Originally published February 21 2006
Google introduces new restrictive service for China
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The new Chinese Google service will offer a self-censored version of the Google search system. Thousands of terms and sites that include issues like independence for Taiwan or Tibet will be restricted.
Web search leader Google Inc. said on Tuesday that it was introducing a new service for China that seeks to avoid a confrontation with the government by restricting access to services to which users contribute such as e-mail, chat rooms and blogs.
The new Chinese service at http://www.google.cn will offer a self-censored version of Google's popular search system that restricts access to thousands of terms and Web sites.
Hot topics might include issues like independence for Taiwan or Tibet or outlawed spiritual group Falun Gong.
In seeking to compete more aggressively in the world's second biggest Internet market -- where Google has lost ground to a more popular home-grown search company Baidu Inc. -- the company is facing the toughest challenge yet to its corporate mantra of "don't do evil."
In a compromise that trades off Google's desire to provide universal access to information in order to exist within local laws, Google will not offer its Gmail e-mail service, Web log publishing services or chat rooms -- tools of self-expression that could be used for political or social protest.
Instead, it said it would initially offer four of its core services -- Web site and image search, Google News and local search -- while working toward introducing additional services over time.
"Other products -- such as Gmail and Blogger -- will be introduced only when we are comfortable that we can do so in a way that strikes a proper balance among our commitments to satisfy users' interests, expand access to information, and respond to local conditions," the company said in a statement.
The move in China comes less than a week after Google resisted the U.S. Justice Department's efforts to get information about commonly used sex search terms.
That government demand was met by search rivals such as Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft, spokesmen for those companies said.
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