In The News

John Shinal January 24, 2006
Citizens in China and the US can no longer depend on their Internet searches remaining private. Last week the US Justice requested information from four major US search engines on users’ search results. The request, ostensibly to assess the frequency of searches for child pornography and to prevent children from viewing harmful material, raises questions about personal freedom and the right to...
Jonathan Mirsky January 18, 2006
In China, searching for the word “democracy” on the Internet can lead to a decade spent behind bars. Chinese Internet users are subject to surveillance, content blocking and harsh punishment for posting or viewing forbidden material in what amounts to the largest program of state censorship ever implemented. The policy contradicts those who maintain that political reform will surely follow...
David Barboza December 9, 2005
Online gamers with money to burn, who have neither the time nor patience to battle their way up to the higher levels of games such as World of Warcraft and Magic Land, are willing to pay others to do it for them. A business known as "gold farming" has appeared in China, in which young men, mostly with dim employment prospects, spend hours playing online games, accumulating points,...
Howard W. French November 25, 2005
In early July, a Shanghai blogger introduced herself to China as an aspiring “Web cam dance girl”. Today, the 25-year old Communist Party member is regarded as the most popular blogger in China – thousands of avid fans tune in for her provocative dances and ironic political commentary – and one of the pioneers in a trend that is challenging government censorship. Chinese Web logs have exploded...
Stuart Anderson November 16, 2005
The numbers are better, but not good. Since hitting a low in 2002, post September 11, the number of foreign graduate students enrolled in the United States has been improving, albeit slowly. The importance of these international students to American technological and economic superiority cannot be understated, as former US immigration official Stuart Anderson writes. Foreign graduates...
Victoria Shannon November 15, 2005
In countless contexts and from every corner of the world, the internet is hailed as a revolutionary force, breaking down traditional barriers of class and nation with an inexorable flow of information. As its accessibility increases, the internet becomes more and more a tool of democracy and international cooperation. But this leveling playing field cannot smooth over an underlying reality: the...
Peter Mandaville October 27, 2005