“The year 2003 was the year of the Internet opinion in China,” said Hu Yong, the translator of (among others) Negroponte‘s key works, at the second day of the Berkeley conference on China’s digital future. His Saturday panel on the effects of the Internet on public opinion painted a picture of dramatic change. The case of Sun Zhigang, a student who died in January 2003 while in police custody, is one of many examples that illustrates how debate on the Internet can lead to change; in this case it led to the recall of a long-outdated law that allowed random arrests.
The Internet has been eroding the power base of the propaganda ministry, writes Li Xiguang, dean of the school of journalism at Tsinghua University in Beijing, in a recent book. And the old forces are kicking back, writes Joseph Kahn in a Sunday New York Times article. Dinosaurs can be pretty nasty when they know they are dying.
2003: Year of the Internet Opinion in China
