{"id":19989,"date":"2012-05-16T12:43:58","date_gmt":"2012-05-16T04:43:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chinahearsay.com\/?p=12858"},"modified":"2012-05-16T12:43:58","modified_gmt":"2012-05-16T04:43:58","slug":"implausible-rumor-dept-china-greenlights-government-smartphone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/2012\/05\/16\/implausible-rumor-dept-china-greenlights-government-smartphone\/","title":{"rendered":"Implausible Rumor Dept.: China Greenlights Government Smartphone"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I fabricate, you decide.<\/em><\/p>\n

Dateline: tomorrow<\/span> – - Following the formal announcement of the launch of Baidu’s cloudish smartphone, which follows similar moves<\/a> by every other incorporated business entity in the People’s Republic of China, including that guy on the corner selling “lamb”\u00a0kebabs, the government has decided to stop messing around with its bloated domestic security budget, cut out the middleman, and jump into the market directly.<\/p>\n

Enter the Little Red Phone\u00ae, a joint project between the powerful Ministry of Public Security and the secretive Information Sequestration Bureau (so secretive, many would argue that, \u00e0 la\u00a0Keyser S\u00f6ze<\/a>, it doesn’t even exist).<\/p>\n

[Editorial note: when performing research for this post, China Hearsay was urged by government liaison officers to discontinue use of the acronym \"ISB\" when referring to the Information Sequestration Bureau on account of the agency's ongoing trademark dispute with the International School of Beijing.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Why is the government taking this unprecedented step? Bi Ming (\u7b14\u540d), Professor of Epistolary Literature at Miskatonic University, has reviewed several unpublished white papers drafted by China’s security officials:<\/p>\n

You have to understand that the security business is expensive. In addition to all that technology and personnel, the sheer number of man hours it takes to keep tabs on everyone is mind boggling. Just in the mobile sector, there are so many different service providers, hardware manufacturers, and distributors to deal with, and that doesn’t even take into account data mining. The resources just aren’t available any more. However, if they provide the software and the hardware, and distribute the product themselves, all those information supply chain issues simply melt away. They would be stupid not to do it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After the July 2011 announcement that music sensation Lang Lang<\/a> would soon release a rhinestone-encrusted smartphone with a fold-out piano keyboard (industry insiders refer to the peripheral device as the “10-inch Pianist”), there was a great deal of soul-searching in Beijing. If Lang Lang can do it, officials ultimately decided, it’s almost embarrassing that we are not in the market.<\/p>\n

Fast forward to the first quarter of 2012, when the\u00a0Little Red Phone\u00ae went into production. IT news site Ubertechnik reported last month that the initial release will include the standard\u00a0Little Red Phone\u00ae (specs include a 3.5″ Retsina Display (manufactured by the Athens-based Goat Glass), with a patented uni-core processor, 200 MB onboard memory, an RCA port, and a floppy drive), a slimmed-down “mini” phone powered by a Pentium II processor, and a high-end model,\u00a0co-branded with Audi,\u00a0with optional gold plating.<\/p>\n

Zhuge Liang (\u8bf8\u845b\u4eae),\u00a0editor of Beijing Bytes <\/em>magazine, often referred to as the smartest man in the China IT sector, thinks that the\u00a0Little Red Phone\u00ae project has several built-in advantages:<\/p>\n

Well, first, they could simply force everyone to buy it. No need for early adopters, who tend to be whiny bitches. Second, they could market the phone as the best choice for consumers worried about data privacy. If you buy a\u00a0Little Red Phone\u00ae, you will know exactly how and for what reason your private information will be used. Third, obviously the floppy drive; I still have a few of those in a drawer somewhere at home that I would like to use.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

No details are yet available on equipment suppliers or the operating system. Some have speculated that instead of working with a private equipment supplier, the government may rely on in-house capabilities (one of our sources mentioned a company or agency with a name similar to “Waw-Way” but refused to confirm). When that source was asked whether the operating system would be open source, he laughed at our correspondent and told him to piss off.<\/p>\n

With the anticipated roll-out of the\u00a0Little Red Phone\u00ae, rumors about a possible\u00a0Little Red Tablet have already begun to percolate through the Intertubes. While it it doubtful that the government would use the “Little Red Tablet” name\u00a0(the PRC trademark is currently owned by Proview Technology Shenzhen Ltd.), tech site Gizmodo has already announced that they have purchased a prototype device that was abandoned by a customer at Beijing’s Zhongguancun Blindman Massage and KTV Family Eatery. Details should be forthcoming shortly.<\/p>\n

\n

\u00a9 Stan for China Hearsay<\/a>, 2012. |\nPermalink<\/a> |\nNo comment<\/a> |\nAdd to\ndel.icio.us<\/a>\n\nPost tags: \n<\/small><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Be the first on your block to buy a Little Red Phone\u00ae. I'd get one even if it wasn't mandatory!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[213,194],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-china-news","category-news-chinese-law"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19989\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinalegalblog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}