{"id":371,"date":"2010-06-21T03:32:07","date_gmt":"2010-06-21T03:32:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rigf.asia\/?page_id=371"},"modified":"2024-01-25T06:50:26","modified_gmt":"2024-01-25T06:50:26","slug":"hong-kong-igf-june-18th-2010-session-1","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/hong-kong-igf-june-18th-2010-session-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Hong Kong IGF \u2013 June 18th, 2010: Session 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Emerging Issues<\/span><\/p>\n

________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n

REAL TIME TRANSCRIPT: Emerging Issues<\/p>\n

Hong Kong IGF
\n 9:30-11:30, Friday 18 June 2010
\n Hong Kong<\/p>\n

DISCLAIMER: Due to the inherent difficulties in capturing a live
\n speaker’s words, it is possible this realtime transcript may
\n contain errors and mistranslations. An edited version of the
\n realtime transcript which amends the inherent errors, will
\n be posted later. LLOYD MICHAUX and APrIGF accept no
\n liability for any event or action resulting from the
\n contents of this transcript.<\/p>\n

________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n

>> : Welcome back to the second day of the Hong Kong
\nInternet Governance Forum.<\/p>\n

The theme of the forum is building vibrant
\ncommunities, realising internet possibilities.<\/p>\n

The hosting organisation of the forum includes
\nAPNIC, APTLD, DotAsia Organisation, Freedom House, the
\nHong Kong Council of Social Service, The Hong Kong
\nFederation of Youth Groups, the Hong Kong Internet
\nRegistration Corporation Ltd, Hong Kong Representative
\nof the Multistakeholder Advisor Group of the IGF,
\nInternet Professional Association, iProA, Internet
\nSociety Hong Kong, NetMission and Office of the
\nHonourable Samson Tam, Legislative Councillor of
\ninformation technology all functional constituent sir.<\/p>\n

Also, we would like to thank our adviser, office of
\nthe Government Chief Information Officer to help enable
\nthis event to happen.<\/p>\n

To make this event successful, we would like to
\nthank our sponsor for their kind support, including our
\ngrand sponsor Microsoft and am nick, Cyberport,
\nHong Kong Internet Registration Corporation Ltd, our
\ncommunity sponsor, APTLD, impact, Japan registry
\nservices and Singapore Internet Research Centre.<\/p>\n

Today, there is simultaneous interpretation into
\nMandarin, Cantonese, English available throughout the
\nday.<\/p>\n

Please feel free to get a headset from the counter,
\nbecause our speaker may conduct the session in Cantonese
\nor English or Mandarin.<\/p>\n

So you may get it as soon as possible.<\/p>\n

Besides, there is sign language available for us
\ntoday.<\/p>\n

Now, may we proceed to the first session of the day,
\nwhich is about the emerging issues of the internet. May
\nI now invite Mr Charles Mok, chairman of the Internet
\nSociety Hong Kong, to start the session for us.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: Welcome back.<\/p>\n

Thank you for coming to our last day of the Asian
\nPacific Regional Internet Governance Forum on a Friday.<\/p>\n

I also want to take this opportunity to welcome our
\npanellists. Today, the topic that we’re going to
\ndiscuss in this session is going to be emerging issues.<\/p>\n

When we were thinking about the agenda for the IGF,
\nwe are seeing that internationally, the so-called —
\na number of so-called emerging issues are becoming more
\nimportant.<\/p>\n

Among these issues, typically, a lot of times,
\nparticularly, for example, because of the impact of the
\nweb 2.0, because of the impact of the social media and
\nso on, a lot of these issues are becoming very
\nimportant, but somehow we, in the IGF context, many
\npeople feel that there needs to be — this needs to be
\nseparated or highlighted in itself as a topic of
\ndiscussion, in addition to the ones that we have been
\ntalking about in the previous days, like critical
\ninternet resources, like security, privacy, openness,
\naccess, diversity and so on.<\/p>\n

Today, I’m very happy that in our local Hong Kong
\nconference, we are able to gather a number of local and
\nregional players in the emerging issues facing us and
\nparticular content and content in the web 2.0 social
\nmedia environment, in particular, how are people using
\nthe internet to further their civic engagement.<\/p>\n

That is the area that we are trying to approach
\ntoday.<\/p>\n

There might be a number of different policy areas
\nthat will be touched upon during the process, during
\nthis discussion, including freedom of expression,
\nintellectual property and so on.<\/p>\n

Today, we have a number of speakers from Hong Kong,
\nmainland China and Taiwan and the US, but of course
\nPeter is also from Hong Kong.<\/p>\n

We are hopefully going to be able to look at these
\nfrom a local, regional or China perspective, as well as
\nan international perspective.<\/p>\n

The order of speakers that I have tried to arrange
\nis that we’ll try to have our local Hong Kong speaker
\nspeak first and then we move on to China and Taiwan and
\nthen finally, a more international and overall
\nperspective from Peter Yu.<\/p>\n

Let me introduce our speakers to you in the order
\nthat they will be speaking.<\/p>\n

First of all, Oiwan Lam, she is the north-east Asia
\neditor of Global Voices On-Line and the editor of
\ninmedia.net that many of you are probably familiar with
\ninside of Hong Kong.<\/p>\n

The second speaker will be Isaac Mao on the far
\nside.<\/p>\n

Issac is not only a very famous blogger in China,
\nalso an early internet entrepreneur, he is also now
\na fellow of the Berkman Centre of the internet in
\nHarvard university.<\/p>\n

After Issac, we are very happy to have Sherman So.
\nSherman used to be a technology journalist with South
\nChina Morning Post, but she has recently written a very
\nfamous, very well received book on the internet in
\nChina, called Red Wired. Sherman will also be talking
\nto us after Issac.<\/p>\n

After that, we will have a perspective from Taiwan.<\/p>\n

Eric Lee, who is the senior Project Manager in the DITI
\nof the Research Centre for IT Innovation of Academia
\nSinica. He is also very active in the open source
\nmovement in Taiwan.<\/p>\n

He will be speaking to us in the Taiwan context.<\/p>\n

Finally, again, Prof Peter Yu, who is the Director
\nof Intellectual Property Law Centre of Drake University
\nLaw School in the US.<\/p>\n

Let us welcome all our panellists.<\/p>\n

To start off, let me turn the microphone over to
\nOiwan and maybe you can tell us what language you would
\nlike to speak in, in case they need to get their
\nheadsets on.<\/p>\n

>> Oiwan Lam: I will talk in Cantonese.<\/p>\n

Today my topic is local and overseas or the
\ninformation flow and the people also at the media, what
\nis their contribution. Why they need to encourage this
\nkind of information flow.<\/p>\n

Before I answer this question, why some people or
\nthe media needs to have local and global information
\nflow.<\/p>\n

First of all, we have to understand why the network,
\nfirst of all, before we understand, we believe that
\ninternet can encourage the abundance of communication,
\nbut what we have seen right now, in different location
\nor regions, we have the same language, even China,
\nTaiwan and Hong Kong, the internet — there is
\na boundary. Because it’s due to our culture and
\npolitical reasons.<\/p>\n

We have two examples here.<\/p>\n

These are two — internet in China, they are hosted
\nin Hong Kong or Hainan island, but you can see here,
\nwithin China’s traffic range, this is RSA, it is very
\nhigh, it is over 3,000. The other internet
\ninmediahk.net, it is in Hong Kong, in Hong Kong, it is
\nabout 944. In Taiwan, it is over 20,000. In China, it
\nis over 300,000. Both internet, they are using Chinese,
\nboth internet, one is in China and one is in Hong Kong,
\nwhich is very close, but in 1510, they have a lot of —
\nthey work in Hong Kong, but the issues they are talking
\nabout is in China.<\/p>\n

But most of the readers are from Hong Kong and so
\nyou can see this is the media is Hong Kong, 1510 is
\nmainly for the mainland China.<\/p>\n

But you can see this is on 16 June, both headlines
\nfrom both websites. 1510, there are a lot of articles
\nof discussion and talk about rich and poor and youth
\nproblem and China’s history overall.<\/p>\n

In Hong Kong side, they are talking about the
\ndiscussion and some of the questions about after the
\n80s.<\/p>\n

As you can see, there is a lot of topics that can be
\ndiscussed together, maybe the youth problem or youth
\nissues or the democratic movement from the sun how
\nrevolution until now, there is a lot to see. Especially
\nin Hong Kong, you can see is one country or ever remarks
\nerr our moving should be interlinked and we cannot be
\nseparated from China from this way, but our readers are
\nseparated and our issues cannot be merged together, even
\nthough economically or politically, we are very close.<\/p>\n

But in the whole society or in the civil level, we
\nare very apart or we are with boundaries. But with the
\nwhole social movement or topics or some innovation, we
\ncannot be able to have an integration.<\/p>\n

Another topic that we have to manage is we have to
\nget a closer look when we go into a medium, do we have
\nenough information? Do we understand the mainland
\nChina, because we have to get this kind of knowledge
\nthrough the media, like TV or newspaper. Is this
\nmainstream media? Are they that helpful? In this map,
\nyou can see these are some segments of media attention
\nmap.<\/p>\n

Every day, within that website, they will show
\na chart within that day, the media, what is their main
\nissue they will play their concern.<\/p>\n

You can see in red for China, but in Africa, not too
\nmany people have their attention on it.<\/p>\n

You can see the media will in different regions,
\nthey will pay much attention to it, but for something
\nequally important, they will simply not have much
\nattention on that.<\/p>\n

This is for Taiwan.<\/p>\n

This is a map from Taiwan. This is a very funny one
\nand a very interesting one and a it can show how
\nTaiwan’s mainstream media, how they are going to do some
\nbias to make some fun.<\/p>\n

For example, China they manufacture poison or
\npolitical or very dirty things. For Africa is always
\ndesert and Canada is heaven for the gay people,
\nhomosexual people.<\/p>\n

That’s why the mainstream media, they gave it like
\na map, they projected in a way like this.<\/p>\n

Even in Hong Kong, maybe they can be able to make
\nthing like that, but for Hong Kong people, they may have
\nthe same objective towards what manufactured from China,
\nbut a lot of topics we did not touch.<\/p>\n

In another example, we are talking about the suicide
\nissue of the FoxConn, when we have to see is framework
\nis sweetshop, is problem for labour.<\/p>\n

So they ignore a lot of other issues.<\/p>\n

One day, I read something. I was born — somebody
\ninterview a person who is a post-80s local worker. He
\nwork in Honda, as well as FoxConn and he told some
\nstory. It was in the 1980s, when he’s born. As the
\nperson, he entered the factory and what kind of
\ndifficulty he’s facing.<\/p>\n

Besides, it’s a kind of abusing of his soul, not
\nonly his body. He has a lot of other love and sex
\nproblem and a lot of the girls he like and then he saw
\nall these girls become the lovers of the management team
\nfrom Taiwan, the girls ran away from him, because most
\nof the suicide in the 12 cases, most of them related to
\nthis love affair.<\/p>\n

There is a lot of uneven levels, because also
\nbecause of the genius and they cannot be very forced and
\ndon’t have the balance and from these are some
\ngrassroots stories, you can see there are a lot of
\nreasons that you have to understand what kind of
\nproblems is existing.<\/p>\n

>From this grass root information, this is very
\nimportant for us, how we are going to handle, understand
\nthese kind of issues.<\/p>\n

In the focus related from China, Taiwan, because
\nFoxConn is from Taiwan, China is also — also for
\nHong Kong, because Hong Kong, there is Hong Kong people
\nhas a lot of investment in China, so these are very
\ninterrelated.<\/p>\n

That’s why we will see we need to conduct a grass
\nroot information bridging.<\/p>\n

That’s why we have to focus on this issue and then
\nwhat right now we should take a closer look.<\/p>\n

What kind of, some of these grass root people trying
\nto do information bridging. One of them is Twitter.
\nTwitter is some spontaneous, they are very — there are
\nsome people who have — they would like to transport
\ntheir information. They will provide this information
\nthey would like to pass on. These people will retreat
\nvery frequently.<\/p>\n

You can see the recruit page. You will know what
\nkind of information that people think are important.
\nThere are some individuals that think these are
\ninformation that they think is very important, so the
\nmessage will get very frequent reading.<\/p>\n

So a lot of people use Twitter or media will collect
\ntheir local or grass root informations from Twitter and
\nthen they are going to express them in the global media.<\/p>\n

In Twitter is a very spontaneous trial and some of
\nthem are very organised. For example, the bridge
\nblogger in China, there’s a similar bridge blogger.
\nThis is one is called the angry Chinese blogger. They
\nare pinpointing to mainstream media overseas. They are
\ngoing to pin point what they think they are not correct,
\nincorrect.<\/p>\n

In the recent months, one is called Cochina, there
\nis volunteers, regularly they will organise some forums
\nand they are going to express it through Twitter or
\ninternet to have it informed in China in realtime.<\/p>\n

But for the Chinese readers, they only can be seen
\nthrough the internet, but this kind of bridging helps
\nthe mainland Chinese to form a more internet civil
\nsociety. Once they see or they are reading or they are
\npaying comments on their page on the internet, these can
\nencourage their discussing atmosphere in what — there
\nis another very important 1617. We can see people,
\na lot of people in China watch for the debate instead of
\nHong Kong, but because in mainland China, they don’t
\nknow or understand Cantonese, so they read it through
\nChinese characters in text. So they understand much
\nbetter of what is the issue.<\/p>\n

Some of the Hong Kong issues, they can pass it to
\nmainland China and help the mainland Chinese development
\nin the civil level.<\/p>\n

Then the third example is Dalai Lama, which is
\nbroadcast through the Google media.<\/p>\n

Officially, the Dalai Lama cannot discuss with the
\nmainland Chinese Government that discuss through the
\nmedia.<\/p>\n

One is NGO affiliates. Global voice on-line is very
\nspecial organisation. Some of the local grass root
\ninformation, they try to translate it into English and
\nshow it to the global readers. Now they develop into
\na very huge volunteer organisation.<\/p>\n

They not only to English, all the things is
\ntranslated into 17 different languages and in the
\nfuture, in different countries, they might try to create
\ntheir own local information and then they will translate
\nit back into English.<\/p>\n

This process, how is one English website and then
\ndevelop into hundreds of volunteers participated of
\norganisation. Because there’s no support and there’s no
\nfunding. Because only people think it’s necessary and
\nthey just come and because it’s very spontaneous and
\nit’s very needed by the local people, because the whole
\ncommunity, the development is getting larger and larger.<\/p>\n

There’s no funding to support. Everything is done
\nby volunteers and and this funding and support is one
\nissue. Why people are so encouraged to do kind of media
\nbridges, because you can see this is a necessity.
\nThere’s a big need for that.<\/p>\n

Recently, for the past six months, Global Voice has
\ntried to cooperate with New York Times, some mainstream
\nmedia, they use some of the English issues, columns on
\nthis information bringing on the mainstream media, which
\nhave another impact to the mainstream media as well.<\/p>\n

In the whole presentation, I’m trying to tell from
\nthe grassroots, they generated some information bridging
\nand how important they are and how they give their
\nimpact. They come to understand our local community as
\nwell as for the global society.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: Let’s get a little bit more of a China
\nperspective.<\/p>\n

Issac Mao was here and give us actually on the
\nsecond day of our conference, he also gave us a — he
\nwas also involved in the Asian Pacific part of our round
\ntable and now we are happy to have him back in the local
\nconference.<\/p>\n

>> Isaac Mao: Actually, it’s the second time I’m trying to
\ntalk about the internet governance model, but I would
\nlike to add more China elements today, because when
\nI talk to people engaged in internet governance, I would
\nlike to say more about the models, how to engage both
\ngrassroots and the governments in the same platform.<\/p>\n

We always have a lot of discussions between
\ngovernments on internet governance in these years, but
\nfew challenges we can see those grassroots really
\nengaged in the dialogues and the conversations to try to
\nimprove the governance quality with the policymakers.<\/p>\n

So it’s not very high quality model, in my mind.<\/p>\n

Today, in spite of those governance model, I would
\nlove to mention more the recent updates in China
\ninternet sphere.<\/p>\n

Let me show you two cases. First, just last night,
\nI went to the Hong Kong parliament. I joined the
\npost-80s activities, but just as an observer. I saw
\ntheir energies.<\/p>\n

But at the same time, I used this application to see
\nhow many people are trying to join together on line,
\njust like Oiwan, many people spontaneously join many
\non-line activities, not by going to the same maybe
\ndiscussion group, but also, you know, using the same
\nhash tag or just talk by themselves, they can see the
\ngroup power from our society.<\/p>\n

So it’s not like traditional internet model,
\na centralised activity, a centralised website or portal
\nwebsite you can join.<\/p>\n

Instead, you can see this application. Actually,
\nI get data from Twitter sphere. You can use the same
\ntag to show how many people are participating or sharing
\nthe same sentiment.<\/p>\n

I see a big amount of people were talking about
\nyesterday’s debate, TV debate.<\/p>\n

But actually, many Chinese people, they are using
\nthis tag — I will switch to another tag. It is called
\nGFW. Many people know that, right? It is called great
\nfirewall.<\/p>\n

When you talk about Great Firewall, you can imagine
\nthat all the Chinese people are in a cage of internet.
\nIt’s not the real internet, because more than 7,000
\ncriteria were put into this censorship system. You
\ncannot access Youtube. You cannot access Twitter,
\nFacebook, et cetera, within China, wherever you are, in
\na hotel, in school, in your home, so you can never
\nreally access those websites without a proxy services.<\/p>\n

But more and more people, they are now aware of the
\ncensorship, the existence of the censorship system, so
\nthey are trying to find ways to bypass it, so-called
\nscaling the wall.<\/p>\n

Before 2008, there are no more than 2 per cent of
\nChinese internet users know the term, because they don’t
\ncare about it. They said that I have a lot of
\ninformation to access. It’s overload already. I can
\naccess Sina, I can access QQ, et cetera, but after 2008,
\nin the past two years, we see so many new criteria were
\nput into Great Firewall system.<\/p>\n

So many, many websites, you never know what’s the
\nreason it was blocked by the Great Firewall system,
\nbecause you have no channel to complain. That’s a black
\nbox. It’s a system you can never complain.<\/p>\n

That’s my argument, that why the internet governance
\nshould be a model like this.<\/p>\n

We need internet users to have their position in
\nthis internet governance model, but as you see, the
\ngovernment, I didn’t put outside of internet users and
\nbusinesses. We would love to get them into the
\nlandscape of internet users. They always say that you
\ninternet users, blah, blah, blah, but they didn’t think
\nthat themselves are also internet users.<\/p>\n

That’s the problem.<\/p>\n

So we should try to get this kinds of model to be
\ndeployed all around the world, to all the governments,
\nall the internet users.<\/p>\n

The internet users should have their own ways to try
\nto push this kind of model to be deployed.<\/p>\n

The second case I want to show is foursquare, which
\nwas blocked just in June 4th, several days ago.<\/p>\n

Why? Because foursquare, it’s a location based
\nservice and many people check in foursquare on June 4th
\nto Tiananmen Square and it’s virtually check in.<\/p>\n

When you use your mobile phone to check in
\nfoursquare, it indicates how many people are there are
\nchecking in the same time with you.<\/p>\n

So just on June 4th, when you check in Tiananmen
\nSquare, you found that you were blocked in China and
\nthis kind of event, even driven blockage happen every
\nday.<\/p>\n

We can see almost 10 to 20 websites or criterias
\nwere pit into Great Firewall system.<\/p>\n

Day by day, you can see so many websites cannot be
\naccessed in China.<\/p>\n

But will this situation last forever? How much
\nextent we can see in the next few years about the
\ncensorship system, versus the internet users
\nconfrontations, like the what you see on-line.<\/p>\n

Although Twitter is blocked in China, many users are
\nnow using VPN or on-line proxy or third party clients to
\naccess Twitter in China. The number is increasing
\ndramatically. In the one year, after Twitter were
\nblocked.<\/p>\n

Why? Because Twitter is so easy to transfer
\ninformation and relay information.<\/p>\n

I myself is the inventor of RT, you know, the
\nshort-term for retreat. It’s very powerful, because
\nwhen you see someone is talking about something in 140
\ncharacters, you can just put RT in front of this and
\npublish within your Twitter timeline.<\/p>\n

Your friends, your network, will see this message
\nquickly, in minutes, and then this is kind of relayed
\nmethodology can show power all around the world.<\/p>\n

So Twitter is now becoming a really powerful tool in
\nChina, especially for grassroots. So there are also
\ncopycats in China, like Sina microblogging, 6 million,
\nare now using Sina microblogger. But I think Twitter is
\nstill the first-hand message from Chinese internet
\nsphere, because many realtime accidents were mentioned
\non Twitter, then back to China based microblogging
\nservices, because there are a lot of self censorship
\nthere and more than 300 people in Sina now are
\nmonitoring microblogging services and try to remove any
\nsensitive content.<\/p>\n

Another term called sensitive key words in China
\nrise up.<\/p>\n

Wherever you visit website, you can see, if you
\npublish something there, you may see some warning
\nmessages told you that there are many sensitive key
\nwords in your post. So your post cannot be published.<\/p>\n

Even you publish, you may get message to notify you,
\nyour post was removed, because there are many sensitive
\nkey words.<\/p>\n

This case, you can imagine that sensitive key words
\nwill be everywhere, because June 4th is a sensitive key
\nword, but 60-40, the number is also sensitive key word,
\nbecause many people invented different variations to
\ndescribe June 4th.<\/p>\n

So the sensors have to define the sensitive key
\nwords as a set of criteria. June 4th, 6.4, you know,
\nwhatever. Many internet users in China, they also
\ninvented May 35, you know, they don’t say June 4th
\ninstead they use May 35.<\/p>\n

But however, these terms also, once the sensors
\nrealise that, if you put into the sensitive key words
\nlist, again, you know, so you can see that the increase
\nof the sensitive key word.<\/p>\n

That cause me to think about the censorship model in
\nChina.<\/p>\n

Because before, I use the first model, Tom and Jerry
\nmodel, because the sensor is Tom, definitely, and we,
\ninternet users, are the Gerry. We try to use different
\nways to express ourselves and the data, you know, trying
\nto chase us and then we found many other ways to escape.<\/p>\n

After that, there is another theory called cute cat
\nin our internet is also invented by my colleague in
\nBerkman Centre. He said that if we put more
\nentertainment or lifestyle content on-line, like user
\ngenerated content, the sensors will be harder to find
\ntheir topics.<\/p>\n

Not only those Jerries, they found their ways to
\nescape, but also they publish more like cute cats
\ncontent. So that the Tom cannot easily find the target.<\/p>\n

That’s something happened in the past five years in
\nChina, definitely, because I found that there are almost
\n124 times of content volume increase from 2002 to 2008.<\/p>\n

Although the sensors put efforts on censorship part,
\njust like mentioned, the internet user still use
\ndifferent ways to express themselves.<\/p>\n

Then in these two years from 2008, 2009, because the
\nincrease list of sensitive key words, we see another
\neffect emerge, called dog chasing tail.<\/p>\n

I called it because I seeing dos, you know, some
\ndogs chasing their own tails and by himself, but he may
\nnot realise it’s his own tail, because he just thought
\nthat it’s a toy, whatever.<\/p>\n

The faster he runs to chase the tail, the faster the
\ntail runs, definitely, because it’s part of his body.<\/p>\n

We see many, many funny things happened in the past
\ntwo years, because the increase of sensitive key words.
\nBecause of June 4th, some engineers found that pie on
\nthis, a soft programming language cannot be accessed.
\nWhy? Because one of the pie on this’ library upgrade to
\nversion 6.4. So it’s a tail. The sensor, they didn’t
\nreally — it’s not Jerry, because it’s definitely
\nsomething not really sensitive, but the sensor, because
\nthey try to sensor everything they don’t like, including
\nthose several censorship, they want to satisfy the
\ngovernment, so they do more, I mean, tougher censorship
\nover their users. So they bite themselves. Because
\nthey don’t distinguish what is the real content they
\nwant to sensor. They cannot.<\/p>\n

We can see many things happened ridiculous recently,
\nlike one of the universities bulletin board to recruit
\nthose doctoral applications. One of the requirements is
\ncalled (Chinese spoken). But after push lishing the
\nword became (Chinese spoken).<\/p>\n

So it becomes, you have to support the leadership of
\nsensitive key words. So it means that almost all those
\nnormal content, once the censorship becomes ridiculous,
\nthe real word becomes ridiculous, at the same time. So
\nthe dog bite itself.<\/p>\n

About 10 days ago, QQ users in China, because there
\nare millions of Twitter users in China, some people
\nfound they cannot chat with a certain city name in
\nChina. They asked Twitter why, QQ why. QQ service told
\nthem that because it is part of our leader’s name, he is
\nthe top sensor of China, his propaganda department, the
\nchief of the propaganda department.<\/p>\n

So you can see that the sensor, they never really
\nwant to sensor themselves, but as they invent the
\ncensorship system, they never limited and show
\ntransparent criteria about censorship. So they bite
\nthemselves.<\/p>\n

We can see that the paradox will increase. I will
\nshow the last slide.<\/p>\n

Before 2008, we see that the censorship system, they
\nhave quick increase in China, because of the heavy
\ninvestment on that. We know that many human resources
\nand technical facilities invested over, over billions of
\nR&D invest in the back-end to try to filter any bit of
\nthe key word, of the traffic on-line.<\/p>\n

After 2008, we see that a big boost about
\ncensorship, because more internet users and domain names
\nwere put into the blacklist and more sensitive key words
\nwere put into the business service providers, so they
\nseveral censor a lot.<\/p>\n

But from my prediction, with more diversified
\ninternet tools and software services, maybe hundreds of
\nfoursquares will emerge in the next several years.<\/p>\n

People have multiple choices, they can use different
\ndevices, iPad, iPhone and mobile phones, et cetera. So
\nthey can generate much more content than before.<\/p>\n

>From 2002 to 2008, we see 124 times of content
\nincreasing. But in another six years, we see another
\nmaybe over 100 times of content increasing.<\/p>\n

However, the censorship system itself, because of
\nwhat we are seeing. They cannot sustain their increase
\nat the same time with the internet users, the content
\ngenerate.<\/p>\n

So I see that they will face a big challenge from
\nthe internet users in China, even in China.<\/p>\n

So I see that maybe after 2013, or roughly 2014,
\nI think the censorship system will totally useless,
\nbecome void.<\/p>\n

So that’s my prediction, we can see. Because it’s
\nnot some once invention can be defeated, it’s something
\nthat came from cloud because the internet users form all
\nkinds of cloud, like the what was just mentioned.<\/p>\n

I believe more international efforts could help to
\nreach this crossing point, the tipping point as well.<\/p>\n

Thank you.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: Let’s turn now to Sherman. Sherman is the
\nwriter, the co-author of Red Wired, a recent book on the
\ninternet impact in China.<\/p>\n

>> Sherman So: Today I want to talk about China internet.
\nI think a lot of business people, a lot of people just
\nwould see it as a big opportunity.<\/p>\n

But I’m also going to tell you it’s even bigger
\nchallenge for a lot of guys and especially for
\nforeigner, China internet, it might look really sexy,
\nbillions of dollars is there and there is millions and
\nmillions of users, but is that a real opportunity for
\nespecially the foreigner?<\/p>\n

I think a lot of people have seen charts like that.
\nSo by this year, I think we are at about 400 million
\ninternet user in China and that is about 30 per cent of
\nthe internet population.<\/p>\n

In the coming few years, they can pass to
\n40 per cent or even 50 per cent.<\/p>\n

If we can count down what is the top 10 internet
\ncompanies in China, we can see that the biggest one is
\nTencent and they are making maybe US$1.8 billion in
\nrevenue last year and their market cap is something like
\nUS$30 billion.<\/p>\n

The next one would be Shanda. They are the top
\non-line game provider. Baidu, the top search engine
\nprovider. Alibaba, their business is e-commerce. And
\nTaobao would be the largest on-line auction market but
\nright now because it is not listed, so we don’t know its
\nrevenue or income, but it definitely is of the size of
\nAlibaba.<\/p>\n

Then we see Netease, also a game player and then
\nSohu, they are one of the largest portals, plus an
\non-line game player. Sina is the largest portal.<\/p>\n

Perfect World is another on-line game. Ctrip is the
\nlargest on-line travel provider.<\/p>\n

Even for Ctrip, their market cap is something like
\n6 billion right now.<\/p>\n

Let’s talk about Tencent. What they do. Tencent,
\nI think my speaker next to me, they are the largest
\ninstant messaging platform in China.<\/p>\n

It’s called QQ. They got maybe 78 per cent of the
\nmarket share in terms of how many people, internet user
\nwas using it.<\/p>\n

Today, their market cap is bigger than eBay or
\nYahoo.<\/p>\n

Their user, the registered user is like 568 million.
\nThat is the larger than the state internet population.<\/p>\n

Also, they got 60 million paying their internet
\nservice, 20 million something paying their mobile
\nservice. So what we can see is a big opportunity. This
\ncompany is no longer small. They are bigger than eBay
\nright now.<\/p>\n

What is the driving force behind that? I think it’s
\nyoung people looking for fun and friends. About
\n70 per cent of China internet population are actually
\npeople younger than 30 years old. This is a chart of
\ntheir age distribution. You can see that 10 to 19 years
\nold is about 35 per cent and 20 to 39 is about 30
\nsomething per cent.<\/p>\n

You know that China have this one child policy for
\na long time. They actually, at this kind of age, are
\nlooking for peer group. They are looking for support.
\nThey are looking for friends. They don’t have it with
\ntheir own family. They are the single child.<\/p>\n

Also, China does not have the recreation facility,
\nlike sport facility, like basketball or football field
\nis nearby. If you have been to some secondary city in
\nChina, they just are buildings and buildings. They are
\neither factory or homes and you can rarely see something
\nthat let people run or you can play balls with friends.<\/p>\n

Internet become their only way of getting
\nentertainment and actually it’s a low cost alternative,
\nbecause even you cannot afford a piece of computer at
\nyour home, you cannot afford the broadband connection,
\nyou can go to internet cafe and it’s only about 2RMB and
\nyou can play for a whole hour.<\/p>\n

If we look at the top 10 list again, we can see
\na lot of them are actually on-line game provider.
\nTencent, besides the QQ platform, they also run two of
\nthe a most successful gaming in China and every game has
\nconcurrent user, more than 1 million people. That means
\nmore than 1 million people are playing at the same time.<\/p>\n

Then Shanda is the biggest on-line game provider,
\nPerfect World, they are all on-line game providers.<\/p>\n

But for foreigner, especially for foreigner, it’s
\nnot that easy if you want to get to the China market,
\nalthough it seems to be really sexy.<\/p>\n

First of all, they got strong players like Tencent
\nand that is the culture difference. Basically, the
\nexpectation is very different. Also, there is lack of
\ninfrastructure. We expect something like a credit card
\npayment, something like a good — if you are doing
\ne-commerce, do you have the delivery ready? Is people
\nready? Finally is the government. I think any
\nforeigner, because the other issue we can gradually
\nunderstand, we can gradually — and the infrastructure
\nwill improve eventually, but the Chinese Government’s
\nattitude, I think that is the one part that most
\nforeigners or foreign businessmen have really confused
\nabout.<\/p>\n

Let’s look at the point about the strong local
\ncompetitor. Let’s look at a it Tsu bied by secondr to.
\nFor the search engine and this is 2008, before Google
\nsaid they want to exit from China. At that time, Baidu
\nis already leading it two times. It got 60
\nsomething per cent market share, whereas Google is only
\n28. For on-line auction, Taobao got 80 per cent, more
\nthan 8 a per cent and eBay is only 7 per cent. On-line
\ntravel like Ctrip got 51 per cent, but e-Long, which is
\ncontrolled by eBay, speedia is only 11 per cent. The
\nsame thing happen for instant messages, QQ got
\n77 per cent, whereas Microsoft Live Messenger only got
\n4 per cent, Skype, 3 per cent and on-line portal Sina
\ngot 27 per cent, Sohu close to 20 per cent when Yahoo
\nonly got 3 per cent.<\/p>\n

The local competitor is, they know about the culture
\nissue, they know how to deal with the government and
\nthey find way to overcome that infrastructure problem.<\/p>\n

For example, like Ctrip, they are the largest
\non-line travel provider. They know the credit card is
\nnot ready, they know people doesn’t get on line to book
\ntheir trips, so what they are doing, they are sending
\npeople to airport or the bus station. They provide them
\nwith a card, a booklet with a number to call and if you
\nwant to book a hotel in one of the cities, you just call
\ntheir hotline and it’s a 24 hour hotline and you just
\ntell them, I want to book a certain hotel. You don’t
\neven need to pay. You just go to that hotel and then
\njust say, I book with Ctrip and then the hotel will
\ncheck you in with the rate that is already agreed and
\nafter you pay the hotel, the Ctrip will collect their
\ncommission from the hotel.<\/p>\n

So that is how they solve the infrastructure
\nproblem.<\/p>\n

But those things can be — if you eventually know
\nthe trick, then you can do it. But I think for most
\nforeigners, the issue is the Chinese Government’s
\nattitude. I think that attitude was changing and is
\nchanging to even become more and more conservative.<\/p>\n

Initially, I mean, in the 2000, when the internet
\njust started, internet population was really low in
\nChina. That’s less than 1 per cent of China internet
\npopulation is on-line.<\/p>\n

At 1999, maybe 1 in 1,000 people, then maybe only 16
\nwas getting on-line.<\/p>\n

At that time, the government was thinking internet
\nis a good thing, it’s technology, it’s a form of
\ntechnology and we will encourage it.<\/p>\n

At that time, the recollecting body is mainly the
\nministry of information and MII. MII’s objective is to
\nincrease network capacity, is to increase people using
\nthe internet, because the regular telecom service, they
\nwant more people to use the tell follow service, because
\nthey just build the network.<\/p>\n

At that time, it’s quite free. The censorship
\nproblem is not that serious. The Great Firewall was not
\nthat perfect.<\/p>\n

As the internet population increase, right now, it’s
\nabout 30 per cent of the population is on-line. So it’s
\nno longer a form of technology, it’s a form of media and
\nChina government control that, the media tightly.<\/p>\n

Right now, the regulating body is no longer MII or
\nthe new conversion MIIT, they got SARFT. That means
\nstate administration for radio and film and television.
\nThere is the same body that regulate TV, your newspaper,
\nso they are seeing the same thing. So they apply the
\nsame standard. If I’m regulating TV that way, I’m going
\nto regulate the internet the same way.<\/p>\n

That’s why we are seeing this kind of government,
\ngovernment intervention is getting stronger and stronger
\nevery day.<\/p>\n

And we got ministry of culture, they are going to
\nregulate those on-line game. GAPP is the general
\nadministration for press and publication. Everyone is
\nin it and there will be more in the coming years.<\/p>\n

Because internet is no longer just a technology,
\njust an invention. Now it’s a media and China
\ngovernment really care about media control.<\/p>\n

I bring two examples saying that how that affect
\nbusiness, why business eventually exit from China and
\npart of the reason is this government control.<\/p>\n

I think a lot of people know about eBay getting into
\nChina in 2003 and then they basically exit from China in
\nthe end of 2006.<\/p>\n

How they get in the market. They buy the leading
\nplayer. At that time, the leading player got
\n80 per cent of the market share and it’s called Eachnet.
\nThen their competitor started a service called Taobao
\nand by the mid of 2005, the table is already turned.
\nTaobao got the dominant market share already, about
\n60 per cent, whereas eBay only about 30 per cent.<\/p>\n

By the end of 2006, eBay basically exit from China
\nand they do it by folding its China operation with
\na joint venture with Tom Online.<\/p>\n

What is the real reason? Everyone is saying because
\nTaobao is free and eBay charges, that is why they lost
\nthe case.<\/p>\n

But the Eachnet founder said that is not really the
\nreal reason. After he sell Eachnet to eBay, he stay on
\nwith eBay for a year as a consultant. So he know what
\nis the case, what is exactly happening.<\/p>\n

The real case is actually, eBay at that time moved
\nthe platform from China to the US. So on the exact day
\nof the move, which is about October 2004, the traffic
\ndrop by half and one of the reasons is the Great
\nFirewall of China.<\/p>\n

They block everything that look like sensitive. So
\nsomething like a user name like Beijing 64, they would
\nbring down your whole server. It’s not just the guy,
\nBeijing 64, cannot access his account, it’s every other
\nuser with the same server that maybe a few thousand of
\nsame user using the same server would bring down,
\nbecause of this kind of sense sore ship.<\/p>\n

Who create those name, like Beijing 64? That could
\nbe very common, because, you know, if you are somebody
\nin Beijing and you type your name and the system will
\nassign you maybe take out this 64, this is a name.<\/p>\n

So a lot of things like that happen.<\/p>\n

Another thing is that the local competitor, Taobao,
\nthere is rumour saying that they are the one who create
\nthose names or product names that close to a sensitive
\nwhere that bring down your server.<\/p>\n

So that is one reason. Of course, after they move
\nthe platform, the development is also slow, because now
\neverybody have to be done in the headquarters and if you
\nwant to change one word on the screen, they take nine
\nweeks to do it and if they want to increase one feature,
\nthey might be taking nine months to do it.<\/p>\n

All this reason making eBay basically crippled in
\nChina. Then they exit, because they lost the market.<\/p>\n

This year, they got another incident that is even
\nmore sensational. Is that Google exit from China.<\/p>\n

They don’t exit because they lose market share.<\/p>\n

They actually have a good market share. So when they
\nenter China in 2005, their market share is about 20
\nsomething and then they have to, because Baidu was
\nreally strong and they have to struggle. They have to
\nlocalise and so on, so the market share actually dropped
\nto 16 per cent in mid-2006.<\/p>\n

But then it rebounds back to about 36 per cent in
\n2009.<\/p>\n

But even then, Google choose to exit from China.<\/p>\n

The reason is that they said in their announcement,
\nbecause they complain about hackers into gmail and this
\ngmail account belong to some activist, someone was
\nreally active in the social event, democracy in China.<\/p>\n

Also, about government censorship, about they have
\nto screen all those sensitive words from their search
\nengine, if they have to put the search engine in China.<\/p>\n

What is the choice? In March this year, they choose
\nto close Google.cn and they choose to diverse all the
\nChina traffic back to Hong Kong, where they can provide
\na free on in censored search engine. If China want to
\nblock any of those traffic, they can block that.<\/p>\n

I have been in China for the last two months.
\nI have been using Google.com .hk. I find the service is
\nreally smooth. It’s as fast as before. But I didn’t
\nsearch anything sensitive, but my friend was telling me
\nthat he run a search engine marketing firm. He’s saying
\nthat Google, the budget spent on Google search engine
\nwas decreasing. So before the crisis, he’s spending
\nmaybe 70 per cent of his budget, his client’s budgets,
\non Baidu and 30 per cent on Google.<\/p>\n

But right now, this moment it’s about 77 per cent on
\nBaidu and only about 23 per cent on Google. He foresee
\neventually maybe the Google budget will decrease to
\n15 per cent, because Google choose to exit from China.<\/p>\n

Somebody was searching them with sensitive key words
\nand that will bring down the server and the service for
\na while.<\/p>\n

So that is hurting their business.<\/p>\n

The point is why Google choose to exit from China,
\neven when they have a booming business. The government
\nrelationship.<\/p>\n

One of their former staff were telling me,
\ngovernment relationship has always been a problem for
\nthem. They always find it difficult to work with the
\nChinese Government. If you have been to China, you will
\nsee that. Because they seem to always changing the
\nrules. When in Hong Kong or the US, we see law as
\na given fact, so everyone just stick to one set of
\nrules.<\/p>\n

In China, the rules seem to be kind of flexible.<\/p>\n

Also it’s changing. It seems to be this year, something
\nis OK, something is correct. But next year, they are
\nsaying that, well, we find out a new situation and
\nI want you to change it now.<\/p>\n

Then you talk to them, saying that, but, we have
\na law saying that this is OK, but then the Chinese
\nGovernment will say, but then I will change the law.<\/p>\n

So I think a lot of people who have been with China
\nand deal with China government will find out that.<\/p>\n

Also, Lee Kai, the CEO they hired just to head
\nGoogle China, he left just before the incident and
\nsomebody was saying that he was somebody who can bridge
\nthe gap. He can talk to the US headquarters and
\nconvince them how to do business in China and he also
\ncan talk to the China government about why the US
\nheadquarter want to do, what’s the one who can media
\nbetween the two parties. He left just before the
\nincident. So maybe no one to mediate the situation, so
\nthat’s why they have a decision to just leave China.<\/p>\n

Also, localisation have always been an issue for
\nGoogle China. They have make some effort, something
\nlike they know Google is difficult to spell for
\na typical local Chinese, then they invent g.cn, which is
\neasy to spell or Google, they also go to promote their
\nservice in the internet cafe, they buy directory site
\ncalled 265.com. But still not enough. Most people were
\ntelling me that they are still not doing enough.<\/p>\n

Something like they only have 20 agents, 20
\nsomething agents in China, when Baidu have 200.<\/p>\n

Their hiring process was crippling too, because they
\nonly want to hire somebody with a US degree who can work
\nin a US technology firm. But the point is, those people
\nmay not know the Chinese culture well enough to develop
\nthe business.<\/p>\n

That is the end of my presentation.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: Let’s have our next speaker, Eric from
\nTaiwan, who will give us his presentation.<\/p>\n

>> Ilya Eric Lee: Hello even here. This is really an honour
\nto be invited to Hong Kong Asian Pacific regional IGF.<\/p>\n

This is my first time to Hong Kong, even though
\nTaiwan and Hong Kong is very close. Everything is so
\nnew to me.<\/p>\n

I would like to speak in Mandarin and to try to
\ntransmit a little bit Taiwan-ness to bring it to here,
\nto share with you.<\/p>\n

My internet friends call my Ilya Lee. Previously,
\nfrom 2004, I was seen from Taiwan E learning, my
\nspecialty is digital learning. We wish to set up a kind
\nof — we want to use the internet to bring out some —
\nin my own position, in past years, past six years,<\/p>\n

I have been involved in this programme.<\/p>\n

There are two responsibilities. One is I try to
\ncompare Korea and some bigger Asian regions and other
\ninternational cultural portals. We have an
\ninternational organisation called cultural model. It’s
\nkind of a federation, a cultural portal communities.<\/p>\n

It’s how they cooperate with each other to meet the
\nchallenges ahead.<\/p>\n

My other responsibility is how to use web 2.0 to
\noutreach and engage more public, to have a more
\ncivilised society.<\/p>\n

In the past year, there is my job. I focus on web
\n2.0.<\/p>\n

We want to create a sort of globalisation and things
\nlike that.<\/p>\n

In today’s presentation, I want to show you some
\nphenomena, both local and global.<\/p>\n

I want to show you that everybody is involved in the
\nprogramme we have been studying for the past few years.
\nI want to show you my slides. My title is open the
\nsocial media silos.<\/p>\n

The new challenge for internet governance.<\/p>\n

Social media has evolved as a centre and focus. It
\nhas focused many people’s imaginations. Games you play
\non Twitter and Facebook.<\/p>\n

Because all the information has become sort of
\ncentral in these silos, so I wish to explore the impact.<\/p>\n

Over the past few years, the number of users of
\nFacebook has increased tremendously and I think it’s
\na global phenomenon.<\/p>\n

That means like it’s a global phenomenon and the
\nnumber of users has been increasing tremendously and
\nit’s like a harvesting phenomena and has spawned a lot
\nof social movements, like a lot of companies who would
\nlike to be involved in new enterprises, starting new
\nenterprises as well.<\/p>\n

It looks like the service is kind of an internet
\nrevolution and this is kind of revolutionary.<\/p>\n

It’s a kind of revolution.<\/p>\n

If things happen, if hero happens for the first
\ntime, he looks like he’s a hero. But if a phenomena
\nhappens repeatedly occur, the phenomena becomes
\nridiculous.<\/p>\n

It’s the same paradox that applies to the so-called
\ninvention. When it first came up, it was very popular,
\nbut when it lasts for a period of time, it kind of dies
\ndown. It has not become so fresh as it was before.<\/p>\n

Activists like to use Facebook, this kind of media,
\nto appeal to its audience. Like Facebook, they would
\nlike to have the same appeal to the world. Facebook,
\nwhen it first appears, it was presented image that, come
\non, use the Facebook, use us, so you can express your
\nopinions.<\/p>\n

This year, we have a floral exhibition in Taiwan.<\/p>\n

There were a couple of social movements recently and
\nthey try to use Facebook and other similar media to
\npromote their campaigns and tries to encourage people
\nwho were in silence, who were kept in silence, because
\nthey were deprived of the media, to come up and express
\nthemselves through the new media, like Facebook.<\/p>\n

At the social campaigners, they did not used to have
\na lot of opponents before but now, because of the
\nFacebook, they have different voices.<\/p>\n

Now me, as a researcher, a practitioner in this
\narea, we have some reflections upon these social
\nmovements, because I feel that our society is just
\nevolving and growing.<\/p>\n

What kind of silos is that?<\/p>\n

It’s a kind of deadlock situation, because for those
\nwho can use, for Facebook users, they can communicate,
\nbut for on in Facebook users, these two groups of people
\ncannot communicate with each other and it becomes
\na deadlock and the digital divide is still real and
\nviable and there’s no breakthrough.<\/p>\n

Now, it seems that they are all excluded. In the
\npast two years, we have a new term, when the social
\nmedia revolution is kind of hot spreading everywhere, it
\nis called participatory divide.<\/p>\n

Perhaps because we don’t have a computer, then we
\nare deprived of any connection with the community.<\/p>\n

So the level of participation is affected by your
\naccess to a computer. So if you don’t have a computer,
\nthen it’s more difficult for you to be connected and
\nthat’s a challenge.<\/p>\n

Apart from this, this year, March, the Facebook has
\nan exposure. They had someone saying their future plans
\nand strategy. They want to upgrade their connection to
\na new level.<\/p>\n

They want to upgrade their infrastructure system.
\nAs Issac has mentioned, the difference and divergence
\nbetween virtual world and physical world is so real. So
\nwhat can Facebook do to connect the virtual and the
\nphysical?<\/p>\n

It seems that the disconnection has grown and it’s
\njust a distance, has grown apart.<\/p>\n

What are the technical details?<\/p>\n

This should be addressed. This disconnection or
\ndistance should be addressed. This is kind of mat Rick
\ninformation and this condition can be very stressful.
\nWhat are the technical details that can be overcome.<\/p>\n

For example, open standard. Now the challenge is
\nhow to syndicate the different open standard media.<\/p>\n

Now the stress upon the global consumers can be
\nquite diverse. Our social campaigners want to promote
\nthemselves in Facebook, they want to deliver
\ninformation. But there might be limitations or
\nrestrictions from the government.<\/p>\n

It has become an issue.<\/p>\n

We are moving from the open source paradigm. We are
\nmoving from the open source paradigm to open media era.<\/p>\n

As we want to develop openness, but it’s always
\ndominated by the technical experts and the technical
\nparadigms.<\/p>\n

Now it seems that the design of a software has
\ndominated the level of openness. In the past, the level
\nof openness was dominated by the technical experts. Now
\nit has become a trap for humanity.<\/p>\n

Now, as we are just followers, we became passive.
\nIt is another challenge for the users.<\/p>\n

Lastly, I want to say, as we talk about this silo,
\nit’s not already there. It seems that this
\ndisconnection may evolve each time with a key note
\nspeech by Apple or Facebook or Google.<\/p>\n

I would like to frame this as democracy.<\/p>\n

I would like to frame this as democracy.<\/p>\n

We might need multilateral participation to create
\nthese silos.<\/p>\n

We need grass root people. We need academia. We
\nneed academic people. We need a variety of groups of
\npeople, especially professionals, to redefine the future
\nof our country.<\/p>\n

As we can see, these designers are the corporates
\nare the government, are the academic people. But can
\nthey really define our future with the evolving media?<\/p>\n

I think Taiwan is an interesting example. When
\nI was young, I really follow everything, every
\nregulation from the government. We always saying
\ngovernment performs slower than the society. We are
\nstill exploring. It’s part of evolving democracy. We
\nare experimenting democracy in that way.<\/p>\n

Recently, in Taiwan, we are reflecting on how we
\nhandle in disasters and catastrophes abound, like the
\nearthquake and how we can use, circulate information
\nthrough Twitter, Facebook, to mediate the government, to
\nhelp relieve the situation, in terms of natural
\ndisasters.<\/p>\n

In Japan, when there is natural disaster, they are
\nselling machines, will automatically turn into a —
\na machine that sells drin,. When is the proper time for
\nme to break the glass to reclaim those social immediate
\nca things back to civil society?<\/p>\n

To what level can we turn this design into an
\nempowering machine, in times of disaster.<\/p>\n

I think as other speakers have mentioned, we need to
\npay more attention to extreme situations, because we
\nneed to redefine our new social values.<\/p>\n

It’s through the extreme situations that we need
\na platform to express our opinions, how things should be
\nredefined, how our society should be redefined.<\/p>\n

So a platform was needed.<\/p>\n

Thank you.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: Thank you. Finally, Peter Yu, professor
\nfrom the Drake University Law School, will give us his
\nperspective and then we’ll open the floor to all of you.<\/p>\n

>> Peter Yu: Thank you, Charles. It’s great to be speaking
\nat home and it’s also very exciting that Hong Kong is
\nhosting the Regional Internet Governance Forum.<\/p>\n

Let me start by offering an apology to the
\norganisers.<\/p>\n

I was supposed to come back here earlier for the
\nwhole conference, but I was asked to testify on China on
\nWashington DC, so I cannot come back until last night.
\nSo now me mind is between the US and also Hong Kong, but
\nI will try my best to share with you my thoughts about
\nthe global issues.<\/p>\n

I think one of the challenges in trying to
\nunderstand how we can link the different issues together
\nis to find some common grounds between the interest of
\nwhat is going on in other countries and what is happen
\naing here.<\/p>\n

What I have done is to focus on a topic that I think
\nwill be of interest to some of you here, but at the same
\ntime it’s also a good example of how civil engagement
\nhappens at the global level.<\/p>\n

What I want to talk about is the new anti
\ncounterfeiting trade agreement, the acronym is ACTA.<\/p>\n

If you have not heard of this agreement, don’t worry
\nabout it, because that agreement has been negotiated in
\nsecret.<\/p>\n

It’s an agreement that’s been negotiated by the
\nUnited States, European Community, Japan, Switzerland,
\nAustralia, New Zealand, Canada, South Korea, Singapore,
\nMorocco — don’t ask me why some of those countries are
\nthere. Basically, what you get is a country club, so
\nthose countries get together to negotiate on a country
\nclub basis.<\/p>\n

The problem is what they are going to negotiate will
\nactually affect a lot of other countries who are not
\nbeing involved.<\/p>\n

I’m very excited that Hong Kong is not one of the
\nnegotiating parties, because it will affect some of the
\nongoing reforms in the intellectual property, especially
\nwith respect to digital copyright. Hong Kong is not one
\nof the negotiating parties, but at the same time, what
\nis going on with ACTA may affect is not of other
\ncountries. So it’s very important for us to find out
\nwhat happens with the agreement. The only problem is
\nthat the agreement has been negotiated in secret, so
\nthere’s no way to find out.<\/p>\n

How can we find out?<\/p>\n

The simple answer is use the internet. Who happened
\nis the draft of the agreement has been leaked to the
\ninternet, through something like Wikileaks, through
\na lot of other websites from the NGOs, a lot at of the
\nNGOs have been working with each other in trying to use
\nthe Freedom of Information Act or Access to Information
\nAct in trying to get information from the government and
\nwhatever they got, they just post it on the website and
\nthey share it with others.<\/p>\n

What is really interesting in terms of what they
\nhave been doing is that you got different information
\ncoming from different places, some in Germany, some in
\nthe US, some in Canada, and you can piece all the
\ndifferent information together in trying to understand
\nwhat is the real scope of the agreement, what are the
\ndifferent negotiating terms or negligenting points
\nwithin the agreement.<\/p>\n

What is also interesting from what we have heard
\nfrom other speakers is that it’s not only limited to
\nwebsite.<\/p>\n

People have been using Facebook, people have been
\nusing Youtube, they have been using a lot of different
\nsocial networking tools in trying to get people
\norganised, trying to coordinate the effort to fight
\nagainst ACTA and trying to provide information. If you
\nstill have no idea what this agreement is about, go on
\nto Facebook, go on to Youtube and type it in and try to
\nfind out more about what’s going on there.<\/p>\n

You will find that there is a community build up in
\ntrying to fight against this one, because they fear that
\nit’s going to affect a lot of people, especially those
\ninternet users.<\/p>\n

So it is actually quite interesting phenomena of
\nwhat’s going on at the international level.<\/p>\n

But there are five different things we can take from
\nthis set of incidents.<\/p>\n

The first one obviously is about civil engagement.
\n20 years ago, if something like this happened, it will
\nbe very difficult to get the information or even 10
\nyears ago.<\/p>\n

But today, it’s getting much more difficult for
\ngovernment to actually stop providing information to the
\npublic.<\/p>\n

What is really interesting about what happened here
\nis that the whole draft of the agreement has been leaked
\nonto the internet and a month later, the government of
\nall the negotiating parties agree to release their own
\ndraft.<\/p>\n

So you can see how the governments have been
\npressured into releasing the information that actually
\nbelongs to the public.<\/p>\n

But what is really amazing with respect to what they
\nare releasing to the public is that the official version
\nis not as good as the leaked version. With the leaked
\nversion, at least you got the different parties, you got
\nthe different negotiating points, and the official
\nversion, a lot of the disagreement have been taken out.
\nSo it’s much more difficult for people to understand
\nwhat is the Japan’s position and what is the United
\nStates position.<\/p>\n

I think it’s quite interesting, because that will go
\ninto the second lesson that we can get this in the
\ninternet, you cannot offer an inferior official version.
\nThat is basically the same mistake made by the music
\nindustry. They offer a lot of the downloads that
\nactually are not as good as what people can get from
\nfile sharing services.<\/p>\n

If the negotiators and the governments cannot
\nunderstand this point, I wonder how effective they can
\nbe in negotiating an agreement that can tackle these
\nproblems.<\/p>\n

That shows how difficult it is to deal with
\nchallenges in the digital environment.<\/p>\n

The third point I think is also quite important is
\nthat it’s not just about the resistance from the public,
\nbut also about a lot of the government officials who
\nactually do not have the information, whether it’s been
\nthe US or the European Communities, or whether it’s in
\nthose countries that are not involved in negotiating the
\nagreement.<\/p>\n

What’s really amazing to me is that a lot of the law
\nmakers have been kept in the dark for the whole
\nnegotiation, so you can find letters to the government,
\nyou can find a lot of the postings on the website saying
\nthat they want more information about this negotiation.<\/p>\n

The whole discussion is no longer just about getting
\ninformation or about whether we are striking the right
\nbalance in the intellectual property system, but more
\nabout procedures.<\/p>\n

You see a lot of law makers saying that we are not
\ngoing to wait for the government to tell us what is
\ngoing on here. We want to know because we are member of
\nparliament.<\/p>\n

We deserve to get the information.<\/p>\n

So what they are getting information is actually
\nfrom a lot of the leaked documents and that is quite
\ninteresting, because you now have a lot of public
\nofficials trying to get information from what has been
\nleaked on the internet, rather from their own
\ngovernment.<\/p>\n

So what is going on at the public level is not just
\nhelping the resistance, but also helping those
\ngovernment officials to get more information about
\nwhat’s going on with their own government.<\/p>\n

So a lot of the things that we have been doing in
\nthe public debate has implications just beyond what we
\nare trying to achieve here and I think that’s quite
\nimportant.<\/p>\n

The fourth thing I think is also quite important is
\nabout the intellectual property industry mindset. One
\nof the reasons why they have kept the negotiation secret
\nis because they feared that the opponents would go in
\nand disrupt their negotiation process.<\/p>\n

It’s very difficult to expect the counterfeiters or
\nthe pirates to actually go into disrupt the negotiation
\nprocess.<\/p>\n

After all, the treaty is about anti counterfeiting.<\/p>\n

The problem is that with respect to digital
\nenvironment, the public are the counterfeiters. The
\npublic are the pirates. So one of the things they are
\ntrying to keep from the public is to make sure that the
\npublic will not have a voice, because those people are
\nlikely to be against the treaty.<\/p>\n

I think that makes it very difficult in digit
\ncopyright reform in a lot of different places, including
\nHong Kong, because the government is supposed to work
\nfor the electorate, supposed to work for the people.<\/p>\n

Yet, a lot of the industries see the electorate or
\nthe people as the enemy or the of point. So how can you
\nreconcile this tension within the political process in
\ntrying to understand how to deal with a lot of the
\nchallenging issues?<\/p>\n

I think it’s going to be very difficult, because on
\nthe one hand, I can see why the industry fear about
\ndisruption from the public. On the other hand, I also
\nsee why it is important for public to actually have
\ninformation, to actually participate in the debate.<\/p>\n

The final thing I want to focus on is how a lot of
\nthe discussion in ACTA actually reflect a lot of the
\nnegotiation items that have been going on in the
\ncorporate reform in Hong Kong.<\/p>\n

If you look at a list of all those items that be
\nincluded in the internet chapter.<\/p>\n

Criminal enforcement. Notice and take down
\nprocedure. Facilitation of corporate lawsuit.
\nStatutory damages,.<\/p>\n

They are all in ACTA. But they have also mentioned
\nby the Hong Kong Government in the consultation
\ndocument. Some of them have been adopted. Some of them
\nwill be rejected. But at the same time, you can see how
\na lot of the developments start from a lot of developed
\ncountries and migrate to other developing country as
\nwell as emerging countries. I think that is very
\nimportant for us to understand what’s going on there.<\/p>\n

Another point that is also related to what Issac and
\nalso Sherman talk about in China is that in a lot of
\ncountries with stronger information control, there is
\na need for the public to use and to reuse and to
\nrepublic corporate content to make a message.<\/p>\n

One of my biggest fears is that the more, the title
\nerr the intellectual property laws are, the more
\ndifficult it is for the public to have the communicative
\nspace to reuse or repurpose a lot of those content.<\/p>\n

I also fear that stronger intellectual property
\nrights for whatever good they will give, will actually
\nbe used as a pretext to silence dissent.<\/p>\n

I think that is something we need to look into.<\/p>\n

A lot of times, we have a tendency to believe that
\nintellectual property issues are very technical, very
\narcane, very legalese, but at the same time, you have
\nimplications to not just about intellectual property
\nrights holders, but also to public, in terms of the
\ncommunication space they have and also how much they can
\nengage in civic debate.<\/p>\n

I think that’s why it’s very important for us to pay
\nmore attention about what’s going on. Hong Kong is
\nundergoing the copyright reform at the moment and trying
\nto figure out how to formulate the solutions in the bill
\nand I think that is the place we need to pay attention
\nto.<\/p>\n

Thank you very much.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: Thank you, Peter. We have heard a lot of
\ndifferent views and I think it’s time to open it up for
\nyour questions. I think you can make your comments or
\nmake your questions in any of the three languages,
\ndialects that we are having the translation with today.
\nFeel free to give us your views.<\/p>\n

No? Haven’t warmed up yet.<\/p>\n

>> : Prof Yu, you gave a breakdown of the ACTA negotiations
\nand the premium letter their leaks. Of course, the full
\nagreement has in fact been published now, April 10, and
\nit is available to everybody. I think to say that it
\nwas secret is not quite correct. The negotiations were
\nfairly clear that they were going on, but because it was
\na draft, it was just never released until it was ready
\nand that was intended to be in fact in late 2009.<\/p>\n

The agreement does in fact build upon existing trade
\nagreements, particularly the trips from WTO and on WIPO
\nitself. Many countries are involved, not just the ones
\nyou mentioned, for example, Singapore is involved, and
\nalso as you’re aware generally speaking at large
\ninternational agreements at this, China tends to be the
\nlead for Hong Kong, although Hong Kong does have the
\nability to contribute towards such agreements.<\/p>\n

The purpose of such agreements really are well
\nbeyond what we are talking about today.<\/p>\n

It’s really things like the global trade in elicit
\npharmaceutical products which cause real damage and real
\nharm to civil society and people.<\/p>\n

I think to kind of characterise ACTA as a secret
\nclub and that Hong Kong benefits by not being involved,
\nis not really to the benefit of Hong Kong.<\/p>\n

I absolutely agree that the criminalisation by naive
\nindividuals, by young kids, for example, by downloads
\nshould be avoided at all costs. We don’t want to create<\/p>\n

a class of criminals. On the other hand, we do want to
\ncreate a class of people that do respect the creative
\ntalentings of others, including most of the people in
\nthis room, which have in fact created works for the
\ninternet.<\/p>\n

I think that the reward should be reaped by those
\nthat do create, unless, of course, they decide to give
\nthem away, which is their personal choice.<\/p>\n

Thank you.<\/p>\n

>> Peter Yu: Let me offer a quick response. I agree with
\na lot of the things you say. What actually happens with
\nrespect to secrecy is that a lot of people have seen
\na draft, so the government officials who were involved
\nin the negotiation process, both from the European
\ncommission and also from US TR, as well as governments
\nin other countries, those industries who are involved in
\ninternational trade add vie are you committees, they
\nhave seen it. Those people from the NGOs who have
\na need to know will be able to see the agreement after
\nthey sign a non-disclosure agreement.<\/p>\n

I would let the audience decide how you characterise
\nthis as whether it is an open negotiation or whether it
\nis a secret negotiation or whether it is semi-secret
\nnegotiation. I think it’s very difficult. I think from
\nconsumer standpoint, if you are not invited by the
\ngovernment to actually look at the draft and sign
\na non-disclosure agreement, you will not be able to see
\nit, until it is ready.<\/p>\n

The difficulty, though, is that the negotiating
\nparties are trying to finish up the negotiation by the
\nend of this year.<\/p>\n

If the time for the draft to be ready is only a few
\nmonths before the completion of the agreement, what’s
\nthe point of the debate? The whole agreement has
\nalready been drafted. So basically, what you can
\nprovide the input is basically, just a few comments
\nabout whether you should go forward with it or you
\nshould make some changes. I think that’s the difficulty
\nI have with the agreement in terms of transparency
\nprocess.<\/p>\n

With respect to your point about a lot of larger
\ntrade issues, I think that’s true. It’s about
\ncounterfeiting, about piracy, but I wish they stop
\nthere.<\/p>\n

The problem is there’s a lengthy internet chapter
\nwhich is more extensive than what you can actually find
\non other issues.<\/p>\n

For counterfeiting, for piracy, nobody disagree with
\nthat, but when you are talking about including the
\ngraduate response system, including the notice and take
\ndown procedure, providing statutory damages for internet
\ninfringement, seconding internet users to jail, those
\nare the items that we don’t think is really related to
\ntrade, really related to piracy or counterfeiting.<\/p>\n

A final point, I’m glad you asked this question, is
\nthat I’m not asking you guys to support piracy.<\/p>\n

I spent a lot of time training intellectual property
\nlawyers. Intellectual property rights are very
\nimportant. What I’m saying is if we are going to
\nincrease intellectual property protection, it’s very
\nimportant for us to increase the corresponding
\nsafeguards. That will be like values, like the parody
\nexception, like limit of criminal enforcement to piracy
\nand counterfeiting and I think or maybe exceptions for
\neducational use.<\/p>\n

I think those are the things that are very
\nimportant. What we should not do is to say there are
\na lot of consequences on internet users, so we should
\nnot protect intellectual property rights. You are right
\nin terms of the fact there are a lot of people who are
\ncreators, who depend on a strong system to be
\nsuccessful.<\/p>\n

So in order for us to strike the balance, we need to
\nprovide safeguards, limitations, exceptions and
\ndefences.<\/p>\n

>> Edmon Chung: We talked about censorship and copyright
\nthis morning. I just came to my mind that it seems when
\nPeter ended, that we talked about the issues, the sort
\nof correlation which brings me to a question to I guess
\nthe panel. It seems that censorship and copyright used
\nto be that we have media companies on sort of our side
\nor the people’s side in terms of as a watchdog against
\nthe government.<\/p>\n

But in this particular fight, are we seeing the
\nmedia who are the big copyright owners actually fighting
\nagainst the people and how do you see that play out in
\nthe internet world when censorship and copyright, if we
\ntalk about like graduated response, that requires some
\nsort of censorship in a way and it’s very much related
\nto censorship. How do you see that play out in our,
\nI guess the people’s allies, who are the media
\ncompanies, who used to be our alloys and now potential
\nfavouring a some sort of censorship on the internet.<\/p>\n

>> Peter Yu: That is a very good question. I think one way
\nto look at the issue is to go back to history, to
\nunderstand that copyright started as a tool. It has
\nbeen used by the church. It has been used by the crown,
\nin order to deal with the printing press and all the
\ndissent and heresy that had been published by the
\nprinting press. To some extent, the linkage is always
\nthere. What is really interesting, in the next two
\ncenturies or so, is that there is an emerging creative
\nand publishing sector that relies on copyright to
\nprovide information that will be useful for the public.<\/p>\n

But that has changed with respect to digital
\nenvironment. When now a lot of those users can create
\ninformation themselves, they can act as printer, they
\ncan act as publisher, they act as distributor and that
\nactually disrupt some of the business interest or some
\nof the existing business models.<\/p>\n

So you see sometimes there is tension between both
\nthe corporate holders and both the users.<\/p>\n

On top of that, we also see the interest of the
\non-line service providers being aligned with the
\ncorporate holders, because one, they now don’t want to
\njust provide the pipes, they want to actually get into
\npremium content, so they have to negotiate agreements
\nwith both the content providers, and they also want to
\nhave some type of discrimination between the type of
\ninformation they actually provide in terms of whether
\nthey got for network neutrality or whether they actually
\ndevelop the different tier of service in light of that
\nmodel.<\/p>\n

So one of the things they need to pay attention to
\nis that the more they discriminate, the harder it is for
\nthem to benefit from safe harbour, because it is very
\ndifficult for them to say we discriminate, but we have
\nno knowledge about what’s going on there. If you are
\ngoing to discriminate, owe know what’s going on there,
\nyou have knowledge and you lose the safe harbour and
\nthat’s why you can see some of the interests have been
\nchanging with respect to what’s going on there. So
\nI think it’s a very complicated issue, but ultimately,
\nI think it affects a lot of the consumers, embraces
\nissues about the cost and also the ability for the
\non-line service providers, but I also want to leave it
\nto the other panellists to address some of the issues
\nyou I mentioned.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: I want to, before that, I want to follow on
\nwhat Edmon has been saying and because what Edmon has
\nsaid made me think about and relating to some of the
\nthings that particularly Sherman and Issac have talked
\nabout. You know there are so many of these technology
\ncompanies, I don’t know whether they are internet
\ncompanies or they are media companies now, that Sherman
\nhas been talking about, these Chinese companies.<\/p>\n

The line between internet companies which are
\noriginally we thought of them as technology companies,
\nthe line between being a ek the nothing company and
\nbeing a media company has very much blurred all over the
\nworld, including in China.<\/p>\n

One thing that struck me recently, because until
\nvery recently, the last several months, I have not been
\nreally a contributor in any of these mainland within
\nsite or social media or blog and so on until recently.<\/p>\n

I have become a very, quite active user of Sina and
\nwe have seen, along with many users in Hong Kong, within
\nthe last, within this month, we are still in June, we
\nare seeing a lot of first-hand experience that Hong Kong
\nusers never had before in facing immediate and very
\nefficient censorship inside of China.<\/p>\n

A lot of Hong Kong users never face that before.
\nBecause somehow, they started to use Sina, so a lot of
\nHong Kong users until now have faced these issues
\nhead on.<\/p>\n

But on the other hand, I also open up a blog in the
\nmainland, in 1510 in China. Actually, I find that to be
\na lot more open than I thought. Maybe they are an
\nexception, but I found them to be more open when
\nI thought when I posted messages about the political
\nsituation in Hong Kong.<\/p>\n

My question is also related to something that Issac
\nhas been saying, I think Issac has been quite optimistic
\nin predicting, if I’m not wrong, that the content and
\nthe users will win over censorship.<\/p>\n

What would be the comment from the other panellists
\non this sort of a prediction? I think it has a lot to
\ndo with what Oiwan has mentioned from the beginning.<\/p>\n

Let me give a few minutes or a minute to each of you
\nto give a final response and then because of time, we
\nwill probably have to close this session and move onto
\nthe next one.<\/p>\n

>> Sherman So: About censorship, event will people
\neventually win over censorship. I think it just take
\ntime and just as Issac mention, how they censor the
\nnetwork is using some kind of technology algorithm that
\nis why they make so much mistake. I think probably
\npeople can just like, somehow can escape that
\ncensorship, maybe there is something they did mind the
\nbox or maybe just it was not as famous as Sina.<\/p>\n

Another thing is besides this kind of technology,
\ndriven censorship, China is also using just a police
\nwork. They have direct connection with all the major
\ninternet players in China.<\/p>\n

That means Sina, Youku, Tudou and you can you
\nfounder tell me how the China government actually do the
\ncensorship on his own site. They need to get a licence
\nto offer video sharing service in China.<\/p>\n

But in order to get the licence, they have to fulfil
\ncertain kind of policy on censorship. How do you do the
\ncensorship?<\/p>\n

For that, it took one year to negotiate with the
\ngovernment. Basically, he has to show the government
\nthat is how we monitor our posting, how we see some part
\nof them is technology driven, some part of them is
\npeople, and if we see something that is sensitive, we
\nwill take it down and only by assuring that they can get
\nthe licence.<\/p>\n

Somebody didn’t assure the government enough, they
\ndidn’t get the licence and the government basically
\nclose it down.<\/p>\n

The point is, once you get to a certain size in
\nChina, the government start knocking on your door and
\nthey want your cooperation.<\/p>\n

Besize the technology, using algorithm to do the
\ncensorship, they are also using this kind of business
\nrelationship, because once you get to certain size, the
\ngovernment will knock on your door.<\/p>\n

One of the funny things is I think everyone has
\nheard of Tudou now, they may be the top video sharing
\nsite in China.<\/p>\n

In August, in 2008, May, there is a earthquake. The
\ngovernment want the internet, all the internet providers
\nto tone down their entertainment. They want them to
\nshow a black and white interface. They want no more
\non-line game for three days.<\/p>\n

How do they do that? Tudou tell me that they
\nactually receive a phone call from the government,
\nsaying that we want you to put something up on your
\nwebsite, saying that it’s mourning period.<\/p>\n

A smaller website I know of, they offer on-line
\ngame, they receive an email. That is how they organise
\nit. If you are big enough, you got a phone call. If
\nyou are a little bit smaller than that, you got an
\nemail.<\/p>\n

I think if you got even smaller, then they pay you
\nno attention.<\/p>\n

That is my answer.<\/p>\n

>> Oiwan Lam: For 1510, they have a certain tricks, because
\nI talk to them. Their company is registered in
\nGuangzhou. Their server is in Hainan. Their DNS is
\nregistered in Beijing. So there are three different
\ngovernment departments looking after them. But they are
\nnot coordinating with each other. So the owner, she can
\nplay around. Like when she receive the phone call from
\nBeijing, then it takes time for the Beijing government
\nto go through the Guangzhou and then to her.<\/p>\n

So if it is a very serious matter, then they will go
\nthrough all this complication.<\/p>\n

But if it is something minor, then the government<\/p>\n

department, they usually will skip it, because it’s too
\ncomplicated. You have to go through three departments
\nin order to crack it down.<\/p>\n

So they get the space from all the tricks.<\/p>\n

For the copyright and civic engagement issue in
\nChina it’s very extreme.<\/p>\n

Like sometimes copyright can be a kind of activism.
\nRecently the diary of Lee pang has been circulated in
\nChina. Even it is not published, it is not printed in
\nHong Kong. The copyright holding is in Hong Kong
\ncompany.<\/p>\n

Then there is another book, it is also written by
\na Hong Kong writer. He actually give out the copyright.
\nHe was circulating the version in China, mainland China,
\nsaying that it’s OK for mainland Chinese to download the
\nbook, because I don’t care about it. I want more people
\nto read about it.<\/p>\n

But if copyright is being criminalised, then even
\nthe writer is willing to give it out in China, but it’s
\nowned by a book company.<\/p>\n

Then the Chinese Government can add on the issue as
\na criminal case.<\/p>\n

Even the writer is willing to give it out.<\/p>\n

So the criminalisation of copyright had a very
\nserious problem and the China government is now more,
\nhow do you say, they know how to play the game, they use
\nthe international language for their censorship, like
\nthe cracking down of pornographic material, they refer
\nit to the western practice and also the copyright case.<\/p>\n

So if you criminalise the internet content, in the
\npast, usually when the book company feel that their
\ninterest is being violated, when they will sue the
\nindividual to get back their interest.<\/p>\n

But in a criminal sized case, it becomes the
\nresponsibility of the government to do the crackdown
\naction. Even if the writer, the owner of that copyright
\nproduct, they are willing to circulate it and because
\nthe book is banned in China anyway, it won’t affect
\ntheir interest for Chinese people to download it, then
\nit becomes a criminal case in China.<\/p>\n

>> Ilya Eric Lee: I think I have two stands in this kind of
\nsituation.<\/p>\n

First is I am an internationalism guy which means
\nthat — let me complete the two roles I have.<\/p>\n

First is the internationalism guy and second is the
\ntechnical optimistic and technical pessimistic guy at
\nthe same time. Which means that I think the technology
\nis running fast forward and even moving faster toward
\nanother new thing. So the way trying to control, to
\nbring it down to the, even though there is kind of
\nground level for IPV6 or the kind of packet based kind
\nof censorship is a kind of clutching hands as the most
\nessential thing, but I do think if we go back to the
\ncommunity level, to the local level, the hybrid form of
\ntransmitting messages like engaging with the community
\nnewsletter or to make it multiple accessible on the
\nvarious devises or mediums is a way to make creative
\npeople to find a way to transmit their voices out.<\/p>\n

At this point, I think I’m quite thinking if we have
\nenough international pipes, we provide much more
\ncapacity for everyone to do their own engagement, then
\nthis kind of top down, one way, one directional
\ncensorship would be not — definitely not as effective
\nas 5 or 10 years ago and even will be declining in the
\nfuture.<\/p>\n

The other thing I think both Sherman and Oiwan all
\nmentioned details about, for instance, the licensing and
\nthe change of licence and lack of coordination between
\ngovernment parties.<\/p>\n

I think all these things we involve into the details
\nso from my side, from the technical part, I think the
\ntechnical things, the detail of technical thing is also
\na way of detour or to create the alternative space, like
\nthe people could use media to transmit message to each
\nother.<\/p>\n

I think besides social network, social media, mainly
\nwe mention the tech based social media. The video based
\nsocial media will be booming with tools like flip and
\nother kind of ultra lightweight mobile device.<\/p>\n

>From the internationalism and the technical
\noptimistic and also pessimistic part, I think we need to
\nget involved into the details of technology, then we
\nwill find the space to make the prediction happen in
\nsome way.<\/p>\n

>> Isaac Mao: I just want to add some comments to my own
\npredictions, trying to explain it, not on pessimistic or
\noptimistic discussions.<\/p>\n

I just want to show people that the increase of
\nusages of new technologies and maybe new social norms,
\nsocial structures, could boost the structure of content
\nintelligence, what I call cloud intelligence, that could
\ndefeat the traditional censorship mentality. It’s
\na different paradigm fighting to each other.<\/p>\n

So it’s not only just something about purely daily
\ncensorship, others those censorship efforts, it’s
\nsomething like, it’s totally different paradigm we are
\nfacing.<\/p>\n

In my new coming book, maybe come out next spring,
\ncalled sharism, the mind revolution, I try to provoke
\nthe human nature sharing back to our world. Because
\nevery one of us are actually natural born sharing
\npeople, but step by step, we were locked into different
\ncages in different context, cultural, religious and
\nbusiness context, prevent us from sharing.<\/p>\n

This kind of things are somewhere to being allowed
\nby some free cultural movements around the world, like
\ncreative comments like we discuss in Seoul in Asia
\ncreative comments conference.<\/p>\n

We found that we are forming a new spectrum about
\nprivacy, from privacy to publicity.<\/p>\n

Actually, the traditional word separate us to the
\ntwo polarised positions. Either very private or very
\npublic.<\/p>\n

But now we are forming a very profound social
\nselection. We have different options that people can
\nchoose and everyone actually could become a small Wiki
\nleak website. You leak yourself, you leak your
\nsurroundings. Then things can become very profound.
\nYou see a very transparent world.<\/p>\n

That’s not something only about China censorship
\nlandscape, but also the global openness of culture and
\nknowledge, human knowledge.<\/p>\n

>> Peter Yu: My answer is “yes” or “no” and I hope one of
\nthem will be correct. Yes, for two different reasons.
\nCensorship standards will change according to the
\nconcerns over stability and also you vary from
\ngeneralration to generation. So I suspect the
\ncensorship today will be very different from the
\ncensorship five years from now.<\/p>\n

Is that an improvement? That is a question for us
\nto decide.<\/p>\n

The second point is censorship is only one of the
\ntools in a larger information control policy. There are
\nother tools to have information control.<\/p>\n

For example, propaganda. So I suspect if censorship
\nis reduced, then might still be more propaganda and
\nultimately the question is whether we are getting
\ninformation or not, but not whether they are using
\ncensorship as a tool for information control or whether
\nthey will using otherle toos.<\/p>\n

The answer for no is everywhere you find censorship.
\nI can tell you when I was trying to learn more about the
\nIraq war, I have to go outside the US newspapers and
\ntelevision stations to find information. I use the
\nInternational Herald Tribune, I use the business times
\nfrom Singapore, but surprisingly, the articles there
\nprovide me more information about what’s going on than
\nwhat I can find in the US. So I think that is something
\nthat we cannot avoid with regards of where we are.<\/p>\n

>> Charles Mok: Thank you and let us give a round of
\napplause to all our panellists.<\/p>\n

>> : Now we will move onto the next session immediately.<\/p>\n

There will be no coffee break today. You may now
\nuse the set-up time to refresh. Water is available at
\nthe counter near the entrance. Please feel free to take
\none.<\/p>\n

Also, you may take the similar obtainious headset
\nnear the water counter.<\/p>\n

We will be back in a few minutes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Emerging Issues ________________________________________________________________________ REAL TIME TRANSCRIPT: Emerging Issues Hong Kong IGF 9:30-11:30, Friday 18 June 2010 Hong Kong DISCLAIMER: Due to the inherent difficulties in capturing a live speaker’s words, it is possible this realtime transcript may contain errors and mistranslations. An edited version of the realtime transcript which amends the inherent errors, will be … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Hong Kong IGF \u2013 June 18th, 2010: Session 1”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":["post-371","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=371"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/371\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":562,"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/371\/revisions\/562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/event.rigf.asia\/2010\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}