Recently a Chinese propaganda official told the press that Chinese enjoyed the most freedom of speech as most western website did not allow readers to leave comments while most Chinese website did. Probably so.
Look at this Youtube video on the high profile L.A. police brutality. Even though Youbute does allow visitors to leave comments, actually visitors comments are what makes Youbute the $1.6 billion business, the comment function of this particular heavily visited video is disabled.
Internet has become a main Chinese for Chinese to release their unhappiness on social issues. It seems the government intentionally leaves the channel open so that less people will actually go on the streets. Thanks to cheap labor cost, thousands of Net cops were busy working to delete inappropriate comments. Still, Chinese Netizens get to enjoy moment of shout out on the Internet. On the other hand, although Google's video sharing business model is built on community comments, Google decides it's simply too risky to allow any potential criticism on government that they prohibit comments on sensitive topics. Or maybe, 'censorship' is just too evil a word for Google's taste, and 'shut up' sounds much nicer.
Stated in Google's own Code of Conduct, "..our most important asset by far is our reputation as a company that warrants our users' faith and trust." Google made its name and market share not only by its technically superior search engine, but also because of its 'being different kind of company', evident by clean user interface, and non-commercial rankings of search results, etc. However, the core value of Google has been put into test repeatedly as the company 'evolves'. So one day it may read 'All animals are equal', and the next day it may evolves into '.., but some animals are more equal then others'.
Just another case when the Mafia Nation is laughing at the Police Nation. Google, "
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