Google CEO Eric Schmidt loves China. He really does. He loves “what China is doing as a country and its growth,” according to his speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Only thing Schmidt apparently doesn’t love about China? “We just don’t like the censorship.”
Or the sophisticated and persistent hacking, eh?
Indeed, speaking just weeks after Google made a big show of banging its virtual fist down on the bamboo table, Schmidt altruistically and solemnly noted, “We just don’t like the censorship. We hope to apply some negotiation or pressure to make things better for the Chinese people.”
Why now, brown cow? Have you not been perfectly happy to censor the heck out of the Chinese search market for years? Have you not fended off every criticism of this policy until now with the tired old mantra that “some information is better than no information”? And is Google not now, as you stand there waxing lyrical at Davos, not STILL censoring itself in China as you attempt to come to some sort of “agreement.” Hypocrite.
But all this is supposed to be heartily applauded, because Schmidt has promised that in a “reasonably short time from now we will be making some changes there.”
“Some changes”? Sounds super idealistic, Schmidt.
Of course, Schmidt is hardly hiding his eagerness to come to some sort of agreement with the Chinese government that will allow Google to keep reaping rewards from the massive Chinese economy.
“We’ve made a strong statement that we wish to remain in China,” he told analysts recently.
Humanitarianism and highbrow values be damned then.
