Corporate Bravery from Google. Why now Google? UPDATE: A Google Spokesperson just emailed me this: “This is not about market share. While our revenues from China are really immaterial, we did just have our best ever quarter [in China].” Techcrunch’s Japan writer, Serkan Toto, tweeted at me tonight: “Astonished about how some people, i.e. @scobleizer, idolize Google now. What did G do in the past 4 years in CH besides playing along?” Randy Holloway, who works at Microsoft, tweets: “You are a good guy, but you have lost your mind today. UPDATE: While I was writing this post, TechCrunch ran a post that said it was about business (and made the point that Google did this because it was losing again). I think both questions are legitimate (albeit misguided) and they aren’t the only ones asking. First, let’s take on the question of Google losing in China. Why is it too cynical?
Also, Google, and most other tech companies, have many employees there who develop features for the US market. Google has EVERY INCENTIVE to kiss Chinese ass. The push and pull of China. Sarah Lacy, on Techcrunch, wrote that the Google move today was more about business than about ethics. I am torn by her article, but to explain why I need to go into the push and pull of China and how it rips the heart out of US companies. I’ve visited China twice, once in 1995 to work at a computer show there, and again last year to visit entrepreneurs in Shanghai, get a tour of Seagate’s factory, and see inside PCH, which is one of the supply chains that many of your favorite technology companies use, and visit a blogger conference. As an American I saw two opposite poles: one of unending opportunity and one of unending frustration of dealing with the government.
First, the pull. The opportunity was in my face. When I visited Shanghai I met up with Gary Rieschel, one of the top VCs in the world (he helped start Softbank). There he showed me a nicely profitable taxi screen company and we had to wait for nine taxis before we found one with his screen. But now the push. Why? Rebecca MacKinnon: Google Gets On the Right Side of History - WS. Google’s China Stance: More about Business than Thwarting Evil. Writing about China as an American is always tricky, but nowhere near as tricky as what an American company faces doing business there. Let me say upfront, I don’t envy Google. The company has had more success in China than a lot of other big Valley names, but isn’t and will likely never be the market leader.
And to get that far, many in the West feel Google has had to compromise its “do-no-evil” ethics by agreeing to some of the government’s censorship rules. Google has been damned either way: China is too big of a market to ignore, but getting as far as they have has come at a steep price to their reputation and international (read: Western) integrity. Enter the now famous blog post (that was notably, only on the English-language site) saying that Google was no longer playing by the Chinese government’s rules and was prepared to close down Chinese operations if it came to that. 1.
Google’s business was not doing well in China. 2. 3. Google leaves censorship to China's experts. High performance access to file storage Comment Amnesty International was among the human rights organisations scrambling to congratulate Google for threatening to pull out of China today. Which just shows how much human rights activists know about technology.
Come to think of it, if human rights campaigners did know more about technology, they might think twice about using Gmail accounts. It’s hard to see Google’s move as a brave and principled strike against China’s intolerance of political dissent. It’s also worth noting that in its blog posting announcing its change of heart, the fact that the China-based attacks on its systems were concentrated on human rights’ activists' emails was only the second point. Google said it has tightened up its own systems, and is informing other companies affected – as well as going running to the likes of Hillary Clinton, who is threatening serious conversations with China over the issue. So, if Google decides to withdraw from China, what's the cost? Soul Searching: Google’s position on China might be many things, “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of great moral crises maintain their neutrality.” – John F.
Kennedy How exciting! Google has issued a statement saying it’s un-censoring its search results in China! And it’s threatening to pull out of the country completely, in retaliation for an alleged (and, we’re led to infer, government-backed) attempt to hack the Gmail accounts of Chinese dissidents! As a tech story, it has all the makings of a classic diplomacy thriller; a modern-day Cuban Missile Crisis with Google as Adlai Stevenson, waving photos of hacked emails at China’s Valerian Zorin.
“Don’t wait for the translation! Unsurprisingly for such a bold move, Google’s statement – that it would no longer be bowing to Chinese censorship, having spent four years doing precisely that – has sparked debate amongst my esteemed friends and colleagues in the blogosphere. On one side, Robert Scoble has congratulated Google, almost unconditionally. So who is right? The Price Of Google In China. The news this past week that Google would cease the censorship of its search results in China, and could well be forced to entirely halt operations in the country as a result, is quite simply one of the most interesting stories to come along in the tech sphere in a long time.
The reality is that it’s not just a tech story; it spills into the world of international politics and beyond. And it could have wide-reaching ramifications far into the future. Did I mention there was hacking involved and potential espionage? There are just so many angles to this story, and nearly everyone seems to have an opinion. My position is a simple one that is twofold: it’s never too late to do the right thing. The people hooting and hollering immediately following Google’s post on the matter may have been being a bit naive about some of the causes behind this move, but that doesn’t make their immediate reaction that this is great news, any less true.
Google did the right thing. [photo: flickr/pamhule] Assessing Google's showdown with China: Does it make sense? | Be. On the surface, Google's threat to shut down its China operations after a cyberattack on its infrastructure looks like sheer business lunacy. How can the search giant give up on the world's biggest growth market? It's easier than you'd think. First, the background. Google in a long blog post detailed how it suffered a cyberattack that changed the company's outlook on China. The key points (Techmeme): The attack was coordinated and focused on 20 large companies and some appear to be confirming that they were also involved.The aim of this attack was to get the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.The attack also focused on U.S., China and Europe-based Gmail accounts that supported human rights in China.Google is way public about this attack and its reaction to them.Google says it won't continue to censor search results and may just shut down operations in China.
Reading all of this laid out in a blog post can be summed up in one word: Wow. There may be a regulatory payoff. The impact of Google’s bold move » Reflections by Susie Wee. Today many people in China are sad. Who’s sad? The people in China who most strongly support Google. These people were excited about Google’s services- search, docs, wave, android, chrome, and all the other services that were yet to come. Google could do no wrong in their eyes, and they were ready to be the early adopters of any service, be it alpha, beta, or product, that Google would deploy.
With its bold statement towards the Chinese government, Google basically closed their doors in China. Sure there are problems. I wrote a blog post about how to do business in Asia. Unfortunately, Google did just the opposite today. I am a big fan of Google. I agree with some points that Sarah Lacy made in her post on this topic. In any case, let me speculate a bit about the potential business impacts. Companies will be hesitant about advertising on Google China, which will hurt Google’s current business in China.
One of my colleagues told me about some advice he had gotten early in his career. Google China: Google Will Stop Censoring its Searches with China. There has been a recent bold statement released from the inner sanctum of Google. Paraphrased: Google said to China, “Due to your noncompliance with our request, we will stop censoring all our searches to google.cn”. With this assertion, this could spell the end of Google and all its business operation in China should one party doesn’t agree with the approach of the other end. These non-compliance could be expounded into these excerpts taken from google’s statement stating that they received recent sophisticated attacks all coming from China targeting “Chinese Human Rights Activist”.
First, this attack was not just on Google. As part of our investigation we have discovered that at least twenty other large companies from a wide range of businesses–including the Internet, finance, technology, media and chemical sectors–have been similarly targeted. Second, we have evidence to suggest that a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.
Google sends a shockwave through Chinese internet | Analysis | For years, security experts in the US and Europe have known that Chinese hackers sanctioned by its government have been probing the computer systems of important organisations – whether aerospace companies, science laboratories or the British parliament, which was targeted at the end of 2005. Now Google has discovered that it, too, is among the targets of those attacks.
The internet giant has declared cyberwar on the world's biggest nation. Who would be brave enough to take on more than a billion people? But the method it has chosen is to flood them with the resource that is so plentiful: the world's information. It is a resource that China's population is hungrier than ever to get. News of tainted milk scandals, cover-ups over shoddy buildings that collapse in earthquakes, riots in Tibet … humans are infovores, always keen – once they have raised themselves beyond subsistence – to know more and more about the world around them. Can China's repressive government survive that? China Says Internet Firms Abiding by Its Laws Welcome (Update1) A make-shift shrine outside the Google Beijing office People congregate outside the Google Beijing office A message of support for Google Inc.
People inside the Google office in Beijing The Chinese flag outside the Google Beijing office Jan. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Ben McLannahan of the Financial Times' Lex commentary team talks with Bloomberg's Linzie Janis about Google Inc.' Jan. 14 (Bloomberg) -- China, in a veiled response to the announcement by Google Inc. that it will stop censoring its Chinese Web site, said it welcomed global Internet companies provided they obey laws that restrict their content.
“The Chinese government administers the Internet according to law and we have explicit stipulations over what content can be spread on the Internet,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said at a regular briefing in Beijing today. Google said Jan. 12 in a blog posting that it had been subjected to “highly sophisticated” cyber attacks originating from China. Unfiltered Searches --Michael Forsythe. After Google’s Loud Stance on China, U.S. Treads Lightly - NYTim. UPDATE 1-White House backs Google, seeks China explanation | Reu. Google and China: the attacks and their aftermath. Yesterday's announcement that Google would stop censoring its search results in China, and that the company had been the victim of sophisticated Chinese cyberattacks, was a Big Deal; Secretary of State Hilary Clinton even felt the need to weigh in on it with an official statement. And she wasn't the only one with an opinion, insight, or suggestion to share. Clinton weighs in.
Her brief statement, in full, reads: "We have been briefed by Google on these allegations, which raise very serious concerns and questions. We look to the Chinese government for an explanation. Don't worry about your data, enterprise users! Girouad stresses that the attack was "not an assault on cloud computing" and "we believe our customer cloud-based data remains secure. " Seriously, stop clicking on those e-mail links. A Northrop Grumman report notes that this happened at a US research lab in recent years. EFF calls for other firms to follow Google's lead. Not business as usual. The cynics scoff. Clearing Up Confusion on Google and China - China Real Time Repo.