from the exercise-is-contraindicated-in-heavy-smog dept.
Chinese state censors won't be permitting Pokémon Go and other augmented reality games anytime soon:
Nintendo's hit smartphone app, Pokemon Go, and other augmented reality games are unlikely to be rolled out in China any time soon, after the state censor said it would not license them until potential security risks had been evaluated.
[...] Prompted by "a high level of responsibility to national security and the safety of people's lives and property," the censor, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television, is coordinating with other government departments to evaluate the game's risks, an industry body said. These risks include the "threat to geographical information security and the threat to transport and the personal safety of consumers", a games panel of the China Audio-video and Digital Publishing Association, which is governed by the censor body, said in a posting on its website.
Some Chinese companies have been developing similar games based on augmented reality and location-based services, prompting the panel to seek advice from the top licensing body, it said.
Related Stories
Two economists are blaming Pokémon Go for causing traffic accidents and likely fatalities:
For a brief, shining period last summer, Pokémon Go reigned supreme. It brought obsession, joy, and, according to a new paper, injuries and death.
This working paper, appropriately and evocatively titled "Death by Pokemon Go," shows the darker side of the massively popular augmented reality game. Purdue University economists Mara Faccio and John McConnell combed through accident reports from Tippecanoe County, Indiana, in the first 148 days after the game was released in July 2016. In that county alone, the total value from injuries, damage, and the two lives lost is between $5.2 million and $25.5 million. If you scale this to cover the entire US, it would suggest that $2 billion to $7.3 billion were lost just in those few months.
The reports showed during those 148 days, 286 additional crashes occurred in the county, compared to the same period before. Of these, 134 were near pokéstops. In this scenario, it's crucial to determine that Pokémon Go caused these damages directly, as opposed to just causing people to be outside more, thus more likely to be hit by cars.
Also at PC Magazine.
Related: Peak Pokémon Go?
No Pokémon Go or Other AR Games in China
Russian Prosecutors Seek 3.5 Years for Blogger Who Played "Pokémon Go" in Church
Trial Will Decide Whether Milwaukee Can Require Permits for Using Locations in Augmented Reality
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Wednesday January 11 2017, @06:24PM
It sure seems like no one is playing Pokemon Go anywhere else anymore either. I still can't believe that crappy reskin spiked Nintendo's stock price.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @06:26PM
How can anybody stand having these control-freak bureaucrats talk down to them in this fashion?
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday January 11 2017, @06:33PM
*Catches Koffing*
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(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday January 11 2017, @06:38PM
That sucks, you really should pay attention to those smog alerts.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday January 11 2017, @07:22PM
What? KOFFING is evolving! [...] Congratulations, you have caaaancer!
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by ikanreed on Wednesday January 11 2017, @06:48PM
The specter of cultural relativism rises from the murky mists, ominous and suggesting inevitable arguments and bile
Because Chinese culture does not value freedom as the highest virtue the way American culture does. Not following with the group on casual day-to-day things is considered rude. Not showing sufficient respect for your superiors(even people the same "rank" as you with a few months more experience) in the workplace can easily get you fired. That same core attitude also affects how people relate to their government.
It's very different from the attitude we have here where as long as you, personally, firmly believe you're doing the right thing, you're in the right. I'd hasten to add that it will sound, from my description, like people there are just deluded and don't know what's good for them, but there's definitely an extent to which the difference is colored by the fact that you were raised on one side of that difference.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @07:21PM
Yeah. Moral relativism; I guess that's why we should just accept the mutilation of little boys' and girls' sexual organs in, say, Egypt, amirite?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by ikanreed on Wednesday January 11 2017, @07:40PM
Like... even though I knew this reply was coming(Just look at that italicized preamble), my mind still can't help but boggle at the consistency with which people see a post about the explanatory power of moral relativism about human behavior and immediately conclude it automatically coincides with an implicit endorsement of every cultural norm of every culture. The only moral point it raises is to be aware of the biases you've got from your own culture, and put some effort into reflecting on how objective your own beliefs about morality actually are.
Believe it or not, in spite of everything, I still have a very very western philosophy influenced rights-based mostly-consequentialist perspective on morality. But those personal beliefs regarding what I personally think is right and wrong has very little to do with my ability to empathize with the fact that others are taught different values, and they in turn affect what they think is okay.
Or maybe you think that by recognizing that you'd be denied the right to morally condemn acts that you see as wrong, and push for changes in the societies that have those problems? I really don't know.
Either way, I'm baffled by just how much it hurts some people to point out that, yes, cultures do affect what people see as right and wrong, and as a consequence, what they see as oppressive.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @07:54PM
As always, you've missed the point: I'm not looking for an explanation of their behavior.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Wednesday January 11 2017, @08:00PM
Oh, so that's new. An ignorant ass who revels in ignorance.
I was replying to someone who did show a modicum of interest in the subject. But congrats on your supplying your shitty, poorly considered opinion, while being disinterested in discussing it, I guess.
We're all so interested in your utter lack of intellectual curiosity about the world around you. Thanks for sharing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @08:12PM
No, you were responding to a rhetorical question; it wasn't a question at all.
Check your reading comprehension, "ikanreed".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @08:18PM
Your rhetorical question was still a point being made, you don't get to magically evade criticism that way.
Your mutilation comment was an extreme response to something that wasn't even stated, check your own reading comprehension and stop drawing conclusions for other people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @08:27PM
Extreme? irrelevant? Here, let me help you: How can anybody stand having these control-freak bureaucrats of religion cutting up little boys' and girls' sexual organs (let alone their own sexual organs)?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @09:06PM
When a girl's sexual organs are cut up, that oppression, and it's your fault you male. You implicitly endorse it every time it happens. You mind control the hands of the old woman who uses the knife.
Now, when a boy's sexual organs are cut up, you just need to get used to the idea. You're a sexual object. Deal with it, faggot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @09:42PM
Extreme? Yes. Your example is too extreme to have a conversation about relative morality since the overwhelming majority of people would be against sexual organ mutilation and would find it morally reprehensible. It polarizes and derails the conversation.
Irrelevant? No, I never said that.
The topic at hand is Chinese government censorship of augmented reality software, not sexual mutilation. Get back to the topic on hand and stop this stupid tangent.
If it makes you feel any better I am against any physical mutilation regardless of gender. Is this a massive troll move to get someone to point out circumcision in the US?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @10:08PM
Do you even mathematics, bra? Taking a statement (e.g., a formula) to the [extreme] limit is one of the cornerstones of logical discourse.
If you don't like the results of taking the limit, then maybe you ought to review your position.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @10:36PM
Check your spectrum hun.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @08:04PM
immediately conclude it automatically coincides with an implicit endorsement of every cultural norm of every culture
There was zero "explanation of their behavior", the explanation was of your narrow minded behavior.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Wednesday January 11 2017, @09:11PM
uh... huh. Pretty ambiguous. Let me answer as many possible interpretations of your post as I can.
If this is about how my post implied more universal acceptance of the cultural norms in question than actually exists and glosses over how many people struggling to change things in China there are: good point. I did oversimplify that.
If this is about how my post glossed over that these unspoken rules are themselves far more complex and reasonable than I gave them credit for: sure. good point. I oversimplified that too.
If this is about how "No. Putting up with a government over-regulating a game is NOT OK" then... yeah. I'm not a fan of doing that. But that wasn't the point of my post.
Most other interpretations call for a "Fuck you too, AC"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @10:44PM
Possible 4th interpretation (and as it turns out the correct one for I am wise and all knowing *in this matter*): The post was to the ACs replying to ikanreed in an attempt to point out that they were missing ikanreed's point about cultural diversity and moral relativism. The quick jump to sexual mutilation was a type of Godwin, shutting down the conversation before it even started, and that got me involved with this threadfest.
I do like that your misinterpretation resulted in some good points!
(Score: 2) by edIII on Wednesday January 11 2017, @08:35PM
There's all of that.... but then also that the game itself is a public nuisance. Nintendo made a lot of money without ever thinking about *where* they were putting down monsters. All of the responsibility and accountability was simply for people other than Nintendo.
Considering the sheer amounts of reports of trespassing on private property by Pokemon Go addicts, I don't think it's that unreasonable in *America* to put some regulatory oversight into games that use real life locations and location based services. It can't be random, but needs to be in approved places. Obviously that makes more work for Nintendo, but that is where the liability needs to reside. Nintendo has to know for each and every "drop" point in the real world just what the legal liabilities *are*, and stick to public areas. Clearly the players themselves have demonstrated a unique ability to go "full retard" in their quests.
Nintendo really were inconsiderate buttheads of the highest order to just pepper the world indiscriminately with possibly rare monsters for these insane addicts to climb over/break into/swarm some poor people's backyard for a fucking Snorax. At its height I heard reports of "flash flooding" of an area just because the game indicated a popular and rare monster.
Yeah, China has issues with censorship and a different culture. Stipulated. They also share in common with us the reaction to trespassing and the idea to regulate these games is not intrinsically totalitarian. Pokemon Go is fucking nuts, dude :)
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday January 11 2017, @08:50PM
STOP RIGHT THERE
http://money.cnn.com/2016/07/25/investing/nintendo-shares-pokemon-go/ [cnn.com]
https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-relationship-among-Niantic-Labs-Nintendo-and-The-Pok%C3%A9mon-Company-Whos-benefitting-the-most-from-the-success-of-Pok%C3%A9mon-GO [quora.com]
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(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday January 11 2017, @09:08PM
and stick to public areas
Can't play pokemon go without a smartphone and hard to buy one without a camera and hard to play the game without flashing it all around.
Generally in the USA if you're in a public area you can take a picture. That's actually kinda unusual for the rest of the world. Quite a few militaristic places will get all agitated if you take a picture of the harbor or the docs or the airport.
For example in the US we usually line our waterfronts with parks and private recreational areas so no one cares if you play with your phone camera on some bridge, but in other parts of the world they get all out of whack about military secrets and terrorism.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 11 2017, @10:28PM
Americans don't value freedom to that extent. We regularly elect politicians that take away more and more of our freedoms, and fight against the Democrats that are supporting things that would increase our freedoms.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Wednesday January 11 2017, @10:44PM
While I agree with your conclusion that we frequently fight against political actions that improve our overall freedom, cultural norms don't exactly mandate conclusion. It's almost trivial to come up with ways where valuing something a little too much can keep you from getting it.
Imagine wanting money so much that you never invested it once you had it. You'd end up broke compared to the wastrel who lazily drops 5% of their income into their 401k.
Or being so concerned for the safety of your children that you end up preventing them from developing the life skills they need to survive.
Or valuing education so much you skip extracurriculars and can't get into a high-end college.
And let's not forget the nerd classic: being so desperate for a date that you scare away anyone who might be interested in you.
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Wednesday January 11 2017, @10:45PM
You need to look at some of the legislation, Democrats promote a huge amount of freedom restricting and surveillance policies all for the goal of "SAVE THE CHILDREN". American's getting fucked over is a bipartisan effort.
~Tilting at windmills~