This kind of tech drama doesn't happen too often folks. Ever since several accounts at Google got hacked by someone in China earlier in December 2009, Google has taken the gloves off and announced that they were no longer censoring search results. Of course, the Chinese government simply flipped some switches on the Great Firewall of China, and started blocking various Google services. The response from within China has been somewhat varied, ranging from cautious support to nationalistic outrage.
So what happens now?
The obvious answer is that Google loses, big time. China's 384 million plus internet users will probably turn to the domestic search engine Baidu, and Google will no longer have a foothold in the world's fastest growing tech market. Of course, Sergey Brin expected this, and this was a decision based on personal rather than business ideals.
But the more disturbing answer is that US tech companies working with China will face this sort of treatment for the indefinite future. Google hasn't been the only high-profile company that has had trouble recently working with the Chinese government. Activision-Blizzard also has experienced its fair share of troubles in its efforts to renew the World of Warcraft license with the Chinese government, even though it has done exactly the opposite of what Google has chosen to do.
With an increasingly nationalistic and inward-focused China protests about intellectual property violations, hacking attacks, and censorship will fall on mostly deaf ears. As Western tech services and firms are handicapped by the Chinese government, Chinese copycats will continue to flourish. The digital divide between China and the rest of the world is growing day by day, it's clear that the digital landscapes on both sides of this divide will be very different.
Update: Oh, and it was confirmed that Yahoo had several email accounts hacked very recently. Starting to see a trend here?
Image courtesy AFP
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