China Demands Removal Of Skeletons From World Of Warcraft
In more weird WoW news this week, China has upped its super evil-looking attempt to "harmonize" the internet by demanding that no skeletons be seen by any Chinese players of World of Warcraft. Apparently missing the irony of removing skeletons from closets or the internet, China has ordered The9, the company licensed to operate WoW in China, to replace player corpses with graves and to cover up Undead players' exposed ivory with flesh.
World of Warcraft appears to have been the only online game featuring skeletons to be singled out thus, I'm guessing due to its size and popularity - so as to set an example.
China continues to block the Chinese version of Wikipedia and has no doubt taken other more shadowy routes to prevent its population - over one billion people - from accessing the free information and free speech of the online world. Whether or not one nation can isolate itself from a global society that grows more interconnected each day (and brings the technology to back that claim up) will be a question for the history books, but China's ruling party's insistence on "harmony" and "purification" despite such forces as "truth" and "reality" can't possibly ever reflect positively on China or its government.
Indeed, Chinese president Hu Jintao's call to purify the internet of "anything that might affect 'national cultural information security' or his attempt to promote a 'harmonious society'" sounds Orwellian at best and downright Palpatinian at worst. Are we just a bad hair day away from a raspy whisper directing the genocide of the poor undead Forsaken? "Wipe them out. All of them."
My forsaken brethren, do not go gentle (again) into that good night - pwn them. Pwn China!
Censorship reaches internet skeletons [GulfNews]
[via Kotaku]
tiny dancer
Posted to Video Games on 7 July 2007
· Comments (8)
Other stuff like this: blizzard, censorship, china, the9, world of warcraft, wow
"...its population - one-tenth of the planet's..."
We're still at 6.6 billion people, right?
We are, yes! How in the world did that come out of my fingers? Thanks :)
I'm confused.
Why don't they like skeletons?
Do they not believe in them or something?
I am also confused; but then, I'm often confused by what China chooses to censor and chooses not to.
I think we'll actually see China being less and less able to do things like this as it gets more prosperous. While I doubt that you'll see some sort of revolution (and the gods help the world economy if that happens), I think the growing Chinese middle class will eventually begin to push back a bit more on these sorts of things. That could take a good few decades, however.
Muddy, the US government keeps nudity from happening on network television, but that doesn't mean they don't believe in breasts or penises. I have a feeling that the Chinese government, for whatever reason, thinks it's indecent and will melt people's brains (more than WOW already does melt people's brains).
China's skeleton phobia is well known. Magic: The Gathering, for instance, is not allowed to sell in China unless any skulls and skeletons in the art of any given set are covered up with flesh, clothes, or whatever.
I guess I understand the cultural reasons for this but.. China is just getting ridiculous about it's censorship. There's this, lots of google/yahoo censorship, censoring the chinese pirate from potc3, etc.
Kind of seems like they are trying to keep a desperate hold of their country and losing the battle D:
LMAO,
China government, what a bunch of complete morons. If they think the country seeing skeletons in a game is gona cause a problem they all got to be mental. Thank god I'm american.