The major difference I find in these four years is that, in 2007 we could freely access facebook, orkut, picasa and any number of community portals and blogspots in China. (four years back, I stayed in Tianjin, one of the biggest cities in China after Beijing and Shanghai) Now, at present, none of these websites and portals can be opened. There are strict monitoring and blocking of many a portal that may cause inconvenience to the ruling deispensation in Beijing
Still, there are loopholes. Internet is flooded with proxy websites. Many proxy sites are payable. They help people access all blocked sites and portals for a price. Just pay USD 5 per month through Paypal, the entire internet is unblocked for you. I too used one of the proxy sites to keep my blogspot ticking. There are a few free proxies too, which, many are using for opening Facebook.
Media is under government control. All television programmes are aired after getting government’s nod. People are allowed to watch what the government decides. It reminds us of the period of 1970s and early 80s in India. In the age of internet, people has many other alternatives to get the news. But, I am afraid, the citizens of that country may not dare peep into any stuff that is presumed to be anti-government.
There are so many Chinese television channels on the air. Whereever we go, we can only come across such channels. CCTV, the government owned 'Doordarshan' looks to be as boring as the latter one. People may not hae any choice but to be content with what they get. They learnt the art of being cintent. Ask no quastions. This is what even the genaral public loves to tell us.
CCTV has an English News channel. There they always air the government propoganda besides the news about protests for democracy and enonomic equality elsewhere in the world. Anna Hazare's fasting, Egyptian and Libyan unrest and the Occuppy Wall Street dmonstrations were all found prominant place in the news channel. We can hardly find any news about a protest being taken out on the Chniese streets. We do not even know that the Jasmine Revolution that started in Tunisia an year back had repercussions in China too. Inconvenient news items cannot penetrate the iron curtain so easily. The Chinese version of the Jasmine revolution was nipped in the bud by the authorities.
There are so many Chinese television channels on the air. Whereever we go, we can only come across such channels. CCTV, the government owned 'Doordarshan' looks to be as boring as the latter one. People may not hae any choice but to be content with what they get. They learnt the art of being cintent. Ask no quastions. This is what even the genaral public loves to tell us.
CCTV has an English News channel. There they always air the government propoganda besides the news about protests for democracy and enonomic equality elsewhere in the world. Anna Hazare's fasting, Egyptian and Libyan unrest and the Occuppy Wall Street dmonstrations were all found prominant place in the news channel. We can hardly find any news about a protest being taken out on the Chniese streets. We do not even know that the Jasmine Revolution that started in Tunisia an year back had repercussions in China too. Inconvenient news items cannot penetrate the iron curtain so easily. The Chinese version of the Jasmine revolution was nipped in the bud by the authorities.
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