Undoubtedly the biggest world news (which followed soon after North Korea's recent nuke test) are the protests that followed last week's elections in Iran. Days of protests of young Iranian people with the help of world wide web services like tweeter, youtube, etc. have drawn the attention of the world. It turns out Internet has a great role in the organising and reporting of the protests.
After a supposedly fraud election bloody clashes with police and security services have resulted as defience to accepting the re-election of current Iranian President Ahmadinejad.
Since the Iranian Revolution these are the biggest and most tumult times in Iran. No doubt there will be a change. Let's hope that change will be for the better!
According to reports, in Tehran, cries of protesters, "God Is Great!" echo in the night...
----
In some relation.
In view of the events in Iran and the Internet role in the anti-government (pro-democratic, pro-reform) movement, NYTimes op-ed columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote a piece urging the support of anti-Internet censorship tools...*
Tear Down This Cyber Wall
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/18/opinion/18kristof.html?_r=2
Hm, I'm thinking. Chinese authorities and censors no doubt are watching (and learning)from the current situation of Iran...
What happens in Iran will no doubt be crucial not only for Iranians but also for the World.
The irony in the similiraty of Internet control (censorship) between the two countries is that Internet censorship has and is encouraging anti-authoritarian sentiments. Iranians are among the people who as a result of government consorship and control have become very savvy as to circumventing Internet censorship and control. Internet defience is not necessary equal to political defience, at least initialy, but too obvious censorship can have a very unexpected side-effect.
A situation very similar to that in China...
Recent stepping up of Internet control in China may turn out to have the oposite of the wanted effect...
And that can turn dangerous...
*By the way this post is made possible with the help of such tools...
Monday 22 June 2009
China's New Censorship Softwear Tool Green Dam's Currious Black List of Words
The "hot" topic of the last few days has been the new controvercial requirement made by the Chinese government for the installing of a "filter"-software called "Green Dam Youth Escort" which is to be included (pre-installed or otherwise provided) with each new computer sold after the 1st of July. While under the pretext it is to prevent youth from the harmful pornography and violence contents on the Internet, many people have already expressed serious doubts not only about implementing the order, but also the quality of the product...But most importantly it is very dubious what exactly the purpose of this softwear is. Is it really preventing and protecting youth from porn and violence or is it yet another effort (and at that not a very subtle one) to curb freedom of information?!
Recently on Wikileaks (http://wikileaks.org/wiki/A_technical_analysis_of_the_Chinese_'Green_Dam_Youth-Escort'_censorship_software)
there appeared a technical analysis of the said software.
The other day I spend some time carefully studying the linked list of non-pornographic words' black list.
It is just amazing what kind of words are deemed dangerous!!!
Green Dam black word list
http://www.fast-box.net/browse.php?u=czovL2RvY3MuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS9WaWV3P2lkPWFoMjd4ejRwYno2c18yNGM2ZHcyN2c2&b=13
Now reading this list carefully one is struck with the following absurdities. Never mind the obvious forbidden topics, i.e. "the usual suspects" such as FalunGong, Tiananmen "6.4 accident", Dalai Lama, human rights, officials corruption etc., there appear to be words in this list that one wonders why are they considered dangerous, the most absurd is the including of words such as gratitude, moral conduct, goodness, Confucianism...?! Hm, wasn't this software supposed to prevent youth from "harmful content"?!! How exactly does words such as humanity, humanism, goodness, etc. figure in being dangerous and harmful?!
Another inexplicable feature is the inclusion of the names of cities and countries...If you want to search for Australia, Amsterdam or Ukraine for instance you'll be prevented from opening such contents. One wonders why the hell names of countries and cities are deemed sensitive?!
But the most obvious target (apart from FaLunGong which appears to be the main target of the software judging from the black wordlist contents and particular obsession with the forbidden sect)seem to be all terms and ideas connected with Buddhism...
Buddha, Guanyin and Amitabha Buddha are obviously dangerous and harmful to the "healthy" growth of the future Chinese generation?!
It's no joke. Most basic Buddhist terms are in this black list : karma, karmic retribution, reincarnation are in the blacklist. But the wordlist is far from subtle. It is obvious that the "target" is religion and believes of all kind. Not only Buddhism is considered dangerous (monk, nun, temple, praying to Buddha, scriptures are obviously "dangerous" words), all sorts of basic words that have to do with religion are considered dangerous...priest, church...But definitely Buddhism is the main target. Practically some of the basic terms that appear in Buddhism are "dirty words"?!
So now it appears that "Buddha" is a dirty word?!!!
Who is the crazy, insane/ incompetent person who made up the list?!
It's ironic that those same people beat the drum of the so-called 5000 years of Chinese culture and history.
But, damn it, without Buddhism and Buddhist culture, China's culture doesn't come up to much isn't it?!!
Daoism and Daoist priests (and also Confucianism) figure in the blacklist, so one wonders what is not harmful to the Chinese youth if Chinese culture itself is in the blacklist...Perhaps money and stock and shares...?!!
I get the feeling that this softwear as many other Chinese intiatives was so badly conrived that it will instead of doing the "job" it was set to do it will backfire...
Already it has a very ironic side-effect of drawing riducule from people who otherwise will remain politically indifferent.
I have no doubt that this is (mostly) a (it appears badly contrived) political softwear. Not to mention the dubious fact that this is a state-inplemented monopol and there is the question of the huge amount of taxpayers money that will enter in a particular someone's pockets...Ironically, "corruption" is in the blacklist of "dirty/dangerous words"...
Recently on Wikileaks (http://wikileaks.org/wiki/A_technical_analysis_of_the_Chinese_'Green_Dam_Youth-Escort'_censorship_software)
there appeared a technical analysis of the said software.
The other day I spend some time carefully studying the linked list of non-pornographic words' black list.
It is just amazing what kind of words are deemed dangerous!!!
Green Dam black word list
http://www.fast-box.net/browse.php?u=czovL2RvY3MuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS9WaWV3P2lkPWFoMjd4ejRwYno2c18yNGM2ZHcyN2c2&b=13
Now reading this list carefully one is struck with the following absurdities. Never mind the obvious forbidden topics, i.e. "the usual suspects" such as FalunGong, Tiananmen "6.4 accident", Dalai Lama, human rights, officials corruption etc., there appear to be words in this list that one wonders why are they considered dangerous, the most absurd is the including of words such as gratitude, moral conduct, goodness, Confucianism...?! Hm, wasn't this software supposed to prevent youth from "harmful content"?!! How exactly does words such as humanity, humanism, goodness, etc. figure in being dangerous and harmful?!
Another inexplicable feature is the inclusion of the names of cities and countries...If you want to search for Australia, Amsterdam or Ukraine for instance you'll be prevented from opening such contents. One wonders why the hell names of countries and cities are deemed sensitive?!
But the most obvious target (apart from FaLunGong which appears to be the main target of the software judging from the black wordlist contents and particular obsession with the forbidden sect)seem to be all terms and ideas connected with Buddhism...
Buddha, Guanyin and Amitabha Buddha are obviously dangerous and harmful to the "healthy" growth of the future Chinese generation?!
It's no joke. Most basic Buddhist terms are in this black list : karma, karmic retribution, reincarnation are in the blacklist. But the wordlist is far from subtle. It is obvious that the "target" is religion and believes of all kind. Not only Buddhism is considered dangerous (monk, nun, temple, praying to Buddha, scriptures are obviously "dangerous" words), all sorts of basic words that have to do with religion are considered dangerous...priest, church...But definitely Buddhism is the main target. Practically some of the basic terms that appear in Buddhism are "dirty words"?!
So now it appears that "Buddha" is a dirty word?!!!
Who is the crazy, insane/ incompetent person who made up the list?!
It's ironic that those same people beat the drum of the so-called 5000 years of Chinese culture and history.
But, damn it, without Buddhism and Buddhist culture, China's culture doesn't come up to much isn't it?!!
Daoism and Daoist priests (and also Confucianism) figure in the blacklist, so one wonders what is not harmful to the Chinese youth if Chinese culture itself is in the blacklist...Perhaps money and stock and shares...?!!
I get the feeling that this softwear as many other Chinese intiatives was so badly conrived that it will instead of doing the "job" it was set to do it will backfire...
Already it has a very ironic side-effect of drawing riducule from people who otherwise will remain politically indifferent.
I have no doubt that this is (mostly) a (it appears badly contrived) political softwear. Not to mention the dubious fact that this is a state-inplemented monopol and there is the question of the huge amount of taxpayers money that will enter in a particular someone's pockets...Ironically, "corruption" is in the blacklist of "dirty/dangerous words"...
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