I knew Google and China( or should I say as we did in my youth, Communist China) would bump heads eventually.  Frankly, I was a bit shocked when Google, with its, techy, geeky, cutting edge capitalist, corporate culture, knuckled under to Chinese censorship in 2006.  I knew it was only a matter of time— and I was right. 

We are talking world views that are like day and night. Google is a metaphor for the American way of thinking and China represents the ultimate in centralized authoritarianism. So, I was not surprised when last January,  Google, after tracing a bunch of serious hacker attacks on websites and email accounts of Chinese dissadents( both inside and outside of China) to servers in mainland China, threatened to pull out if the government did not do something. Nor was I surprised at the Chinese reaction which was to totally ignore and deny. Guess what— privacy is not a right in China and opinions which differ from the party line can land you in jail or worse.

Google Moves to Hong Kong

Yesterday, Google decided to stop censoring results for Google cn. and has moved its Chinese operations to its servers in Hong Kong where it can provide uncensored results.  It has also launched a new website where it posts updates on what google services are available to users in mainland China. It is all perfectly legal and everybody is bowing and smiling, but make no mistake.  This is the opening salvo in an information war.

 Here’s what Google had to say on its company website:

“Figuring out how to make good on our promise to stop censoring search on Google.cn has been hard. We want as many people in the world as possible to have access to our services, including users in mainland China, yet the Chinese government has been crystal clear throughout our discussions that self-censorship is a non-negotiable legal requirement. We believe this new approach of providing uncensored search in simplified Chinese from Google.com.hk is a sensible solution to the challenges we’ve faced—it’s entirely legal and will meaningfully increase access to information for people in China. We very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision, though we are well aware that it could at any time block access to our services. We will therefore be carefully monitoring access issues, and have created this new web page, which we will update regularly each day, so that everyone can see which Google services are available in China.”

 Here’s what I have to say.  Good for you, Google, for firing an opening round against the Chinese government and their “ great Firewall”.  The internet is the new world community and it is important— very important— that it not be restricted by any national or corporate entity. That includes not only profit making corporate entities like Verizon and Comcast, but also governments and their agencies. Don’t expect China to take this lying down. They’ll be blocking HOng Kong soon. But don’t you back down. Right is right and you are right, Google.

The internet is something special and unique and not just another commercial product to be manipulated by the powers that be.  It truly is a vehicle for the people of the world and the last best hope of humanity.  It is changing the world dramatically, which is why repressive, authoritarian regimes hate and fear it so much. 

 It is one thing for an American car company ot offer up company secrets and share corporate power in China in order to get a share of the market.  It is quite another thing for Google whose product is truth and the free flow of information to knuckle under to China’s information firewall. Google is the future of us all.  It is also a company whose motto from the beginning has been ” don’t be evil“ 

By pulling out of mainland China they are not only doing internet freedom a favor, they are being true to themselves. Go Google.