back to article MS, Yahoo! and Google snub debate on freedom

Yahoo!, Google and Microsoft have passed up the chance to take part in a web conference on internet freedom being hosted by human rights group Amnesty International this evening. The event is being held to discuss how free debate is being quashed by oppressive regimes. The three tech giants could have made a crucial …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Talk to the hand

    Fact of the matter is that companies such as these have no social or moral compass. They exist solely to make money and will do whatever it takes to maintain inclusion in the Chinese market (or elsewhere). Money is all that matters, and any real discussion about censorship or information sharing with governments is just talking to the hand. Management at these places will never walk away from the potential cash cow that is China, even if it means getting some blood on their hands.

    Money is the only reason for living, as can also be seen by the US policy towards global warming, torte law and internet gambling. They either ignore the realities of the issue, or just outlaw it where they can't legally control the action.

    Yippee. What a great world (especially if you are a US citizen) we live in.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Amnesty International

    I can't blame any company from staying as far away from Amnesty International as absolutely possible. Their marketing team is as bad (or worse) than any politicians and they are almost guaranteed to take whatever is said and twist it around for their own benefit. By appearing at this event any company could (would) be seen as colluding with Amnesty, which is really bad.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The Bush administration believes in Amnesty International.

    On March 27, 2003, Rumsfeld said:

    We know that it’s a repressive regime…Anyone who has read Amnesty International or any of the human rights organizations about how the regime of Saddam Hussein treats his people…

    The next day, Rumsfeld said:

    …[I]t seems to me a careful reading of Amnesty International or the record of Saddam Hussein, having used chemical weapons on his own people as well as his neighbors, and the viciousness of that regime, which is well known and documented by human rights organizations, ought not to be surprised.

    On April 1, 2003, Rumsfeld said:

    [I]f you read the various human rights groups and Amnesty International’s description of what they know has gone on, it’s not a happy picture.

    Surely any organization that the Bush administration supports and believes in so strongly couldn't be as bad as you say.

  4. Dillon Pyron

    And where will it be available?

    Will China get to see this?

    And how long before it gets DoSed?

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Mmmmmmm...

    Not a big fan of supporting oppression but this is the same Amnesty who supported the IRA over decent peoples' rights not to be blown up in. Nice.

  6. Mike VandeVelde

    Rumsfeld and Amnesty International

    2003

    See above.

    2005

    Amnesty International: "The detention facility at Guantanamo Bay has become the gulag of our times, entrenching the practice of arbitrary and indefinite detention in violation of international law"

    Rumsfeld: "those who make such outlandish charges lose any claim to objectivity or seriousness"

    hmmm.... seems to depend more on who Amnesty International is talking about than what they are actually saying.

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