A company providing access to an online database of academic theses and dissertations has been accused of cooperating with Chinese political censorship and content revisions.
Media reports said that master’s theses and doctoral dissertations by students at local universities, including National Taiwan University (NTU), had all instances of “my country” changed to “Taiwan.”
Not a single word should be changed in papers authorized by students and professors, NTU president Kuan Chung-ming (管中閔) said yesterday on the sidelines of an NTU event.
Photo: Wu Po-hsuan, Taipei Times
No one is allowed to revise papers that have been authorized, he said, adding that it was a fundamental rule in academia.
For example, it would be unreasonable if automated translation software changed every mention of “New Taiwan dollar” in a paper to “New Chinese Taipei dollar,” he said.
The university would ask businesses not to make changes, he said.
The Ministry of Education said that the nation’s sovereignty should not be belittled.
The ministry would instruct universities and colleges to evaluate their database vendors, it said.
If improper actions are found, universities should immediately demand that the vendors make improvements, it said, adding that the universities should terminate their contracts if no improvements are made.
Airiti (華藝) — the vendor in question — said in a statement on Wednesday that when it exports Taiwanese academic content, the content is in its original form.
The Chinese market has certain particularities, so the metadata can be tweaked to increase the possibility of the content being discovered in an online search, but the body of a work would not be touched, Airiti said.
NTU sociology professor Ho Ming-sho (何明修) wrote on Facebook on Wednesday that a keyword search of his full name resulted in 23 hits on Airitilibrary.cn and 57 results on Airitilibrary.com, despite the databases belonging to the same company.
Not all of the 57 search results on the second platform were his articles, but articles of his that were missing could be considered “sensitive,” including a 2017 article titled “The Third Force and Umbrella Soldiers: Comparing the Elections of Taiwan after the Sunflower Movement and Hong Kong after the Umbrella Movement,” Ho said.
An Airiti representative said that it is inevitable that different countries and regions have different regulations.
The company can only respect that a database subscriber chooses the content they need, the representative said.
Typhoon Usagi yesterday had weakened into a tropical storm, but a land warning issued by the Central Weather Administration (CWA) was still in effect in four areas in southern Taiwan. As of 5pm yesterday, Tropical Storm Usagi was over waters 120km south-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), the southernmost tip of Taiwan proper, and was moving north at 9kph, CWA data showed. The storm was expected to veer northeast later yesterday. It had maximum sustained winds of 101kph, with gusts of up to 126kph, the data showed. The CWA urged residents of Kaohsiung, Pingtung County, Taitung County and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春) to remain alert to
ONE LAST TALK: While Xi said that Taiwan was a ‘red line,’ Biden, in what is likely his last meeting with Xi as president, called for an end to China’s military activity around Taiwan China’s military intimidation and economic coercion against Taiwan are the main causes of tensions that are destabilizing peace in the Taiwan Strait, Taipei said yesterday while thanking US President Joe Biden for expressing Washington’s firm stance of maintaining peace and stability in the region. Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) met on Saturday for their third meeting and their first talks in seven months on the sidelines of the APEC forum in Lima, Peru. It was likely Biden’s last meeting as president with Xi. During their conversation, Biden reiterated the US’ opposition to any unilateral change to the “status quo” from either
Taiwan would participate in the 2026 APEC summit to be hosted by China after Beijing promised it would ensure the personal safety of attendees, Taiwanese national security sources said yesterday. The APEC Leaders’ Machu Picchu Declaration announced yesterday said that China would host the APEC summit in 2026. Beijing proposed hosting the summit shortly before this year’s gathering began on Friday, a national security official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Many APEC members expressed concerns about China hosting the event and said that prior communication over the decision was insufficient, the official said. Taiwan brought up concerns about legal “guidelines” China announced in
MEET AND GREET: The White House, which called the interaction ‘just a handshake,’ did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether Biden planned to visit Taiwan’s envoy to the APEC summit, Lin Hsin-i (林信義), on Friday invited US President Joe Biden to visit Taiwan. During the APEC Leaders’ Informal Dialogue, Lin, who represented President William Lai (賴清德) at the summit, spoke with Biden and expressed gratitude to the outgoing US president for his contribution to improving bilateral ties between Taipei and Washington over the past four years, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. Lin and Biden exchanged views during the conversation, with Lin extending an invitation to Biden to visit Taiwan, it said. Biden is to step down in January next year, when US president-elect Donald Trump is
RSS