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Dissident Jailed, Assist to Yahoo

Posted by Pierre in PHP
Friday, April 28. 2006

Wang Xiaoning was convicted of the charge of “incitement to subvert state power” after e-mailing electronic journals about multi-party system. This the fourth case implicating Yahoo. It is a shame. I cannot understand that. Yes China is the world’s second largest internet market but that does not justify the decisions to collaborate with dictactorships, oppressors or massivelly corrupted governement (China can fit in the three categories I think…).

On one side, I like Y! new community strategy with their various OS projects, on the other side, such things make me doubt about the goodness of its board or intentions. If anyone cares.

From Wired.

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yosoyminero - #1 - 2006-04-28 21:56 - (Reply)

Yes, I fully agree: It’s a shame! In fact it’s also a shame that everyone’s just wanting to make business with/in China. It doesn’t matter where the money comes from or how, it only matters to make more and more money, even if you know that that money comes from opressing people in developing countries. It’s a shame our lack of ethics (I include myself someway)...

Chris D - #2 - 2006-04-29 02:53 - (Reply)

Pierre, Don’t you think the lives of a few dissidents and many tens of thousands of peasants is a reasonable price to pay so we in the West can have all these kewl web 2 mashups? I guess people can say "I didn’t know" but the Germans already used that excuse at the end of WWII. But truth be told- I’m just another hypocrite so who the heck am I to talk!

Alan Knowles - #3 - 2006-04-29 03:30 - (Reply)

Actually Yahoo are getting investigated here (Hong Kong) for breaching privacy laws in releasing this information…

Alan Knowles - #4 - 2006-04-29 03:33 - (Reply)

I forgot the link… www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/ar…

Andrei - #5 - 2006-04-29 06:33 - (Reply)

Pierre, You really have to go beyond your tunnel vision. Yahoo! does not "collaborate" with dictatorships anymore than foreign companies "collaborate" with US government. The fact is that you have to abide by the laws of the country if you are doing business there. When Chinese authorities asked Yahoo! for this information, all they provided was the name of the individual with no mention of his supposed "crimes" or anything like that. What do you propose Yahoo! should have done? Refused to give this information? What are the consequences of that? You cannot simply break the law. You can only hope to change them and the way to do it by getting US government to influence Chinese government and that’s exactly what Yahoo! has been trying to do. That is the only reasonable avenue of progress. The alternative is pulling out of China completely, but don’t you think that would hurt more people than it would help?

Aaron Wormus - #6 - 2006-04-29 08:19 - (Reply)

If the US government needed data from yahoo in the sake of "national security" to catch a "terrorist" would it be any different? Bottom line is that when you choose to do business in a country you also agree to abide by their laws.

Chris D - #7 - 2006-04-29 15:25 - (Reply)

The following report (particularly section 6) sheds more light on the situation. It is from a very well respected media outlet. Actually, if you take the time to view all the segments, it is very enlightening. www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/fr…

Pierre - #8 - 2006-04-29 16:13 - (Reply)

Andrei, I did not say that other companies are any better. Y! concurent like google are equally bad. The actual US government is everything you want but an example of democracy or human rights respects. Telling that Y! is trying to change the situation there by collaborating with the local government is so wrong. They do buisiness, period. Aaron’s example is demagogic and wrong. Governmental services cannot simply ask a company to give away private data without first having the authorisation from a judge (or whoever is the investigation judge over there, don’t ask me the name of this position :-). This is what I call a counter power, which makes Bush’s current life a little pain. Where is this counter power in China? There is none.

Pierre - #9 - 2006-04-29 16:21 - (Reply)

"You cannot simply break the law." There is between 3000 and 10000 executions per year in China. When the law kills so many people per year, millions in the last fifty years, you are right, you cannot break the law, the law is already gone.

Aaron Wormus - #10 - 2006-04-29 19:43 - (Reply)

"Governmental services cannot simply ask a company to give away private data without first having the authorisation from a judge" Do you know that they didn’t have a Judge request the information? If they did would it have been right?

Pierre - #11 - 2006-04-29 19:52 - (Reply)

Awormus, for one, the american justice, without being perferct, works and is independent. This is not the case in the simulacre of justice and judgements in China. Now, if you try to convince me that everything is nice and pretty overthere and that companies are right to do such things, you can stop, I’ll never change my mind on this topic.

Andrei - #12 - 2006-04-29 20:42 - (Reply)

Pierre, I already said all that I meant to say about this issue. Idealism is great, but unfortunately it is not how the world operates. You kind of ignored my questions (what should Yahoo! have done and what would have been the consequences of that decision), so I don’t see the point of discussing it here any further.

Pierre - #13 - 2006-04-29 21:50 - (Reply)

Andrei, Ah yes, I forgot, excuse me :-) First, what they should not do, collaborate. They should try at least try to lie and give wrong/invalid informations. Obvioulsy, if the government catches them, and they will after the fifth or sixth time, they will nicely ask Y! China to leave. Ah yes, they will loose the market… What has lost this man? Please note that I do not say that only Y! is bad, I already posted about Google as well. And there is many other companies doing so. It is crazy how we have a short memory… Should I remember you what happened 60 years ago? It is not as that level, but the problem is the same.


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