“Apple, complying with what it said was a request from Chinese authorities, removed news apps created by The New York Times from its app store in China late last month,” Katie Benner and Sui-Lee Wee report for The New York Times. “The move limits access to one of the few remaining channels for readers in mainland China to read The Times without resorting to special software. The government began blocking The Times’s websites in 2012, after a series of articles on the wealth amassed by the family of Wen Jiabao, who was then prime minister, but it had struggled in recent months to prevent readers from using the Chinese-language app.”
“Apple removed both the English-language and Chinese-language apps from the iTunes store in China on Dec. 23. Apps from other international publications, including The Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal, were still available in the app store,” Benner and Wee report. “‘We have been informed that the app is in violation of local regulations,’ Fred Sainz, an Apple spokesman, said of the Times apps. ‘As a result, the app must be taken down off the China App Store. When this situation changes, the App Store will once again offer the New York Times app for download in China.'”
“The Times bureau in Beijing said it had not been contacted by the Chinese government about the matter. A Times spokeswoman in New York, Eileen Murphy, said the company had asked Apple to reconsider its decision,” Benner and Wee report. “Apple’s chief executive, Timothy D. Cook, has said that the company complies with all local laws… Foreign tech companies face increasing pressure from government authorities in China. In April, Apple’s iBooks Store and iTunes Movies were shut down in the country, just six months after they were introduced there.”
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MacDailyNews Take: Ironically, The New York Times was Steve Jobs’ favorite “news” website to use in his iPhone and iPad keynotes.
When truth is replaced by silence, the silence is a lie. ― Yevgeny Yevtushenko
