Mini Blog Post

I just experienced my first taste of good, old-fashioned Chinese censorship over the internet. I was doing some research for my one-on-one topic with a Chinese professor out of the government and history departments (let me add that my topic is US-China Relations from 1979-2009, including the contentions period in mid 1989 that we Americans like to call the Tiananmen Square Massacre) and after a minute I realized that I was staring at a blank page. I pressed F5 a couple of times, thinking my browser was just acting stupid. Then I looked at the url and saw "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_square_protests_of_1989."


I also want to share the story of how I had to sign up for internet because I feel like it will make any web proxy that exists impotent. First you go to a building to sign up to use the internet on one of their computers. Then you stand in line so they can look up your application, make sure you filled it out correctly and then have you pay for opening an account and getting access for a certain number of months. If you application was filled out incorrectly in anyway, as mine was, you will have to wait for a computer to open up so you can fill out the form, again, then stand in line, again. When you get past hurdle #2 you have to go back to those computers and register again for internet using a special password they give you. Then you return back to your room, hope someone you know has software called "ruijie" that you install on your computer (they call it a support program, but it's just extra censorship support for the government), then you put in your id and the password that you chose when doing the initial application. And when that's all said and done, you have internet! I think an interesting point to make is that most of the censorship technology used in China comes out of Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT), so you better not send me anything subversive to the government or they'll find me and look me up. And who honestly wants to be locked up in a Chinese prison...


Btw, pictures coming soon!