China Doesn't Want People Talking About Egyptian Uprising Online

from the let's-just-leave-that-alone... dept

Mon, Jan 31st 2011 1:50pm — Mike Masnick

Whatever you think of how much impact social media has had on recent political uprisings and protests around the globe, it appears that many governments are worried about the impact. We've already seen how Egypt shut down the internet to try to slow down communication among protesters. And there's at least some sense of dominoes falling, with Egypt following Tunisia, and a few protests starting to show up in a few other countries around the Middle East.

It looks like China has decided not to risk being the next domino by having the various microblogging/social network sites in that country block any mention of Egypt. I do wonder how effective that move actually is. Once people realize it, won't that just make them wonder why, and make them more likely to seek out info on Egypt?

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: china, egypt, protests, social media, uprising

14 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Steve (profile), 31 Jan 2011 @ 2:23pm

Streisand effect not applicable?
I get the idea of your last comment "Once people realize it, won't that just make them wonder why, and make them more likely to seek out info on Egypt?"... but isn't there a point where the news is so enormous that the repressive government is "better off" blocking the speech then hoping people wont seek it out on their own? In the case of Egypt, the story is so huge that no one could not help but notice it. It's not like people in China are going to only become aware of (and more interested in) these events because the news is being blocked. OK... maybe the blocking will make it more interesting to them but that would be offset by the inability of news getting to the average citizen. Or at least, that is what China is gambling on.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2011 @ 2:58pm

Call it "Pharaohville" or something and maybe the filters won't catch it.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Paul Hobbs (profile), 31 Jan 2011 @ 3:43pm

Re:
Why not Egipt? Or Ejypt?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Jay (profile), 31 Jan 2011 @ 3:56pm

A really good question
How will Google work on this one in China?

This should really test their tails...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
crade (profile), 31 Jan 2011 @ 3:56pm

There might be a few people who realize it's missing but in general if they don't already know about it, how would they realize it's missing from the current news?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2011 @ 4:22pm

Someone should hack a spam company, redirect it to China, and replace all of the "get huge boner" e-mails with ones that say "There is a revolution going on in Egypt and your government doesn't want you to know about it. I wonder why."

I'm just kidding. That wold be illegal.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Eugene (profile), 31 Jan 2011 @ 5:16pm

What countries like China fail to realize, is that actions like this actually make it *more* difficult for them to monitor its citizens. By flagging specific keywords, you prompt those who create the keywords to invent new euphemisms you haven't thought of. You effectively direct them under your own radar.

Consider, for example, how difficult it is to prosecute drug lords and leaders of organized crime. Since law enforcement has been so careful to flag any mention of illegal activity through suspected communications, criminals simply avoid those terms entirely. Catching someone red-handed in this manner is typically a monumental task.

In contrast, look at how the U.S. at least feigns tolerance to anti-government groups within the country. Very little if any of their communications involve complex, obtuse euphemisms that make it impossible to take action. Often, these groups end up logging reams of publicly available incriminating evidence...were they to ever *actually* do anything stupid. But if they ever began to suspect their communications were being constantly flagged, you bet your fake eyelashes that those communications would start looking reeeal boring to the average viewer.

I would not be surprised if China's conduct over the years has spawned an entire underground pseudolanguage of unflaggable, unmonitorable communications.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
monkyyy, 31 Jan 2011 @ 6:14pm

Re: A really good question
"we are sorry but we refused to follow chinas demands in censorship, about the resent riots in egypt, so u removed access;
consider the 'wisdom' of ur 'awesome' government and dont ask around"

china shouldn't show their guns, when people dont care
[ link to this | view in thread ]
monkyyy, 31 Jan 2011 @ 6:58pm

Re:
spam inst known for its strong legal teams, they flee not fight
[ link to this | view in thread ]
John D (profile), 31 Jan 2011 @ 8:30pm

Re:
It's like a You Don't Know Jack Gibberish Question
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 31 Jan 2011 @ 11:38pm

China have a lot of little riots in their hands most in the poor parts of China that nobody outside or even in the inside gets to know about it, so that is why they are concerned if somehow all those little peasants unity it would be a lot of people.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 1 Feb 2011 @ 12:55am

Egypt, what's that?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Mateo Jose (profile), 21 Feb 2011 @ 10:09pm

A-MAZ-ING what is happening in the world today. Who knew that the Internet and Twitter would cause such upheavals? It is even more fascinating that these despotic leaders don't want their own people communicating with each other. From an oppressive leader's POV I can understand it, though! XD
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Mateo Jose (profile), 21 Feb 2011 @ 10:16pm

Re: Re: Why not Egipt? Or Ejypt?
Well for starters, "Egypt" is the English word for that country. And...Egyptians call the country "مصر"‎ in Arabic. Who even knows what the Chinese call it or how they write it. But yes, perhaps misspelling the name would help for any Engrish-speaking Chinese.
[ link to this | view in thread ]