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Google Mirror Beats the Great Firewall of China

Posted by CmdrTaco on Sun Sep 08, 2002 08:36 AM
from the let-the-whacamole-commence dept.
News
An anonymous reader writes "TheNew Scientist has an article about a Google search mirror called elgooG that apparently beats the Chinese firewall to the outside world. It displays all of the text backwards, requiring you to use a mirror to read the text." No big shocker- but imagine how many such mirrors could exist ;)
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  • The ironic thing... (Score:4, Informative)

    by Kredal (566494) on Sunday September 08 2002, @08:38AM (#4215473) Homepage Journal
    is that the mirror site, http://www.alltooflat.com/geeky/elgoog/, is blocked by the copy of Websense used on my network. Heh.
    • And now China will block that alltooflat mirror site.

      And you wanna bet that posting suggestions on how to beat their firewall is gonna get Slashdot blocked?

      Ah, well. The whole China censorship thing is one of the few areas where Voice of America isn't full of crap -- it's pretty egregious.

  • wow! (Score:3, Funny)

    by mattbland (260913) on Sunday September 08 2002, @08:39AM (#4215477)
    the vertical scroll bar even appears on the left side of my window in IE.

    i've even got used to reading the url's backwards.

    • the vertical scroll bar even appears on the left side of my window in IE.

      IE switches the scroll bar to the left when the direction attribute on the body element is set to right-to-left:

      <body dir="rtl">

      More information about right-to-left languages and HTML can be found in the specification [w3.org].

  • The site got slashdotted (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 08 2002, @08:40AM (#4215480)
    anybody have a mirror?
  • !doog pu me' kcuf
    • !doog pu me' kcuf<

      . .SEOHS NWOLC gnikcuf si anihC .sessa diputs rieht pu meht kcuF.

      (htimS niveK ot sporp etairporppa)

      l-

  • Good, except... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 08 2002, @08:42AM (#4215485)
    That's great it displays text backwards and all, but mirrors don't reverse the order text. Make yourself a nice big "R" and hold it in front of a mirror. See the difference?

    If you use a mirror to read this google mirror you are going to see the letters in the right order, but they are all going to be backwards!
    • It requires that YOU type your text in the revers order :P This is way too hard to use :(
    • That's great it displays text backwards and all, but mirrors don't reverse the order text. Make yourself a nice big "R" and hold it in front of a mirror. See the difference?

      If you use a mirror to read this google mirror you are going to see the letters in the right order, but they are all going to be backwards!

      It is possible (and easy) to reverse the entire page with IE: http://x42.com/test/flip.html [x42.com]
          • >No, actually it doesn't. Yes, actually it does.
            You're right, but keep in mind that the post you were responding to was itself responding to a post talking about looking at the image of the site in a mirror. This led me, along with (I'm sure) Loligo probably, to assume that the poster meant that the weird effect was caused by the reversed image. But of course, the parentheses are outward facing in both the original page and the optical mirror image.
          • >Yes, actually it does. At the 'mirror' site, the
            >letter *order* is reversed, but individual
            >letters themselves are not

            heyyyyy, you're right. I wasn't looking at examples, I was just spouting off the top of my head.

            What an asshole *I* am. Who the hell do I think I am? I've got SOME DAMN NERVE.

            Er.. yeah. D'oh.

            -l

  • When you input a search term it has to be backwards as well, and I've never mastered the art of typing backwards. So if you suddenly forget the url for /., you have to type in "todhsals" at this mirror to find it.
    • One way to do it is to alternate typing your letters with your left hand, and hitting the left-arrow key with your right hand.

      So s-left-l-left-a-left-s-left-h-left-d-left-o-left-t becomes "todhsals". You can type backwards pretty quickly this way, but it's probably also a good way to get repetitive stress syndrome so I wouldn't really recommend it to any aspiring Leonardo da Vinci's.

      I wonder how it works for Chinese since it's traditionally written from the bottom of the page, starting on the right hand side. Do they do even have this functionality on computers?
    • Seems like a bit of javascript could fix this?
  • So who is writing code for an OS mirror program? What a great idea for a browser plugin, a plugin that re-mirrors the text on the user's display so it can be read.
  • This is not a real Google mirror. The site will forward you to other (advertising partner) sites on certain keywords. I've tried "love" und "sex" (normal and reverse) and I am sure there are more.

  • a mirror will not quite work... (Score:3, Redundant)

    by deander2 (26173) <public.kered@org> on Sunday September 08 2002, @09:04AM (#4215579) Homepage

    The flow of the text is reversed, but not the letters themselves. So if you look at this site in the mirror, the letters will all be in the correct order, but themselves appear reversed.

    Ah-ha said Captian Nitpick! ;)

  • Watch this. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by cioxx (456323) on Sunday September 08 2002, @09:20AM (#4215634) Homepage
    Fun with IP protocols.

    Slashdot - 1075594134 [1075594134]

    Google - 3639550820 [3639550820]

    Wonder if that would beat the Firewall also.

    Discuss. ;)

  • Other choices (Score:3, Informative)

    by Nept (21497) on Sunday September 08 2002, @09:24AM (#4215645) Journal
    better than elgoog:

    Google Labs [google.com] - allows full searches, can circumvent firewall

    Soap Client for Google Searches [soapclient.com]

    Google Groups [google.com] - still accessible for usenet searching.

  • Is slashdot blocked by The Great Firewall?


    I mean...it's a site that covers a lot of linux & open source stuff (which China likes) but is also very liberal in the opinions expressed on the site.

  • .. I doubt it -- have they given any thought at all to that historically mirror-challenged group, the vampires?
  • Mirror mirror on the wall, who is feeling luckiest of all?
  • So if you view the elgooG website in the elgooG cache to you get Google?

  • So ..... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Enonu (129798) on Sunday September 08 2002, @10:37AM (#4215867) Homepage
    If I elgooG a elgooG result, do I get the original?
  • Am I missing something here?

    The "horizontal mirror" thing is kind of weird and quirky. Heh. In the course of testing a content-rewriting HTTP proxy once, I had it replace all occurrences of "server" by "serverino". This falls into about the same area of interest I think.

    Apart from that, it's just a proxy, right? Not an open proxy, just one which proxies to Google only. China filters out the proxy; no more story any more.

    I guess if it became commonplace for sites all over the place to spring up Google-proxies, then that might be relevant, since the Chinese authorities would have a hard time finding and blocking them all.

    But it's just one site, so what's the big deal?

  • Huzzah! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Ravagin (100668) on Sunday September 08 2002, @11:52AM (#4216225)

    I have had for years the strange and useless "party trick" ability to read english equally well left to right or right to left (on paper or in my head, leading to "talking backwards"), and it struck me as cruel that such an awesome talent would be so utterly useless - trust me, in performance, it gets old after about five or ten minutes.

    But now I can search for stuff backwards. Today, Google, tomorrow, the world! Muahahahaha!

    ahem

    • The Chinese don't give a fuck about the Google search page, or the results page either.

      They're being blocked simply as collateral damage, the target of the Chinese filters is the google cache.

      You see people were using the Google cache to gain axcess to Google's mirrors of sites that the Chinese were blocking, such as Tibet.org

      Using this silly mirrored Google mirror site gains nothing you click any of the 'dehcaC' (cache) hyperlinks on its result pages & you end up on the standard Google cache pages which are still blocked.
    • > In the USA we are busy trying to censor
      > Napster,Kazaa and programs that are peer to peer.

      Had Napster and Kazaa been only used to trade scans of artwork made by children in reverence of their loving parents, no censorship would have taken place. As soon as these peer-to-peer networks were used to pass copyrighted material in a fashion that stepped outside the typical fair-use bounds, the hammer fell.

      This isn't the same deal and you make a mockery of the issue of absolute censorship when you try to make the illegal distribution/procurement of copyrighted material equivalent to keeping a country's population potentially ignorant of a great many truths.

      Google is nothing like Napster or Kazaa. Google is a snapshot of the free world, full of news, information and inflammatory, asshole-written comments. The people of China are being *deprived of the right to decide for themselves what is relevent*. It is a ploy by the Chinese government to maintain ignorance in the population, thereby making the population easier to control.

      Are you more ignorant of the world if you can't download the latest Britney single for free, depriving poor, poor Britney the royalties due because you appreciate her tight little ass? I highly doubt it, mate.

    • Re:Google is like Napster or Kazaa (Score:5, Insightful)

      by the gnat (153162) on Sunday September 08 2002, @11:04AM (#4215993)
      HORSESHIT. This is one of the stupidest comments I've ever read on Slashdot. Hope somebody mods it as a troll.

      Learn the difference between "censorship" and "lawsuits". In the US, the media companies are trying to shut down or control these networks to prevent trading of their IP. This is not censorship. The companies are using their rights within copyright law. The government enforces these rights, but does not act out of personal interest. Sure, laws like the SSSCA would change this, but that'll probably be DOA.

      Using the DMCA to prohibit redistribution might be more like censorship. As far as I know, trade secrets have not been accorded anywhere near the same protection as copyrights. The DVDCCA does not have the legal protection for CSS that would normally allow it to pursue the DeCSS publishers like Kazaa et al.; the DMCA (unfairly, I think) allows them to do so anyway.

      China is different because the government is not protecting anyone's "rights", however abusrd these rights may be. They're setting up their corner of the Internet to be restricted from the beginning, unlike here where restrictions are (rather unsuccessfully) layered on top of an uncontrolled network. They are attempting to prohibit access to ideas, not copyrighted works. They want to control how their citizens think, not where they obtain (or how they view) their entertainment.

      I'm sick of whiny Americans who are so upset about the DMCA that they claim to be oppressed. Your rights are not being violated because the MPAA won't let you download Spiderman. You're so naive from living in a free country that you're incapable of understanding what people in other parts of the world have to go through. What the DMCA is being used for is incomparable next to the evil of communism and totalitarianism.

      Want to strike a blow for freedom and democracy? Stop wasting your time bitching about the MPAA and instead organize a boycott of Cisco, a company whose actions imperil the freedom of four times as many people as are affected by the DMCA.
      • I will not feed the trolls. I will not feed the trolls. I will not.. ah Hell, here goes.

        Your rights are not being violated because the MPAA won't let you download Spiderman. You're so naive from living in a free country that you're incapable of understanding what people in other parts of the world have to go through. What the DMCA is being used for is incomparable next to the evil of communism and totalitarianism.

        Guess what? Right now, we are living in a democracy. However, that's rapidly changing. Given that corporate donations to PACs have been upheld by SCOTUS to be "free speech", corporations now have the ability to "shout" really loudly at congressmen; far louder than you or I alone ever could.

        There used to be a time when a congressman (or woman) voted on a bill thinking "is this good for the people in my jurisdiction?" Now, though, the real question is "is this good for the companies that donate to my campaign, which allows me to tell the people in my jurisdiction what I've 'done'?"

        Laws like the DMCA are the crest of a wave which will wash forward with increasing speed and power. The government passes laws now to "protect its industries" and protect profits at the expense of the welfare of its consum^H^H^H^H^H^H citizens. In fifty years, what say do you hope to have, if such outrageous laws are allowed now?
        • You still have the right to unelect your congressmen, or to run for office yourself. You also have the right to protest unfair legislation. You're also able to see what's happenning in our government because it is legally required to operate in the open, and you can even see exactly which companies donated money to which politicians. None of this is true in China.

          I agree that IP law has tilted in favor of corporations. You're extrapolating this trend to predict corporate-organized totalitarianism. For the benefit of those readers here who haven't yet reached high-school US history, we've been through worse before. Labor strikes used to be broken up with armed troops. Now our economy is tightly regulated to protect the citizens against the industries. The DMCA and SSSCA are troubling, but I hardly think they're any worse than the sort of corporate welfare that's existed for many years.

          We live in a mixed economy; deal with it. Socialists and libertarians may not be happy with our system, but it's worked fairly well so far. There are always extremes, where laws unfairly penalize or empower corporations, but I view this is the price of prosperity. The worst of our system usually gets filtered out sooner or later. This doesn't mean we shouldn't be vigilant against abuses, but it does mean we shouldn't be as hysterical as you and the original poster.
      • I'm sorry but Google can be used to find illegal files (some are legal, I know).
      • It's not illegal here. China doesn't follow the same rules.
        Google has exactly the same effect as Napster does. Sure it may link to legal content, but it also links to illegal content.
        Just stop thinking that your way is right for one minute, and make a rational judgement. You may disagree with the policy of China, but it is their policy. You can scream all you want, but unless you are willing to bring in one billion immigrants into your country, it's a very moot point. It's illegal content until the government says otherwise, and if it's that big of an issue to them, then the chinese proletariate should revolt.
        As for government policy, at least they're only blocking content, rather than macarthy-esque witch hunts to bring down the capitolist dogs who would dare circumvent these controls.

        It never ceases to amaze me how often economics impedes humanitarian issues. Why can't any country in the world do something completely benevolant? It's not that hard...
        • You forget, America is a superpower. Democracy and freedom happens to be in our best interests because free democratic states don't usually go to war with each other (or us). Besides, we're nice people. Your claim about the lack of benevolancy in foreign policy makes me think that you haven't looked very hard.

          Your choice of "don't whine or allow a billion immigrants" is a false dichtatomy. There are many other options available. Applying economic or military pressure, for example. Attempting economic and cultural engagement for another.

          At least they're only blocking content, rather than macarthy-esque witch hunts...

          Oh god. You do know that you are clueless, don't you? China's witch hunts make McCarthy look like Inspector Clouseau. Have you heard of Falun Gong? Maybe you could tell me how blacklisting a few Hollywood movie stars is equivalent to imprisonment, forced labor, and execution? Do you even know what was going on in China just a few years after we had McCarthy? Ever hear of the cultural revolution? Do you know how many people died in the cultural revolution?
          • Economic sanctions have proved real useful in the past. Cuba and Iraq are really bowing to the pressure. Economic sanctions and military pressure have had two results: the further impoverishment of the proletariate, and war. Ask the Germans about economic sanctions after WW1
            I am not underplaying the death in China. I know of tiananmen square, spoke to classmates who had family there. I know of China's not-so-gentle naturalization of outlying provinces. And I know that China is not the only country to commit such atrocities.
            However, in Canada, we sent back boatloads of Chinese refugees without consideration. We didn't even give them medical attention. How benevolant is that? Spending months at sea in cargo containers to escape a previous life, and getting turned back at the border, unsure if you can live the trip again. If my country starts bitching about everything going on in China and doesn't have the guts to even offer medical attention to these people, merely because it would be an inconvenience, I would call every one of us hippocrites!
            Face it, the developed countries do not want economic prosperity in China. We are happy getting cheap goods from them. It is in a country's economic interest to hinder the development of other nations, because once we raise the standard of living to equal amounts throughout the world, we all live in a third world nation.

    • Re:excellent editing (Score:5, Insightful)

      by WEFUNK (471506) on Sunday September 08 2002, @09:23AM (#4215640) Homepage
      it's only 5 days since slashdot reported that the rumors of chinese blocking of google were false..

      Maybe I'm feeding a troll, but it's only 2 days since CNN [cnn.com] reported that AltaVista has now been blocked in a addition to Google. Also, it's actually been 5 days since most of the Slashdot readers in China disagreed with the anonymous poster who claimed the initial reports were false.
    • >Seriously though, this is a good reminder that there are billions of people on this planet that don't have the right to freely share ideas.

      Don't deceive yourself. There are many corporate interests within the US which actively curtail our ability to freely exchange ideas. Unfortunately, since the "war on terrorism", it has become much easier to strip away free speech by saying it is necessary for security.

      What with the advent of the US Patriot Act and other such measures, we are well on our way toward government control like China (both online and offline). It just hasn't gotten quite so bad, yet...

      Our constitution promotes democracy, not capitalism. Unfortunately, these two are usually considered equivalient for some bizarre reason. Until people realize that democracy is what makes us great, expect your liberties to erode. Watch what happens in China closely.

    • Re:Flaw in China's firewall. (Score:4, Funny)

      by Tablizer (95088) on Sunday September 08 2002, @12:52PM (#4216442) Homepage Journal
      They should only give access to a list of accredited sites. And block all others.
      Otherwise they would be fooled endlessly by such simple tricks.

      That would make the web almost useless. Then again, why should they care?

      I wonder what people see when they click on a blocked link? Do they get "not found", or "you notty boy, that link is subversive"?

      If the first, then people must think that a lot of sites are permanently broken.

      The gov could get around this by redirecting the links to some proganda page that resembles the original, but that takes a lot of labor. Then again with a nation of 1.2 billion people, labor is not something in short supply. Are they hiring, by the way?

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