Thread: The language in all these internal memos shows censors know full well how angry people really are. This escalating cat and mouse game of info control deepens distrust in anything censors deem OK to be seen. And that has profound consequences. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/19/technology/china-coronavirus-censorship.html?smid=tw-share

This article brilliantly explains the “how,” but the “what” is common knowledge even in China. Ppl know censorship is ubiquitous and online speech is controlled. Weibo’s “trending topic”, which has greater news agenda-setting power than many news media in China, is often rigged.

This knowledge and the fact that big Vs are discouraged (so not many expert voices) has resulted in a unique weibo culture where ppl crowdsource the truth——rushing to get something viral just so more ppl can see/ fact-check/add/archive/discuss before it inevitably disappears.

The attempts to get ahead of the censors are often implicit. Other times more obvious and defiant, like in this case where ppl got very creative about sharing a profile of whistleblower doctor Aifen: https://twitter.com/izzy_niu/status/1237437855745683457?s=21 https://twitter.com/izzy_niu/status/1237437855745683457

In the early days of covid, people did what I now see as online protests, where instead of confronting the police in the street, they confronted censors and algorithms. On the evening of dr. Li Wenliang’s death, ppl tried to get various version of #freedomofspeech trending. https://twitter.com/izzy_niu/status/1225483872919486464

What I’m trying to say is disinformation works differently in an environment where ppl know that censorship is the default and their info diet is manipulated. This article offers a snapshot of the censorship machine. But it evolves and learns from how people react and fight back.