[-empyre-] *TickTack*: Speculating the emergency law + wider relations to the west

[ellen pau]

Thanks SL, Geert ,and Winnie,

I hope to bring the story of HK to raise the awareness of how media art
circle could benefit the humanity and resist totalitarian

HK is a very special place that witnessed clashes of many different ends,
Post imperial and Post colonial democracy , one country two systems,
capitalist and communist ideologies  US-China Trade War, sharp power and
the global politics, geopolitics in South China Sea and North Korea and
many more.

 As the Disillusion and Frustration of a New Generation is Fuelling Hong
Kong’s Protests
<https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/the-disillusion-and-frustration-of-a-new-generation-is-fuelling-hong-kongs-protests>
, a new kind of Hong Kong activism emerges as protesters mobilize without
any leaders
<https://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-hong-kong-youth-activism-decentralized-protests-20190614-story.html>
.

Hong Kong is a great firewall Hong Kong is not China <http://bit.ly/2KIpE9T>
,
Hong Kong has been listed as one of the free city in the world but yet
civic freedom are limited by new technology such as big data and smart city
program. As Hong Konger still can read about the Hidden Camps in XinJiang
<https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/China_hidden_camps,>, anti
China's social credit system
<http://www.ejinsight.com/20190726-why-the-china-social-credit-system-must-be-resisted/>
fear
of tight control of speech  and even genocide are the fear exposed
underneath the anti-extradition bill.The hijacking of smart Lamp-post is
one of the examples <https://bit.ly/2yyaxKG (Gizmodo)> ON 25 Aug, A lamp
post was pulled down for examination by protesters to reveal all the
hardware inside. Many of them are made in China and are possibly connected
to server in China, infringing privacy and data such as surveillance (heat
) image and bio metric data could not be excluded.

Another spotlight is how the protesters are brilliantly using social media
(Facebook, Telegram, Lihkg ) and mobile communication (airdrop
<https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-49280726>, Bridgefly
<https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnkoetsier/2019/09/02/hong-kong-protestors-using-mesh-messaging-app-china-cant-block-usage-up-3685/#3bd001ab135a>
etc) to make decisions and to spread their news, to call for support from
the global communities. While technologies help shaped the movement, many
chat rooms in Lihkg (a similar version of Reddit) spring up for action and
tactics discussion, witness's video, while telegram, Tinder and pokermon Go
<https://www.vice.com/en_asia/article/evjg74/hong-kong-protesters-are-now-using-tinder-and-pokemon-go-to-organise-people>
took up the role in organizing the crowd, like Lennon Wall
<https://today.line.me/hk/pc/article/How+Hong+Kong%E2%80%99s+Lennon+Walls+became+showcases+for+art+and+design+of+extradition+bill+protests-P2RYvr>documentation
or crowd sourcing resources such as volunteers, advertisement,
transportation, protective gear, food coupon etc etc. . On the other hand,
China sends out fake news <https://on.wsj.com/2YWM1lh>, misinformation
<https://nyti.ms/2korTGh>  about the protests and  DDOS attack on HK
<http://bit.ly/2Ky5WyM>independent press and chatrooms
<https://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1477922-20190831.htm>. China
authority will check Mobile phone
<https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3022828/chinese-immigration-officials-inspect-hongkongers-phones>
and even take blood sample
<https://www.asiatimes.com/2019/08/article/visitors-to-china-warned-about-phone-checks/>
to collect biometric surveillance across the border at Shenxhen.  Over 900
Facebook and twitter accounts were removed because of the state backed
mis-information.
There are prediction that the next US presidential election will be
affected by  social media too.

Beside social media, Media technology that China can't block were used in
communication on the street  e.g. Mesh messaging
<https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnkoetsier/2019/09/02/hong-kong-protestors-using-mesh-messaging-app-china-cant-block-usage-up-3685/#3bd001ab135a>
Protesters create tactical media for activists via github (Github was
banned in China <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_of_GitHub>) e.g.
Real Time map and self made 15 channels live feed video
<http://bit.ly/2yTSxKD> at site of confrontations.
An AR Lennon Wall <https://padlet.com/lennonwall_hkhk/hk> was build after
the dispersed sites over HK were vandalized again and again.  Activists
explore open source and collaborative means and see it as an opposing force
to the coming totalitarian control and high pressure from the government.

Began as anti-extradition rally, peaceful protestors and Hong Kongers were
engaged in a leaderless and decentralized network
<https://www.hongkongfp.com/2019/07/21/organisation-future-hong-kongs-open-source-anti-extradition-law-movement/>,
using a tactic from the Bruce Lee's philosophy - "Be Water". The activists
are creative, they created hand sign
<https://graphics.reuters.com/HONGKONG-EXTRADITIONS-TACTICS/0100B0790FL/index.html?fbclid=IwAR29Rj5MDSnUYwy7rPGv-ml7n39e6ylQqbsiCtASbVuZ2afv-eR7C8K9TRg>
, neologism <https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=44132#more-44132>,
amazing
propaganda <http://bit.ly/2YM6hGL>, creative ways to fight tear gas (Road
Cone <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAbrQZOcGDo>, Tennis racket
<https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/30/opinion/sunday/hong-kong-protests.html>
) and making use of Blockchain
<https://medium.com/kepler-blockchain-lab/區塊鏈之於社會運動-cddb780ec1ae> to
protect the already being washed off history of the real Hong Kong. Hong
Kong protestors are using pop culture memes
<https://qz.com/1700030/hong-kong-protestors-cite-pop-culture-to-stay-visible-to-world/>
to stay visible to the world

I have followed the protest from the beginning and noticed it had gone more
deadly as the police exerted excessive violence towards protestors.
HK is burning <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1tUte_vKmk>, as activists
said "as we burnt, you burnt with us" (from the movie Hunger game) , I urge
citizens of the world rethink their stance towards protection of humanity,
freedom and democracy. As the brave new world arrive very soon with 5G,
social media and surveillance ...

Thanks for listening.

On Sun, Sep 1, 2019 at 11:34 PM //Winnie Soon <rwx at siusoon.net> wrote:

> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
> There are many events and incidents happened in the past few months in
> Hong Kong. Instead of laying out everything with a long text and
> reference lists/news, I have selected a short film "Hong Kong's fight
> for democracy" as a point of departure, which is produced independently
> by a video producer, photographer and writer Parjanya Christian Holtz
> who is now based in Denmark. (see here:
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzfgG1CZjc0) The film touches upon
> various tactics used by Hong Kong people, such as the crowdsourcing
> newspaper campaign "stand with Hong Kong at G20", decentralized,
> leaderless and autonomous organization (2:22), social media
> communications such as telegram, WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook
> (3:44), hand signals (5:14), reaching out international support (5:43),
> demonstration at the Hong Kong airport, etc.
>
> In view of many possible lines of discussion regarding things that have
> happened, such as the surveillance lamposts (see here:
>
> https://www.hongkongfp.com/2019/08/26/hong-kong-tech-firm-pulls-smart-lamppost-programme-surveillance-accusations-staff-threats/),
>
> decentralization of the leaderless protests, use of telegram and the
> online forum (especially LIHKG: https://lihkg.com), sending and
> receiving updates and files via airdrop onsite, this thread would rather
> focus on the emergency power, which refers to the "Emergency Regulations
> Ordinance" (see here:
>
> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-08-30/how-hong-kong-protests-could-lead-to-internet-cut-off-quicktake)
>
> that was passed by the colonial government in 1922, giving the super
> power to the chief executive to "make any regulations whatsoever which
> he [or she] may consider desirable in the public interest". This could
> include limiting internet access, extending censorship of media and
> communications, controlling of all transportation systems, and many
> others. While the western world is speculating on Chinese army may
> deploy in Hong Kong, this potential deployment of the emergency rule
> will confer great powers from the HK government to control many aspects
> of life. This would have huge cultural, economic, political and social
> implications and consequences across local and international
> organizations. John Tsang Chun-wah, former financial secretary and a HKU
> Adjunct Professor, warns this will bring "disastrous results" to Hong
> Kong. (see here for the full article:
>
> https://www.hkcnews.com/article/23244/extradition_bill-emergency_regulations_ordinance-23244/emergency-law-disastrous-john-tsang-warns)
>
>
>
> Yesterday, LIHKG, one of the HK most local popular chat forums for
> discussing the protest strategies, was subjected to an unprecedented
> giant DDoS attacks resulting in internet congestion, blocking sites  and
> server overload. According to LIHKG, total attack requests exceeded 1.5
> billion on 31 Aug 219, highest record on the total request frequency was
> 260k/sec in which then lasted for 30 mins before it is banned.
> (https://lihkg.com/thread/1525319/page/1)
>
> Additionally, Twitter and Facebook, just earlier on, had shut down
> hundreds of accounts that were spreading misinformation about the
> pro-Democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong against China. Both platforms
> identified these as part of a Chinese campaign to change public opinion
> in the West. Furthermore, it appears that western media and tech
> companies like Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and Telegram are somehow
> involved in the Hong Kong protests and in the wider political regime (in
> terms of both end users' generated content and corporational policies).
> See also the latest report on the telegram app update to prevent
> identity monitoring by authorities:
>
> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-hongkong-telegram-exclusive/exclusive-messaging-app-telegram-moves-to-protect-identity-of-hong-kong-protesters-idUSKCN1VK2NI.
>
>
>
> In response to the week 1 topic on *TICKTACK* I hear the water running,
> this thread is more to speculating tactics not only used by protesters
> locally but also outlining some of the cultural and technological
> phenomenon in western tech and media companies, and, last but the least,
> the concerns of emergency power that could extend various kinds of
> censorship in Hong Kong.
>
> best,
> Winnie Soon
> www.siusoon.net
>
> _______________________________________________
> empyre forum
> empyre at lists.artdesign.unsw.edu.au
> http://empyre.library.cornell.edu
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