Beijing Police To Launch Animated Web Patrols

Reader geoffrobinson notes an AP story on a new initiative by the police in Beijing to put a visible police presence on the screens of Chinese citizens. Starting Sept. 1, little animated cop figures will wander across the displays of users of a baker's dozen of Chinese Web portals. The program is set to expand by year's end to all sites "registered with Beijing servers," according to the report. The point of the anime-like figures seems to be to remind citizens that their Web usage is being monitored, not to actually implement any further monitoring themselves.

Sweet!

[Spudtrooper]

Bonzi Buddy got a new job!

Oh no!

[orionop]

What is next, an animated goatse reminding us of the horrors that are to be found on the internet?

So

[Vinegar Joe]

If you google Tiananmen does a little animated tank come out and crush your cursor?

Insert clippy joke here.

[rabiddeity]

You look like you're trying to access the Real Internet! Would you like me to:

-block the sites you're trying to access
-uninstall your proxy software
-report you to the authorities for re-education
-subtly rewrite your search results

Re:1984

[Chairboy]

Shouldn't that be "Big Brother is watching Yu"?

Re:Odd...

[QuantumG]

"He said he was going somewhere he would need Euros"

Damn you single trade currency!

I for one

[Renig]

welcome our animated police overlords.

I saw one of these guys hanging around this site

[Anonymous Coward]

Just like the cops at home. [dunkindonuts.com]

Three avatars.

[Anonymous Coward]

They got both a male and a female cop. And a police car.

So to continue your analogy, perhaps we can have the goatse guy and the tub girl, and meatspin as the police cruiser.

Re:So

[RuBLed]

Remember those ads where you need to shoot the rubber ducks and win a prize? I'm smelling a firefox addon going to be made by a pissed Chinese.

Easy Vista

[KingPrad]

This should streamline running Vista. Now whenever you are prompted for Allow/Deny the character will go ahead and choose Deny for you. Every time.

Awww...

[StikyPad]

They're so cute they just make me want to limit my searches to government approved propaganda and puppies.

I'll bite the trollbait...

[Anonymous Coward]

I live in China, and I can tell you that it's certainly not in a "death-like state like that the of Chinese government oppression". Sure, censorship exists, the government is quite corrupt and abusive, especially on the lower levels, and it can be hard to find a good book. It drives me up the wall sometimes, just how flat the popular culture is- anything controversial gets dropped like a hot rock.

On the other hand, there are raunchy popular novels (printed by half-legal vanity presses) being sold right outside my door. There's tons of (bad) modern art expressing the pain of living in Chinese society, and (bad) rock 'n roll expressing the pain of being young and unloved. Although there are fewer than 100 movies released to theaters each year on the mainland, every film ever made is sporadically available on DVD, from Deep Throat to To Live to They Live. Chinese people can find every sort of approved and forbidden idea under the sun if they're curious, and they're mostly free to discuss it in private. Publishing is another thing, but the Cultural Revolution is over, and you can pretty much say whatever you want to your friends.

China is booming, and the authorities can barely keep it under control. I won't defend their actions (although cartoon cops are hardly the worst things they do....) but the notion that China in any way resembles 1984 is absurd. While the government is sliding from totalitarian Communism towards plutocracy, the people are getting away with everything they can, and it's a lot. I don't hold out a lot of hope that we'll have big D Democracy here anytime soon, but to imagine that this country, or the US, or anyone else would somehow be better off in a Massive 3rd World War is insane.

You are insane.

Tentacles

[mwvdlee]

Can you get all hentai on that girl cop and "interact" with her using a tentacle cursor?

Re:Is it really funny?

[kalirion]

Reminds me of an old Soviet joke:

A Russian and an American are discussing the merits of their governments.

The American says, "We have full freedom of speech. I could stand on a soap box all day and yell 'The American government sucks, and the American president is a criminal' and I would not be arrested."

The Russian replies, "That's nothing. I could go into Kremlin, call a press conference with invitations to all the communist party leaders, and announce 'The American government sucks, and the American president is a criminal' and I would be commended."

Re:Oh no!

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Award 4 internets to this person.