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Google left China today and will not continue its Chinese search results. While it is a monster step for the world's biggest search engine, all's not yet over for Google in China.

First of all, they only really left 'mainland China'. If you go to Google.cn, you'll be redirected to the Chinese language Google Hong Kong. Google is still in Hong Kong, China's Special Administrative region, where the "One Country, Two Systems" capitalist rule of law governs the land. You don't need to censor results in Hong Kong. Not yet anyway.

Google has announced today what it's calling an "entirely legal" way of giving mainland China unfiltered search results. The Google.cn domain now redirects to its Hong Kong servers via Google.com.hk, providing uncensored access in traditional and simplified Chinese.

"We very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision, though we are well aware that it could at any time block access to our services," writes David Drummond, SVP of Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer, on the official Google Blog, while also noting to expect some slowdown while the HK servers deal with an expanded load of users.

Google' being an Internet business, doesn't need its servers don't have to be in China either. Google just completed a huge trans-Pacific cable project that will allow it to have unprecedented speed to Asia…from its North American datacenters.

That is if China let's Google past its Great Firewall.

Meanwhile, R&D work will continue on the mainland, and a sales presence will remain. The company has created a "Mainland China service availability" page, which will be updated daily, for seeing what parts of Google's business are being blocked by the country at any given time. As of today, that includes Youtube, Google Sites, Blogger, and partial blocks of Docs, Picasa, and Groups. We're very curious to see how the page'll look in tomorrow's update.

China strikes back

China has given its own response, in English, saying that Google has "violated its written promise." An official for the State Council Information Office goes on to say, " This is totally wrong. We're uncompromisingly opposed to the politicization of commercial issues, and express our discontent and indignation to Google for its unreasonable accusations and conducts." More details via Xinhuanet.

The White House also chimed in. "We are disappointed that Google and the Chinese government were unable to reach an agreement that would allow Google to continue operating its search services in China on its Google.cn website," said National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer. More via Yahoo! News.

Another take

The New York Times sat down, briefly, with Google co-founder Sergey Brin for a few elaborations on today's events. For starters, Brin noted that the new policy was entirely Google's idea, and the US government was not involved in any way. He also silenced whispers that Google would be releasing software for bypassing censorship. "I think those tools are going to come of their own accord. I don't think we have to do anything," he said.

The Great Response

China has now responded by whipping its state computers into a filtering frenzy, blocking and censoring out content it considers objectionable from Google's HK-based search results. Adding to its show of strength, it's expected the Chinese government's influence will also result in China Mobile canceling a deal to have Google as its default search provider on mobile handsets. We suppose it's Google's turn to respond now.

Credits: Engadget, Computer World

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