is an important source of information for us.”
It was not 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 yesterday. 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.