Reflection on HK's new formula for milk formula

A few weeks ago the SCMP editorial lobbied for a 'New Formula for Milk Formula' (Mar 29, 2013) to address the so-called 'formula shortage' in Hong Kong. The formula crisis was reduced to a violation of the law of demand and supply. Backed by this economic principle, hysterical parents joined the anti-Chinese sects in blaming mainlanders and cross-border traders for causing the milk scarcity. The discourse on infant formula threw the city into a frenzy of Sinophobic rage.

Yet the suppliers of the baby formula did not comment on the shortage until their businesses were imperiled by the two-can export quota. This time, the seven manufacturers pledge a vow on steady supply in concert with the General Chamber of Pharmacy. ('Baby Milk Formula Producers Plan to End Export Restrictions' dated April 26, 2013) I couldn’t help but wonder: where were these people a few months ago? When local mothers were painfully scouting around for your products, where were you? What did you do to sooth your customers?  

When the media spotlight is disproportionately put on the demand factor, does anyone ever cast doubt on the business ethics of these suppliers? Shouldn’t the suppliers share some of the responsibilities for causing the social unrest? After all, market equilibrium is a two-way street. When Hong Kong people indulge themselves in trashing mainlanders and the stereotypically corrupted Chinese government, does (has) any self-respected Hong Kong citizen ever reflect(ed) on the corporate greed that is endemic in this city? 

In the Pulitzer and Nobel Prize-winning novel ‘The Grapes of Wrath,’ John Steinbeck depicted the gripping scene in which people starved even when the supply of crops was abundant because the growers dumped the crops into the river to keep the price up. Steinbeck held the covetous farmers responsible for causing the plight of the poor and hungry during the Great Depression. In the twenty-first century Hong Kong, are we still experiencing the purposeful destruction or hoarding of milk powder to keep the price high? 

It’s time to reflect on who is the real culprit behind this incident. We will return to the dark age where there is a growing wrath among the adults if social justice is not restored.

Google and China: civil rights or business espionage?

I've been following for a while the groundbreaking news of the possibility for Google to withdraw their business in China. According to this post from Google's official blog site, Google is considering of leaving because the gmail accounts of some human right activists were hacked by the Chinese government. Google claimed that the infringement of intellectual property and civil liberty by the Chinese authority undermined their founding beliefs in promoting free access of information to the cyber community.

If you look into some of the claims and evidence supplied by Google in their official document, you'd be clueless and wonder "what is G complaining?" Media censorship? Infringement of property rights? Violation of human rights? For the first variable, GFW and censorship has been there ever since Google made the inroad into the Chinese market in 2006, and G is well aware of the filtered search engine they introduced to China from the beginning, so why now? On the second level, if breaching their servers is the concern here, why didn't other companies with their systems hacked complain? Were they threatened? What is the comparative scope of damage? The comparative POV is important because G could be making an exaggerated accusation by over-victimizing itself. So far I found the third claim simply groundless. On what ground does G catalogue the political engagement of their users? How does G distinguish what email accounts belong to "advocates of human rights"? Even if the accounts belong to prominent social activists, were the exact emails being accessed contain human rights-related topics? If not, then it's at best a privacy and internet security problem. Why drag human rights into this discussion? I understand that China has a horrible record when it comes to media censorship and encroachment of civil right, but I don't see how G can back up their arguments in this incident. For example, not sufficient evidence is supplied by G on the intended target and motivations of the email hacks. If the email strip-search affects many more companies, what gives G the right to claim that human rights related topic is the outstanding reason for the hacks? Why doesn't G grant the Chinese authority the benefits of the doubts?

The point here is not internet censorship in China in general, but this specific event. Based on this text and other blog articles, I don't see how the limited evidence G provided support their argument that "the primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activist", or so as they maintained.

If you were a human right activist, would you put "human right activist" as your name? Your occupation? Your interest? Your affiliated group when you sign up for the Gmail accounts? When I sign up mine, I didn't put my Chinese name in my gmail account, do you know how many "Christine Luk" are there in HK alone? I left my date of birth open too. The point is, it seems very unlikely G can deduce the political engagement of its email users from the mere account information provided at the time of signing up. These info. are circumferential at best. I understand that G needs to protect the privacy of its users, but it should disclose the sources of evidence by which they employed to back up their claim. Moreover, G said the information being assessed is only limited to the subject line and the account activity rather than the content of the emails. So how does what appeared to be an internet security problem (which is a separate but important issue) to a human right-related issue?

Apparently I am not the only one who questioned Google's decision. This blog article provided a possible (and plausible) explanation of the Google's farce. I don't have valid evidence to verify this story, but at least the situation is skeptical and dubious enough to attract counter-arguments from the netizens. If there were indeed an engineering spy from the CPC, the divulge of the account information of the human rights activists appeared to be more precisely and concretely demonstrated rather than some vague grounds that "anything is possible on the net" as my FB friend threw out. It also explained the unofficial announcement of this consequential decision. But there is no evidence so far lending support to this anecdotes.

Also, Shanghai Scrap gave a critical account of the "cowardice" of Google by pulling all out from the Sinosphere instead of hanging in there and make a difference in the long run.