Email in china
anonymous
April 12 2007, 01:47:21 UTC
I would highly recommend asking your friends to email only nice pleasantries to you from overseas. Plan on being out of touch with news and such as you know it. They take their Internet censorship very seriously, and offenses do win people jail time. I'm sure that most everything would probably be ok, but I am not Chinese, I am not familiar with Chinese laws, and I personally would not want to risk it.
I've heard too many stories of people running up against the Great Chinese Firewall--a lot of them from people thinking they'll be ok because they're just visiting, or perhaps that the laws somehow don't apply to them. Here in America, thwarting censorship sounds great, and the idea of being an information freedom fighter is awesome--but it's their country and their laws, and they have a very different attitude about it.
Please don't chance it. =/ They censor Google and Google News--please don't try to work your way around it.
Re: Email in chinaplantyhamchukApril 12 2007, 09:11:51 UTC
yeah, the Great Firewall is no joke.
I was hankering more for local area news, which I wouldn't be able to get through chinadaily or their usual news outlets AND would be unlikely to set off censors. ATL news is usually pretty grim. Fortunately, despite my cravings for the worthy journalism of the NYT, I have enough marbles left (bareyY) to not ask anyone to send me anything obviously incendiary. My plan has been to first ask the Prof handling the trip her advice on it before heading abroad. If I'm stuck over there for 5 weeks with no LJ, no google news, and what passes for journalism there... oy! That's a scary scenario indeed. Thanks for the concern, and yeah I know the laws there don't really leave much in the way of flexibility. Fortunately, the NYT has kept me well informed of such things...
It's not so much about thwarting censorship to be a rebel, it's more about my news/data addiction than anything else. If I could find more specific information on what I /will/ have access to I'd be a bit more relaxed about the whole thing
Comments 14
I've heard too many stories of people running up against the Great Chinese Firewall--a lot of them from people thinking they'll be ok because they're just visiting, or perhaps that the laws somehow don't apply to them. Here in America, thwarting censorship sounds great, and the idea of being an information freedom fighter is awesome--but it's their country and their laws, and they have a very different attitude about it.
Please don't chance it. =/ They censor Google and Google News--please don't try to work your way around it.
- Ninja
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I was hankering more for local area news, which I wouldn't be able to get through chinadaily or their usual news outlets AND would be unlikely to set off censors. ATL news is usually pretty grim. Fortunately, despite my cravings for the worthy journalism of the NYT, I have enough marbles left (bareyY) to not ask anyone to send me anything obviously incendiary. My plan has been to first ask the Prof handling the trip her advice on it before heading abroad. If I'm stuck over there for 5 weeks with no LJ, no google news, and what passes for journalism there... oy! That's a scary scenario indeed. Thanks for the concern, and yeah I know the laws there don't really leave much in the way of flexibility. Fortunately, the NYT has kept me well informed of such things...
It's not so much about thwarting censorship to be a rebel, it's more about my news/data addiction than anything else. If I could find more specific information on what I /will/ have access to I'd be a bit more relaxed about the whole thing
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