Google deals in doubt amid spat with Beijing
By ALEXA OLESEN, Associated Press
1 hr 2 mins ago - 3/24/2010BEIJING –
Google Inc.'s business ties in China unraveled a little more Wednesday amid a widening backlash
to the U.S. Internet company's decision to move its Chinese search engine offshore in a challenge
to the country's online censorship laws.
While the stand is winning Google praise in the U.S. and other countries, it's threatening to turn
the company into a pariah in China.
A high-profile Communist Party newspaper skewered Google in a front-page story.
And more of its partners and advertising customers in the country appeared to be
distancing themselves from the company.
Google, based Calif., still hopes to expand its non-search operations in China,
but its refusal to play by the government's censorship rules could make that unrealistic.
By challenging the often tetchy government, Google appears to have violated an
unspoken rule of doing business in China, especially in the Internet industry —
whose control Beijing sees as crucial to maintaining its authoritarian rule."Everybody in the Internet space operates under the good graces of the government,
and if the government's not happy with your partner, you probably are going to have to change," said T.R. Harrington, founder and CEO of Shanghai-based Darwin Marketing, which
specializes in advertising for China's search engine market.
Investors already seemed to have concluded that Google won't be bringing in as
much revenue as they once anticipated.
And Google's losses could turn into a windfall for China-based Baidu Inc., which already
held a commanding lead in the country's search market.
Setting up a search engine on Chinese soil four years ago helped Google build
new business relationships. But those alliance have started to fracture since Monday,
when Google started to redirect search traffic from mainland China to an uncensored Hong Kong
service on Monday. Though part of China, Hong Kong has a semiautonomous status due to
its history as a British colony, and Google is not legally required to censor results there.
I know...TL:DR....but this is good stuff so just a few more interesting snips from the article:China's filters eventually could be used to restrict all access to Google's services.
Beijing initially seemed to shrug off Google's move. A government statement called the move
"totally wrong" while a Foreign Ministry spokesman appeared to dismiss it as an isolated business case.
The People's Daily newspaper on Wednesday was more shrill, accusing Google in a
front-page commentary of cooperating with U.S. intelligence forces and suggesting
its decision to move its search engine to Hong Kong was a salvo by U.S. Internet warriors.
"Considering the United States' big push in recent years to prepare for Internet war, perhaps this
could be an exploratory pre-dawn battle," said the commentary in the newspaper's overseas edition. While the U.S. State Department has said it was not involved in Google's decision over its
search engine, a speech by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton championing Internet freedom
added to Beijing's concerns about collusion and aggravated recently tense U.S.-China relations. "Google's decision is a strong step in favor of freedom of expression and information," Sen. Byron Dorgan,
D-N.D., chairman of Congressional-Executive Commission on China, said at a commission hearingWednesday.
"It is also a powerful indictment of the Chinese government's insistence on censorship of the Internet."
LINK to every word 
Subject: U.S. Company tackles China over Censorship/Freedom of Speech 
Wed Mar 24, 2010 7:01 pm
