Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
PUBLIC INTERNET
One of the best things about life in Beijing is the almost unlimited free pubic wireless In-
ternet. Cafés, bars, and even many restaurants become pseudo offices for freelancers and
students. There are actual Internet cafés, but these are often grimy, dimly lit burrows with
sour-smelling couches. On the odd occasion they may have their function, but it's almost
always just as easy and twice as pleasant to go to a café. If you're simply after printing,
photocopying, or scanning services, countless printers around town can handle these jobs
for you. There is no expectation in Beijing that you should eat an entire menu as a way of
paying “rent” for spending an entire day in a café. Many get by on a single coffee. The most
anyone will do is possibly ask you to move to a smaller table during peak hours.
CENSORSHIP AND JUMPING THE GREAT FIREWALL OF CHINA
China is, of course, well known for its censorship and blocking of various web-
sites—Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are just the beginning. You may also have trouble
logging on to sites such as IMDB, Netflix, BBC, Dropbox, porn sites, and even occasionally
Gmail. Thanks to a bitter past between China and Google, the company departed China
and Google.com was blocked. So when searching for information on your computer or
cell phone it won't work. If not using a proxy, you'll need to try such alternatives as
www.google.com.hk (Hong Kong), www.google.com.au (Australia), www.ask.com ,
www.yahoo.com , and so on. You may even need to resort to local search engine options,
such as Bing China ( http://cn.bing.com ) or (the big one) Baidu ( http://cn.bing.com ) .
It's also well established that the government monitors user interactions. There is no pri-
vacy here and you should be aware that transmitting any sensitive comments or content
carries serious risk. Even phone calls and message chats on Skype can be monitored. When
particular national events arise, the government cracks down even harder.
You can avoid a lot of this by using a proxy server or VPN (Virtual Private Network),
a server that you connect to that connects to another website on your behalf. It not only
means that you can look at sites that are blocked but that it's harder for others to monitor
what you're doing. It's contentious whether or not these are illegal, but there are endless
private and government enterprises out there that also require proxies for the sheer secrecy
of their own business, so a blanket ban on proxies or VPNs seems all but impossible.
Some proxies require you to download software, while others are accessed online via
a given website. Prices vary, but you're generally looking at spending US$10/month or
US$70/year. There are free ones, but these tend to get blocked extremely quickly by the
Chinese government. The government is always improving its technology for tracking and
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