It's been fun the last few days reading countless news articles, blog posts, BBS blurbs, and so on. I don't do Twitter much these days, so that's a further frontier I've failed to travel beyond.
As I mentioned yesterday, I don't want to do a metapost or sum up everything that's been going on since Google announced that it would no longer following censorship rules when operating Google.cn. That story, and the reactions of Beijing, have been well covered.
Some long-term issues have been debated ad nauseum, of course, some of which are amusing. Perhaps the one that has floated to the top of the fetid bog that is my consciousness concerns the actions of other foreign-invested enterprises in China.
The big question is summarized well by this PC World headline:
Indeed. The WSJ blog explains in further detail:
Google may just have set a new benchmark for corporate morality in China. Call it the Google Standard. Other companies will be judged against it, not just by human rights groups but a host of other stakeholders whose interests Western companies must take into account, from ethical investors to consumer groups. If Google could defy China, these groups will ask, why not you?
It's just become harder for Western companies to justify compromises, ethical or commercial, in the China market. That could make the decision to stay or go a bit more complicated.
Is there now a Google standard? I have no idea. I'm much more interested in asking whether there should be one, whether it makes any sense for multinational corporations to be making ethical/moral decisions like this.
(More)
© Stan for China Hearsay, 2010. |
Permalink |
6 comments |
Add to
del.icio.us
Post tags: