This news item has a few “lost in translation,” issues but is still interesting: some people in China are apparently complaining that Apple is promulgating pornography there.
According to Communist Party of China mouthpiece People’s Daily Online, a man rang up China National Radio to complain that he downloaded an app that contained “sexually explicit written material.”
The app, provocatively titled “18 novels forbidden in the Ming and Qing Dynasty,” contained content that “annoyed” his family. (And, although we’re sure you weren’t the least bit curious, we searched and turned up no English translation of this content in iTunes).
Li Qiang, professor with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told the radio that the offending content is a crime, according to a 2010 judicial interpretation on pornography dissemination in China, and called for a “public prosecution” of Apple.
An Apple spokesperson told CNR that the content carries a warning that it is “only suitable for adults over 17.”
“In a country that has zero tolerance toward pornography dissemination, we won’t accept the rating system at all. Apple can’t use American laws to treat the problem in China,” Li said.
This could be an interesting conundrum for the Cupertino company after the famous “freedom from porn” declaration and all the flip-flopping on adult content in the iTunes U.S. store.
Via People’s Daily
Nicole Martinelli is a San Francisco freelance writer who heads up Cult of Mac Magazine, our weekly publication available on iTunes. You can find her on Twitter and Google+. If you’re doing something new, cool and Apple-related, email her.
48 responses to “Apple accused of pushing porn in China”
Wow. The Chinese are so used to censorship, they demand it, even in the face of logic.
17 and up means 17 and up. If you’re to thick to understand that, you shouldn’t even be allowed to use technology.
There go the Chinese again, always trying to take over the world. Sheeesh.
Apple will learn how to do business there. There are laws against portraying human skeletons and viscera in video games as well. A lot of zombie games are probably against the law. Blizzard Inc. had to redo many graphics in their game after the Ministry in charge of video games there deemed it inappropriate and had it removed from the market. Took them two years to get it back on the market there.
The best option for Apple will be to have the China iTunes Store follow the rules there and have its own curators that can handle the issues. If they want to sell 500 million iPhones there, there are a lot of things that in the App Store that can get them banned from the country. They’ll only be under more scrutiny as they get more popular.
Ratings really aren’t the issue. China is a totalitarian state with totalitarian rules. The Ministry of Commerce can ban Apple from doing business in the country because of this complaint. Therefore, Apple will do what the Ministry of Commerce asks.
Apple just needs to delete the content and say that the content was in one of those “counterfeit Apple stores.“
Sounds like if I would accuse Sony for showing Porn on TV I own…
Isn’t this the pot calling the kettle black? In America you can find gay chat apps on the iTunes store….WTF? Just coz America thinks it is ok doesn’t mean it is elsewhere!
Of course there is censorship in the US, Wikileaks is a damn good example of the US trying to censor free speech you moron!
When in Rome, do what the Romans do. It is utter stupidity to think that America can use their own law to apply to all in this world.
Did I say there wasn’t? There’s FAR more in China than the US.
I just got a $827.89 iPad2 for only $103.37 and my mom got a $1499.99 HTV for only $251.92, they are both coming tomorrow. I would be an idiot to ever pay full retail prîces at places like Walmart or Bestbuy. I sold a 37″ HTV to my boss for $600 that I only paid $78.24 for. I use http://blue.gg/5g
I just got a $827.89 iPad2 for only $103.37 and my mom got a $1499.99 HTV for only $251.92, they are both coming tomorrow. I would be an idiot to ever pay full retail prîces at places like Walmart or Bestbuy. I sold a 37″ HTV to my boss for $600 that I only paid $78.24 for. I use http://blue.gg/5g
What exactly is not ok about gay chat apps? What exactly is not ok about adult content given that it is disseminated to adults?
I don’t agree that China is trying to take over the world, but these laws against honest sexuality are archaic and morally unfounded. China is oppressing the Chinese and that is the real tragedy.
But didn’t you have to buy $800.00 in bid coins you lost in competitive bids on previous auctions? That means you won the $103.37 bid for only $903.37! What a deal!
It really is too bad that China is the future.
The problem is a) the definition of an adult. In the US that means (if I recall properly) 20 years+ in e.g. Germany it means 18 years+, and b) what’s the definion of adult content.
A lot of the nudity stuff rated 18+ in the US would be OK to be disseminated to non adults in Germany. You can’t just think that the US definition of things is universal. And this is just comparing the US to a EU country with similar values and culture.
You are so thick you shouldn’t be allowed on the Web either. No porn means no porn. Regardless of age. In China porn is illegal. Fuck 17 and up, that’s irrelevant. That’s as if you’d say Apple’s OK to disseminate racist content, because they said it’s 17 and up. If it’s illegal it’s illegal. As much as I hate the Chinese regime, in this case Apple has screwed up.
Hold on, I think we agree that if Apple wants to legally be blameless in a foreign country, then them hiding behind US law is absolutely useless. What I disagreed with in Hei Bei’s comment was the implication that whether something is “ok” in a moral sense depends entirely on which country you live – and the laws customs there. Laws can be immoral. Maybe Hei Bei meant “ok” in a legal sense, in which case I agree that laws are obviously different in different countries – but that point seems trivial.
The definition of “adult” is always going to be a problem in a judicial sense because of individual differences in brain development and other areas. Every country does it differently and I never asserted that USA’s laws should be universal – far from it. However, just because the USA doesn’t have an exact pin point on what it means to be adult, doesn’t have anything to do with whether or not censoring adult content to adults is, in principle, a good or bad thing.
The practical difficulties of defining adulthood does not suggest that we should just abandon the definition and use a “catchall” and oppress all sexual expression.
Can this SPAM please disappear??
then why you buy an ipad? stupid chinese
So when en Europe let us have our porn !
FYI. I’ve been to China several times. Porn is readily available many places (magazines and some DVDs). In fact, one magazine vendor down the street from my hotel had Chinese soft-core gay porn mags for say in the open. Apparently that’s ok, but cultural literature from the dynasty eras is forbidden? Whatever…..
It’s difficult for people living in a free society to understand how others can be happy to spend their lives in cultural limitations…
It’s not so long ago that porn was outlawed in the States too and still today it is not well “viewed” in certain circles. Does the president do porn?
we do not have the right to go around the world imposing our values/laws (or lack thereof) on the rest of the world. Should the U.S. live under Sharia law? Ask a Muslim. Now ask an American.
1) Define “porn”. Because we don’t know just how “pornographic”this is. Apple has a strong stance against porn (despite having perfectly good parental controls), so I doubt they’d change the rules too much for China.
2) You can’t bitch about your kids seeing something when you were warned that the content was not for children. When you do, it’s like screaming “I’m an idiot who can’t read” as loudly as you can in the middle of town. I’m so tired of people doing it, in any country.