【中文标题】拆掉中国的“防火长城”
【原文标题】Taking Down China’s ‘Great Firewall’
【登载媒体】新闻周刊
【原文作者】Daniel Lyons
【原文链接】http://www.newsweek.com/id/230820
为什么说谷歌的姿态是一次公关胜利，也是对北京监控政策的结实一击。
对于矽谷中的大部分人来说，世界上分为两种人：“开窍”的人和“不开窍”的人。“开窍”的人笃信以下描述：互联网是人类历史上曾经发生过的最伟大的事情，它的规模如此巨大、影响如此强烈，应对它的唯一方式是在它席卷一切旧事物的时候登上这列火车，期望营造一个可以盈利的新世界。
“不开窍”的人是那些对抗或拖延互联网脚步的人，符合这个描述的产业包括：电影、音乐、出版、房地产、有线电视、移动电话运营商……这是个很长的名单。现在，位于这个名单首位的是中国。
当谷歌拒绝继续接受中国对其搜索结果进行监察时，传达出的就是这样一个信息。突然间，中国的无良变得人所共知，它被描述成邪恶、落后甚至愚蠢。这是件不可思议的事情，因为中国正在向世人证明自己是多么的老练和超前，尤其是在新科技领域，从太阳能板到高速火车。
但是一涉及到互联网，中国就变得“不开窍”了。笨拙地入侵服务区到被抓住的地步？推崇信息过滤设备？阻止信息的流通？残害搜索引擎以期让人们得到监控版本的真相？
这简直是白痴。中国正在与互联网抗衡，就像其它与之抗衡的人一样，中国必将失败。中国人已经学会如何绕开“防火长城”，使用类似Tor那样的匿名软件，就可以建立一条虚拟通道，绕过过滤器，并且在网络上匿名交流。
移动网络的应用带来了更多的自由。当下，人人都有一个智能手机，这意味着每个人的口袋里都装着一个摄像机和一个虚拟卫星网络。你怎么阻止？伊朗政府关闭了国内的主流媒体，但是新闻和照片还是通过推特传到外界。
没错，政府可以关闭传递推特信息的服务器，但是黑客可以设置代理服务器来绕过障碍。政府再次关闭它们，可是黑客可以设置新的代理服务器。
IT界前辈Stewart Brand曾经说：“信息喜欢自由（免费）。”我相信这句话的意思是“自由”，而不是“免费”。信息不愿意让自己被束缚住。
从理论上讲，我相信政府有能力关闭所有的移动电话、电缆制造和网络运营商。但是想想，当公众被拉回黑暗时代之后会有多么大的反应。
换句话说，你赢不了的。当人们在90年代的时候说互联网将在全球范围内掀起一股颠覆性的力量，所表达的就是这个意思。
不可否认，谷歌在当初就不应该和中国达成这个浮士德（译者注：德国天文学家和巫师，据传将灵魂卖给了魔鬼）式的交易。谷歌为自己辩解说，中国用户至少可以得到有限的谷歌信息，这比一点都没有要强。我认为以上解释都是胡说八道，谷歌就是想挣钱。
但是4年之后，谷歌在中国的发展取得了一些进展，同时也赔了不少钱。谷歌的市场占有率只有百度这个中国搜索引擎的一半，而且看不出有进一步发展的趋势。所以，或许谷歌本来就想退出中国市场，在监察问题上的纠结仅仅是撤退的借口。谷歌拒绝对此发表评论，并让新闻周刊的记者去参考公司博客上关于此事的声明。*
进入一个只被允许销售自己产品的半成品的市场是一种什么感觉？就像美国的汽车生产厂家只有同意卸下一个轮子之后，才被允许在中国销售汽车。
更有趣的是，中国开始偷偷潜入谷歌的服务器，试图挖掘出有关中国人权活动人士的相关信息。而谷歌在遇到这件事时只是说“停手吧”。
但是也许背后有些理论在支持。也许谷歌对于中国的黑客行为并不吃惊。他们也不应当吃惊，因为所有国家，包括我们的国家，都在互联网上做手脚，用网络在监控人民。
所以或许谷歌早已计划好了一切。也许谷歌在2006年的时候就已经与中国达成默契，计划是：要么1，在中国赚到大钱。如果的确如此，他们就对网络监察保持沉默。要么2，在中国的生意不景气，但是找到一个机会来引发有关互联网的监察的争论，以此来吸引一些正面的关注。我的猜想是，即使是谷歌那些自作聪明的天才也不会想到事情会进展到如此地步。但是无论如何，这场争论是我们希望看到的。
互联网的规模比任何一个国家，即使是像中国这样的大国，都要大。之所以把中国称作“不开窍”的人，是为了引起世界上其它国家的关注。
*补充：在这篇报道首次发表之后，一名谷歌发言人告诉新闻周刊，说离开中国的决定与所谓的“借口”无关。谷歌说：“这完全是错误的，实际上中国上个季度的业绩比以往任何时期都要好。”
原文：
Why Google's stand is a public-relations win and a solid blow to Beijing's policy of censorship.
To many in Silicon Valley, the world is divided into two kinds of people: those who "get it," and those who don't. The people who get it are the ones who understand that the Internet is the biggest thing that has ever happened in the history of the human race, a wave so huge and so powerful that the only way to cope with it is to jump on and hope to make money building a new world once the tsunami has laid waste to the old one.
Those who don't get it are the ones who try to fight the Internet wave, or slow it down. Entire industries fit that description: movies, music, publishing, real estate, cable-TV providers, operators of mobile-phone networks—the list goes on. Now, at the top of the list, goes China.
That is the message Google is sending by saying it will no longer comply with China's demand that its search results be censored. Suddenly China is being called out for its transgressions, depicted not just as evil but also, worse yet, as backward and stupid. This is all kind of incredible, because China is proving itself to be so advanced and sophisticated at next-generation technologies, from solar panels to high-speed trains.
Yet when it comes to the Internet, China does not get it. Hacking into servers so clumsily that you get caught? Throwing up filters? Choking off information? Hobbling search engines so that people get a censored version of reality?
This is idiotic. China is fighting the Internet. And like everyone else who fights the Internet, China will lose. People in China can already get around the "Great Firewall," using anonymizers like Tor, which lets you create virtual tunnels so you can sidestep filters and communicate anonymously over the Internet.
The shift to the mobile Web creates even more freedom. These days everybody has a smart phone, which means everyone now has a video camera and a virtual satellite truck right in their pocket. How do you stop that? The government in Iran shut down mainstream media, but news and pictures keep flowing out via Twitter.
Yes, a government can shut down servers that are passing Twitter messages. But then hackers route around the roadblock by setting up proxy servers. The government can hunt those down and block them, but hackers just set up new ones.
Technology guru Stewart Brand once said, "Information wants to be free," and I believe this means "free as in freedom," rather than "free as in beer." Information will not allow itself to be penned up.
I suppose in theory a government could shut down all cell-phone and landline operators and all the Internet service providers. But imagine the backlash when a population gets dragged back into the Dark Ages.
In other words, you can't win. This is what people meant, back in the 1990s, when they said the Internet would be a disruptive force on a global scale.
To be sure, Google should never have made its Faustian bargain with China in the first place. Google rationalized the deal by saying Chinese users were better off getting a limited version of Google than getting no Google at all. My sense is that this claim was rubbish and that Google just wanted to make money.
But four years later Google has made little headway in China and is likely losing a great deal of money there. Google has only half the market share of Baidu, a Chinese search engine, and can't seem to gain ground. So maybe Google just wants to get out of China, and the censorship battle provides cover for a retreat. Google declined to comment on that point and directed NEWSWEEK to the company's blog post on the matter.*
What's the sense of pushing into a market where the government lets you sell only a half-baked version of your product? It's as if U.S. automakers could sell cars in China only if they agreed to ship them with one wheel missing.
On top of that, the Chinese started hacking into Google's servers, trying to dig up information about Chinese human-rights activists. At which point the Google guys just said, "Enough."
But here's a theory. Maybe the Google guys weren't really shocked by China's hacking. They shouldn't have been, since all countries, including our own, are hacking the Internet all the time and using the Web to spy on people.
So maybe Google had this planned all along. Maybe it went along with the China deal back in 2006 figuring that it would either (a) make loads of money in China, and if so, keep quiet about the censorship; or (b) fail to create a thriving business in China, but create an opportunity to generate some positive publicity by sparking a debate about the Internet and censorship. My guess: even the smarty-pants Google geniuses probably don't think that far ahead. But anyway, the debate is one we need to have.
The Internet is bigger than any one country—even a country as big as China. Calling out China as someone who "doesn't get it" is a way of putting the rest of the world on notice.
*Update: After this story originally posted, a Google spokesperson told NEWSWEEK that its decision to possibly leave the country had nothing to do with providing cover. "That's totally untrue," says Google. "We actually just had our best quarter ever in China."
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发表于 2010-2-1 11:01
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发表于 2010-2-1 11:15
互联网应该是免费（自由）的包括所有的软件比如视窗系统~~这话我同意~~其他的~~考虑下