韩寒《我只是在猜想》英文德文本

"I am just speculating"

[This blog post by China's top blogger was deleted by the blog hosting service Sina.com.]

(Bullock.cn) I am just speculating. By Han Han. January 17, 2010.

http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20100118_1.htm

2010: China begins an Internet clean-up campaign with the slogan: "If you stop beating someone for 3 days, he/she may get on the roof and remove tiles." (Note: 三天不打，上房揭瓦 is a Chinese saying. When applied to children, the notion is that you beat your child in order to make him/her behave (as in respecting authority, maintaining discipline and being a good citizen) and, conversely, if you don't beat your child, he/she will misbehave. It also applies to wife-beating.)

2010: The relevant department expands the list of banned terms. The Chinese word for "file" (which has the same sound as Party) and the English letter "D" disappear in mainland China. Dangdang was changed to Angang, while Douban became Ouban.

2010 June: The government inaugurates the "Protect the Children" campaign. Children's Day is elevated to the same status as National Day. It is also announced that all information that is unfavorable to the healthy development of children and adolescents will be strictly prohibited. At the same time, the Shanghai World Expo introduces the slogan "World Expo, World Expo, catch ten thousand adulterous couples in bed" in order to conduct online and offline anti-pornography (anti-"yellow") campaigns simultaneously. The government makes it clear that anything and everything connected to pornography shall be censored because they stand for obscenity and feudalism. Elementary school students are mobilized to march in the streets to demonstrate against anything pornographic ("yellow").

2010 July: The Elementary School Students Patriotic Committee finds out that the five yellow-colored five-pointed stars on the national flag are inconsistent with contemporary progressive ideas. The relevant department decides to change the five-pointed stars from yellow to red.

2010 August: The government discovers that the red five-pointed stars are the same color as the background, so that it is hard to find them. Representatives of elementary school students propose the five-pointed stars be changed into green color, to represent green scarves and Green Dam.

2010: Based upon the recommendations of the Elementary School Students Loving Care Committee and representatives of elementary school students, the government tightens the censorship standards on photographs, with guiding principles such as "erect nipples equal bare nipples."

2010: All Internet forum masters are formally given public service worker status.

2010: The government introduces a brand new Internet Great Wall. This Great Wall system is based upon the collective wisdom of innumerable of experts from all walks of life in China. They work together at a military base. The satellite photos of their work site was misinterpreted by people inside and outside of China as those of an aircraft carrier under construction.

2011 January: The government allocates 100 billion yuan to hire Internet commentators from its next round of economic stimulation package. The pay for Internet commentators rises from 50 cents per post to 1 yuan per post. The target for 2011 is to have 100 billion positive posts. The Fifty-cent Gang members at the various forums weep in gratitude because their long, arduous work over the years has finally allowed them to join the big team. From there on, the ratio of Internet commentators versus normal people is about 50:50 at the large Internet forums.

2011: Google, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter announce that they are re-entering China and opening up registration. At the same time, the aforementioned websites announce from the United States that they are not developing any businesses in China. But their announcements are instantly censored, so that nobody in China knows.

2011: All those who register at the aforementioned websites are systematically tracked down by the Great Wall system. Their computers are re-installed. Afterwards, if the users want to visit a general-purpose website, they can only reach People.com.cn and Xinhua; if they want to visit a forum, they can only go to Strong Nation Forum and Tiexue Forum; if they want to visit a video site, they can only go to CCTV 1. Once the system is re-installed this way, there is no way to undo the settings.

2011: The price of computers goes up by 100%. Computer scalpers proliferate. When users buy new computers, they find that they can only access the aforementioned websites.

2011: Housing prices go up by 100%. At the real estate transaction websites, the housing unit must be identified as either "full Internet access" or "restricted Internet access."

2011: Southern Metropolis Daily and Southern Weekend are renamed Male Metropolis Daily and Male Weekend, and reclassified as marital agency newspapers. The ratio of Internet commentators and ordinary people there reaches 9 to 1.

2011: A certain city leader comes under human flesh search.

2011: In the second round of Internet clean-up, all search engines are closed. The major portals and the newspapers publish articles with titles such as "Searching made us lazy people," "Internet searching seriously detrimental to ability of elementary school students to use their brains" and so on. The leaders say, "we never use Internet searching. The situation today says clearly that Internet search has a hundred bad points and nothing good whatsoever."

2011: Baidu is acquired by Pepsi Cola and becomes an official beverage website.

2012: Sina.com reports that a certain village leader received 500 yuan in bribes. This news story is rated as the top news story in China for the year 2012 with more than 500 million page views. Many people read it repeatedly. Even after censorship, there are more than 1 million comments. Many people think that this was a new high point in watchdog journalism. But according to the Internet polling, 90% of netizens still think that the news story should not have been published because it destroys social stability and may lead to ethnic splits.

2012: Elementary school students denounce Sina.com for having an erect nipple. Sina.com is shut down for re-organization.

2012: All forums stop accepting registrations or comments. The Chinese Writers Association and the Chinese Literary Union take over the Internet to become Internet content providers. The Internet goes back from Web 3.0 to Web 0.3. The Internet is read-only with no comments being allowed.

2013: The Elementary School Students Healthy Development Committee denounces Sina.com for having another erect nipple.

2014: Sina.com ("new wave" in Chinese) is acquired by Mountain Dew ("powerful wave" in Chinese) and becomes an official beverage website.

2015: The government cuts off the Internet altogether. A universal online computer is introduced. This is the only way to go online. This computer does not have a keyboard. You are only given a mouse. The slogan for the re-organization project is "You only have a mouse -- what can you do?"

2016: The number of Internet users in China drops down to 1 million. All websites are merged into a single website. It does not matter what URL you enter because you will be directed to that website. All updates are synchronized to the People's Daily. In the same year, the Internet industry disappears in China. This causes 5 million people in the Internet-related industry to lose their jobs either directly or indirectly. The disappearance of e-mail means that the previously closed but now revived Postal Office hires 100,000 of them. But 4.9 million people still have no jobs. At the same time, almost 1 million Fifty-cent Gang members lose their jobs. The Fifty-cent Gang members complain that they worked like dogs for their whole lives but now they don't even get pensions.

2016: The People's Daily writes: One industry was sacrificed in return for the stability of the nation, but it was worthwhile.

2016: comments that the nation faced the risk of break-up if the Internet industry had continued. The anti-China forces outside the nation and the splittists inside China were using the Internet to incite the masses. Fortunately, the relevant departments took strong measure and prevented the situation from worsening.

2016: Zhou Jiugeng is vindicated. He gets out of jail and becomes the Minister of Information Industry. Meanwhile Yu Qiuyu is appointed as the Minister of Culture.

2016: The 1 million jobless Fifty-cent Gang members have no other skills and therefore could not find new jobs. They could not feed themselves. Several tens of thousands of Fifty-cent Gang members gather in Beijing. During Children's Day, 150,000 Fifty-cent Gang members sit down in front of the government headquarters office to conduct a silent hunger strike. They ask the government to arrange jobs for them, give them credit for their prior work, and grant them public service worker status retroactively. The People's Daily writes that the government never had the job position of Internet commentator. Therefore, all those Fifty-cent Gang members wrote on their own. The Fifty-cent Gang members are unable to show any labor contract to prove that they had an worker-employer relationship with the government.

The spokesperson for the Fifty-cent Gang members say that they were underground agents who had done great work to secure national stability.

The government gives the Fifty-cent gang members three days to leave Beijing or face arrest. People's Daily writes that if one praises the government, one should not apply pressure on the government. Praising the government cannot be a condition for obtaining money. Praises should be uncompensated.

2016: The Fifty-cent Gang members continue their hunger strike. The citizens say that they fully support the hunger strike by the Fifty-cent Gang members. They also do not provide any food to hunger strikers and they block off all possible channels that can bring food in. Thus, they make sure that the Fifty-cent Gang members will stick to their hunger strike.

The next day, Minister of Culture Yu Qiuyu visits the scene of the hunger strike and reads the "Tearful advice to the Fifty-cent Gang." The Fifty-cent Gang members say that Minister Yu's speech is too profound for them to understand.

2016: The Fifty-cent Gang is accused of the crimes of illegal assembly, illegal marching, illegal demonstration, attacking the government, violently resisting against the law, smearing the government, endangering public security, disrupting social order, spitting in public, etc. The organizers are arrested. But the government says that they will be lenient towards blind followers who don't know the truth and offer them an opportunity to reinvigorate themselves: they give 50 cents to each of them to feed their hunger. comments on the scene: Fifty-cent Gang members see fifty cents and break out in tears.

2016: The Fifty-cent Gang crisis is peacefully resolved, once again showing the ability of the Party and the government to maintain stability. The Fifty-cent Gang leader tells the CCTV reporter on camera: "I am so sorry about before."

2017: Unemployment figures continue to rise drastically. The collapse of the Internet industry leads to a serious economic recession. The government says that the manufacturing industry will be the backbone of the nation once more. China will use all its natural resources to export at low prices.

2017: Hostile anti-China forces overseas get together and mislead the United Nations and various nations to pass a resolution to forbid the importing of Chinese goods anywhere in the world in order to express their opposition to the shutdown of the Internet in China. The Chinese government issues strong condemnations. They say that the administration of the Internet in China is an internal matter which other countries have no right to interfere with. The other countries counter that it is also an internal matter for them to ban Chinese goods and China has no right to interfere with that either.

2019: It is the military parade on the seventieth anniversary of the founding of the nation. On that day, the government announces that China will lock down its national borders and concentrate on strengthening itself so that all reactionary forces will tremble in fear. On that day, China makes a statement to the rest of the world: "If you stop beating someone for 3 days, he/she may get on the roof and remove tiles." Many nations say that they don't know how to translate this sentence.

2020: ...

2020: Earth is destroyed. The descendants of the Mayans say that it is normal to see a margin of error of plus or minus ten years on such events.

---

Starblogger über Zukunftsszenarien

Erstellt 18.01.10, 12:22h, aktualisiert 18.01.10, 13:55h

http://www.ksta.de/html/artikel/1262873727700.shtml

Nachdem Google im Streit um Angriffe und gefilterte Suchergebnisse seinen Rückzug aus China angekündigt hat, malt sich der chinesische Starblogger Han Han aus, wie weit die Zensoren gehen werden. Mit seiner Genehmigung eine gekürzte Version.

Das Jahr 2010: China beginnt eine Internet-Säuberungskampagne mit dem Slogan: „Wen man drei Tage lang nicht haut, der steigt einem aufs Dach.“ (Chinesisches Sprichwort für unartige Kinder. Anmerkung der Redaktion.)
Juni 2010: Die Regierung startet die Kampagne „Schützt die Kinder“. Informationen, welche die gesunde Entwicklung von Kindern und Jugendlichen gefährden könnten, werden strikt verboten. Die Regierung betont, dass alles, was mit Pornografie zu tun hat, Obszönität und Feudalismus verkörpere und daher zensiert werden müsse. Grundschüler werden mobilisiert, um durch die Straßen zu marschieren und gegen das „Gelbe“ zu demonstrieren. (Gelb ist die Farbe der Pornografie; Chinas Behörden rechtfertigen damit die Internetzensur, obwohl in Wahrheit die politische Kontrolle im Vordergrund steht. Die Grundschülermobilisierung spielt auf die Roten Garden der Kulturrevolution an. A.d.R.)

Sterne verändert

Juli 2010: Das Komitee Patriotischer Grundschüler erklärt, dass die fünf gelben Sterne der Nationalflagge im Widerspruch zur fortschrittlichen Ideologie stehen. Die zuständige Behörde entscheidet, die Sterne von gelb in rot zu ändern.

August 2010: Die Regierung stellt fest, dass die roten Sterne auf rotem Grund nicht mehr zu erkennen sind. Vertreter der Grundschüler schlagen vor, die Sterne grün zu färben, um den „Grünen Damm“ zu symbolisieren („Grüner Damm“ ist der Name einer Zensur- und Spionagesoftware, die Chinas Regierung 2009 auf allen neuen Computern installieren wollte. Nach öffentlichem Protest wurde die Einführung verschoben. A.d.R.). Die Regierung baut im Internet eine neue Große Mauer. Sie beruht auf der kollektiven Weisheit unzähliger chinesischer Experten, die in einem Militärstützpunkt arbeiten. Satellitenfotos ihres Lagers werden in- und außerhalb Chinas mit einem im Bau befindlichen Flugzeugträger verwechselt.

Kommentarschreiber einstellen

Januar 2011: Die Regierung stellt in ihrem jüngsten Konjunkturpaket 100 Milliarden Yuan bereit, um Kommentarschreiber für Internetforen einzustellen. Das Planziel für 2011 beträgt 100 Milliarden positive Kommentare. In großen Internetforen erreicht das Verhältnis von professionellen Kommentarschreibern und normalen Benutzern 50:50.

2011: Es erscheinen Ankündigungen von Google, Youtube, Facebook und Twitter, dass sie nach China zurückkehren und Benutzer zur Registrierung eingeladen sind. Die Mutterkonzerne in den USA dementieren das, doch ihre Erklärungen werden sofort zensiert. Benutzer, die sich bei den genannten Webseiten registrieren, werden vom Große-Mauer-System erkannt und ihre Computer neu installiert. Wer hinterher eine gewöhnliche Webseite aufrufen will, erreicht automatisch die Volkszeitung und die Nachrichtenagentur Xinhua. Wer ein Chatforum besuchen will, landet bei „Starke Nation“ oder „Forum Eisenblut“.

Und wer ein Videoportal ansehen will, wird ans Zentralfernsehen weitergeleitet. Sobald das System reinstalliert ist, können die Einstellungen nicht mehr geändert werden. Der Preis für Computer steigt um hundert Prozent. Rechner werden zum Spekulationsgut. Wer einen neuen Computer kauft, kann nur noch die zuvor genannten Webseiten öffnen.

Zweite Phase

In der zweiten Phase der Internetsäuberung werden alle Suchmaschinen gesperrt. In großen Portalen und Zeitungen erscheinen Artikel mit Überschriften wie „Suchen hat uns faul gemacht“ oder „Internetsuchen führen bei Grundschülern zu schweren Beeinträchtigungen der Gehirnaktivität“ usw. Die Parteiführung erklärt: „Wir benutzen nie Suchmaschinen. Die heutige Situation zeigt eindeutig, dass Internetsuchdienste hundert Nachteile und keine Vorteile haben.“

2012: Sina.com (Chinas größtes Internetportal, auf dem auch Han Hans Blog erscheint. A.d.R.) berichtet, dass ein Dorfkader Bestechungsgeld in Höhe von 500 Yuan kassiert hat. Die Nachricht wird in China zur meistgelesenen Nachrichtengeschichte des Jahres 2012, mit über 500 Millionen Seitenaufrufen. Viele Menschen lesen sie mehrfach und halten dies für einen neuen Höhepunkt der Kontrolle des Staats durch die Medien. Trotzdem geben in einer Internetumfrage 90 Prozent an, der Artikel hätte nie erscheinen dürfen, weil er die soziale Stabilität gefährde und zu ethnischen Unruhen führen könne.

Schriftstellerverband übernimmt das Internet

2013: Internetforen akzeptieren keine Kommentare mehr. Der Chinesische Schriftstellerverband übernimmt das Internet und liefert künftig alle Inhalte. Das Internet wird von Web 3.0 auf Web 0.3 zurückgesetzt.

2015: Die Regierung schaltet das Internet vollständig ab und führt einen zentralen Onlinecomputer ein. Computer haben keine Tastatur mehr, sondern nur noch eine Maus.

2016: Die Zahl der chinesischen Internetbenutzer fällt unter eine Million (Heute: 380 Millionen. A.d.R.). Alle Webseiten werden zu einer einzigen zusammengelegt und Nachrichten mit der Volkszeitung synchronisiert. Im gleichen Jahr verschwindet in China die Internetindustrie. Fünf Millionen Menschen verlieren ihren Job. Da es keine Emails mehr gibt, finden 100.000 neue Anstellungen in den wiederbelebten Postämtern. Die Volkszeitung schreibt: „Eine Industrie wurde geopfert für die Stabilität der Nation. Es hat sich gelohnt.“

Nation vom Zerfall bedroht

Die Hauptnachrichtensendung berichtet, dass die Nation vom Zerfall bedroht gewesen wäre, hätte man das Internet weiterbetrieben. Die anti-chinesischen Kräfte aus dem Ausland und Separatisten aus dem Inland hätten das Internet benutzt, um die Massen aufzuhetzen. Glücklicherweise ergriffen die zuständigen Behörden harte Maßnahmen und verhinderten eine Verschlechterung der Situation.

2017: Die Arbeitslosenzahlen steigen dramatisch an. Der Zusammenbruch der Internetindustrie hat zu einer schweren Rezession geführt. Die Regierung erklärt, Produktionsbetriebe seien künftig wieder das Rückgrat der Nation. China will alle natürlichen Ressourcen einsetzen, um billig exportieren zu können.

Resolution der Vereinten Nationen

Feindliche anti-chinesische Kräfte aus dem Ausland verbünden sich und verabschieden in den Vereinten Nationen eine Resolution, die den Import chinesischer Waren weltweit verbietet. Damit protestieren sie gegen die Schließung des Internets in China. Die Regierung reagiert empört und bezeichnet die Verwaltung des Internets als interne Angelegenheit, in die sich kein anderes Land einmischen dürfe. Die anderen Länder erwidern, dass es andersherum auch ihre interne Angelegenheit sei, den Import chinesischer Waren zu verbieten.

2019: Militärparade zum 70. Jahrestag der Gründung der Volksrepublik. Die Regierung erklärt, die Landesgrenzen würden geschlossen, ums sich auf die Selbststärkung zu konzentrieren. Die reaktionären Kräfte sollen vor Angst zittern. China veröffentlicht eine Nachricht an den Rest der Welt: „ Wen man drei Tage lang nicht haut, der steigt einem aufs Dach.“

(Aus dem Chinesischen von Bernhard Bartsch)

网罗高手引导正确舆论，甘肃将建650人网评团

作者：任聪
来源：每日甘肃网-西部商报
来源日期：2010-1-19
本站发布时间：2010-1-19 11:16:18

http://www.chinaelections.org/NewsInfo.asp?NewsID=166867


　　全省宣传思想工作会议昨日在兰召开

　　每日甘肃网-西部商报讯 当今互联网已经成为各种社会思潮、各种利益诉求的集散地。发现和培养一批引导正确舆论方向的网络评论员队伍已刻不容缓。昨日，全省宣传思想工作会议在兰州召开，省委常委、宣传部部长励小捷出席会议并作了重要讲话。今年，我省将逐步形成一支网络“高手”、“好手”、“写手”等650人的网评队伍体系。

　　【规划2010】

　　全省逐步建立650人网评队伍

　　今年我省要利用互联网强大的新闻聚合、在线互动等功能，加快网监、网评队伍建设，形成以50名网络评论“高手”为核心层、100名网络评论“好手”为紧密层、500名网络评论“写手”为外围层的网评队伍体系。

　　网络评论员需积极关注社会热点和舆论动态，知识涉猎面宽、储备量大，有较高的写作水平和较好的文字功底，能理性公正地分析当今一些社会现象，见解独到，观点新颖，有较强的说服力和影响力。网络评论员可经常登录网站、BBS、博客等，了解网上信息并针对网民关注的热点问题，及时发帖跟帖，正确引导社会舆论。

　　86个县区的新闻网站年内开通

　　励小捷明确了2010年全省宣传思想文化工作的具体举措：积极回应人们普遍关心的就业就学、楼市股市、卫生医疗等热点，主动设置议题，引导群众正确看待热点，理性合法表达诉求；全省86个县区的新闻网站今年年内有效开通；做好2010“感动甘肃十大陇人骄子”评选活动，组织开展“争做道德实践先锋”主题活动和全省第二届道德模范评选表彰活动；对我省重大历史和现实题材进行梳理，面向社会征集戏剧重大题材创作项目；争取黄河剧院、金城第一戏楼建设早日完成；谋划好新的公共文化建设项目，对“社区书屋”和“社区和学校电影放映工程”等建设项目抓紧论证，争取早日列入“十二五”规划的盘子；推进党委、人大、政协、法检两院对外重要信息发布工作，协调重点企事业单位开展资助新闻发布，加强选题策划和议题设置，选择公众关注的热点问题，及时邀请新闻发言人“自主发布”。

　　【回眸2009】

　　《大梦敦煌》成全国收益最好的剧目

　　回眸2009年，全省近1200万人次参与全国“双百”人物和“感动甘肃人物”评选；我省戏剧《大梦敦煌》入选文化部首届“优秀保留剧目大奖”，以650%的投入产出比成为全国收益最好的剧目；中央主要新闻媒体对我省的报道近4000条，央视《新闻联播》110条，创历史最高；全省共举办新闻发布会257场，满足了公众的知情权，主动引导了社会舆论……兰州九州开发区滑坡、天水和酒泉因冰冻造成的大范围堵车、兰州石化某罐区爆燃事件都在当天给予及时报道，有的实现了直播。励小捷说，2009年我省加强了重大活动的宣传报道和热点问题的引导，既积极关注社会关切，又没有把问题炒热，及时准确、公开透明地做好突发公共事件的报道。

RFI：晚上好 中国监察员先生

作者 杨眉
发表日期 17/01/2010 更新日期 17/01/2010 14:31 TU

在立足中国四年之后，全球最大搜索引擎公司-谷歌表示将重新考虑是否撤出在中国的投资。法国《解放报》一月十四日刊出一篇署名文章，以“晚上好，中国监察员先生”为题，报道了相关消息。

文章开头指出：中国的政治警察冲向世界。在向外到处输出其审查之际，中国败露了对美国搜索引擎巨头-谷歌窃取隐私的行为。谷歌宣布将考虑是否撤出这一拥有三亿三千八百万网民的国家。

谷歌方面透露：去年十二月中旬，谷歌的基础设施受到来自中国的攻击，受到攻击的，同时还有至少二十个包括网站、财经、科技、媒体和化学工业在内的各领域的重大公司。但是谷歌没有详细披露这些受到攻击的相关企业所属国家的具体情况。

谷歌方面掌握的证据表明：攻击的主要目标，是进入中国人权卫士的邮件信箱。在欧洲、美国和中国的数十名关注中国人权问题、GMAIL信箱的使用者的邮箱，受到第三者经常性地访问。这种窃取行为可能是通过使用破译软件或使用者密码的方式实现。

解放报文章指出：谷歌虽然没有直接谴责中国政府的窃取行为，但其公告却十分明确：“考虑到最近一年来，中国试图限制网络言论自由的做法，面对这些攻击和监控行为，谷歌正在考虑继续留在中国的可行性”。

中国不断加强对网络的镇压。上个月，警方甚至宣布：禁止在没有填写复杂的行政表格的前提下，创立个人网站。解放报指出：谷歌宣布考虑撤出中国的消息似乎获得美国政府的支持。

美国国务卿希拉里克林顿表示：希望中国政府就这一引发严重关切与质疑的事件作出说明。希拉里还召集了谷歌、微软、Twitter等公司的高管。美国国务卿表示：对现代社会和经济而言，在网络上进行自由表达具有其关键性。文章最后写道： 有人在谷歌驻北京总部门前放置了一些鲜花。在一个花环上出现了这样的赞美字眼：谷歌，真汉子。

另外，《解放报》在同一天的另一篇报道中，报道了中国的监察出现在其他领域的现象。报道以：北京，世界的老大哥为题，对北京的检查制度进行了分析。报道指出：2009年以来，中国将其检察制度全球化，法国未能幸免。去年，北京至少进行了两次干预，要求法国电视台禁播两部有关中国的资料片。其中一部是关于八九天安门镇压；另一步则涉及西藏话题。

2009年的春天，其中一部影片在中国拍摄之际，中国警察在法国影片制作公司驻北京总部窃取了刚刚完成的片子的一个副本。这家公司不愿透露姓名的负责人披露：他随后受到中国外交部一名官员的召见。

在巴黎，法国电视台一些负责人受到中国驻巴黎使馆召见、要求取消播放某某影片计划的事情也屡有发生。同样要求保持匿名的一家法国大电视台的负责人透露：中国驻法使馆要求取消播放一部有关中国主题的影片，他们使用了非常强的心理战手法。

报道指出：一般而言，在电视领域，对中国的压力保持沉默成为一种规则。有人强调：中国是唯一一个使用如此粗暴手段的国家。北京试图强加对世界的看法，采取的是越来越不掩饰的手段。

去年夏季举行的墨尔本电影界也遭遇了“严重伤害了十三亿四千万中国人”的事件，并为此付出了代价。秋季法兰克福书展的主办方，不得不在中国的要求下作出让步，取消对贝岭和戴晴的正式邀请。中国在不久前举行的美国加州棕榈泉电影节再次使用了恫吓手段，在要求主办方撤除播放有关达赖喇嘛影片的要求遭到拒绝的情况下，北京要求两名参展的中国导演退出电影节。根据美国国会的一份报告，中国的类似压力也常常瞄准大学教师。

《解放报》最后指出：这种极度缺乏外交的强烈的攻击方式，受到了相应的国家机器的支持和配合。专门负责监督互联网以及外国记者和学者活动的国务院新闻办便是其中之一。

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Messieurs les censeurs chinois, bonsoir

Google a finalement vu rouge. Après quatre ans en Chine, le géant américain dit «reconsidérer» sa présence dans le pays. En cause : des opérations d’espionnage diligentées par Pékin.

Par PHILIPPE GRANGEREAU
http://www.liberation.fr/monde/0101613642-messieurs-les-censeurs-chinois-bonsoir

La police politique chinoise part à l’assaut du monde. La Chine, qui a commencé à «exporter» sa censure partout, y compris en France (lire ci-contre), a été prise en flagrant délit d’espionnage par le géant américain Google, qui a annoncé hier qu’en conséquence il allait reconsidérer sa présence dans ce pays de 338 millions d’internautes. «A la mi-décembre, notre infrastructure a été victime d’une attaque très ciblée et très calculée venant de Chine. Google n’a pas été la seule victime. Notre enquête a permis de découvrir qu’au moins vingt autres compagnies importantes de secteurs très divers - Internet, finance, technologie, médias et industrie chimique.»

Google ne précise pas la nationalité des entreprises concernées. «Nous détenons la preuve que l’objectif principal des assaillants était d’entrer dans les boîtes mails des militants chinois des droits de l’homme.» Selon Google, cet objectif n’a été atteint que dans deux cas, et partiellement. Hommes politiques, journalistes, aux Etats-Unis, en France ou ailleurs… Personne n’est cependant à l’abri, à en juger par les autres révélations alarmantes de Google. «Indépendamment de cette attaque sur Google, nous avons découvert que les boîtes mails de dizaines de personnes, usagers de Gmail, qui s’intéressent aux droits de l’homme en Chine, basés en Europe, aux Etats-Unis et en Chine, ont régulièrement été pénétrées par des tiers.» Cet espionnage aurait été rendu possible par l’emploi de logiciels espions, ou tout simplement en volant le mot de passe de l’usager.

«Conséquences».Google n’accuse pas directement le gouvernement chinois d’espionnage, mais son communiqué est explicite : «Ces attaques et cette surveillance, ajoutées aux tentatives depuis un an de limiter la liberté de parole sur le Web, nous ont conduits à passer en revue la faisabilité de nos opérations en Chine.» Google reconnaît que depuis la création de Google.cn (Google Chine) en 2006, l’entreprise a dû censurer une partie de son contenu afin de plaire aux censeurs chinois. Mais c’était pour la bonne cause, plaide la compagnie américaine, car elle offrait malgré tout aux Chinois «un accès accru à l’information». Trop, c’est trop, dit aujourd’hui Google, qui a défié Pékin en levant une partie de la censure qu’elle s’imposait : les internautes chinois peuvent depuis hier soir accéder à la photo taboue de l’homme face aux chars de Tiananmen sur Google Chine. «Les conséquences potentielles de notre décision peuvent aller très loin et celle-ci a été très dure à prendre», écrit Google, qui estime qu’au-delà de ces intrusions de la Chine dans la vie privée de dizaines de citoyens européens, américains, chinois et autres, «c’est la liberté de parole en tant que telle» qui est en jeu.

Formalités. La Chine n’a cessé de renforcer sa répression sur Internet. Le mois dernier, la police a même annoncé qu’il était désormais interdit de créer son site personnel sans remplir des formalités administratives complexes. L’annonce laisse entendre que la procédure «d’accréditation» de ces sites individuels a peu de chances d’aboutir. La découverte, en décembre, de cet audacieux complot d’espionnage chinois a fait l’effet d’une décharge électrique à Washington. L’annonce de Google semble avoir été coordonnée avec le gouvernement américain. La secrétaire d’Etat, Hillary Clinton, souhaiterait procurer aux Chinois un moyen de contourner la censure, selon Digital Times. Elle a réuni à cet effet la semaine dernière les PDG de Google, Microsoft, Twitter et Cisco Systems - qui est soupçonné d’avoir vendu à Pékin la technologie qui a lui a permis de créer, en 2002, son système de surveillance d’Internet baptisé «la grande muraille de feu» («the Great Firewall»). «La capacité d’opérer en toute confiance dans le cyberespace est capitale pour les sociétés et les économies modernes», a déclaré Hillary Clinton hier, en disant «attendre des explications du gouvernement chinois». A Pékin, des gerbes de fleurs ont été déposées devant le QG de Google. Sur l’une de ces couronnes, on pouvait lire ce message de félicitations en chinois : «Google, un vrai homme.»

Par philippe grangereau

La Chine est-elle menacée par le "syndrome soviétique" ?

LE MONDE | 14.01.10 | 13h50 • Mis à jour le 14.01.10 | 13h50

Thierry Wolton est historien, spécialiste des systèmes communistes.
http://www.lemonde.fr/opinions/article/2010/01/14/la-chine-est-elle-menacee-par-le-syndrome-sovietique-par-thierry-wolton_1291681_3232.html

Cette année 2010 doit consacrer l'aura internationale de la Chine avec l'Exposition universelle de Shanghaï, en mai. La manifestation est voulue par Pékin comme le point d'orgue d'une offensive de charme qui a commencé avec les Jeux olympiques de l'été 2008. L'événement sera sans doute une fois de plus remarquablement maîtrisé par les autorités et les superlatifs ne manqueront pas pour saluer l'extraordinaire réussite de ce pays.

Tout cela n'est pas sans provoquer quelques réminiscences. Il y a un demi-siècle s'ouvrait une époque également triomphale - pour l'Union soviétique. La décennie 1960 avait été précédée par le voyage de Nikita Khrouchtchev aux Etats-Unis, en septembre 1959. Au cours de cette opération de relation publique, le numéro un soviétique avait promis que son pays ne tarderait pas à dépasser la puissance américaine.

S'ensuivit une vaste campagne de propagande destinée à accréditer cette thèse, ponctuée de réussites époustouflantes, dont l'envoi en 1961 du premier homme dans l'espace fut la plus spectaculaire. Pendant les vingt années suivantes, Moscou fournit des statistiques flatteuses sur la production de blé, d'acier, etc., qui accréditaient l'incontestable supériorité du mode de production socialiste.

On a appris récemment qu'un bureau spécial avait été créé par le Kremlin pour fournir les chiffres qu'attendait un Occident ébahi par cette success story. L'offensive fut complétée par un dégel sur le plan intérieur, puis par l'envoi à l'Ouest de quelques fleurons de la culture soviétique, comme les Choeurs de l'Armée rouge. A relire la presse de l'époque, convaincue que l'URSS serait, sans doute possible, la grande puissance de la fin du XXe siècle, on ne peut être qu'admiratif devant la force de conviction dont fit preuve Moscou ou stupéfait par notre extraordinaire naïveté.

Il est intéressant de se souvenir de ce qu'a fait le Kremlin de cette "opération de marketing" réussie : il a cru à sa propre propagande, conforté par l'image que nous lui renvoyions de sa puissance irrépressible. Les décennies 1960-1970 furent marquées par une poussée significative de l'URSS, et du camp socialiste en général, sur la scène mondiale, jusqu'à l'invasion de l'Afghanistan, en décembre 1979. Ces avancées paraissaient d'autant plus victorieuses que le camp occidental était alors en crise économique, avec le premier choc pétrolier de 1973, et morale, à la suite de la défaite américaine au Vietnam en 1975.

Sur le plan des rapports de forces internationaux, l'URSS pouvait réellement prétendre à un partage du leadership mondial avec les Etats-Unis. Sur le plan intérieur, l'"entrouverture" au monde qu'exigeait ce rôle de grande puissance se paya bien par quelques contestations. Elles furent promptement réprimées (Tchécoslovaquie en 1968, internement de dissidents...), souvent dans l'indifférence des démocraties qui ne voulaient pas se brouiller avec ce grand pays.

Il y avait là une certaine logique dont tout le monde était en fin de compte victime : les peuples subissant le joug communiste, qui ne pouvaient guère, ou si peu, compter sur un soutien occidental ; les opinions publiques de l'Ouest, tétanisées par une puissance que leur vantaient les médias ; les responsables des pays démocratiques, dont la pusillanimité encouragea le Kremlin à pousser toujours plus loin ses avantages ; enfin, les dirigeants soviétiques eux-mêmes, qui finirent par oublier combien leur empire était fragile. La suite est connue.

Or la "sinomania" actuelle est bien plus forte que ne le fut jamais la "soviétomania" d'antan. Elle s'est accentuée ces dernières années grâce à des mécanismes qui rappellent ceux qui firent la splendeur de l'URSS : une remarquable réussite économique soulignée par des statistiques flatteuses ; une certaine fascination des Occidentaux pour une culture, un mode de vie (voire une multitude) exotiques pour eux ; une montée en puissance sur la scène mondiale favorisée, voulue même, par les autres grands au nom de l'équité. Il est devenu banal de prédire que l'empire du Milieu sera le leader de notre planète avant la mi-temps de ce siècle. Croyance d'autant plus ferme que le monde occidental est à nouveau en crise.

La Chine nous apparaît aujourd'hui tellement éloignée de ce que fut la Russie soviétique d'hier qu'il peut sembler hasardeux d'établir le parallèle. Et pourtant... L'URSS et la Chine communiste ont suivi des voies similaires une grande partie du XXe siècle et, même lorsque leurs chemins ont divergé, elles ont poursuivi des politiques analogues, inspirées par la même idéologie. La poigne de Mao ne fut pas moins sanglante que celle de Staline. L'un et l'autre se lancèrent dans une industrialisation forcée au prix de millions de paysans morts, l'un et l'autre s'assurèrent d'un pouvoir absolu en terrorisant leur population.

Par la suite, le jovial Deng Xiaoping ne fut pas sans rappeler le débonnaire Khrouchtchev, l'un et l'autre rêvant de faire décoller une économie socialiste en panne grâce à la technologie occidentale. A partir des années 1990, l'offensive de charme de la Chine n'est pas sans similitude avec celle de l'URSS dans les années 1960-1970. Certes, les actuels dirigeants chinois ne ressemblent pas aux gérontes retranchés dans le Kremlin jusqu'à l'arrivée de Gorbatchev en 1985. Mais, justement, leur dynamisme ne rappelle-t-il pas, peu ou prou, le volontarisme de ce dernier, ultime espoir du communisme soviétique pour tenter de sauver le régime ? Ils s'en sortent, il est vrai, autrement mieux que lui en la matière.

Comparaison n'est pas raison, mais des systèmes de même nature peuvent générer des comportements politiques similaires. Le Parti communiste chinois a beau être le premier parti léniniste darwinien, comme l'a joliment dit Nicolas Bequelin, chercheur auprès de Human Rights Watch, c'est-à-dire capable d'évolution, il n'en reste pas moins un parti d'esprit totalitaire, engendrant des réflexes policiers pour ceux qui sont à sa tête. Du Tibet au Xinjiang, contre les intellectuels dissidents ou les paysans spoliés, la chronique de la répression durant les dernières années illustre le raidissement du régime.

A l'instar de l'URSS, la Chine réclame désormais sa part de gouvernance du monde que mérite sa réussite économique. Dans les années 1970, Moscou parlait de détente ; Pékin rassure en évoquant sa montée en puissance pacifique tout en consacrant des moyens de plus en plus importants à son armement (même si ce budget est encore loin d'égaler celui des Etats-Unis). Si on escamote la part communiste de cette Chine-là, ces parallèles n'ont aucun sens. Mais, jusqu'à preuve du contraire, ce pays reste gouverné par un parti unique, dirigé par des hommes formés à son unique moule, qui gardent la haute main sur l'économie et qui s'en partagent les fruits, de manière quasi héréditaire. Dans ce type de régime, l'essentiel demeure le pouvoir, qui décide de tout.

Il est donc pertinent de se demander si la Chine, aussi mirifique qu'elle nous paraisse, ne risque pas d'être victime du syndrome soviétique, ses dirigeants finissant par être atteints des mêmes maux qui ont conduit à la chute de l'URSS. La combinaison entre notre admiration béate et un pouvoir sans partage, indifférent aux douleurs de son peuple, obsédé par ses intérêts de puissance, le tout attisé par les doutes des pays occidentaux sur le modèle libéral, autant de facteurs qui pourraient déboucher sur des lendemains difficiles.

Le jeu de miroirs entre des communistes chinois trop sûrs d'eux, convaincus par leurs propres statistiques de la réussite de leur régime, et des dirigeants occidentaux obsédés par leurs balances commerciales et leurs déficits, qui ne pensent qu'à les amadouer pour quelques parts de marché, peut faire oublier à Pékin ses fragilités intrinsèques : obsolescence d'une partie de son appareil industriel, discrimination sociale, déséquilibre entre l'offre et la demande, inflation, bulle spéculative, vieillissement de la population, catastrophes écologiques. En somme, tout ce qui caractérise une économie socialiste.

Cet aveuglement réciproque, entre Occident et Orient cette fois, pourrait conduire la Chine à vouloir aller trop loin, comme l'URSS jadis.

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RFI编译

中国是否患有苏联综合症

作者 小山
发表日期 17/01/2010 更新日期 17/01/2010 22:42 TU

1月14日法国《世界报》观点栏目刊登一篇署名文章，评论中国强大的背后隐藏着制度性的问题与脆弱，堪比整整半个世纪之前开放时代的苏联。文章作者是历史学家，研究共产主义制度的专家梯耶利・沃尔腾，阐述“中国是否患有苏联综合症”的威胁。本次当今世界节目就来介绍这篇文章。

沃尔腾写道，以5月上海举办世界博览会为标志，2010年将成为中国争取国际地位达到极致的一年。这是北京追求的壮举，将如同2008年夏天尽展辉煌魅力的奥运会那样，世界博览会将又一次尽善尽美的在政府当局的掌控下，也将有众多夸张的词语来赞扬中国超群的成功。然而所有这一切不会不使人回忆联想，半个世纪前，苏联同样开始了一个胜利的时代。上个世纪60年代由1959年9月赫鲁晓夫访问美国而开启，在向世界展示的炫耀活动当中，苏联一号领导人许诺在不久的将来，他的苏联会超过美国。

沃尔腾的文章继续写道，苏联接着开始了宏大的宣传运动来鼓吹这个雄心壮志，推出无数令人惊讶的成功，其中以1961年世界第一人登上月球最为辉煌。[误译。原文l'envoi en 1961 du premier homme dans l'espace，“1961年第一次把人送进太空。”]其后的20年，苏联提供浮夸的数据来吹嘘小麦，钢铁等生产的产量，证实社会主义生产无可非议的优越性。

人们只是现在才知道克里姆林宫设立了一个办公室，专门提供让西方惊羡苏联如此成功的数据。宣传攻势甚至包括作出对国内解冻的姿态，派出苏联招牌团体，像红军合唱团到西方去访问。今天重读当时相信苏联在20世纪末就会成为超级大国的报道，人们在莫斯科的意志力量和西方无以伦比的幼稚面前不得不感到惊叹。重新回忆苏联的“公关行动”如此成功很有意义，苏联也相信自己的宣传，在西方人信以为真的苏联不可战胜的形象面前沾沾自喜。60年代和70年代，苏联和社会主义阵营在国际舞台上明显不断的强大留下深刻的烙印，直到1979年苏联入侵阿富汗。由于西方阵营陷入因1973年第一次石油危机引发的经济困境，同时由于1975年越南战争失败而带来的精神危机，反衬苏联强大更显得特别耀眼。

国际力量对比问题上，苏联号称是真正的能与美国争雄的世界领袖；而在国内，因为世界大国的脸面要求，必须有的“有限开放”引来一些抗议，这些抗议被无情镇压，（1968年的捷克反抗，抓捕持不同政见者），这样的事件经常在西方国家不想跟苏联关系弄僵的担心而下不闻不问中发生。

这里存在某种让所有人都受害的逻辑：遭受共产主义制度磨难的人民不能或很少能够指望西方的支持；西方的舆论被新闻报道吹嘘的苏联大国威力所迷惑；西方大国领导人对苏联的胆怯又反过来鼓动克里姆林宫去追求更多的优势；最后就是苏联领导人自己也忘记他们的政权是多么的脆弱。结果当然是众所周知的。

《世界报》署名文章指出，目前的“中国狂热”要远比当年的“苏联狂热”更强烈的多。近年来，“中国狂热”又让人回顾起之所以使苏联辉煌的某些因素而得到进一步加强，其中包括以可观的数据加重强调的杰出经济成果；西方的某种文化，某种甚至多种多样的生活方式，对中国来说就像是异国情调的诱惑；国际舞台上日益强大的形象，甚至这种地位又是其他大国以平等的名义而希望实现的。中央帝国将在本世纪中叶之前主导全球的预言，已经成为老生常谈，而再度进入危机的西方世界则更加让人相信这一说法。

沃尔腾接着写道，中国与昨日的苏联相比如此之遥远而在二者之间建立平行的关系成为偶然；然而，苏联和中国在20世纪大部分时间里走过同样的路程，而且哪怕他们的道路不同，但是他们所执行却是相同的政治路线，并且来自同一个意识形态。毛的双手所沾的鲜血并不亚于斯大林，毛泽东与斯大林均使用恐吓群众来维持他们的绝对权力。

其后，沃尔腾又说，就连笑口常开[不确。原文jovial，开朗。]的邓小平也让人想起温文尔雅[误译。赫鲁晓夫怎么都谈不上温文尔雅。原文为débonnaire，宽厚、温厚。相对于斯大林的冷酷、阴险，赫鲁晓夫显得热情、厚道。 ]的赫鲁晓夫，这两位人物都幻想使停滞不前的社会主义经济利用西方科技腾飞。沃尔腾强调指出，从90年代开始，中国的魅力攻势与六七十年代的苏联没有共同点。[误译。原文为n'est pas sans similitude avec ...，“不是没有相似之处”。]诚然，目前的中国领导人与1985年戈尔巴乔夫上台之前克里姆林宫顽固不化的老领导人不同。但是正因为如此，难道目前中国领导人的活力不让人或多或少让人想起戈尔巴乔夫的那种试图用最后的一点希望来挽救共产主义制度的一意孤行吗？当然，应该承认中国领导人在这一点上要比戈尔巴乔夫强。[此说肤浅。论活力，比起勃列日涅夫、苏斯洛夫，十常侍率皆仿佛参差。而80年代初苏联尚有切尔年科、安德罗波夫等大老，是能提携戈氏，令图维新。今国朝真无首脑之行尸矣。]

比较并不见得就对，但是同一性质的制度可以产生相同的政治表现。真可惜中国共产党是第一个唯物主义的以马列主义为指导思想的政党，有能力演变，但仍然是个独裁的政党，产生条件反射式的警察反应，在西藏和新疆问题上如此，对异见知识分子如此，对被掠夺的农民也是如此，而且近些年来的镇压也充分证明中国政权愈来愈强硬。

以苏联为榜样，中国如今也要求其经济成功所应赢得的治理世界的权力。在70年代，莫斯科曾谈到缓和；北京则保证和平发展，但同时却不断增加军费开支（哪怕中国军费与美国军费相比还相距甚远）。如果避而不谈中国的共产党的话，那么这些相似之处就没有意义了。但恰恰是中国在一党统治之下，由一个模式训练教育出来的人所领导，他们牢牢控制着经济，以世袭的方式瓜分经济成果。在这样的制度下，权力是灵魂，权力决定一切。

所以应当试问，尽管中国显现百般奇妙，中国是不是有患苏联综合症的危险，中国领导人是不是也患有苏联领导人的病痛，而这些病痛最终导致苏联垮台。我们目瞪口呆的崇拜正与这个绝不分享的权力结合在一起，这个政权无视人民的痛苦，只顾权力的利益，这一切再加上西方国家对自由体制的怀疑，有很多可能会导致困难的明天。

研究共产主义制度的历史学家沃尔腾在《世界报》的文章中还说，这种对自己过分肯定，确信自己的政权成功的自己的统计数字的中国共产党与只关心贸易平衡和逆差，只想着以阿谀奉承的办法赖分一羹中国市场的西方领导人之间的哈哈镜游戏，会让北京忘却内部的脆弱：落后的某些工业，社会分化，供求失衡，通货膨胀，投机泡沫，人口老化，环境灾难等问题不断。

总而言之，这都是社会主义经济的特点。而这次西方与东方之间的相互盲目，可能会导致中国像过去的苏联一样，理想远远超过现实。

谷歌创始人布林：谢谢您带我们离开苏联

近几日，Google公司官方博客透露的如果其无法获得“在中国境内提供一个不经审查的搜索引擎”，就拟退出中国市场的新闻成为世界各国媒体关注的焦点，其所带来的震荡和影响恐怕不是现在就可以完全说得清的。不过，据报，Google的这一决策，一个关键人物起到了至为重要的作用，他就是 Google两位创始人之一：谢尔盖布林（Sergey Brin）。

据美国《华尔街日报》披露，Google公司在决策之前酝酿了数周，两名创始人佩奇（LarryPage）和布林均参与了高层讨论。讨论中，首席执行官施密特（EricSchmidt）认为，应继续在华经营，尽力改变政权；但布林反驳说，公司已经尽了力，应该离开。讨论的结果显而易见是布林的意见最终占了上风，使Google终于回归了其“不作恶”的道德准则。报导中称，长期以来对于在华经营具有矛盾心理的布林，其童年是在同为共产国家的前苏联度过的，他因与中共政府合作审查内容而一直深陷道德困境。

那么，在前苏联的短暂的生活经历，为何让布林对共产国家产生了如此负面的印象呢？

1973年8月，布林于出生在莫斯科的一个犹太人家庭，父亲米歇尔布林和母亲欧格尼娅布林均毕业于莫斯科国立大学。米歇尔是一位数学家，当时在莫斯科一所学校任教。一家三口加上布林的奶奶共同居住在莫斯科市中心的一套30平方米的公寓中。

1979 年，布林6岁时，全家被迫移民美国。在《Google故事》一书中，布林的父亲米歇尔详述了他们被迫离开的原因。“在前苏联，尽管官方称并不存在反犹主义，但在现实生活中，共产党却通过拒绝接受犹太人进入大学而将其排斥在高层专业人士之外，特别是物理系，犹太人完全不能涉足。”为此，米歇尔在报考大学时被迫将专业改为数学，尽管他的梦想是当一名宇航员。在大学期间，他的成绩全部为A。然而，尽管成绩优秀，因为他是犹太人，研究生院还是根本不考虑接收他。

童年时的布林就知道自己的父亲无法追求他所希望的职业，但直到在美国若干年后，他才进一步了解到了细节。

那是在1977年，当他的父亲参加完在波兰华沙举行的一个国际会议后，就对自己的妻子和母亲说：“我们不能再在这里呆下去了。”因为在会议上，他通过“自由地和来自美国、法国、德国和英国的学者们的交流”，发现“他的西方同仁们并非是怪物”。在对自己和儿子的未来仔细考虑后，布林的父亲决定移居美国。

然而，布林的奶奶不愿意离开莫斯科，因为这是她生活了大半辈子的家；而布林的母亲则最终表示跟随丈夫的决定。

1978 年9月，他们开始正式申请出境签证，其结果是布林的父亲米歇尔立即被学校解雇了；出于同样的原因，布林的母亲也不得不离开了自己的工作岗位。在随后的8个月等待签证的过程中，丧失了固定收入的一家人只能靠布林的父母打零工糊口，而且当时的他们并不知道申请是否会被受理。在此期间，父亲利用照看布林的机会，教给了他有关计算机方面的知识。

1979年5月，一家人终于拿到了签证并被允许离开了前苏联。抵达美国后，布林的父亲在马里兰大学谋得了一个教职，直到现在他还是该校的数学教授，而布林的母亲则成为了美国宇航局的一名专家。聪明的布林在念小学一年级的时候，就向老师提交了一份有关计算机打印输出的设计方案，这让老师大为吃惊。要知道，当时计算机还刚刚开始在美国普通家庭出现。

中学毕业后，布林进入马里兰大学攻读数学专业，由于成绩杰出，他在取得理学学士学位后获得了一个奖学金，随后进入斯坦福大学，并被校方允许免读硕士学位而直接攻读计算机专业的博士学位。在此期间，布林选择了休学，而与同窗好友佩奇一起创建了后来家喻户晓的互联网搜索引擎Google。

早在1990年，即布林17岁生日前，他的父亲率领一批在数学方面具有天分的高中生前往苏联进行为期二周的交换学习，布林亦在其中。此行唤起了布林童年时对专制政权的恐惧，他还记得当他面对苏联专制压迫时的第一个冲动就是将石头砸在警车上。在第二天的行程中，布林将父亲叫到一边，直视着他的眼睛说：“谢谢您将我们带出了苏联！”

布林的潜台词大概是：如果今天的他依旧生活在专制的苏联，那么他将同自己的父亲一样无法追求他的理想，甚至还要忍受专制带来的恐惧。是啊，如果当年布林的父亲没有将其带出苏联，Google是否能够诞生，亦或何时诞生都是个未知数吧。或许，在决定是否和怎样与中共打交道的过程中，这句话早已在布林的头脑中萦绕了许久，这也正是让他陷入道德困境的原因。然而，Google的妥协并没有换来其所希望的“让中国人接触到更多的信息和创造一个更加开放的互联网络”，反而让布林更清醒地意识到了与共产专制国家打交道无异与虎谋皮。

于是，布林一个漂亮的转身，将自己、将Google从道德的困境中解脱，将中共、将那些所有为了经济利益而出卖人权的公司、政府再次置于众目睽睽之下。中共、上述公司和政府何去何从，任由选择。

无题

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NYTimes: Scaling the Digital Wall in China

By BRAD STONE and DAVID BARBOZA
Published: January 15, 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/16/technology/internet/16evade.html?pagewanted=1

The Great Firewall of China is hardly impregnable.

Just as Mongol invaders could not be stopped by the Great Wall, Chinese citizens have found ways to circumvent the sophisticated Internet censorship systems designed to restrict them.

They are using a variety of tools to evade government filters and to reach the wide-open Web that the Chinese government deems dangerous — sites like YouTube, Facebook and, if Google makes good on its threat to withdraw from China, Google.cn.

It’s difficult to say precisely how many people in China engage in acts of digital disobedience. But college students in China and activists around the world say the number has been growing ever since the government stepped up efforts to “cleanse” the Web during the Beijing Olympics and the Communist regime’s 60th anniversary last year.

As part of that purge, the Chinese government shut down access to pornography sites, blogs, online video sites, Facebook, Twitter and more.

While only a small percentage of Chinese use these tools to sidestep government filters, the ease with which they can do it illustrates the difficulty any government faces in enforcing the type of strict censorship that was possible only a few years ago.

Jason Ng, a Chinese engineering school graduate who will say only that he works in the media business, wakes every day at 8:30 a.m., and then begins his virtual travels through an open, global network by fanqiang, or “scaling the wall.” He connects to an overseas computer with a link, called a proxy server, that he set up himself. It costs 15 renminbi, or around $2, a month to share with about two dozen other friends.

Mr. Ng then works on his blog and checks the news on Google Reader and Twitter to “officially start my day of information.” Chinese citizens engaged in such practices say the government rarely cracks down on them individually, preferring instead to go after prominent dissidents who publish information about forbidden topics online.

As a result, college students, human rights activists, bloggers, journalists and even multinational corporations in China are rushing to use tools that go over or around barriers set up by Chinese regulators, in part because they feel it is the only way to participate in a global online community.

Isaac Mao, a well-known blogger and activist in China, says the number of people seeking access to blocked sites has grown as more and more popular Web sites have been shut down by Beijing.

These digital dissidents have begun to organize small conferences and networks to share information and tricks about how to get access to banned material. “People start to hold a grudge against the government for depriving them of access to the Web sites they regularly visit,” Mr. Mao says.

But as the government has expanded its control over Internet, it has also intensified efforts to close some of the channels being used to evade the online blockade. The result has been a technological game of cat and mouse between the Chinese government and a global contingent fighting for online freedoms.

AnchorFree, a start-up based in Sunnyvale, Calif., has built a profitable business by providing free, advertising-supported software called Hotspot Shield that tunnels about 7.5 million people around the world into the Internet by encrypting Internet users’ data and cloaking their identities.

But last summer, the Chinese government blocked AnchorFree’s Web site so that Chinese citizens could no longer download the software. Almost immediately, its users began e-mailing their own copies of the program to friends and posting links to other sites that hosted it. The program’s use in China has doubled since then, said David Gorodyansky, AnchorFree’s founder.

Other censorship-evading tools have been created by nonprofit companies trying to combat authoritarian governments and by former Chinese citizens who, in many cases, want to help fellow members of persecuted minority groups still in the country.

Several such tools were created by a group called G.I.F., or Global Internet Freedom. It was founded in 1999 by members of the Falun Gong sect living in the United States as a way to get unfettered information about their practice into the country by e-mail. About a million people in China now use the service, which is maintained by about 50 volunteers around the world.

Users must download the G.I.F. programs and then every time they use servers, find the Internet Protocol addresses, or online coordinates, of servers around the world. G.I.F. volunteers try to distribute these coordinates through a multitude of channels, like instant-messaging services.

David Tian, a NASA engineer in Maryland who says he works harder at night on G.I.F. than he does during the day on weather satellites, says that officials from the Chinese government have begun posing as G.I.F. users, so they can intercept those I.P. addresses and block them. In turn, G.I.F. volunteers now work to identify these government officials and track them, so they can keep the information out of their hands.

An even bigger challenge, Mr. Tian said, is keeping up with the rapidly growing demand for the service from countries like China and Iran. “The bottleneck is not their firewall, it’s our capacity,” he said. “We have to limit bandwidth to what we can afford, so when there are a lot of users, some have to wait.”

Many of these organizations are hoping the United States government will help out with money. Since the 2008 budget year, Congress has appropriated nearly $50 million for tools that encourage “Internet freedom,” though only a small portion of that money has yet been handed out.

One problem, says Michael J. Horowitz, a fellow at the Hudson Institute, a conservative policy research group, is that that the federal government appears reluctant to pay for efforts associated with groups that alienate the Chinese government.

“Many of these guys are Falun Gong practitioners and the State Department doesn’t want to aggravate China,” he said. “China goes more nuclear at the mention of Falun Gong than any other two words in the whole dictionary.”

Despite these bureaucratic battles, people on the side of greater Internet freedoms in the continuing fight against Big Brother say the battlefield is inherently tilted in their favor.

“The architecture of the Internet makes our work easier,” said Bill Xia, a programmer based in North Carolina whose software tools, including DynaWeb and FreeGate, are used by hundreds of thousands of people in China every day to access forbidden sites. “The starting point of the Internet is open networks. Everybody can publish and receive data, and unless they want to shut down the whole Internet, we have the advantage.”

方老师也鸡冻了

没人能不鸡冻。不鸡冻的要么是装的，要么吃屎吃惯了。

中国正在成为互联网的孤岛(2010-01-17 05:43:49)

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_474068790100hake.html

方舟子

　　全世界最受欢迎、服务最好的网站，除了google都已经被挡在中国互联网之外，facebook，twitter，youtube，wordpress，blogspot，wiki的插图部分，imdb……现在google也不妙了，问题不是中文谷歌要撤出，而是搞不好google所有的服务都被屏蔽掉。我曾经说过可以免费合法地下载正版音乐的谷歌音乐是中国互联网的唯一可取之处，现在看来这也要完蛋了。

　　中国互联网越脱离世界，就越难吸引海外人才回国。对于那些每天的生活离不开上述网站，用facebook交友、twitter发布信息、youtube娱乐、wordpress写博客、wiki查资料、imdb查电影信息的海外人士，叫他们怎么海龟啊？难道要他们切断以前的网络联系，改用国内模仿这些网站建的山寨版？比如百度就是google的山寨版，不仅技术和内容创新上与google不是一个数量级的，经营理念也截然相反。google的理念是“不作恶”，而百度的理念是“不为善”——不择手段捞钱，百度首席产品设计师孙云丰嘲笑google是因为在中国赚不了钱才要撤出中国，正是百度这种一切向钱看的阴暗心理的反映。他们无法理解这个世界还有比钱更高尚的东西。自从我知道百度根据交钱的多少来决定搜索排名顺序，不交钱就给予封杀之后，就不再用它搜索网页了。

　　百度百科完全就是盗版大全，例如，很多条目大量地剽窃我的文章，甚至把我的文章整篇搬过去做为条目内容，但是删掉了我的署名，说不定若干年后会有某个“方学家”据此考证出我是靠抄百度百科写文章的。如果我要求百度百科删掉这些剽窃文章，他们要求我办繁琐的手续来证明那的确是我写的。他们盗用的时候轻轻松松拿过去，我不让他们盗用还需费力去证明，这种无赖，当然最适合在现在的中国生存。

韩寒：我只是在猜想(2010-01-17 03:57:25)

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_4701280b0100gmcy.html

http://www.bullock.cn/blogs/twocold/archives/93216.aspx


2010年 中国开展互联网整治活动，活动口号为“三天不打，上房揭瓦”。

2010年 相关部门扩大屏蔽词词库，汉字“档”和英文字母“D”在大陆消失。当当网和豆瓣网被迫改名为肮肮网和藕瓣网。

2010年6月 政府启动“保护儿童”项目，儿童节被提到和国庆节相同的位置，并且宣布，严格限制一切不利于少年儿童健康成长的资讯。同时，上海世博会提出“世博会，世博会，捉奸在床一万对”的口号，线上线下同时启动扫黄项目，政府明确表示，一切和黄色有关的东西，都将被屏蔽，黄色代表色情和封建。小学生们都被发动了起来，纷纷走上街头，表示不放过一切黄色的东西。

2010年7月 小学生爱国委员会发现，因为五星红旗上的5个五角星为黄色，不符合时代的进步思想。该提议经过研究，相关部门决定将五个五角星改为红色。

2010年8月 政府发现，将五角星改为红色以后，和国旗原背景色一样，导致分辨困难，经过小学生代表的提议，国旗上五角星被改为绿色，代表着绿领巾和绿霸。

2010年 根据小学生爱护委员会和小学生代表的提议，政府收紧图片审查标准，并提出“激凸等于露点”的战略指导思想。

2010年 所有论坛的版主被收编为公务员。

2010年 政府推出全新网络长城，该长城系统汇聚了无数中国各行各业专家的智慧，他们在一个军事基地中集中工作，他们工作的卫星照片一度被海内外误读为中国在制造航母。

2011年1月 政府新一轮经济刺激计划中拨款1000亿用于网络评论员，网络评论员的薪水由每条五毛涨为每条一元，2011年的目标是有1000亿条正面评论，坚守在评论征地的五毛党们黯然落泪，苦撑多年，被骂无数，终于等来了大部队。从此，在各大互联网评论中，网评员和正常人类的比例达到5比5。

2011年 GOOGLE，YOUTUBE，FACEBOOK，TWITTER等网站宣布重返中国并开放注册。

同时 所有上述网站在美国宣布并未在中国开展任何业务。

马上 这条消息被全新长城系统屏蔽，在国内无人知晓。

2011年 在上述网站注册的用户被长城系统追踪，他们的电脑被锁定，综合类网站只能打开人民网，新华网，论坛类网站只能打开强国论坛和铁血论坛，视频类网站只能打开央视一套。经过系统重装，都不能破解锁定。

2011年 电脑涨价一倍，出现卖电脑的黄牛。但用户买回新电脑以后发现还是只能打开上述规定网站。

2011年 房地产涨价一倍，在房地产交易网上，房源必须标明是上网房和限网房。

2011年 南方都市报，南方周末被改名为男方都市报和男方周末，被重新转型为婚姻介绍类报纸。同时，网评员和正常人类的比例达到9比1。

2011年 某市领导被人肉搜索。

2011年 互联网第二轮整治，所有搜索网站被关闭，各大门户网站和报纸发表“搜索，让我们变成懒人”、“网络搜索严重影响小学生的动脑动手能力”等文章，领导们表示，我们从来不用网络搜索，也到了今天的地位，说明网络搜索百害而无一利。

2011年 百度被百事收购，成为饮料官方网站。

2012年 新浪网曝光某村领导收受贿赂500元，该新闻被评为2012中国年度新闻，该新闻点击量达到5000亿，很多人反复点击，经过删除后留言量高达一百万条，很多人认为，这是舆论监督重新开始的一个新起点。但是网络投票中，九成网友认为该新闻不应该发表，因为破坏了社会的稳定，甚至可能导致民族的分裂。

2012年 新浪网被小学生举报搜索到有人激凸。新浪网被停业整治。

2013年 所有论坛停止注册和发帖功能，中国作家协会和中国文联接收互联网，成为互联网内容提供商。互联网从WEB 3.0退回到WEB 0.3，网络模式改为只能浏览资讯，不能发帖。

2013年 小学生健康成长委员会举报新浪网又出现激凸。

2014年 新浪被激浪收购，成为饮料官方网站。

2014年 小学生健康成长委员会举报，有人在QQ上向他们发送露点照片，导致该学生看到以后上街强奸了数十人。

2014年 QQ，MSN等聊天工具被禁止，个人博克和微博被禁止，但是屡屡有不法分子通过各种技术手段上传一些私人的想法和信息。政府非常头疼。

2015年 政府部门将网络全部切断，并统一推出上网专用电脑，只有用该电脑才能上网，没有键盘的接口，只给你一个鼠标。改专项整治活动的口号为“只给你丫一鼠标，看你还能怎么着”。

2016年 　中国网民下降到100万，所有网站合并为一个网站，输入任何网址都将链接入该网站。该网址更新内容以当天人民日报为准。同年，中国的互联网产业消失，直接导致近500万互联网相关产业从业人员失业，除了因电子邮件被取消后重新兴起的邮政行业接纳了十万人以外，490万人面临再就业困难。同时，近100万五毛党失业。五毛党感叹道，做牛做马做狗了半辈子，连退休金都没有。

2016年 人民日报发文：牺牲了一个产业，换来了国家的稳定，值。

2016年 新闻联播评论，互联网产业发展下去，国家将面临分裂的危险，国外反华势力和国内分裂势力借助着互联网煽动群众，幸亏有关部门采取强硬手段，避免了事态的扩大。

2016年 周久耕平反。周出狱后任命信息产业部部长。余秋雨被任命为文化部部长。

2016年 100万失业的五毛党因为根本没有其他技能，一直找不到工作，没有生活保障，数万五毛党开始向北京聚集，该年儿童节，十万五毛党在政府门前静坐绝食，要求政府安排工作或者买断工龄，并追加公务员称号。人民日报发文表示，政府从来没有过网络评论员这个职业，所有的网络评论均为五毛党自发评论。五毛党们拿不出任何劳动合同来证明其和政府之间的劳动关系。

五毛党的发言人表示，他们当年是地下工作者，为国家的稳定立下了汗马功劳。

政府表示，限五毛党三日内离京，否则将予以逮捕。人民日报发文表示，赞美政府就不应该向政府施加压力。赞美政府不能作为换取钱财的条件。赞美都应该是无偿的。

2016年 五毛党继续绝食，市民们表示，支持五毛党绝食，绝不向五毛党提供食物，并且监督五毛党绝食，切断一切五毛党可以获得食物的途径。

第二天，文化部部长余秋雨在绝食现场发表“含泪劝五毛书”。五毛党们纷纷表示，讲的太深奥，听不懂啥意思。

2016年 五毛党的罪名包括非法集党，非法游行，非法示威，攻击政府，暴力抗法，诽谤政府，危害公共安全，扰乱社会秩序，随地吐痰等。组织者被逮捕，但政府表示，宽容对待不明真相的盲从者，给他们一个改过自新的机会，给绝食者每人发五毛用于充饥。新闻联播评论这一场景：五毛见五毛，两眼泪汪汪。

2016年 五毛危机平安解决，再现党和政府稳定局面的能力。为首的五毛党面对央视记者的采访，说了三个字，悔当初。

2017年 失业人数剧增，互联网产业的崩溃导致经济严重衰退，政府表示，制造业将再一次作为国家支柱产业，中国应当利用一切自然的资源，以低价的优势向海外出口。

2017年 海外反华势力勾结起来，狼狈为奸，蛊惑联合国以及各国，通过了关于各国家禁止向中国进口任何商品的法案，以反对中国对互联网进行封锁。中国政府强烈谴责，表示中国的互联网管理是中国的内政，其他国家无权干涉。其他国家表示不向中国进口商品是该国的内政，中国政府无权干涉。

2019年 国庆70周年大阅兵，在阅兵当天，政府表示，闭关锁国，苦练内功，让一切反动势力在我们面前颤抖吧。当天，中国向全世界发出电文，电文内容共八个字：三天不打，上房揭瓦。很多国家表示难以翻译。

2020年 ……

2020年 地球毁灭，玛雅人的后代表示，前后十年内的误差是正常的。[不是地球毁灭，是贵国归天。]

忧机密遭窃 德国高科技业扬言退出中国

报道指，谷歌（Google）等多家美国公司遭中国黑客攻击，让西方企业对资讯安全更加警惕。德国的高科技业警告，如果中国坚持要求交出软体原始码，不排除退出中国市场。

　　中央社引述德国《商务日报》（Handelsblatt）报道，除了透过网络黑客，中国还利用产品认证、专利权、间谍等手段，取得情报和技术。

　　今年5月起，中国将针对资讯安全产品实施强制认证制度（Chinese Compulsory Certification, CCC），申请时必须将晶片蓝图和软体原始码交给相关单位，不然无法在中国生产、进口和出售。

　　代表德国高科技业的利益团体“德国资讯商业通讯新媒体公会”（BITKOM）总裁谢尔警告，“如果仍按原计划，要求特定的资讯安全产品申请认证，迫使公司公开软体原始码，创新的公司将从中国外移”。

　　防火墙、作业系统和路由器，都属于资讯安全产品的范畴；不过实务上，包括手机和晶片卡等含有安全科技的产品，也可能包括在内。

　　中国欧盟商会（European Union Chamber ofCommerce in China）在一份文件中也指出，“与认证本身没有直接关系的机密产品细节和情报，可能因此落入中国竞争者的手里”。

　　报道引述北京的德国企业代表说，忧心机密外洩，“已经成了欧洲公司将产品出口到中国的最大绊脚石”，例如在太阳能领域的几家德国高科技公司，一家软体公司也因为不愿交出程式原始码，而拒绝来自中国的大订单。

七嘴八舌

暗战Google

ecocity @ 2010-1-16 10:36 阅读(1723) 评论(9) 推荐值(85) 引用通告 分类: 未归类

除去一些渲染性的漏洞，配合媒体报道的事件中各方面的表现以及一些报道（如Wired这篇）来看，此文相当有意思，让人不禁想起来《十亿消费者》中的场景。转自这里，真相大白之前，还希望读者明辨。

---

以下的真相，如果你有怀疑，如果你觉得其他的说法才是真的，那么请你解释这样一个事实：

Google总部在声明退出中国之后，立刻取消了所有中国工程师访问Google代码服务器的权限。
他们都是在上班后发现服务器的home目录进不去了。事先根本没有通知。
很多人写到一半的代码，就没法动了，要等几个礼拜之后，调动到美国才能继续写

如果Google是有预谋的撤离，为什么要采取这种手段？他完全可以让员工继续工作，做一些善后工作。 比方说现在Google music，中国公司和美国做的是不一样的（music.google.cn 和 music.google.com）现在要取消中国的music了，完全可以让中国的工程师来做这个代码迁移的工作。

现在是中国的工程师全部带薪休假，由老外来接手善后事宜。

为什么Google突然那么不信任中国这边的团队？毕竟他们自己开发的代码，让他们自己来做迁移肯定效率更高啊

唯一的原因就是，Google内部的技术人员中被安插了党的特务（就在Google上海办公处）

事实真相就是，这个人在受到党的派遣，应聘Google成功之后，就把Gmail的关键代码down下来然后上交给了组织。

而这个组织破解gmail系统的目的就是为了获取“人权团体”的邮件，这些在Google官方的声明都有

这样一来会暴露gmail系统的所有漏洞，而且Google官方不能承认这个事情，否则他在国际上的声誉会大受影响。他能做的就是停止中国所有的工作，中国这边所有的工程师已经不能登陆google的代码服务器了。然后应该会抓紧几天时间修改一部分gmail代码

其实事情就是这样简单完全是突发事件，所以Google的官方声明，你去读一读原版，写的是很仓促的，字里行间都能读出他们最高层的震惊，就是Google三个最高层的人临时讨论一致决定的。如果是什么和美国政府商量好的，你觉得堂堂Google的官方声明会写的那么潦草，一点正式文件的套路都没有？

Google撤离也不是因为互联网审查，这个当然是一件很让Google不舒服的事情，但这几年他不也就这么忍下来了嘛

特工这次的窃密行动，使Google有面临全面破产的危险（Google官方博客也说了，牵涉到知识产权的问题），说白了，再在中国呆下去，可能要威胁到整个公司的生存，所以才如此仓促的把中国部门的一切工作全部停掉

所以Google一开始还说打算和中国谈判，但是今天马上就放弃谈判的打算了，因为就算政府让步，Google也不能再留了，再留就有性命危险。也不是中国市场赚钱不赚钱的问题了，赚这点小钱，把整个公司的性命搭进去，风险太大了

关于Google工程师访问Google代码的权限，Google对于技术人员的诚信是相当信任的。即使是一个实习生，也可以访问99%以上的代码。 Google只有一个代码库，每个进去的人学到的第一条开发原则就是：搜！从代码库里面尽量搜索功能相似的代码，然后给原作者发Email。讲究这种整个公司的代码共享，才会达到有那么高的编码效率。而且Google的代码，注释，和技术说明文档是一体的，对每一个工程师都是公开的

你可以喷我，也可以提出其他的说法，但是请你在回复之前先看完全文，然后想想自己的说法能不能自圆其说！！

我只能说，特工你太辣手了，实在逼得人家混不下去了

补充一：

这个事情还在调查中，有一个人，他是党员，来了Google没多久，就把gmail核心代码下载下来，而且现在这个人已经不知所踪了，这些是可以肯定的

至于他是谁指使的，我们只是猜了

这两天Google总部派人过来和中国每一个工程师喝咖啡谈话，调查是不是这个人还有同伙

同时总部在评估，这件事情造成了多少代码泄漏，哪些代码需要重写

等这些工作做完，就会开始转移中国这里的工程师（要是没有调查就转移，岂不是让别的卧底混入美帝了嘛）

然后这个时候总部应该会给一个说法，让真相大白于天下，等再过一个月左右大家再回来看这个帖子吧！

补充二：

算了我来说吧。

里面一共三个卧底，里面居然还有共产党支部。

里面的支部书记是国安四年前就布的局。

这个朋友本科就是交大出来的，后来去了信安部。

信安部派他会交大信安学院念计算机，天天做算法题, 毕业就进了Google。

之后发展了两个内线，其中一个内鬼暴力破决Gmail的源代码系统，
把代码偷出去给了政府。

政府主要是要监控用Gmail的反共分子。

里面不得了，居然还有国安局的党支部小组。

这个老兄拿了100万奖励，外加公务员待遇。

这帮人一下班就偷偷去陆家嘴开党支部会议。

小补充三：

google是如何发现代码被转给特工的？

除非google在每个员工的电脑上装监控软件。

要访问代码，必须登陆Google唯一的代码服务器
服务器端有你的浏览记录

现在只知道这个人是党员，他在很短时间内浏览了很多代码，而且这个人现在不见了，我只是根据这些猜测他是上交组织了

第一攻击了很多源代码管理服务器，

第二明确地告诉你是非法弄到的。

大家再看会，我的手机就会响起了……

现在同事大部分已经开始准备离开了，少部分技术人员和法律部的会继续留下来，大家情绪非常失落，谁也没有想到会是这么个结果。

NYTimes旧文：Google 的中国问题

Google 的中国问题

ecocity @ 2010-1-16 6:44 阅读(1928) 评论(2) 推荐值(44) 引用通告 分类: 未归类
2006年纽约时报的长文，译者不详。英文原文有一些小错误，译文中予以了保留。

Google's China Problem (and China's Google Problem)

By CLIVE THOMPSON


“Google”在中国：他不是Google

在中国，很多年轻人都把李开复当作名人。虽然不是像陈冠希或者演唱组合F4那样，但是这个44岁，总是身着一身灰色的计算机专家肯定能吸引一大堆粉丝。当这个Google中国公司的总裁在中国的大学发表演说，讲中国的年轻人如何该和世界上其他地方的青年竞争的时候，黄牛党会把门票炒到60美元一张。还有一次，李开复演讲的会场里有8000名听众，学生们被李开复的每一句话所吸引。

不难看出为什么李开复被崇尚科技的中国年轻一代视为偶像。他在台湾长大，之后去了美国，中英文都很熟练。在去年加入Google以前，他曾在加州为苹果公司工作，之后又效力于微软中国。他一手建立了位于北京的微软亚洲研究中心。他个人曾出版了"Be Your Personal Best,"一本卖得很好的励志类书籍，内容是关于中国学生需要接受有承担风险的精神的美国资本主义制度。七年前，他建立微软实验室的时候，就聘用了十几个中国顶尖的毕业生。现在他又在Google重复这样的步骤，“中国的学生绝对不同凡响。”他在北京和我见面的时候这样说。“他们有巨大的学习的欲望。”

在讲述科技带来的巨大解放的时候，李就像是一个传教士。他说，网络会给中国广大农村地区的人们带来更平等的机会。一旦国内的小乡村也实现了网络化，距离北京或者上海几千里之外的学生也能够学习麻省理工或者哈佛的网络课程，从而解决受教育的问题。李在去年夏天才加入Google，但是他身上早已经带着Google员工的那种热诚和理想化的信念。当他从微软离职的时候，他在个人网页上发表了一封感情洋溢的公开信，赞扬Google将信息传播给大众的这种使命感。他用了一个公式作为结论：年轻+自由+平等+ 颠覆+创新+用户为本+不要做坏事=Google的奇迹。

当我拜访李开复的时候，Google的奇迹正在北京的商业区的办公室里被进行着。这些小办公室看起来就像是在匆忙中租下来的。狭小的房间里挤满了穿着T-SHIRT的年轻人，围着巨大的纯平显示器，讨论Google的新程序代码。“我们这些人所抱的理想都是非常高尚而重要的，“李告诉我，“如何做出用户喜欢的东西，然后考虑下一步如何盈利。还有就是不要做坏事。”李开复指的是Google公司的格言。“不要做坏事---我想我在内心深处始终是一个理想主义者。”

但是Google最近几个月在中国的行动看起来却不怎么理想主义。在一月份，也就是李开复开办北京办事处不久，公司宣布将在中国市场推出新版本的搜索引擎。为了遵守中国的法律，Google同意净化所有中国政府不赞成的搜索结果。这其中包括法X功；宣扬言论自由的网站；或者任何提及天X门XX的网站。如果你搜索“西藏”或者“法XX”，中国以外的google能给出几千个博客，新闻，还有讨论组。但是在中文Google上试试，绝大多数的链接都不见了。Google把他们删得一干二净。

Google的决定在美国反响极差。一月份，公司主管被召到国会听证会，他们的行为被拿来和纳粹合作者相比。公司的股票下跌，抗议者举着标语在公司总部外抗议。Google虽然并非唯一一家在最近由于中国问题而受谴责的美国科技公司，而且也不是做的最过分的。然而Google的管理者却应该另当别论。当公司在两年前上市的时候，公司年轻的创始人，Sergey Brin和 Larry Page 在写给证券所的文件中说，Google是一个值得信任的，关注公众利益的公司。Google现在却和压制自由的中国政权合作，他如何自圆其说？

我很难准确的了解李开复对于公司和中国政府的合作持怎样的态度。作为我和李开复会面的条件，Google不允许我提起有关此类的问题，只有公司在加州的总部才被允许谈论此话题。但是当我和李谈起网络是如何改变中国的时候，他的一个观点颇能说明问题：他所雇用的中国学生，其实并不渴望民主。“人们其实可以自由地谈论这个话题，他补充说，（指的是民主和人权问题）我不认为他们在乎这个。我认为大家会说：“美国民主，那是好东西。中国现在的繁荣和稳定，也是好东西。不管怎么样，我现在能去我喜欢的网站，能看到我的朋友，过得开开心心。”李开复说，当然，关于自我的表达，公开发表言论，已经变成了中国年轻人当中的热门话题，这是由于互联网的普及以及博客，论坛已经遍布中国。“但是我不认为这有什么政治含义，”李接着说，“我认为只是越来越多的人发现他们可以表达自己，并且被别人听到。他们喜欢这个,这样就够了。”

这样的话在我听来，就像是含糊的政治见解—一种缩了水的言论自由的概念。但是当我和中国的年轻一代网民相处一段时间以后，我听到的都是略有不同的类似观点。年轻+自由+平等+不要做坏事 这是一个等式，包含着几个恒量，却有着许多个可能的解答。当下，对于中国人来说，何谓自由？审查制度也有层次之分？限制信息也有好坏之分？在美国，这样的问题根本就无法被接受---对话到这里就该结束了。但是在中国，正如Google所发现的那样，对话才刚刚开始。

文化差异

事实上，Google在中国并不是先驱。雅虎是第一家进入中国市场的美国网络公司，在1999年就推出了中文网站，并在北京建立了办事机构。雅虎的决策层很快就认识到进入中国是多么困难—而且文化的障碍对于美国人来说是何等的巨大。例如，中国的生意人在沟通的时候不喜欢留言，留信息这样的方式，他们倾向于使用手机和短信。（我在联系一个中国总裁的时候就遇到对方电话关机，而且不能使用留言的情况）对于中国网民而言，网络最吸引人之处---这一点和美国不太一样—就是论坛。成千上万的关于不同问题的争论在论坛上出现。百度，一个2001年推出的中国搜索引擎，雅虎的早期竞争者之一，发明了一个讨论工具。允许人们对当前的热点搜索项目进行即时讨论。用户现在如果在百度搜索nba巨星姚明的话，他们找到的不只是关于他比赛的报道，他们还能加入和姚明有关的成千上万个聊天室。百度的聊天室每天会有超过5百万的发帖。

正如雅虎所发现的那样，这些文化上的细微差别导致了美国公司的网站对于中国用户而言太外国化了。也使得这些用户转投那些中国网站。这其中包括了新浪和搜狐。这两家网站的搜索引擎不那么好用，但是充斥着论坛聊天室还有政府批准的中文网站。高涨的民族情绪可能也有关系。“现在大家都有一种强烈自豪感，要支持自己人。”香港城市大学的LIH告诉我。

雅虎在另外一股席卷中国的浪潮里也走得太慢了：盗版的浪潮。自从Napster事件以后，西方国家普遍都把上网免费下载音乐和电影看作违法行为。当然在西方这种现象还是很猖獗，但是自从iTune的成功以后，更多的人愿意付费。在中国，下载盗版音乐，电影和软件就和上网查看天气预报一样平常。百度的总裁发现很多年轻人都在网上找盗版mp3，所以公司就专为此目的开发了一个界面。一天下午，当我在北京的一家网吧里的时候，隔着几张椅子的一个年轻人正在吸着可乐，看着下载的《最后的武士》，他的朋友则在使用百度来下载50cents乐队的新专辑。“差不多五分之一的百度流量来自mp3的搜索，这个在美国肯定不合法。”robin李，37岁的公司创始人说到，“现在我觉得唱片公司可能对我们提供的服务不太高兴。”他最近这样告诉我，“但我认为数字音乐是一种趋势，无法阻挡。”

一开始，Google在进入中国市场上的策略和雅虎就不同。2000年早些时候，Google的工程师悄悄地开始研发能够接收中文，日文，韩文的系统。到了年底，一个勉强能用的中文版google就诞生了。2001年的时候如果你在中国上网，Google的服务器就会检测到你的位置并自动连接到中文的界面。法文版的Google系统也是这样运作的。

就在百度吸引大批喜欢下载mp3的年轻人的时候，Google却在另一些人那里受到欢迎：中国大城市里面的白领，那些接受西方文化，说话夹杂着英文单词的，一个认同全球视野多于民族情绪的阶层。

靠着吸引这些人，Google在2002年底成功超越了雅虎，占领了中国搜索引擎流量的四分之一---这样的成绩完全是在加州的公司完成的，远离中国政府的影响。

防火墙构成的万里长城

接着在2002年9月3日，Google消失了。中国人在那天发现网站被封锁了，只剩下一个错误信息。中国政府开始封锁Google。中国在网络审查上主要依靠两个手段。对于境内的公司，政府使用一系列惩罚和恐吓手段来保证内容的干净。对于境外的网站，政府使用另一种卓有成效的控制方法：被称作网络上的中国万里长城。

当你在使用网络的时候，你感觉似乎是无形无界的。实际上却不是。通过光缆传输的信息需要经过真实的国境线。中国一共有三条光缆主线，中国的网络就以此来和世界连接。中国政府要求管理这些网络的公司设置路由端口，在国内外网络的交接处。其中一些设施是由sisco思科公司提供的，一家美国公司，作为中国的新审查员。

如果你用北京的一台电脑进入一个服务器在芝加哥的网站，你的浏览器就会发出一个请求，这个请求就会通过光缆传到审查的路由那里，然后被检查。如果请求的网站在中国政府的黑名单上—长长的名单—而且还在增多—请求被拒绝。如果请求没有被拒绝，路由接着就会检查所请求的网站上有没有敏感词汇。如果网站包含一个类似“法X”或者1989XXX之类的，路由就会阻断信号，回到网吧，你就会看到浏览器给出一个错误提示。这个过滤系统的复杂程度让人惊讶，可以让某个网站的一些网页通过，同时封锁一些页面。当我在北京的网吧上网，我可以浏览BBC的娱乐和体育页面，新闻页面就打不开。

Google给审查者们带来了特殊的问题：由于当时Google在中国并没有办事机构，中国政府无权干涉，也没有能力让Google主动清除搜索结果。这样，网络长城的功效就只有一半了：它能够屏蔽Google的搜索结果所指向的网站，但是却没法阻止人们看到被禁网站的列表。例如你在上海，然后搜索人 权，你可以搜索到包括中国人 权组织在内的被中国政府屏蔽的网站。但是当你试图点击链接试图进入的时候，你就又会得到一个报告错误的提示信息。政府官员不喜欢这种状况--中国人由此能感觉到，他们的领导人对什么话题感到了威胁—但是Google很受欢迎，他们也不敢完全屏蔽。

在2002年，状况发生了改变。中国政府决定全面屏蔽Google。为什么？各种理论充斥着。Google的创始人sergey告诉我，他怀疑是某个竞争对手从中挑拨—某个中国的竞争对手。但他很老练地没有给出任何一个名字。但是很多美国的网络总裁都相信百度在Google被封的事件中直接受益。一个在北京的合资企业家告诉我，屏蔽Google的幕后挑拨者就是百度，2002年，百度的市场占有率比Google低3个百分点。“百度的一些人就坐下来找了上百个能让Google被封的证据。”她说，（她坚持要求匿名，以免遭到官方的报复）“接着百度的人就拿着这些结果找到政府，说，看这些有危害的东西都是在Google找到的，这就是Google被封的原因。“百度坚决否认指责。当我和北京社科院的一位教授谈起的时候，他也否定对于百度的指责，争辩说百度本来就要比Google强，而且更了解中国人的需要。然而，许多了解内情的人都告诉我，中国本土的网络公司经常向政府反映竞争对手的网站内容，以此希望对手遭到打压。在中国，审查制度不只是一个政治工具，而且还是一个竞争工具—一根公司之间互相捶打对方的大棍。

自我审查有奖

10月份的一个晚上，当我去到一家网吧的时候，那里120多个机位已经被年轻人们占满了。（因为电脑和家庭网络还是很昂贵，所以很多年轻人都是去网吧上网，享受低廉的价格和高速的带宽—还有冷饮）每个人看起来都准备好好地享受一整个晚上：年轻的女孩穿这粉红色和黄色的hello kitty的运动衫，在几个聊天窗口之间切换。楼上一帮穿着橄榄色军装的年轻中国士兵，欢笑着徜徉在中世纪幻想的魔兽世界里。在一堵墙边，挨着一副褪色的功夫电影海报，贴着一行字：请勿浏览色情及违法网页。这个告示几乎没有任何作用；这里的每个人看起来根本不会去浏览关于天X门事件的网站。我询问了网吧的老板，他的顾客会不会经常浏览非法的内容。不经常，他笑着回答，就算有，也是黄色网站。他觉得封锁非法信息应该是政府的事。“政府不准看，那就是不该看。”

对于中国，西方人经常会犯的一个错误就是假设，政府进行审查是偷偷摸摸的。恰恰相反，党对于这个问题非常的诚实---甚至是骄傲。一个不愿意透露姓名的美国商人告诉了我一件事，关于他参加一个中国网络公司协会的颁奖礼，其中出席的包括主要的网络服务提供商。“我当时坐在听众席，然后他们就说，现在宣布年度自律奖！然后宣布了10个公司，给他们发了奖牌，然后握手。一位部长也在那里，还和每个人都拍了照。这基本上就像是自我审查优秀奖—然后每个观众都在鼓掌。”这位商人解释说，中国的网络审查，是警察的一项额外任务。一月份，深圳公共安全部门推出了两个可爱的卡通形象“网络警察”，被命名为JINGJING和CHACHA，每个网络警察都有博客和聊天窗口，市民可以和他们聊天。北京青年报引用深圳官员的话“这两个形象的主要作用是震慑。”文章接着解释说这两个形象主要是公开提醒所有网民，注意安全和健康地使用网络，自我规范网上行为，创造和谐网络环境。

震慑和“自我规范”，事实上在党使用审查制度控制私营网络公司方面很关键。要获准经营网络业务，私人公司必须签订一份协议，不允许包含某些特定话题的内容出现，包括“扰乱公共秩序或破坏稳定团结”，“损害国家荣誉和利益”，或者“违反国内风俗和习惯”。有一项禁令特别针对邪教或者其他迷信，这是很清晰地指向法XX的。但是整个协议的表述，有意地搞得很含糊。随便哪一级哪个部的官员都可以要求把他认为过分的内容清除掉。

国家信息产业部的官员每周都会召集各大网络服务公司的管理者开例会---特别是拥有新闻，博客和论坛的那些---讨论那些新的话题可能在本周出现，而且最好被清理掉。“私底下我们都叫他吹风会。--换句话说，就是会吹哪个方向的风。”那个美国商人说到。政府官员会在几天前就发出警告。

美国的网络公司在刚来中国的时候，都希望政府能够提供一份官方的黑名单，以及需要审查的敏感词。他们很快发现这样的清单根本不存在。取而代之，政府只是要求公司模糊地去进行自我规范。所以公司必须要参透中国的政治，从而自己了解什么东西政府会不喜欢。去年网上曾经流传着一个清单，据传是政府给博客公司的黑名单。事实上，这份黑名单是中国一家博客公司的一位年轻总裁自己整理的。每一次政府要求清理一个帖子，他就留意哪些内容是政府针对的。过了一段时间，他就开发出了自己的黑名单，让自己的公司以后免遭斥责。

不服从自我审查规范的后果很严重。一位美国的公共关系顾问最近在帮一家中国门户网站工作时见到，一天下午，警察冲进公司办公室，把CEO拖进了会议室然后严厉斥责他没能阻止违法内容。“事后他脸都吓白了。”这名顾问回忆说，“你必须理解，这些人都被吓坏了，真的吓坏了。他们很害怕被抓去坐牢。每天坐在办公室里，他们都在想着这种事。”

这样的结果就是，中国的网站总是会审查清除掉甚至比需要的还多的内容。中国这一整套体系是建立在一个经典的心理学事实上的：自我的审查永远要比官方的审查更全面更彻底。让每一件网络公司都各扫门前雪，政府就有效地控制了用其他方法难以监控的数十亿电子邮件，新闻，论坛话题。政府采用的方法看起来就像是让公司去自己揣测，然后时不时，怒气冲冲地要求网站在24小时内清理某些内容。James，一位美国的中国问题专家说：“他们的执法总是充满着随意性，让人觉得他们就是在监控所有事情。

政府的监控虽然很全面，但也有不灵的时候。某一天可能某个被禁的站点又突然看得到了，多数是由于路由器超出负载，或者政府突然决定容忍这个网站。第二天，或许这个网站就又消失了。总的来说，网民的举动都是很小心的。他们很少触及政府的戒条。在中国有许多不能够跨越的界限，大家不用经常谈论这个，但每个生活在其中，了解中国文化的人都或多或少的理解这些界限。这也正是美国公司对中国的环境感到困惑的原因。什么是被允许的？什么是被禁止的？

对比美国人经历的彷徨，当我问起中国的商人，政府的审查制度对于公司到底难不难操作。“我告诉你，绝对不会比在美国提交财政报表难。”XIN YE，sohu的创始人这样说。还有一个晚上，我和张朝阳，新浪的总裁在上海一家爵士酒吧喝酒的时候，我问其他，多长时间他需要把新浪论坛上的帖子清理一次。他回答：“不太经常。”我问他，不太经常指的是一星期，一个月还是更久。他提出了反对，我不认为我应该谈论这个。虽然这样，他却没有因为我问的问题而感到困扰，“我不想把这个叫做审查制度，这就像每个国家都会有一种倾向。在美国也有些宗教禁忌不能谈论，大家都知道这个。”

阿里巴巴网站的老板JACK MA说的更直接“我们不想让政府生气。”我是在十月份的一天，在北京中国国际宾馆的大堂见到他的。MA的公司刚刚被雅虎收购了40%的股权，MA全权负责雅虎在中国的经营。他对于网上言论的看法是：“任何在中国属于非法的东西，都不会出现在我们的搜索引擎上。我们只是做生意。股东要的是分红，股东希望我们的顾客能够高兴。同时，我们也没有义务要在政治方面做这个做那个。忘记这个吧！”

小小的革命

去年秋天，在北京星巴克，我遇到了中国最著名的政治博客写手，ZHAO JING。他是一个31岁，穿着讲究而又帅气的人。当他说起90年代晚期网络的到来让中国发生了巨变的时候，言语中透出喜悦。政府之前控制了所有的媒体，但是中国的老百姓可以上论坛或者建立自己的博客了，这就像是解开了一把锁。就算你再谨慎，不愿谈论政治。你也可以只是公开的发表你对其他事情的见解---天气，体育---感觉上真是一场小小的革命。ZHAO（他现在就职于纽约时报北京分社）在言论方面要比大多数人都大胆，越界。大学毕业后，ZHAO在一座小城市的旅馆里做了接待员。他觉得如果自己够幸运，有一天也会有自己的事业。1998年他开始上网，开始意识到他真正想做的事情其实是谈论政治问题。他开始撰文发帖。在网上写了一段时间以后，一家报社的编辑就请他去做记者了。

“这就使网络的作用。”ZHAO说着，并露出一丝微笑，“我只上网了一个星期，就在省内外都出了名。我之前从来没想过自己能写东西。但我也意识到问题不在我，而是我居住的这座小城市。”ZHAO在2003年3月丢了工作，由于他所在的报纸发表了关于一位支持政治改革的退休官员的文章，政府报复性地查封了报纸。但是ZHAO仍然渴望写作，因此就在一个服务器在英国的博客网上安了家。他以安替作为笔名，写了很多诙谐的支持言论自由的文章。这些文章很快就吸引了成千上万的读者。八月下旬，政府使用防火墙封掉了他的网站，这样在中国就没人能看到了。他转而使用微软的博客，MSN SPACE。虽然政府还在监控他的文字，但安替却仍然大胆地在写。安替告诉我，他知道自己很安全，因为他知道哪些界限不能碰。

“如果你只是每天上网写东西，批评政府，他们不会介意，”他说，“因为这只是言论。但如果你想组织一些人—哪怕只有三四个---那他们就要来收拾你了。因为这不是言论，而是有组织有预谋。人们说我很勇敢，但其实我不是。”网络给安替带来了一定的政治影响力，但他说起自己的博客对政府能产生什么影响时，却不怎么兴奋。更让他兴奋一点的，是他对自己的认识不断发生变化。还有几个中国的年轻人也是这样告诉我的。如果网络能给中国带来一场革命，那么革命也肯定是通过每个人的自我实现，通过许许多多微小的，平凡的方式。

一天下午，我去拜访了一位29岁的中国女士，JIANG JINGYI。她在EBAY开了一个网上服装店。当她打开自己在上海的繁华地区的公寓大门的时候，我感觉自己突然撞进了一间别致的SOHO流行时装店。三排衣架挂满了冬天穿的夹克，起居室的中间堆着运动衫，还有整齐地摆放着的跑鞋和靴子。我们坐在她摆了四台电脑的卧室里喝茶，JIANG通过翻译告诉我，她以前是一个设计师。但她自己很喜欢开店。所以有一天就决定在当地的服装厂进一些便宜的衣服，然后放在网上卖。衣服卖得很快，她得了3成的利润。接下来的三个月，她越卖越多。有一天她发现网上拍卖的利润已经超过了她原来工作的工资。她辞了工，开始专心搞拍卖。现在她每月的销售额超过100，000元，合12000美元。

“我的父母没法理解。”她笑着说，一边用电脑向我展示她最新的拍卖，一件售价300元的夹克（网上她给这件夹克的描述是“非常时髦，穿起来很酷！” ）现在JIANG的销售范围已经遍布全国各大城市。以前中国落后的银行系统和信用机制让网络交易很复杂。但现在贝宝---EBAY的网络交易系统—终于把中国和世界市场连了起来。她说自己准备开展小型的国际业务，把打折的衣服直接卖到伦敦或者洛杉矶。

妥协与放弃

Google到现在也没搞清楚，到底是什么原因让中国政府在2002年下了查封令。而查封令在两周之后又神秘地嘎然而止。但是就算解除了查封，Google还是有很多麻烦。中国的防火墙长城拖慢了所有进入这个国家的网络信号。一百次里面有十五次，Google会因为网络塞车而无法使用。防火墙也开始惩罚那些好奇的人们：如果有人查找一个敏感词汇，防火墙通常就回复一个虚假的错误信息，让人以为Google的系统坏掉了。然后接下去的好几分钟，用户就没法再连接上Google----这种惩罚可以算是数字化的一巴掌吧。对于Google来说，这些延迟和错误是个很大的问题，因为搜索引擎本因在毫秒之间给出结果。百度，Google的主要中文竞争对手，就没有这样的问题，因为他们的服务器就在中国本土，在万里长城之内。更糟的是中国的大学网络不能够访问国外网站，意味着Google在其他国家最忠实的粉丝，在中国却不得不选择百度。

BRIN和其他Google的总裁们意识到，防火墙留给他们的只有两个选择，而且都是他们不情愿的。如果Google继续置之不理，继续只在国外运行，那么结果只能是被防火墙拖慢，甚至更不公平的封锁---最终，市场份额就会被百度和其他中文搜索引擎瓜分。如果他们开办中国分部，把服务器开在中国，防火墙的问题就不存在了，服务速度立刻就能提升。但是Google就必须屈从于中国的审查制度。

大棒加胡萝卜最终把Google引到了中国。百度就是大棒：截至2005年，百度已经彻底地击败了竞争对手，几乎抢占了一半的中国搜索引擎市场，而Google的市场份额缩水到了27%。胡萝不就是Google公司自己的一个概念，让一个独裁的国家的人民拥有更多的信息来源，这就是在做好事。公司的职员指出，他们肯定要比那些屈从于审查制度的中国公司做得好。当然，Google也必须清楚最敏感的政治网站----宗教团体，民主组织，天XX纪念---还有黄色网站。但是相比中国用户能够在Google上找到的内容，这些只是九牛一毛。Google还是能让中国人更多地了解艾滋病，环境问题，禽流感，全球市场。BRIN告诉我，利润，在综合考虑的因素中占的比重不大。他认为Google要想在中国盈利至少需要好几年。他认为，事实上进入中国市场的商业考虑并没有希望中国人能够好地获取信息的考虑多。“我们最终决定作出这个妥协。”

他和起来管理层开始讨论哪些妥协他们能够接受。最后决定是，不像雅虎和微软，他们不提供中文的邮件和博客服务，因为这样的服务会被迫使得他们要审查博客或者要把不同政见者的信息提交给秘密警察。他们还决定不会撤销现有的，没有审查过的中文版Google。这样一来，他们实际上就给中国人提供了两个搜索引擎。中国网民仍然可以进入旧版google.com；这个版本提供没有审查过的搜索结果，虽然敏感的结果最后仍然会带来一个错误页面，虽然该版本仍然会很慢而且时不时地被防火墙整个封杀。新版的Google是google.cn,这一版的内容会经过审查---但是会快得多，可靠而且不会被防火墙阻挠。

BRIN和他的小组决定如果他们必须要清理例如“天XX事件”的搜索结果，那他们会在搜索结果的顶端放上一个声明，解释说根据中国法律，有些结果被隐去。当中国的用户查找被禁止的条目，BRIN说，“他们至少能注意到有东西没有了，或者至少注意到国家的控制。”这就使计算机专家经常使用的解决方案：信息缺失其实也是一种信息。（Google的法语和德语版也会显示类似信息，针对一些支持纳粹的网站）

BRIN的小组还要接受另一个挑战：如何决定哪些网站要屏蔽？中国政府不会给他们一个黑名单。所以Google的技术人员就借助高科技手段。他们在中国境内设置了一台计算机，然后设置程序让该机访问国外站点，一个接一个地试。如果有站点被屏蔽了，就意味着政府把它视为非法---这个网站就被加进Google的黑名单。

2005年12月，Google的管理层在许可证上签字，正是进入中国市场。他们从来没有正式地和政府官员坐下来，接受审查协议。他们决定自己先这么做---然后等着政府的反应。

中国风暴

Google.cn于今年一月27日正式运营，维护人权组织的成员马上登陆新的引擎，察看它是如何运作的。Google的自我清查非常全面，有关法XX的第一页搜索结果，都是反对法XX的网站。Google的图片搜索，也是很出类似的结果。输入天X门，你看不到XX和XX，只能看到夜晚的美景还有幸福的中国夫妇在那里的合影。

Google的时机实在选得太差了。Google.cn的做法被代入一个政治语境，和其他在华科技公司的做法相提并论。去年九月，无国界记者组织透露，在2004年，雅虎把一封用户的个人邮件交给中国政府。导致SHI TAO，一名商业记者，在把关于政府规范媒体的文件传给境外网站的时候被捕。他被判入狱10年。接着在12月，微软遵从政府的要求，关闭了安替的博客。值得注意的是，微软的博客服务器甚至没有在中国；公司有效地遵从了大洋彼岸政府的审查，删除了位于美国的服务器里的资料。

对比这些事件，Google的管理层也许表现得更负责更道德。但是中国问题的风暴在二月席卷了硅谷，Google首当其冲。国会召集了三家公司进行听证---一起的还有csico，中国万里长城的硬件提供商---立法会质疑了三家公司的做法，Google更是被特别地教训了一顿。他们质问，一家以“不要做坏事”为口号的公司为何与中国的审查者合作。“这样你们的公司就成了中国政府的打手，”JIM LEACH，爱荷华州的民主党人说，“如果国会也想学学怎么审查，我们就找你们Google。”

安替给出的排名

2月份，我又一次见到了安替，这时候距离他的博客被关闭已经两个月了。我们在北京的一间酒吧喝酒。安替还是像之前那样充满活力，虽然他有点后悔上次自己所做的乐观的评价。“我现在有一点愤世嫉俗。”他的博客被封是因为一篇日志，谈到中国一家报纸的主编被炒。他当时呼吁大家抵制该报。这个举动显然是越界了。已经不只是言论那么简单，因为安替号召了大家去行动。政府联系了微软，要求关闭安替博客，公司同意了。这个举动召来了大批拥护言论自由人士的抗议，他们指责微软甚至在中国政府还没给出正式的要求之前就屈从了。

微软似乎对公众的抗议已经习以为常。在国会听证的时候，公司的政府关系总管表达了遗憾。为了挽回颜面，微软高层指出他们备份了被删掉的博客日志，并把他们寄给了安替。安替告诉我，微软并没有提及，他们拒绝把日志通过电子邮件发给他，他们只是刻了一张碟，然后寄到安替要求的美国境内任何一个地址。微软看起来太害怕中国政府了，安替苦笑着说，他们甚至不敢通过邮件把被查禁的东西寄到中国。（微软拒绝对本文发表评论）

我原本以为安替会很愤怒。但他却出人意料地很平静。他把几家公司进行了道德上的排名，扳着手指一间间的数。他说，Google应该排在最前。它确实真诚地在改善中国人获取信息的质量，而且在这样坏的体系里希望做到最好。微软其次；安替显然对他们的做法不太高兴，但他说微软还是提供了一个好用的博客工具，毕竟给中国人提供了一个公开发表意见的空间。雅虎排在最后，安替对他们的态度唯有怨恨。

“Google做出了妥协。”他说到，有时候妥协是必要的。但是雅虎的行为，却要被归到另一类：“雅虎是叛徒，中国人都痛恨雅虎。”安替说，不同点是雅虎把一个不同政见者置于危险当中，而且很明显没有考虑到对人权的伤害。（雅虎没有做出评论）Google却相反，他们避免了那些有可能导致人们入狱的服务。安替说，他们虽然也在审查信息，但他们犯的错无非是删掉一些信息，而不是删掉自己的人性。

失真的世界

安替的道德观点很让人惊讶，不只是因为对于美国的思维方式来讲太过陌生。大多数美国人，特别是多数思考和写作关于中国问题的美国人，他们的思维中不存在折中的民主，或者折中的言论自由。一个国家要么就完全拥护这些自由，要么就是跌进了集权国家的深渊。但是中国的博客写手和网民们其实之前早已经在谷底待着了。从这个角度来看，被审查过的互联网，已经对中国社会产生了深远的影响。对于年轻一代来说，网络把公共言论变成了一种日常行为。这个角度也正是Google所接受的。由此引出一个有趣的问题：一个不完美的互联网能否带来一个更完美的社会？

有一位我采访过的总裁把中国的互联网问题总结为“失真的世界”的问题。如果那些用Google搜索法XX的人看到的都是反对的网站，他们的世界观会是怎样的？ 他们也许会相信Google的权威，假设情况就是这样。这正是最近国会听证会上，民主党代表CRISTOPHER SMITH所担心的。“关于敏感问题，当Google只是带给你正面宣传的信息，那么Google在其中就起了协从的作用。这样就影响了整个下一代---他们会认为，也许我们可以生存在独裁的环境里。没有什么LECH WALESAS（波兰革命的领袖人物），民主永远都不可能实现。”对于SMITH来说，Google的逻辑就是妥协的逻辑。就像很多公司和种族隔离的南非打交道一样，Google太看重利益，而忽略政治问题。（本月早些时候，Google的CEO在北京见李开复时对记者说，Google去改变中国的审查制度，实在是很“傲慢”）

但是也许失真的世界对中国来说还是小问题，因为很多中国人告诉我，他们很久以前就学会了跳过党的那些虚伪的政治宣传和媒体控制。中国社科院的GUO LIANG教授告诉我一个显著的例子。“哈佛的一些人做了一个关于中国互联网的调查，我们他们调查结果是什么？他们回答，我们认为中国政府试图控制互联网。我就一直笑，我说，我们当然知道这个！”Google的审查过滤对GUO来说并没有什么值得讨论的，一点也不新鲜。

香港城市大学的教授ANDREW LIH说，大多数中国人抱有一种长远的眼光看问题。“中国人有五千年的历史，你现在封一个网站，他们只会想，用不了多少时间，它自己就会回来的。”或者想想中国那些想方设法登陆维基百科全书的人。最近，伟基百科被全面封杀。这些人希望说服维基的管理者能够建立一个中国政府允许的版本，禁掉那些在中国不合法的条目。他们说，这对于中国来说其实是好事，特别是那些边远地区学校。（到目前为止，维基仍然表示不会创建一个审查过的版本）

电脑程序的代码是很灵活的，因此有很多办法对抗虚伪---让信息审查这个事实或多或少被大家看到。在开发google.cn的过程中，Google曾经考虑禁掉和敏感话题有关的所有内容。也就是说在Google中国去搜索法XX，结果是一个支持的站点也没有，一个反对的站点也没有。那样能带来怎样的影响呢？别忘了，当Google推出审查版的google.cn的时候，仍然保留了旧版的搜索引擎。也就是说任何一个网民，只要输入一个敏感词，然后把新旧版本的结果做一个对比，就可以知道黑名单上到底有什么了。有些批评家甚至建议Google做得更多一点，直接把黑名单在美国公布，让审查制度变得完全透明。

超级女生理论

当我和李开复在他北京的办公室谈话的时候，有些时候我会感到他的前后矛盾。有一阵他就像一个热爱自由的Google人，强调说互联网给了每个网民以权力。但是下一分钟，他就更像阿里巴巴的总裁JACK MA---强调中国人对于引发动荡不感兴趣。在和中国的网络公司总裁聊天的时候，我一次又一次的听到这样的圆圈逻辑：我们不觉得清理掉敏感话题有什么不好，因为用户本来就不会去看那些东西。

也许他们是对的，用户是不会去看。但你也能很轻易地反驳说，他们不感兴趣只是因为他们被吓到了。谁会公开地在公共网吧查找不合法内容呢？---甚至是在家里—政府要求每个上网用户都要登记姓名和电话号码以便追踪。政府对网络的镇压甚至有可能变本加厉，如果中国广大的穷苦农民也开始上网。政府适度的容忍受过教育的知识分子的网络言论。但是那些被腐败的地方官僚欺压的农民们都是激进分子，他们对北京来说是现实的威胁。2004年有多达70，000起抗议活动，其中很多都被强硬地镇压了。

在批评家眼中，Google是将中国网民的期望置之不顾，为了保证市场赢利而屈从于中国政府。李开复的话则代表一种完全不同的信念：互联网由于与生俱来的特性，将会逐渐瓦解政府控制言论的能力，为一个拥护民主的社会打下基础。从这个观点出发，中国的革命将不会存在“伟人”，也不会存在LECH WALESA式的英雄，激励被压迫的同胞，为民主而战的将是一亿毫不关心政治的年轻人，他们在博客上谈论他们的约会，他们喜欢的乐队，电子游戏---整整一代把公共言论当作日常习惯的年轻人。

在我们谈话当中，李开复谈起了去年的超级女生，一个模仿“美国偶像”的电视节目。和美国的版本类似，年轻漂亮的女孩在夺目耀人的包装之下演唱西方流行歌曲。每一回合，观众都可以通过短信选出他们最喜欢的参赛者。随着比赛进入白热化，开始了类似总统大选的拉票活动，组织起来的粉丝们建立网站，要求大家投自己喜爱的歌手。最后的决赛，有800万年轻人参与了投票；冠军是李宇春，21岁，学生打扮的她唱了爱尔兰乐队Cranberries的一首zombie。

“我觉得这就是民主的一次实践。”李开复说，“大家为超级女生投票。他们喜欢这个比赛---他们上街去拉票。”换句话说，也许这并不是革命。但是这也许是个开始。

（作者CLIVE THOMPSON是纽约时报杂志的记者，经常报道科技类问题）

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Google's China Problem (and China's Google Problem)

By CLIVE THOMPSON
Published: April 23, 2006

For many young people in China, Kai-Fu Lee is a celebrity. Not quite on the level of a movie star like Edison Chen or the singers in the boy band F4, but for a 44-year-old computer scientist who invariably appears in a somber dark suit, he can really draw a crowd. When Lee, the new head of operations for Google in China, gave a lecture at one Chinese university about how young Chinese should compete with the rest of the world, scalpers sold tickets for $60 apiece. At another, an audience of 8,000 showed up; students sprawled out on the ground, fixed on every word.

It is not hard to see why Lee has become a cult figure for China's high-tech youth. He grew up in Taiwan, went to Columbia and Carnegie-Mellon and is fluent in both English and Mandarin. Before joining Google last year, he worked for Apple in California and then for Microsoft in China; he set up Microsoft Research Asia, the company's research-and-development lab in Beijing. In person, Lee exudes the cheery optimism of a life coach; last year, he published "Be Your Personal Best," a fast-selling self-help book that urged Chinese students to adopt the risk-taking spirit of American capitalism. When he started the Microsoft lab seven years ago, he hired dozens of China's top graduates; he will now be doing the same thing for Google. "The students of China are remarkable," he told me when I met him in Beijing in February. "There is a huge desire to learn."

Lee can sound almost evangelical when he talks about the liberating power of technology. The Internet, he says, will level the playing field for China's enormous rural underclass; once the country's small villages are connected, he says, students thousands of miles from Shanghai or Beijing will be able to access online course materials from M.I.T. or Harvard and fully educate themselves. Lee has been with Google since only last summer, but he wears the company's earnest, utopian ethos on his sleeve: when he was hired away from Microsoft, he published a gushingly emotional open letter on his personal Web site, praising Google's mission to bring information to the masses. He concluded with an exuberant equation that translates as "youth + freedom + equality + bottom-up innovation + user focus + don't be evil = The Miracle of Google."

When I visited with Lee, that miracle was being conducted out of a collection of bland offices in downtown Beijing that looked as if they had been hastily rented and occupied. The small rooms were full of eager young Chinese men in hip sweatshirts clustered around enormous flat-panel monitors, debugging code for new Google projects. "The ideals that we uphold here are really just so important and noble," Lee told me. "How to build stuff that users like, and figure out how to make money later. And 'Don't Do Evil' " — he was referring to Google's bold motto, "Don't Be Evil" — "all of those things. I think I've always been an idealist in my heart."

Yet Google's conduct in China has in recent months seemed considerably less than idealistic. In January, a few months after Lee opened the Beijing office, the company announced it would be introducing a new version of its search engine for the Chinese market. To obey China's censorship laws, Google's representatives explained, the company had agreed to purge its search results of any Web sites disapproved of by the Chinese government, including Web sites promoting Falun Gong, a government-banned spiritual movement; sites promoting free speech in China; or any mention of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. If you search for "Tibet" or "Falun Gong" most anywhere in the world on google.com, you'll find thousands of blog entries, news items and chat rooms on Chinese repression. Do the same search inside China on google.cn, and most, if not all, of these links will be gone. Google will have erased them completely.

Google's decision did not go over well in the United States. In February, company executives were called into Congressional hearings and compared to Nazi collaborators. The company's stock fell, and protesters waved placards outside the company's headquarters in Mountain View, Calif. Google wasn't the only American high-tech company to run aground in China in recent months, nor was it the worst offender. But Google's executives were supposed to be cut from a different cloth. When the company went public two years ago, its telegenic young founders, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, wrote in the company's official filing for the Securities and Exchange Commission that Google is "a company that is trustworthy and interested in the public good." How could Google square that with making nice with a repressive Chinese regime and the Communist Party behind it?

It was difficult for me to know exactly how Lee felt about the company's arrangement with China's authoritarian leadership. As a condition of our meeting, Google had demanded that I not raise the issue of government relations; only the executives in Google's California head office were allowed to discuss those matters. But as Lee and I talked about how the Internet was transforming China, he offered one opinion that seemed telling: the Chinese students he meets and employs, Lee said, do not hunger for democracy. "People are actually quite free to talk about the subject," he added, meaning democracy and human rights in China. "I don't think they care that much. I think people would say: 'Hey, U.S. democracy, that's a good form of government. Chinese government, good and stable, that's a good form of government. Whatever, as long as I get to go to my favorite Web site, see my friends, live happily.' " Certainly, he said, the idea of personal expression, of speaking out publicly, had become vastly more popular among young Chinese as the Internet had grown and as blogging and online chat had become widespread. "But I don't think of this as a political statement at all," Lee said. "I think it's more people finding that they can express themselves and be heard, and they love to keep doing that."

It sounded to me like company spin — a curiously deflated notion of free speech. But spend some time among China's nascent class of Internet users, as I have these past months, and you begin to hear such talk somewhat differently. Youth + freedom + equality + don't be evil is an equation with few constants and many possible solutions. What is freedom, just now, to the Chinese? Are there gradations of censorship, better and worse ways to limit information? In America, that seems like an intolerable question — the end of the conversation. But in China, as Google has discovered, it is just the beginning.

Google was not, in fact, a pioneer in China. Yahoo was the first major American Internet company to enter the market, introducing a Chinese-language version of its site and opening up an office in Beijing in 1999. Yahoo executives quickly learned how difficult China was to penetrate — and how baffling the country's cultural barriers can be for Americans. Chinese businesspeople, for example, rarely rely on e-mail, because they find the idea of leaving messages to be socially awkward. They prefer live exchanges, which means they gravitate to mobile phones and short text messages instead. (They avoid voicemail for the same reason; during the weeks I traveled in China, whenever I called a Chinese executive whose phone was turned off, I would get a recording saying that the person was simply "unavailable," and the phone would not accept messages.) The most popular feature of the Internet for Chinese users — much more so than in the United States — is the online discussion board, where long, rollicking arguments and flame wars spill on for thousands of comments. Baidu, a Chinese search engine that was introduced in 2001 as an early competitor to Yahoo, capitalized on the national fervor for chat and invented a tool that allows people to create instant discussion groups based on popular search queries. When users now search on baidu.com for the name of the Chinese N.B.A. star Yao Ming, for example, they are shown not only links to news reports on his games; they are also able to join a chat room with thousands of others and argue about him. Baidu's chat rooms receive as many as five million posts a day.

As Yahoo found, these cultural nuances made the sites run by American companies feel simply foreign to Chinese users — and drove them instead to local portals designed by Chinese entrepreneurs. These sites, including Sina.com and Sohu.com, had less useful search engines, but they were full of links to chat rooms and government-approved Chinese-language news sites. Nationalist feelings might have played a role, too, in the success Chinese-run sites enjoyed at Yahoo's expense. "There's now a very strong sense of pride in supporting the local guy," I was told by Andrew Lih, a Chinese-American professor of media studies at the University of Hong Kong.

Yahoo also was slow to tap into another powerful force in Chinese life: rampant piracy. In most parts of the West, after the Napster wars, movie and music piracy is increasingly understood as an illicit activity; it thrives, certainly, but there is now a stigma against taking too much intellectual content without paying for it. (Hence the success of iTunes.) In China, downloading illegal copies of music, movies and software is as normal and accepted as checking the weather online. Baidu's executives discovered early on that many young users were using the Internet to hunt for pirated MP3's, so the company developed an easy-to-use interface specifically for this purpose. When I sat in an Internet cafe in Beijing one afternoon, a teenager with mutton-chop sideburns a few chairs over from me sipped a Coke and watched a samurai movie he'd downloaded free, while his friends used Baidu to find and pull down pirated tracks from the 50 Cent album "Get Rich or Die Tryin'." Almost one-fifth of Baidu's traffic comes from searching for unlicensed MP3's that would be illegal in the United States. Robin Li, Baidu's 37-year-old founder and C.E.O., is unrepentant. "Right now I think that the record companies may not be happy about the service we are offering," he told me recently, "but I think digital music as a trend is unstoppable."

At first, Google took a different approach to the Chinese market than Yahoo did. In early 2000, Google's engineers quietly set about creating a version of their search engine that could understand character-based Asian languages like Chinese, Japanese and Korean. By the end of the year, they had put up a clunky but serviceable Chinese-language version of Google's home page. If you were in China and surfed over to google.com in 2001, Google's servers would automatically detect that you were inside the country and send you to the Chinese-language search interface, much in the same way google.com serves up a French-language interface to users in France.

While Baidu appealed to young MP3 hunters, Google became popular with a different set: white-collar urban professionals in the major Chinese cities, aspirational types who follow Western styles and sprinkle English words into conversation, a class that prides itself on being cosmopolitan rather than nationalistic. By pulling in that audience, Google by the end of 2002 achieved a level of success that had eluded Yahoo: it amassed an estimated 25 percent of all search traffic in China — and it did so working entirely from California, far outside the Chinese government's sphere of influence.

The Great Firewall

Then on Sept. 3, 2002, Google vanished. Chinese workers arrived at their desks to find that Google's site was down, with just an error page in its place. The Chinese government had begun blocking it. China has two main methods for censoring the Web. For companies inside its borders, the government uses a broad array of penalties and threats to keep content clean. For Web sites that originate anywhere else in the world, the government has another impressively effective mechanism of control: what techies call the Great Firewall of China.

When you use the Internet, it often feels placeless and virtual, but it's not. It runs on real wires that cut through real geographical boundaries. There are three main fiber-optic pipelines in China, giant underground cables that provide Internet access for the public and connect China to the rest of the Internet outside its borders. The Chinese government requires the private-sector companies that run these fiber-optic networks to specially configure "router" switches at the edge of the network, where signals cross into foreign countries. These routers — some of which are made by Cisco Systems, an American firm — serve as China's new censors.

If you log onto a computer in downtown Beijing and try to access a Web site hosted on a server in Chicago, your Internet browser sends out a request for that specific Web page. The request travels over one of the Chinese pipelines until it hits the routers at the border, where it is then examined. If the request is for a site that is on the government's blacklist — and there are lots of them — it won't get through. If the site isn't blocked wholesale, the routers then examine the words in the requested page's Internet address for blacklisted terms. If the address contains a word like "falun" or even a coded term like "198964" (which Chinese dissidents use to signify June 4, 1989, the date of the Tiananmen Square massacre), the router will block the signal. Back in the Internet cafe, your browser will display an error message. The filters can be surprisingly sophisticated, allowing certain pages from a site to slip through while blocking others. While I sat at one Internet cafe in Beijing, the government's filters allowed me to surf the entertainment and sports pages of the BBC but not its news section.

Google posed a unique problem for the censors: Because the company had no office at the time inside the country, the Chinese government had no legal authority over it — no ability to demand that Google voluntarily withhold its search results from Chinese users. And the firewall only half-worked in Google's case: it could block sites that Google pointed to, but in some cases it would let slip through a list of search results that included banned sites. So if you were in Shanghai and you searched for "human rights in China" on google.com, you would get a list of search results that included Human Rights in China (hrichina.org), a New York-based organization whose Web site is banned by the Chinese government. But if you tried to follow the link to hrichina.org, you would get nothing but an error message; the firewall would block the page. You could see that the banned sites existed, in other words, but you couldn't reach them. Government officials didn't like this situation — Chinese citizens were receiving constant reminders that their leaders felt threatened by certain subjects — but Google was popular enough that they were reluctant to block it entirely.

In 2002, though, something changed, and the Chinese government decided to shut down all access to Google. Why? Theories abound. Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google, whose responsibilities include government relations, told me that he suspects the block might have been at the instigation of a competitor — one of its Chinese rivals. Brin is too diplomatic to accuse anyone by name, but various American Internet executives told me they believe that Baidu has at times benefited from covert government intervention. A young Chinese-American entrepreneur in Beijing told me that she had heard that the instigator of the Google blockade was Baidu, which in 2002 had less than 3 percent of the search market compared with Google's 24 percent. "Basically, some Baidu people sat down and did hundreds of searches for banned materials on Google," she said. (Like many Internet businesspeople I spoke with in China, she asked to remain anonymous, fearing retribution from the authorities.) "Then they took all the results, printed them up and went to the government and said, 'Look at all this bad stuff you can find on Google!' That's why the government took Google offline." Baidu strongly denies the charge, and when I spoke to Guo Liang, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, he dismissed the idea and argued that Baidu is simply a stronger competitor than Google, with a better grasp of Chinese desires. Still, many Beijing high-tech insiders told me that it is common for domestic Internet firms to complain to the government about the illicit content of competitors, in the hope that their rivals will suffer the consequences. In China, the censorship regime is not only a political tool; it is also a competitive one — a cudgel that private firms use to beat one another with.

Self-Discipline Awards

When I visited a dingy Internet cafe one November evening in Beijing, its 120 or so cubicles were crammed with teenagers. (Because computers and home Internet connections are so expensive, many of China's mostly young Internet users go online in these cafes, which charge mere pennies per hour and provide fast broadband — and cold soft drinks.) Everyone in the cafe looked to be settled in for a long evening of lightweight entertainment: young girls in pink and yellow Hello Kitty sweaters juggled multiple chat sessions, while upstairs a gang of young Chinese soldiers in olive-drab coats laughed as they crossed swords in the medieval fantasy game World of Warcraft. On one wall, next to a faded kung-fu movie poster, was a yellow sign that said, in Chinese characters, "Do not go to pornographic or illegal Web sites." The warning seemed almost beside the point; nobody here looked even remotely likely to be hunting for banned Tiananmen Square retrospectives. I asked the cafe manager, a man with huge aviator glasses and graying hair, how often his clients try to view illegal content. Not often, he said with a chuckle, and when they do, it's usually pornography. He said he figured it was the government's job to keep banned materials inaccessible. "If it's not supposed to be seen," he said, "it's not supposed to be seen."

One mistake Westerners frequently make about China is to assume that the government is furtive about its censorship. On the contrary, the party is quite matter of fact about it — proud, even. One American businessman who would speak only anonymously told me the story of attending an award ceremony last year held by the Internet Society of China for Internet firms, including the major Internet service providers. "I'm sitting there in the audience for this thing," he recounted, "and they say, 'And now it's time to award our annual Self-Discipline Awards!' And they gave 10 companies an award. They gave them a plaque. They shook hands. The minister was there; he took his picture with each guy. It was basically like Excellence in Self-Censorship — and everybody in the audience is, like, clapping." Internet censorship in China, this businessman explained, is presented as a benevolent police function. In January, the Shenzhen Public Security Bureau created two cuddly little anime-style cartoon "Internet Police" mascots named "Jingjing" and "Chacha"; each cybercop has a blog and a chat window where Chinese citizens can talk to them. As a Shenzhen official candidly told The Beijing Youth Daily, "The main function of Jingjing and Chacha is to intimidate." The article went on to explain that the characters are there "to publicly remind all Netizens to be conscious of safe and healthy use of the Internet, self-regulate their online behavior and maintain harmonious Internet order together."

Intimidation and "self-regulation" are, in fact, critical to how the party communicates its censorship rules to private-sector Internet companies. To be permitted to offer Internet services, a private company must sign a license agreeing not to circulate content on certain subjects, including material that "damages the honor or interests of the state" or "disturbs the public order or destroys public stability" or even "infringes upon national customs and habits." One prohibition specifically targets "evil cults or superstition," a clear reference to Falun Gong. But the language is, for the most part, intentionally vague. It leaves wide discretion for any minor official in China's dozens of regulatory agencies to demand that something he finds offensive be taken offline.

Government officials from the State Council Information Office convene weekly meetings with executives from the largest Internet service companies — particularly major portals that run news stories and host blogs and discussion boards — to discuss what new topics are likely to emerge that week that the party would prefer be censored. "It's known informally as the 'wind-blowing meeting' — in other words, which way is the wind blowing," the American businessman told me. The government officials provide warnings for the days ahead, he explained. "They say: 'There's this party conference going on this week. There are some foreign dignitaries here on this trip.' "

American Internet firms typically arrive in China expecting the government to hand them an official blacklist of sites and words they must censor. They quickly discover that no master list exists. Instead, the government simply insists the firms interpret the vague regulations themselves. The companies must do a sort of political mind reading and intuit in advance what the government won't like. Last year, a list circulated online purporting to be a blacklist of words the government gives to Chinese blogging firms, including "democracy" and "human rights." In reality, the list had been cobbled together by a young executive at a Chinese blog company. Every time he received a request to take down a posting, he noted which phrase the government had objected to, and after a while he developed his own list simply to help his company avoid future hassles.

The penalty for noncompliance with censorship regulations can be serious. An American public-relations consultant who recently worked for a major domestic Chinese portal recalled an afternoon when Chinese police officers burst into the company's offices, dragged the C.E.O. into a conference room and berated him for failing to block illicit content. "He was pale with fear afterward," she said. "You have to understand, these people are terrified, just terrified. They're seriously worried about slipping up and going to jail. They think about it every day they go into the office."

As a result, Internet executives in China most likely censor far more material than they need to. The Chinese system relies on a classic psychological truth: self-censorship is always far more comprehensive than formal censorship. By having each private company assume responsibility for its corner of the Internet, the government effectively outsources the otherwise unmanageable task of monitoring the billions of e-mail messages, news stories and chat postings that circulate every day in China. The government's preferred method seems to be to leave the companies guessing, then to call up occasionally with angry demands that a Web page be taken down in 24 hours. "It's the panopticon," says James Mulvenon, a China specialist who is the head of a Washington policy group called the Center for Intelligence Research and Analysis. "There's a randomness to their enforcement, and that creates a sense that they're looking at everything."

The government's filtering, while comprehensive, is not total. One day a banned site might temporarily be visible, if the routers are overloaded — or if the government suddenly decides to tolerate it. The next day the site might disappear again. Generally, everyday Internet users react with caution. They rarely push the government's limits. There are lines that cannot be crossed, and without actually talking about it much, everyone who lives and breathes Chinese culture understands more or less where those lines are. This is precisely what makes the environment so bewildering to American Internet companies. What's allowed? What's not allowed?

In contrast to the confusion most Americans experience, Chinese businessmen would often just laugh when I asked whether the government's censorship regime was hard to navigate. "I'll tell you this, it's not more hard than dealing with Sarbanes and Oxley," said Xin Ye, a founding executive of Sohu.com, one of China's biggest Yahoo-like portals. (He was referring to the American law that requires publicly held companies to report in depth on their finances.) Another evening I had drinks in a Shanghai jazz bar with Charles Chao, the president of Sina, the country's biggest news site. When I asked him how often he needs to remove postings from the discussion boards on Sina.com, he said, "It's not often." I asked if that meant once a week, once a month or less often; he demurred. "I don't think I can talk about it," he said. Yet he seemed less annoyed than amused by my line of questioning. "I don't want to call it censorship," he said. "It's like in every country: they have a bias. There are taboos you can't talk about in the U.S., and everyone knows it."

Jack Ma put it more bluntly: "We don't want to annoy the government." Ma is the hyperkinetic C.E.O. of Alibaba, a Chinese e-commerce firm. I met him in November in the lobby of the China World Hotel in Beijing, just after Ma's company had closed one of the biggest deals in Chinese Internet history. Yahoo, whose share of the Chinese search-engine market had fallen (according to one academic survey) to just 2.3 percent, had paid $1 billion to buy 40 percent of Alibaba and had given Ma complete control over all of Yahoo's services in China, hoping he could do a better job with it. From his seat on a plush sofa, Ma explained Alibaba's position on online speech. "Anything that is illegal in China — it's not going to be on our search engine. Something that is really no good, like Falun Gong?" He shook his head in disgust. "No! We are a business! Shareholders want to make money. Shareholders want us to make the customer happy. Meanwhile, we do not have any responsibilities saying we should do this or that political thing. Forget about it!"

A Bit of a Revolution

Last fall, at a Starbucks in Beijing, I met with China's most famous political blogger. Zhao Jing, a dapper, handsome 31-year-old in a gray sweater, seemed positively exuberant as he explained how radically China had changed since the Web arrived in the late 1990's. Before, he said, the party controlled every single piece of media, but then Chinese began logging onto discussion boards and setting up blogs, and it was as if a bell jar had lifted. Even if you were still too cautious to talk about politics, the mere idea that you could publicly state your opinion about anything — the weather, the local sports scene — felt like a bit of a revolution.

Zhao (who now works in the Beijing bureau of The New York Times) pushed the limits further than most. After college, he took a job as a hotel receptionist in a small city. He figured that if he was lucky, he might one day own his own business. When he went online in 1998, though, he realized that what he really wanted to do was to speak out on political questions. He began writing essays and posting them on discussion boards. Soon after he started his online writing, a newspaper editor offered him a job as a reporter.

"This is what the Internet does," Zhao said, flashing a smile. "One week after I went on the Internet, I had a reputation all over the province. I never thought I could be a writer. But I realized the problem wasn't me — it was my small town." Zhao lost his reporting job in March 2003 after his paper published an essay by a retired official advocating political reform; the government retaliated by shutting the paper down. Still eager to write, in December 2004 Zhao started his blog, hosted on a blogging service with servers in the U.K. His witty pro-free-speech essays, written under the name Michael Anti, were soon drawing thousands of readers a day. Last August, the government used the Great Firewall to block his site so that no one in China could read it; defiant, he switched over to Microsoft's blogging tool, called MSN Spaces. The government was almost certainly still monitoring his work, but remarkably, he continued writing. Zhao knew he was safe, he told me, because he knew where to draw the line.

"If you talk every day online and criticize the government, they don't care," he said. "Because it's just talk. But if you organize — even if it's just three or four people — that's what they crack down on. It's not speech; it's organizing. People say I'm brave, but I'm not." The Internet brought Zhao a certain amount of political influence, yet he seemed less excited about the way his blog might transform the government and more excited about the way it had transformed his sense of himself. Several young Chinese told me the same thing. If the Internet is bringing a revolution to China, it is experienced mostly as one of self-actualization: empowerment in a thousand tiny, everyday ways.

One afternoon I visited with Jiang Jingyi, a 29-year-old Chinese woman who makes her living selling clothes on eBay. When she opened the door to her apartment in a trendy area of Shanghai, I felt as if I'd accidentally stumbled into a chic SoHo boutique. Three long racks full of puffy winter jackets and sweaters dominated the center of the living room, and neat rows of designer running shoes and boots ringed the walls. As she served me tea in a bedroom with four computers stacked on a desk, Jiang told me, through an interpreter, that she used to work as a full-time graphic designer. But she was a shopaholic, she said, and one day decided to take some of the cheap clothes she'd found at a local factory and put them up for auction online. They sold quickly, and she made a 30 percent profit. Over the next three months, she sold more and more clothes, until one one day she realized that her eBay profits were outstripping her weekly paycheck. She quit her job and began auctioning full time, and now her monthly sales are in excess of 100,000 yuan, or about $12,000.

"My parents can't understand it," she said with a giggle, as she clicked at the computer to show me one of her latest auctions, a winter jacket selling for 300 yuan. (Her description of the jacket translated as "Very trendy! You will look cool!") At the moment, Jiang sells mostly to Chinese in other major cities, since China's rudimentary banking system and the lack of a reliable credit-card network mean there is no easy way to receive payments from outside the country. But when Paypal — eBay's online payment system — finally links the global market with the Chinese market, she says she will become a small international business, marketing cut-rate clothes directly to hipsters in London or Los Angeles.

Google never did figure out exactly why it was knocked offline in 2002 by the Chinese government. The blocking ended abruptly after two weeks, as mysteriously as it had begun. But even after being unblocked, Google still had troubles. The Great Firewall tends to slow down all traffic coming into the country from the world outside. About 15 percent of the time, Google was simply unavailable in China because of data jams. The firewall also began punishing curious minds: whenever someone inside China searched for a banned term, the firewall would often retaliate by sending back a command that tricked the user's computer into believing Google itself had gone dead. For several minutes, the user would be unable to load Google's search page — a digital slap on the wrist, as it were. For Google, these delays and shutdowns were a real problem, because search engines like to boast about delivering results in milliseconds. Baidu, Google's chief Chinese-language rival, had no such problem, because its servers were located on Chinese soil and thus inside the Great Firewall. Worse, Chinese universities had virtually no access to foreign Web sites, which meant that impressionable college students — in other countries, Google's most ardent fans — were flocking instead to Baidu.

Brin and other Google executives realized that the firewall allowed them only two choices, neither of which they relished. If Google remained aloof and continued to run its Chinese site from foreign soil, it would face slowdowns from the firewall and the threat of more arbitrary blockades — and eventually, the loss of market share to Baidu and other Chinese search engines. If it opened up a Chinese office and moved its servers onto Chinese territory, it would no longer have to fight to get past the firewall, and its service would speed up. But then Google would be subject to China's self-censorship laws.

What eventually drove Google into China was a carrot and a stick. Baidu was the stick: by 2005, it had thoroughly whomped its competition, amassing nearly half of the Chinese search market, while Google's market share remained stuck at 27 percent. The carrot was Google's halcyon concept of itself, the belief that merely by improving access to information in an authoritarian country, it would be doing good. Certainly, the company's officials figured, it could do better than the local Chinese firms, which acquiesce to the censorship regime with a shrug. Sure, Google would have to censor the most politically sensitive Web sites — religious groups, democracy groups, memorials of the Tiananmen Square massacre — along with pornography. But that was only a tiny percentage of what Chinese users search for on Google. Google could still improve Chinese citizens' ability to learn about AIDS, environmental problems, avian flu, world markets. Revenue, Brin told me, wasn't a big part of the equation. He said he thought it would be years before Google would make much if any profit in China. In fact, he argued, going into China "wasn't as much a business decision as a decision about getting people information. And we decided in the end that we should make this compromise."

He and his executives began discussing exactly which compromises they could tolerate. They decided that — unlike Yahoo and Microsoft — they would not offer e-mail or blogging services inside China, since that could put them in a position of being forced to censor blog postings or hand over dissidents' personal information to the secret police. They also decided they would not take down the existing, unfiltered Chinese-language version of the google.com engine. In essence, they would offer two search engines in Chinese. Chinese surfers could still access the old google.com; it would produce uncensored search results, though controversial links would still lead to dead ends, and the site would be slowed down and occasionally blocked entirely by the firewall. The new option would be google.cn, where the results would be censored by Google — but would arrive quickly, reliably and unhindered by the firewall.

Brin and his team decided that if they were going to be forced to censor the results for a search for "Tiananmen Square," then they would put a disclaimer at the top of the search results on google.cn explaining that information had been removed in accordance with Chinese law. When Chinese users search for forbidden terms, Brin said, "they can notice what's missing, or at least notice the local control." It is precisely the solution you'd expect from a computer scientist: the absence of information is a type of information. (Google displays similar disclaimers in France and Germany, where they strip out links to pro-Nazi Web sites.)

Brin's team had one more challenge to confront: how to determine which sites to block? The Chinese government wouldn't give them a list. So Google's engineers hit on a high-tech solution. They set up a computer inside China and programmed it to try to access Web sites outside the country, one after another. If a site was blocked by the firewall, it meant the government regarded it as illicit — so it became part of Google's blacklist.

The Google executives signed their license to become a Chinese Internet service in December 2005. They never formally sat down with government officials and received permission to put the disclaimer on censored search results. They simply decided to do it — and waited to see how the government would react.

The China Storm

Google.cn formally opened on Jan. 27 this year, and human-rights activists immediately logged onto the new engine to see how it worked. The censorship was indeed comprehensive: the first page of results for "Falun Gong," they discovered, consisted solely of anti-Falun Gong sites. Google's image-searching engine — which hunts for pictures — produced equally skewed results. A query for "Tiananmen Square" omitted many iconic photos of the protest and the crackdown. Instead, it produced tourism pictures of the square lighted up at night and happy Chinese couples posing before it.

Google's timing could not have been worse. Google.cn was introduced into a political environment that was rapidly souring for American high-tech firms in China. Last September, Reporters Without Borders revealed that in 2004, Yahoo handed over an e-mail user's personal information to the Chinese government. The user, a business journalist named Shi Tao, had used his Chinese Yahoo account to leak details of a government document on press restrictions to a pro-democracy Web site run by Chinese exiles in New York. The government sentenced him to 10 years in prison. Then in December, Microsoft obeyed a government request to delete the writings of Zhao Jing — the free-speech blogger I'd met with in the fall. What was most remarkable about this was that Microsoft's blogging service has no servers located in China; the company effectively allowed China's censors to reach across the ocean and erase data stored on American territory.

Against this backdrop, the Google executives probably expected to appear comparatively responsible and ethical. But instead, as the China storm swirled around Silicon Valley in February, Google bore the brunt of it. At the Congressional hearings where the three companies testified — along with Cisco, makers of hardware used in the Great Firewall — legislators assailed all the firms, but ripped into Google with particular fire. They asked how a company with the slogan "Don't Be Evil" could conspire with China's censors. "That makes you a functionary of the Chinese government," said Jim Leach, an Iowa Republican. "So if this Congress wanted to learn how to censor, we'd go to you."

Zhao Jing's Rankings

In February, I met with Zhao Jing again, two months after his pro-democracy blog was erased by Microsoft. We ordered drinks at a faux-Irish pub in downtown Beijing. Zhao was still as energetic as ever, though he also seemed a bit rueful over his exuberant comments in our last conversation. "I'm more cynical now," he said. His blog had been killed because of a single post. In December, a Chinese newspaper editor was fired, and Zhao called for a boycott of the paper. That apparently crossed the line. It was more than just talk; Zhao had now called for a political action. The government contacted Microsoft to demand the blog be shuttered, and the company complied — earning it a chorus of outrage from free-speech advocates in the United States, who accused Microsoft of having acted without even receiving a formal legal request from the Chinese government.

Microsoft seemed chastened by the public uproar; at the Congressional hearings, the company's director of government relations expressed regret. To try to save face, Microsoft executives pointed out that they had saved a copy of the deleted blog postings and sent them to Zhao. What they did not mention, Zhao told me, is that they refused to e-mail Zhao the postings; they offered merely to burn them onto a CD and mail them to any address in the United States Zhao requested. Microsoft appeared to be so afraid of the Chinese government, Zhao noted with a bitter laugh, that the company would not even send the banned material into China by mail. (Microsoft declined to comment for this article.)

I expected Zhao to be much angrier with the American Internet companies than he was. He was surprisingly philosophical. He ranked the companies in order of ethics, ticking them off with his fingers. Google, he said, was at the top of the pile. It was genuinely improving the quality of Chinese information and trying to do its best within a bad system. Microsoft came next; Zhao was obviously unhappy with its decision, but he said that it had produced such an easy-to-use blogging tool that, on balance, Microsoft was helping Chinese people to speak publicly. Yahoo came last, and Zhao had nothing but venom for the company.

"Google has struck a compromise," he said, and compromises are sometimes necessary. Yahoo's behavior, he added, put it in a different category: "Yahoo is a sellout. Chinese people hate Yahoo." The difference, Zhao said, was that Yahoo had put individual dissidents in serious danger and done so apparently without thinking much about the human damage. (Yahoo did not respond to requests for comment.) Google, by contrast, had avoided introducing any service that could get someone jailed. It was censoring information, but Zhao considered that a sin of omission, rather than of commission.

The Distorted Universe

Zhao's moral calculus was striking, not least because it is so foreign to American ways of thinking. For most Americans, or certainly for most of those who think and write about China, there are no half-measures in democracy or free speech. A country either fully embraces these principles, or it disappears down the slippery slope of totalitarianism. But China's bloggers and Internet users have already lived at the bottom of the slippery slope. From their perspective, the Internet — as filtered as it is — has already changed Chinese society profoundly. For the younger generation, especially, it has turned public speech into a daily act. This, ultimately, is the perspective that Google has adopted, too. And it raises an interesting question: Can an imperfect Internet help change a society for the better?

One Internet executive I spoke to summed up the conundrum of China's Internet as the "distorted universe" problem. What happens to people's worldviews when they do a Google search for Falun Gong and almost exclusively find sites opposed to it, as would happen today on google.cn? Perhaps they would trust Google's authority and assume there is nothing to be found. This is the fear of Christopher Smith, the Republican representative who convened the recent Congressional hearings. "When Google sends you to a Chinese propaganda source on a sensitive subject, it's got the imprimatur of Google," he told me recently. "And that influences the next generation — they think, Maybe we can live with this dictatorship. Without your Lech Walesas, you never get democracy." For Smith, Google's logic is the logic of appeasement. Like the companies that sought to "engage" with apartheid South Africa, Google's executives are too dedicated to profits ever to push for serious political change. (Earlier this month, Google's C.E.O., Eric Schmidt, visited Kai-Fu Lee in Beijing and told journalists that it would be "arrogant" of Google to try to change China's censorship laws.)

But perhaps the distorted universe is less of a problem in China, because — as many Chinese citizens told me — the Chinese people long ago learned to read past the distortions of Communist propaganda and media control. Guo Liang, the professor at the Chinese social sciences academy, told me about one revealing encounter. "These guys at Harvard did a study of the Chinese Internet," Guo said. "I talked to them and asked, 'What were your results?' They said, 'We think the Chinese government tries to control the Internet.' I just laughed. I said, 'We know that!' " Google's filtering of its results was not controversial for Guo because it was nothing new.

Andrew Lih, the Chinese-American professor at the University of Hong Kong, said that many in China take a long-term perspective. "Chinese people have a 5,000-year view of history," he said. "You ban a Web site, and they're like: 'Oh, give it time. It'll come back.' " Or consider the position of a group of Chinese Internet geeks trying to get access to Wikipedia, the massive free online encyclopedia where anyone can write an entry. Currently, all of wikipedia.com is blocked; the group is trying to convince Wikipedia's overseers to agree to the creation of a sanitized Chinese version with the potentially illegal entries removed. They argue that this would leave 99.9 percent of Wikipedia intact, and if that material were freely available in China, they say, it would be a great boon for China, particularly for underfinanced and isolated schools. (So far, Wikipedia has said it will not allow the creation of a censored version of the encyclopedia.)

Given how flexible computer code is, there are plenty of ways to distort the universe — to make its omissions more or less visible. At one point while developing google.cn, Google considered blocking all sites that refer to controversial topics. A search for Falun Gong in China would produce no sites in favor of it, but no sites opposing it either. What sort of effect would that have had? Remember too that when Google introduced its censored google.cn engine, it also left its original google.com Chinese-language engine online. Which means that any Chinese citizen can sit in a Net cafe, plug "Tiananmen Square" into each version of the search engine and then compare the different results — a trick that makes the blacklist somewhat visible. Critics have suggested that Google should go even further and actually publish its blacklist online in the United States, making its act of censorship entirely transparent.

The Super Girl Theory

When I spoke to Kai-Fu Lee in Google's Beijing offices, there were moments that to me felt jarring. One minute he sounded like a freedom-loving Googler, arguing that the Internet inherently empowers its users. But the next minute he sounded more like Jack Ma of Alibaba — insisting that the Chinese have no interest in rocking the boat. It is a circular logic I encountered again and again while talking to China's Internet executives: we don't feel bad about filtering political results because our users aren't looking for that stuff anyway.

They may be right about their users' behavior. But you could just as easily argue that their users are incurious because they're cowed. Who would openly search for illegal content in a public Internet cafe — or even at home, since the government requires that every person with personal Internet access register his name and phone number with the government for tracking purposes? It is also possible that the government's crackdown on the Internet could become more intense if the country's huge population of poor farmers begins agitating online. The government is reasonably tolerant of well-educated professionals online. But the farmers, upset about corrupt local officials, are serious activists, and they pose a real threat to Beijing; they staged 70,000 demonstrations in 2004, many of which the government violently suppressed.

In the eyes of critics, Google is lying to itself about the desires of Chinese Internet users and collaborating with the Communist Party merely to secure a profitable market. To take Lee at his word is to take a leap of faith: that the Internet, simply through its own inherent properties, will slowly chip away at the government's ability to control speech, seeding a cultural change that strongly favors democracy. In this view, there will be no "great man" revolution in China, no Lech Walesa rallying his oppressed countrymen. Instead, the freedom fighters will be a half-billion mostly apolitical young Chinese, blogging and chatting about their dates, their favorite bands, video games — an entire generation that is growing up with public speech as a regular habit.

At one point in our conversation, Lee talked about the "Super Girl" competition televised in China last year, the country's analogue to "American Idol." Much like the American version of the show, it featured young women belting out covers of mainstream Western pop songs amid a blizzard of corporate branding. (The full title of the show was "Mongolian Cow Sour Yogurt Super Girl Contest," in honor of its sponsor.) In each round, viewers could vote for their favorite competitor via text message from their mobile phones. As the season ran its course, it began to resemble a presidential election campaign, with delirious fans setting up Web sites urging voters to pick their favorite singer. In the final episode, eight million young Chinese used their mobile phones to vote; the winner was Li Yuchun, a 21-year-old who dressed like a schoolgirl and sang "Zombie," by the Irish band the Cranberries.

"If you think about a practice for democracy, this is it," Lee said. "People voted for Super Girls. They loved it — they went out and campaigned." It may not be a revolution, in other words, but it might be a start.