On December 16, 2014, the state-sponsored Global Times published an English language op-ed entitled “Open Internet Not at Odds with Regulation.” Some excerpts:
The following screen recording was taken on December 21, 2014, and shows that the English language version of the editorial remained available, but the Chinese language version was deleted.
Surprised to find that Google had become accessible around midday Monday, Chinese mainlanders posted the news online, which went viral on social media immediately. A jubilant group of Net users assumed that it was because of some kind of agreement between the Chinese government and Google. However, later that evening, the website was blocked again, with many people speculating that the temporary access resulted from an update to the Great Firewall.On the same day the Global Times published a Chinese language op-ed entitled “The ‘Temporary Lifting of the Ban’ on Google is Cause for Reflection” (谷歌“临时开禁”引发的思考) - original URL here - http://opinion.huanqiu.com/editorial/2014-12/5243426.html.
. . . .
It might not be worth figuring out what really happened.
The following screen recording was taken on December 21, 2014, and shows that the English language version of the editorial remained available, but the Chinese language version was deleted.
