Behind the Great Firewall of China
-
0:01 - 0:05In the past several days, I heard people talking about China.
-
0:05 - 0:09And also, I talked to friends about China and Chinese Internet.
-
0:09 - 0:12Something is very challenging to me.
-
0:12 - 0:15I want to make my friends understand:
-
0:15 - 0:18China is complicated.
-
0:18 - 0:21So I always want to tell the story, like,
-
0:21 - 0:24one hand it is that, the other hand is that.
-
0:24 - 0:27You can't just tell a one sided story.
-
0:27 - 0:30I'll give an example. China is a BRIC country.
-
0:30 - 0:35BRIC country means Brazil, Russia, India and China.
-
0:35 - 0:41This emerging economy really is helping the revival of the world economy.
-
0:41 - 0:44But at the same time, on the other hand,
-
0:44 - 0:47China is a SICK country,
-
0:47 - 0:53the terminology coined by Facebook IPO papers -- file.
-
0:53 - 1:00He said the SICK country means Syria, Iran, China and North Korea.
-
1:00 - 1:04The four countries have no access to Facebook.
-
1:04 - 1:08So basically, China is a SICK BRIC country.
-
1:08 - 1:09(Laughter)
-
1:09 - 1:11Another project was built up
-
1:11 - 1:14to watch China and Chinese Internet.
-
1:14 - 1:17And now, today I want to tell you my personal
-
1:17 - 1:23observation in the past several years, from that wall.
-
1:23 - 1:26So, if you are a fan of the Game of Thrones,
-
1:26 - 1:31you definitely know how important a big wall is for an old kingdom.
-
1:31 - 1:36It prevents weird things from the north.
-
1:36 - 1:39Same was true for China.
-
1:39 - 1:43In the north, there was a great wall, Chang Cheng.
-
1:43 - 1:48It protected China from invaders for 2,000 years.
-
1:48 - 1:52But China also has a great firewall.
-
1:52 - 1:57That's the biggest digital boundary in the whole world.
-
1:57 - 2:01It's not only to defend the Chinese regime from overseas,
-
2:01 - 2:05from the universal values, but also to prevent
-
2:05 - 2:08China's own citizens to access the global free Internet,
-
2:08 - 2:14and even separate themselves into blocks, not united.
-
2:14 - 2:18So, basically the "Internet" has two Internets.
-
2:18 - 2:22One is the Internet, the other is the Chinanet.
-
2:22 - 2:26But if you think the Chinanet is something
-
2:26 - 2:32like a deadland, wasteland, I think it's wrong.
-
2:32 - 2:38But we also use a very simple metaphor, the cat and the mouse game,
-
2:38 - 2:41to describe in the past 15 years
-
2:41 - 2:44the continuing fight between Chinese
-
2:44 - 2:48censorship, government censorship, the cat,
-
2:48 - 2:54and the Chinese Internet users. That means us, the mouse.
-
2:54 - 2:58But sometimes this kind of a metaphor is too simple.
-
2:58 - 3:03So today I want to upgrade it to 2.0 version.
-
3:03 - 3:07In China, we have 500 million Internet users.
-
3:07 - 3:12That's the biggest population of Netizens, Internet users, in the whole world.
-
3:12 - 3:17So even though China's is a totally censored Internet,
-
3:17 - 3:21but still, Chinese Internet society is really booming.
-
3:21 - 3:24How to make it? It's simple.
-
3:24 - 3:26You have Google, we have Baidu.
-
3:26 - 3:30You have Twitter, we have Weibo.
-
3:30 - 3:33You have Facebook, we have Renren.
-
3:33 - 3:38You have YouTube, we have Youku and Tudou.
-
3:38 - 3:42The Chinese government blocked every
-
3:42 - 3:46single international Web 2.0 service,
-
3:46 - 3:49and we Chinese copycat every one.
-
3:49 - 3:50(Laughter)
-
3:50 - 3:55So, that's the kind of the thing I call smart censorship.
-
3:55 - 3:59That's not only to censor you.
-
3:59 - 4:03Sometimes this Chinese national Internet policy is very simple:
-
4:03 - 4:06Block and clone.
-
4:06 - 4:11On the one hand, he wants to satisfy people's need of a social network,
-
4:11 - 4:14which is very important; people really love social networking.
-
4:14 - 4:17But on the other hand, they want to keep the server
-
4:17 - 4:21in Beijing so they can access the data any time they want.
-
4:21 - 4:26That's also the reason Google was pulled out from China,
-
4:26 - 4:27because they can't accept the fact
-
4:27 - 4:32that Chinese government wants to keep the server.
-
4:32 - 4:38Sometimes the Arab dictators didn't understand these two hands.
-
4:38 - 4:41For example, Mubarak, he shut down the Internet.
-
4:41 - 4:44He wanted to prevent the Netizens [from criticizing] him.
-
4:44 - 4:50But once Netizens can't go online, they go in the street.
-
4:50 - 4:53And now the result is very simple.
-
4:53 - 4:59We all know Mubarak is technically dead.
-
4:59 - 5:04But also, Ben Ali, Tunisian president,
-
5:04 - 5:05didn't follow the second rule.
-
5:05 - 5:09That means keep the server in your hands.
-
5:09 - 5:15He allowed Facebook, a U.S.-based service,
-
5:15 - 5:19to continue to stay on inside of Tunisia.
-
5:19 - 5:22So he can't prevent it, his own citizens to post
-
5:22 - 5:25critical videos against his corruption.
-
5:25 - 5:29The same thing happend. He was the first
-
5:29 - 5:32to topple during the Arab Spring.
-
5:32 - 5:37But those two very smart international censorship policies
-
5:37 - 5:43didn't prevent Chinese social media [from] becoming a really public sphere,
-
5:43 - 5:49a pathway of public opinion and the nightmare of Chinese officials.
-
5:49 - 5:54Because we have 300 million microbloggers in China.
-
5:54 - 5:57It's the entire population of the United States.
-
5:57 - 6:01So when these 300 million people, microbloggers,
-
6:01 - 6:06even they block the tweet in our censored platform.
-
6:06 - 6:10But itself -- the Chinanet -- but itself can create
-
6:10 - 6:14very powerful energy, which has never happened
-
6:14 - 6:16in the Chinese history.
-
6:16 - 6:212011, in July, two [unclear] trains crashed,
-
6:21 - 6:23in Wenzhou, a southern city.
-
6:23 - 6:24Right after the train crash,
-
6:24 - 6:29authorities literally wanted to cover up the train, bury the train.
-
6:29 - 6:32So it angered the Chinese Netizens.
-
6:32 - 6:35The first five days after the train crash,
-
6:35 - 6:39there were 10 million criticisms of the posting
-
6:39 - 6:43on social media, which never happened in Chinese history.
-
6:43 - 6:46And later this year, the rail minister
-
6:46 - 6:51was sacked and sentenced to jail for 10 years.
-
6:51 - 6:56And also, recently, very funny debate between
-
6:56 - 7:00the Beijing Environment Ministry
-
7:00 - 7:03and the American Embassy in Beijing
-
7:03 - 7:06because the Ministry blamed
-
7:06 - 7:08the American Embassy for intervening in
-
7:08 - 7:11Chinese internal politics by disclosing
-
7:11 - 7:14the air quality data of Beijing.
-
7:14 - 7:21So, the up is the Embassy data, the PM 2.5.
-
7:21 - 7:27He showed 148, they showed it's dangerous for the sensitive group.
-
7:27 - 7:30So a suggestion, it's not good to go outside.
-
7:30 - 7:36But that is the Ministry's data. He shows 50.
-
7:36 - 7:39He says it's good. It's good to go outside.
-
7:39 - 7:43But 99 percent of Chinese microbloggers
-
7:43 - 7:47stand firmly on the Embassy's side.
-
7:47 - 7:51I live in Beijing. Every day, I just watch
-
7:51 - 8:00the American Embassy's data to decide whether I should open my window.
-
8:00 - 8:04Why is Chinese social networking, even within the censorship,
-
8:04 - 8:09so booming? Part of the reason is Chinese languages.
-
8:09 - 8:12You know, Twitter and Twitter clones have a kind of
-
8:12 - 8:15a limitation of 140 characters.
-
8:15 - 8:19But in English it's 20 words or a sentence with a short link.
-
8:19 - 8:22Maybe in Germany, in German language, it may be just "Aha!"
-
8:22 - 8:25(Laughter)
-
8:25 - 8:31But in Chinese language, it's really about 140 characters,
-
8:31 - 8:33means a paragraph, a story.
-
8:33 - 8:37You can almost have all the journalistic elements there.
-
8:37 - 8:41For example, this is Hamlet, of Shakespeare.
-
8:41 - 8:45It's the same content. One, you can see exactly
-
8:45 - 8:51one Chinese tweet is equal to 3.5 English tweets.
-
8:51 - 8:55Chinese is always cheating, right?
-
8:55 - 8:59So because of this, the Chinese really regard this
-
8:59 - 9:04microblogging as a media, not only a headline to media.
-
9:04 - 9:07And also, the clone, Sina company is
-
9:07 - 9:09the guy who cloned Twitter.
-
9:09 - 9:12It even has its own name, with Weibo.
-
9:12 - 9:14"Weibo" is the Chinese translation for "microblog".
-
9:14 - 9:16It has its own innovation.
-
9:16 - 9:20At the commenting area, [it makes] the Chinese Weibo
-
9:20 - 9:24more like Facebook, rather than the original Twitter.
-
9:24 - 9:28So these innovations and clones, as the Weibo and microblogging,
-
9:28 - 9:30when it came to China in 2009,
-
9:30 - 9:34it immediately became a media platform itself.
-
9:34 - 9:39It became the media platform of 300 million readers.
-
9:39 - 9:40It became the media.
-
9:40 - 9:43Anything not mentioned in Weibo,
-
9:43 - 9:48it does not appear to exist for the Chinese public.
-
9:48 - 9:51But also, Chinese social media is
-
9:51 - 9:55really changing Chinese mindsets and Chinese life.
-
9:55 - 9:59For example, they give the voiceless people
-
9:59 - 10:01a channel to make your voice heard.
-
10:01 - 10:07We had a petition system. It's a remedy outside the judicial system,
-
10:07 - 10:10because the Chinese central government wants to keep a myth:
-
10:10 - 10:14The emperor is good. The old local officials are thugs.
-
10:14 - 10:18So that's why the petitioner, the victims, the peasants,
-
10:18 - 10:21want to take the train to Beijing to petition to the central government,
-
10:21 - 10:24they want the emperor to settle the problem.
-
10:24 - 10:27But when more and more people go to Beijing,
-
10:27 - 10:31they also cause the risk of a revolution.
-
10:31 - 10:33So they send them back in recent years.
-
10:33 - 10:37And even some of them were put into black jails.
-
10:37 - 10:41But now we have Weibo, so I call it the Weibo petition.
-
10:41 - 10:43People just use their cell phones to tweet.
-
10:43 - 10:47So your sad stories, by some chance your story
-
10:47 - 10:51will be picked up by reporters, professors or celebrities.
-
10:51 - 10:53One of them is Yao Chen,
-
10:53 - 10:56she is the most popular microblogger in China,
-
10:56 - 11:00who has about 21 million followers.
-
11:00 - 11:03They're almost like a national TV station.
-
11:03 - 11:07If you -- so a sad story will be picked up by her.
-
11:07 - 11:11So this Weibo social media, even in the censorship,
-
11:11 - 11:17still gave the Chinese a real chance for 300 million people
-
11:17 - 11:20every day chatting together, talking together.
-
11:20 - 11:23It's like a big TED, right?
-
11:23 - 11:27But also, it is like the first time a public sphere
-
11:27 - 11:29happened in China.
-
11:29 - 11:32Chinese people start to learn how to negotiate
-
11:32 - 11:35and talk to people.
-
11:35 - 11:39But also, the cat, the censorship, is not sleeping.
-
11:39 - 11:43It's so hard to post some sensitive words on the Chinese Weibo.
-
11:43 - 11:46For example, you can't post the name of the president,
-
11:46 - 11:52Hu Jintao, and also you can't post the city of Chongqing, the name,
-
11:52 - 11:57and until recently, you can't search the surname of top leaders.
-
11:57 - 12:01So, the Chinese are very good at these puns
-
12:01 - 12:05and alternative wording and even memes.
-
12:05 - 12:07They even name themselves -- you know,
-
12:07 - 12:09use the name of this world-changing
-
12:09 - 12:13battle between the grass-mud horse and the river crab.
-
12:13 - 12:15The grass-mud horse is caoníma,
-
12:15 - 12:18is the phonogram for motherfucker,
-
12:18 - 12:25the Netizens call themselves.
-
12:25 - 12:27River crab is héxiè, is the phonogram for
-
12:27 - 12:30harmonization, for censorship.
-
12:30 - 12:35So that's kind of a caoníma versus the héxiè, that's very good.
-
12:35 - 12:41So, when some very political, exciting moments happened,
-
12:41 - 12:47you can see on Weibo, you see a lot of very weird stories happened.
-
12:47 - 12:52Weird phrases and words, even if you have a PhD
-
12:52 - 12:55of Chinese language, you can't understand them.
-
12:55 - 12:58But you can't even expand more, no, because
-
12:58 - 13:01Chinese Sina Weibo, when it was founded
-
13:01 - 13:06was exactly one month after the official blocking of Twitter.com.
-
13:06 - 13:08That means from the very beginning,
-
13:08 - 13:12Weibo has already convinced the Chinese government,
-
13:12 - 13:15we will not become the stage for
-
13:15 - 13:18any kind of a threat to the regime.
-
13:18 - 13:20For example, anything you want to post,
-
13:20 - 13:23like "get together" or "meet up" or "walk,"
-
13:23 - 13:27it is automatically recorded and data mined
-
13:27 - 13:33and reported to a poll for further political analyzing.
-
13:33 - 13:35Even if you want to have some gathering,
-
13:35 - 13:39before you go there, the police are already waiting for you.
-
13:39 - 13:41Why? Because they have the data.
-
13:41 - 13:43They have everything in their hands.
-
13:43 - 13:49So they can use the 1984 scenario data mining of the dissident.
-
13:49 - 13:53So the crackdown is very serious.
-
13:53 - 13:55But I want you to notice a very funny thing
-
13:55 - 13:58during the process of the cat-and-mouse.
-
13:58 - 14:03The cat is the censorship, but Chinese is not only one cat,
-
14:03 - 14:06but also has local cats. Central cat and local cats.
-
14:06 - 14:08(Laughter)
-
14:08 - 14:11You know, the server is in the [central] cats' hands,
-
14:11 - 14:16so even that -- when the Netizens criticize the local government,
-
14:16 - 14:20the local government has not any access to the data in Beijing.
-
14:20 - 14:22Without bribing the central cats,
-
14:22 - 14:26he can do nothing, only apologize.
-
14:26 - 14:28So these three years, in the past three years,
-
14:28 - 14:31social movements about microblogging
-
14:31 - 14:33really changed local government,
-
14:33 - 14:36became more and more transparent,
-
14:36 - 14:39because they can't access the data.
-
14:39 - 14:42The server is in Beijing.
-
14:42 - 14:44The story about the train crash,
-
14:44 - 14:47maybe the question is not about why 10 million
-
14:47 - 14:51criticisms in five days, but why the Chinese central government
-
14:51 - 14:54allowed the five days of freedom of speech online.
-
14:54 - 14:56It's never happened before.
-
14:56 - 15:00And so it's very simple, because even the top leaders
-
15:00 - 15:03were fed up with this guy, this independent kingdom.
-
15:03 - 15:05So they want an excuse --
-
15:05 - 15:08public opinion is a very good excuse to punish him.
-
15:08 - 15:11But also, the Bo Xilai case recently, very big news,
-
15:11 - 15:13he's a princeling.
-
15:13 - 15:17But from February to April this year,
-
15:17 - 15:19Weibo really became a marketplace of rumors.
-
15:19 - 15:23You can almost joke everything about these princelings,
-
15:23 - 15:26everything! It's almost like you're living in the United States.
-
15:26 - 15:31But if you dare to retweet or mention any fake coup
-
15:31 - 15:35about Beijing, you definitely will be arrested.
-
15:35 - 15:41So this kind of freedom is a targeted and precise window.
-
15:41 - 15:45So Chinese in China, censorship is normal.
-
15:45 - 15:47Something you find is, freedom is weird.
-
15:47 - 15:49Something will happen behind it.
-
15:49 - 15:52Because he was a very popular Leftist leader,
-
15:52 - 15:54so the central government wanted to purge him,
-
15:54 - 15:59and he was very cute, he convinced all the Chinese people,
-
15:59 - 16:00why he is so bad.
-
16:00 - 16:04So Weibo, the 300 million public sphere,
-
16:04 - 16:09became a very good, convenient tool for a political fight.
-
16:09 - 16:11But this technology is very new,
-
16:11 - 16:12but technically is very old.
-
16:12 - 16:15It was made famous by Chairman Mao, Mao Zedong,
-
16:15 - 16:18because he mobilized millions of Chinese people
-
16:18 - 16:22in the Cultural Revolution to destroy every local government.
-
16:22 - 16:25It's very simple, because Chinese central government
-
16:25 - 16:27doesn't need to even lead the public opinion.
-
16:27 - 16:32They just give them a target window to not censor people.
-
16:32 - 16:38Not censoring in China has become a political tool.
-
16:38 - 16:42So that's the update about this game, cat-and-mouse.
-
16:42 - 16:44Social media changed Chinese mindset.
-
16:44 - 16:47More and more Chinese intend to embrace freedom of speech
-
16:47 - 16:50and human rights as their birthright,
-
16:50 - 16:53not some imported American privilege.
-
16:53 - 16:57But also, it gave the Chinese a national public sphere
-
16:57 - 17:01for people to, it's like a training of their citizenship,
-
17:01 - 17:04preparing for future democracy.
-
17:04 - 17:06But it didn't change the Chinese political system,
-
17:06 - 17:10and also the Chinese central government utilized this
-
17:10 - 17:13centralized server structure to strengthen its power
-
17:13 - 17:18to counter the local government and the different factions.
-
17:18 - 17:21So, what's the future?
-
17:21 - 17:23After all, we are the mouse.
-
17:23 - 17:27Whatever the future is, we should fight against the [cat].
-
17:27 - 17:31There is not only in China, but also in the United States
-
17:31 - 17:36there are some very small, cute but bad cats.
-
17:36 - 17:37(Laughter)
-
17:37 - 17:44SOPA, PIPA, ACTA, TPP and ITU.
-
17:44 - 17:49And also, like Facebook and Google, they claim they are friends of the mouse,
-
17:49 - 17:53but sometimes we see them dating the cats.
-
17:53 - 17:57So my conclusion is very simple.
-
17:57 - 18:00We Chinese fight for our freedom,
-
18:00 - 18:03you just watch your bad cats.
-
18:03 - 18:06Don't let them hook [up] with the Chinese cats.
-
18:06 - 18:09Only in this way, in the future,
-
18:09 - 18:12we will achieve the dreams of the mouse:
-
18:12 - 18:16that we can tweet anytime, anywhere, without fear.
-
18:16 - 18:23(Applause)
-
18:23 - 18:25Thank you.
-
18:25 - 18:29(Applause)
- Title:
- Behind the Great Firewall of China
- Speaker:
- Michael Anti
- Description:
-
Michael Anti (aka Jing Zhao) has been blogging from China for 12 years. Despite the control the central government has over the Internet -- "All the servers are in Beijing" -- he says that hundreds of millions of microbloggers are in fact creating the first national public sphere in the country's history, and shifting the balance of power in unexpected ways.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 18:51
Jenny Zurawell edited English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China | ||
Jenny Zurawell approved English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China | ||
Jenny Zurawell edited English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China | ||
Ariana Bleau Lugo accepted English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China | ||
Ariana Bleau Lugo edited English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China | ||
Retired user edited English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China | ||
Chuan-Chih Cheng edited English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China | ||
Morton Bast edited English subtitles for Behind the Great Firewall of China |