I wonder why...? Perhaps they're having too much difficulty filtering the exist ones' traffic. Ahhh, not enough censors, eh? http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/03/06/china.internet.cafes.ap/index.html
IMO, they should just stop worrying about censoring the Internet and get on with further liberalizing their society. There are more important things that need to be done in China, and soon!
how bout the travel bloggers like me who needs an internet connection to write about my travel experiences in China (if ever I finally decided to go there after my travel in Morocco)? I just can't see the point of this whole censorship thing the China government implements... it's ok to pay the workers a meager salary but it's not Ok to roam around the information highway?
was going to go to China next year, changed my mind after doing a little research into what life is like for the people actually living there (illegal organ harvesting, people disappearing into thin air when they disagree with the govt etc) and now I find out the govt controlls the Internet too! It didn't feel right to me to go on a holiday there and enjoy myself when there is so much suffering in the country, its very sad.
China is a .... DEVELOPING country. Instances that you mention are very rare and could happen anywhere. Yes, many people still have a poor quality of life, but many people live very modern lives. And life for the majority is always improving, slowly. Skip, There are so many internet cafes here, they will never be able to keep up. Many hole in the wall places. There are so many laws that just aren't really all that well enforced. China is afraid that freedom of speech will lead to large movements that will lead to an independent Tibet, Taiwan, Inner Mongolia, etc, etc. and the country would fall apart. China wants a unified country. There is no telling what would happen to the country if all the S.A.R. areas became independent. Every country has its problems, China has many, so do all the western countries, etc.
The whole concept of law is kind of new in China, understand that. A ban on internet cafes? Please, it is easy for people to bribe city officials to get things done, including a new internet cafe. This "ban" will likely have no effect what so ever. In a country this big, it is very hard to truly enforce most laws and most of the time, they aren't enforced. Plus, things are not blocked for the truly savvy. Plenty of Chinese youth use proxys and other ways to see the sites they need to see, including meaningless sites like facebook.