This morning's Wall Street Journal reports that Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) will enter into discussions with the Chinese government in a few days, addressing its threat to pull out of the world's most populous nation if it has to continue filtering its results and its accusations that Chinese regulators were behind the recent hacking.
I'll spare you the suspense. This is exactly how it will go down.
Google: We have traced the hacker attempts to you. That's just wrong.
China: Maybe we did it. Maybe we didn't do it. It's our country. It's our rules.
Google: Umm, OK. Either way, we want to provide the Chinese with an unfiltered Internet. There is no reason we should have to censor the Tiananmen Square massacre queries.
China: Tiananmen Square what?
Google: See? You're doing it again.
China: You're still blocking Nazi symbols in France and Germany. Why is that?
Google: Well, those countries have certain laws about Nazi imagery.
China: Duh! If Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU) were to enter the United States, could they link to kiddie porn?
Google: You can't compare pedophilia to blocking historical events that actually happened.
China: Did that argument work in France or Germany? And what's this I read in Gawker, that Google supposedly took down the blog of your CEO's alleged mistress?
Google: The key words there are supposedly and alleged. We don't have to answer to you.
China: Yet you expect us to answer to you?
Google: We will leave China.
China: Oh, no! So all of the paid-search revenue generated in China will stay in this country through Baidu and smaller hometown heroes? You're twisting my arm so hard.
Google: OK. We get it. But how do we save face if we want to stay here? The world was patting our back a month ago. We'll be branded two-faced cowards if we continue to play by your rules.
China: Well, just tell them something open-ended. Tell the public you'll remain in China as you explore long-term policy changes. We won't budge, but people will forget over time.
In a nutshell, China isn't going to change and Google isn't going to leave.
Part of being a global company is adhering to different rules in different countries. China's rules and oversight are fierce. It shouldn't have taken months for NetEase.com (NASDAQ:NTES) to reintroduce Activision Blizzard's (NASDAQ:ATVI) World of Warcraft in China, but the alternative of jumping through the regulatory hoops is to not jump at all and stay out. Google knew this going in. Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Yahoo! (NASDAQ:YHOO) are well versed on the guidelines, too.
Plenty of things will dictate a change in policy over time, but they will all have to work their way from the inside out.
