China Pinpoints YouTube, CNN, Google News for Tibetan Riot Censorship
March 17 2008 / by Marisa Vitols / In association with Future Blogger.net
Category: Government Year: General Rating: 12
It surfaced yesterday that the Chinese government is selectively denying its citizens access to YouTube. Google News has also been blocked and media coverage has been denied to CNN. According to the AP, the censorship is in response to the dozens of videos posted of Friday’s violent Tibetan protests.
Although Chinese web/news restrictions are nothing new, it’s nevertheless a bit unsettling to see how quickly such a big country can so selectively shut down such potent communication channels. It makes one wonder how fast that could occur in “more advanced” nations given the “right” situation. Surely the contingency plans have been laid even here in the United States and elsewhere.
At the same time, how could such control possibly be sustainable? The advent of cheap videophones and pervasive connectivity are making it very difficult to restrict information. The next generations of both will further add to the censors’ headaches. For better or worse, we’re heading toward an increasingly transparent world in which the cost of suppressing information may soon be too high for nations (and companies) to stomach.
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What are the implications of a new era of transparency, or a functional participatory panopticon? On the positive side, people all over the planet will have access to unedited news from the source, without intermediaries like CNN or the government deciding what’s “important” for viewers to see. This would mark a step further on the route of globalization and the advent of the global citizen. It would also fuel the accelerating rate of communication and business transactions – increasing the amount of information and the rate at which it’s available will level the playing field and expose inefficiencies currently inherent in the system.
Of course, an increase in transparency would also have its negative effects and unintended consequences. There are reasons as to why many people did not want anyone to catch a glimpse of what went on at Abu Graib, why many state actors want to keep the current genocide in Darfur out of the limelight and why the U.S. government is glad social media wasn’t around during the Cuban Missile Crisis. What would have happened if our intelligence had been interrupted during any of these post-9/11 thwarted terror attacks?
So, will the global citizen of the future entrust higher powers with their information? Trends are already beginning to indicate the opposite. A We Media/Zogby Interactive poll conducted less than a month ago reported that 67% of people “believe traditional journalism is out of touch with what Americans want from their news,” that 70% think journalism is important to their quality of life and two thirds are dissatisfied with the quality of journalism they receive in their communities. It also found that nearly half the respondents said their primary source of news and information was the internet, and increase from 40% last year, proving the shift away from traditional news sources. People are seeking better information and increasingly going to places like YouTube to get their news.
As societies are forced to react and strike a new balance between security and transparency needs, what’s going to happen to our contemporary culture and way of life? If you thought that 9/11 catalyzed a new age of global politics, just wait for the profound shifts we’re to experience in the future as governments continue to lose more and more control over information. Nations like the China, the United States, Afghanistan, Sudan, and countless others will need to swiftly adjust to the new age of information flow, or quickly fall behind their nimbler peers.
