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The parent is modded as flamebait but has a good point. There are sufficient complexities to this story that the choice of title by kdawson should be viewed as somewhat sensationalist.\

You know... I almost meta-moderated this post to try and get the "Troll" removed. The only thing that stopped me was the fact that he accused the editor, rather than the story. I don't know enough about the editor's history to support calling everything he does a troll. This particular story, on the other hand, is about as trolling and biased as I've seen. One could certainly argue that Google's share holders made the wrong decision here, but there's a pretty good argument the other way too. From the headline you'd think Google's board voted in favor of genoncide or something.

They had exactly two choices, both of them with potentially "evil" outcomes, and they chose what they considered the lesser evil. Disagree with them? Fine. That hardly qualifies them as heartlessly evil. Did profit come into the question? Probably... If I have exactly two choices, both with good and bad possible outcomes, but one is likely to make me a few bucks at least... Well, I know I'd probably choose that one.

Yeah, it's actually quite a shock. Who would have ever guessed that Shareholders would be more concerned with their investments than with changing the domestic policy of a foreign government? That's a total surprise.

google is a company, NOT a person. It's purpose is to survive and make profit. I hate it when people act as if corporations are suppose to save the world or something. Professional Ethics aside google's job is to make money and with half the world population being situated in Asia opening up market share there early is important. If people are so cought up with the censorship of the Chinese government then stop buying Chinese products.

i agree with you (and google) about the right course of action here, and that folks like Amnesty are missing the big picture or long view, but i think you're off base on one point:

Taking a stand in prinicple is just that, in principle with no effect on things in the real world.

principled stands can and do often have an effect on the real world. in this particular case, having Google make a hard-line principled stance would have no effect on China because Google has lots of competitors that aren't likely to make the same decision. similar debates have come up in the US federal government, and it's a very different question there. there's no logical inconsistency between voting against this Google-specific measure (because it'd have no positive effect, and arguably a negative one by removing the best information service and replacing it with an inferior one) and voting for government mandated restrictions (because getting Google, Yahoo!, and Microsoft aligned could be powerful enough to make a difference in China's policy), even though both represent hard-line principled stands.

In a shareholder meeting, the only question being asked is "Does this raise or lower our income?"

while this is certainly true the vast majority of the time in practice, there's no particular reason it has to be. lots of people are interested in things other than making money, and shareholder's meetings are a way of expressing to the board all the shareholder's interests. this is why many corporations keep much of the stock off the market, so they can be sure to dictate at least some substantial portion of those interests.

Nonsense.

Everytime we buy a product from China we infuse money into that economy. We give someone the choice (and it IS their choice) to put down their shovel and give up the agrarian lifestyle that their ancestors have had for the last _6000 years_ (it's China, remember), and do something different.

For every poverty stricken child that ends up working in a factory making shoes, we can say two things about that child
- they are more likely to be able to eat than if they had no other source of income
- they are less likely to be forced into child prostitution, which is a serious concern in many developing economies in Asia

It is understandable to think "we enjoy certain labor and lifestyle conditions in the west; everyone should have them". But it's irrational and erroneous. Sectors of the Chinese economy and populace have gone from agrarian to industrial to information based in a fraction of the time it took Europe and the US to do so.

Look at South Korea, which essentially got its start in 1950. For a long time there was a command economy and a suppression of democracy and personal wealth. Yet in fewer than 50 years South Koreas standard of living and material wealth has grown such that in many ways it outpaces the US. Democracy has arrived.

It makes no sense to talk about "working conditions in china" as some sort of single faceted problem. China is a country where rural poor still die from flooding every year on one end, and Hong Kong on the other, which has the worlds highest-per-capita Rolls Royce ownership (despite draconian anti-car rules).

Money is freedom, because freedom in its most abstract sense is choice, and nothing facilitates the execution of personal choice better than having money. The more money we infuse into the Chinese economy, not via government action, but into the leaf nodes -- the people making shoes or any of the other things westerners are calling "slave labor", the more freedom we inject into the most critical portions of the Chinese populace.

I'm no happier about kids working in factories than Americans were at the time of the US industrial revolution. But what I am happy about is that everywhere the American system (which is really the British system) has taken root, the total length of time taken to transition from "agrarian poverty" to "modern economy with full human rights, individual liberty, and high standard of living for the majority" become shorter and shorter, every time.

Now to be fair, "we" are infusing all of this money into China because we think it is in our best interest, not because of some altrusitic paternalism. However -- and this is the "invisible hand" theory showing up -- the Chinese are working for us because _they_ beleive it is in _their_ best interest. The result of our profit-driven desire is that a ton of money is infused into the Chinese economy, which DOES have real benefits to real humans in China.

Suggesting that we cut off that money is somehow altruistic or responsible or any other number of things is simply assinine in the face of a real analysis. You're essentially telling a 10 year old girl who works in a factory "for your own good, we're not going to let you work at all. Good luck finding food or taking care of your sick parents".

Right. They think that the government have done wonders for their country, and I find little evidence with which to argue.

I'm with Ron Paul on this issue - I don't agree with his negative opinion of China, but I agree with his 'attitude'. I don't agree with his 'desire' to see the government 'collapse' so much as see it change for the better.
If you want to influence another country's future, you need to work from a place of cooperation, not by attempting to bully them.

"Free trade cannot be enforced through threats or by resorting to international protectionist organizations such as the WTO. Even if the Chinese are recalcitrant in opening up their markets, it is not the role of the United States government to lecture the Chinese government on what it should or should not do in its own economy."

China has millions, of rich people, by western standards. It even has 345,000 millionaires according to this [google.com] report. I was in Beijing last summer and the prices at the high-class shops are higher than in New York. You can bet that it's those people who mostly own a PC and an internet connection...

> Either that or they agree that a little information is better for the
> chinese people than none at all.

Your statement assumes that without Google, the people of China would have no
information. This is blatantly incorrect: Google ( 25% market share ) implements the same Government-mandated filters as Baidu ( 62% market share ).

Google's presence in China is simply about gaining a foothold in a potentially
lucrative market. ``Empowering the people'' has nothing to do corporate
strategy.

But they can't give the people anything other the China approved stories.
What happens when China wants Google to misrepresent information?

I say empower the people to get to your uncensored search engine.

I don't think either is of much concern to China. In my experience, almost no one uses Google in China - really only foreigners such as myself. Chinese people generally use a Chinese equivalent.