June 25, 2002
Old dog, familiar tricks? ... Let's take five with Moira Gunn. This is "Five Minutes".
Just a few weeks ago there were 2,400 cybercafes in Beijing. Now there are none. They may well spring back, but just when and how many will be revived is not known.
The closures followed a fire that resulted in the deaths of 24 people at one cybercafe; and to understand what is happening requires more than an understanding of technology.
In the US, it's difficult to comprehend the actual demand for Internet cafes. Middle class families can readily afford a computer. Children have network access at school, and college students bring their own computers or go to myriad sites on campus, which are open 24/7. Even people down on their luck get free access at public libraries.
And the librarians themselves have fought relentlessly for freedom of access to information.
It's important to understand that this bears no resemblance to Beijing in particular, or China as a whole.
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Let's start with fire and safety. While regulations officially exist, they are frequently ignored. In the case of this recent fire, there was a single entrance with a bolted door. Customers knocked to be let in or out. Stairs led up to a second floor with 100 computer terminals and barred windows that couldn't be opened from the inside. Set a fire in the stairwell, and everyone upstairs would be trapped.
It's hard for us to imagine such a setting in the US. Still, it took more than attention to safety for Chinese cybercafes to be licensed by the government. They must keep records of customer names, addresses and telephone numbers, along with their access times. A relatively new regulation requires software which tracks the Web sites users visit.
This kind of censorship is unknown to us, and between the Constitution and the efforts of our librarians, we may never know it. Still, it's no wonder that less than 10% of Beijing's cybercafes were licensed before the shutdown.
In short order, two young teens were arrested for their part in the fire. At 13 and 14 respectively, they were objecting to an edict issued in April: Minors under the age of 18 could only use cybercafes on holidays and then only during daylight hours.
One of these young suspects was shown on television telling police officials that he burned the cybercafe with gasoline because they would not let them play there.
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Let me ask you this: Just how does our society relate to this situation? Even if the suspects were adult, we would never see such an interview on television.
On another front, we are not so different. School officials and parents throughout China voice concerns about the impact of the Internet on their teenagers. And what they say bears a striking resemblance to what we hear in the US every day.
The unfortunate deaths of 24 people brought this news to world attention. And it's easy for us to say that the cybercafe closures were just another obvious government ruse to bring the Internet under control.
But China cannot stop the march of technology to cheaper, faster, smaller, mobile and invisible. And in the end, the role of government is to serve society, not control it.
I'm Moira Gunn. This is Five Minutes.
