Tim May once said “National Borders aren’t even speedbumps on the information superhighway”. And in most cases, such a statement would seem to be quite true. By its very nature, the Internet is constantly updating and expanding and in this respect, it’s quite an uncontrollable beast. Perhaps this is why the Chinese Government fear it so much and have gone to such drastic lengths to ensure it does not damage their reputation. If you search for “Tibet” or “Tiananmen square” on google in any country, you will most likely find thousands of articles, blogs, opinion, views, debates, etc. Search for it in China – Nothing.

The fact that Google operates a different version of its search engine in China is purely to obey China’s censorship laws. In making such a move, purely for money related matters, some have referred to Google executives as being akin to “Nazi Collaborators“. I tought the Internet could “transcend national boundaries”, it was supposed to be the one medium which could reach places print or broadcast never could. The fact that google denied the Chinese people this service is a decision based solely on the all powerful dollar. Perhaps the Chinese should count themselves lucky they cant search for the word “democracy” because apparently its meaning has got very mixed up somewhere along the way…