Ng - Blocked on Weibo: whats not allowed on Chinas version of Twitter (and why)

David Li

Jason Q. Ng is a 2013 Google Policy Fellow at the University of Torontos Citizen Lab and a research consultant for China Digital Times. His work has been featured in Le Monde, the Huffington Post, the Next Web, Asia Pacific Forum, and Shanghaiist. He writes regularly on China for Waging Nonviolence. He lives in New Jersey.

WHAT GETS SUPPRESSED ON

CHINAS VERSION OF TWITTER

(AND WHY)

JASON Q. NG

NEW YORK
LONDON

2013 by Jason Q. Ng

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, in any form, without written permission from the publisher.

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Permissions Department, The New Press, 38 Greene Street, New York, NY 10013.

Published in the United States by The New Press, New York, 2013

Distributed by Perseus Distribution

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Ng, Jason Q., 1984-

Blocked on weibo : what gets suppressed on Chinas version of Twitter (and why) / Jason Q. Ng.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 978-1-59558-885-2 (ebook) 1. Censorship--China. 2. Internet searching--China. 3. Internet--Censorship--China. 4. Internet--Political aspects--China. 5. Freedom of information--China. I. Title.

Z658.C6.N42 2013

363.310951--dc23

2013010628

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10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For Dad, who wouldve been amused by this

Jiang Zemin, Eight Elders, Liaison Office, coup dtat, Shanghai Gang, Operation Yellowbird, Boycott Japanese goods / Boycott Carrefour, Retired Emperor, princelings, the New Left, West Ujimqin, Article 23, February Countercurrent, constitutional democracy, minority problem, red terror, snow lion flag, New Western Hills Symposium, the Union of Chinese Nationalists

50 Cent Party, the Four Gentlemen, over the Great Firewall, Ultrasurf, Combining Cyrillic Millions, WikiLeaks, State Council Information Office, Democracy Wall, Goddess of Democracy, Pangu, Victoria, May 35, Green Dam Girl, criminalization of speech, constitutional court, April 26 editorial, Internet commentators, Internet monitoring

one-night stand, rare beauty, partner swapping, sexual intercourse, meow / tits, Mark Six, dew point, aphrodisiac, foot fetish, nude photograph, without hair, panty hose, people eat people, lesbian, seven deadly sins, incest, marijuana, Demerol, roofied, inject

Xu Qinxian, Jiang Yanyong, Wen Yunsong, Liu Binyan, Peng Liyuan, Fang Lizhi, Ma Mingxin, Liu Di, Wu Yi, Dinh Bo Linh, Feng Zhenghu, Kim Lee, Zhang Xiaoyu, Sun Myung Moon, Wang Wenyi, Fei Xiaotong, Lei Jieqiong, Jimmy Lai, Milarepa, Ngapoi Ngawang Jigme

downfall incident, Wan Wuyi, the Great Flood of August 1975, obituary, Bo Xilai, Chen Xitong, Mein Kampf, Shangcai, unnatural death, rich woman, leave a political party, Song Zuying, Jinzhou Prison, Sujiatun

Open Magazine, parade, satellite television, labor strike, organizer, charter, Twitter, never forget, empty stool, flash mob, The Flower of Freedom, March Student Movement, May Fourth Movement, student leader, Dynamic China, Radio Free Asia / Voice of America, Independent Chinese PEN, Boxun.com

tank, massacre, Eastern Lightning, plain clothes, persecution, the September 11 attacks, blockade, machete, hidden microphone, Kashi / Kashgar, HMX, bloodstained housing map, wound, leak, East Changan Avenue, Sino-Russian Secret Treaty, violent demolition, Tibetan protest, cobalt-60, KJ 200, inciting subversion of state power

hair bacon, calico cat, Canadian French, Islam, Hoobastank, Lucky Star, warlord, medicine patch flag, sky burial, sensitive, Communist dog, dry your mother, Zhina, river crab, Sacred Heart Cathedral, flood control monument, Bloomberg, CAPTCHA, conquered nation, Whler / Villar, supplement, black angel, color of leopard

This project started with an image. No, it wasnt the famed image of the tank man staring down a column of armored vehicles outside Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Nor was it an image of any specific dissident act or a photo of protesters. In fact, this image wasnt meant to be artistic at all. But in the stark way it communicates its contents, one might even call it poetic.

The above graph shows the volume of online search activity, as tracked by Google, originating from the northwestern Chinese province of Xinjiang. The graph lays bare the ability of a government to control what was thought to be uncontrollable: the Internet.

Inspired by this graph and by the impressive attempts of China Digital Timess website to track banned words across various Chinese online services,this book does not provide is a scathing critique of Chinas Internet policies, a position I feel is better left to those who are more directly connected to, more knowledgeable of, and more affected by the situation, and I hope readers dont automatically assume this book is a rant against China. Rather, Blocked on Weibo shares an affinity with the mission statement of the now defunct Tunnel, an underground mainland Chinese electronic magazine, which once wrote,

Instead of indulging in the talk of noble causes and great aspirations, it is a better idea to quietly and patiently study the details of the technology. If we have turned our inaugural statement into a technical manual, it is because we are trying to practice this idea. It may be easier for us to approach our shared dream of freedom and democracy through the sideways of technical details than the public square of seething emotions.

Thus, by impartially examining these various censored keywords, we may perhaps see more clearly the sorts of challenges facing Chinese officials, companies, and Internet users as they confront and utilize social media. If nothing else, youll get a little Chinese history lesson from each words explanation.

Weibo is run by a private company, Sina, which is legally responsible for the content that users upload to the website. Weibo

Weibo may have started as a Twitter clone, and for Western readers unfamiliar with the service its still probably simplest to talk about it as such. But in recent years, Weibo has developed a number of features that Twitter doesnt have, including semi-threaded comments, events, polls, games, Facebook-like apps, instant messaging, and community portals. Aided by Chinas banning of Twitter and the addition of these attractive features, Sina Weibo has become the undisputed first source for real-time information in China, with over 350 million registered accounts. Whenever I refer to Weibo in this book, I am referring to Sinas weibo service (as opposed to its primary competitor, Tencent, and Tencents weibo site). Chinese websites are required by law to monitor themselves and remove any material that is deemed offensive by the government. Sina Weibo is allowed in China, whereas Facebook and Twitter are not, because Sina, like all major Chinese Internet websites, is willing to censor the sites content.