Paul Tang, owner of the People's Bookstore in Hong Kong, is still selling works that are critical of the Chinese leadership and are banned on the mainland. Five people in the Hong Kong book industry disappeared recently. Some have turned up in police custody on the mainland. See: China faces diplomatic 'crisis' over missing Hong Kong booksellers | Reuters and Hong Kong's missing booksellers and 'banned' Xi Jinping book - BBC News.
"In Hong Kong's densely packed Causeway Bay district, a red sign with a portrait of Chairman Mao looms over the bustling storefronts and shoppers. The sign indicates that there is coffee, books and Internet on offer inside ... The aroma of coffee and the sound of jazz waft over the book-browsing customers ... a frequent visitor from the mainland, who only gives his surname, Zhang. He's browsing a book on a topic completely absent from mainland bookstores: the independence movement in China's far west region of Xinjiang. Paul Tang cares about helping his mainland customers. He believes in the freedom of speech and the press guaranteed under Hong Kong's laws."In theory, the mainland enjoys freedom of the press," he tells me in a hushed voice. "But in reality, we're not allowed to mention these forbidden topics. So many mainland readers come looking for these books out of curiosity. To put it simply, over here, you can read the truth." While some mainland-owned booksellers have taken banned books off their shelves, Tang says, "We will keep our style." However, he predicts that if the current crackdown takes out too many publishers, "we may need to migrate to other topics, in case we don't have enough products for customers."
Transcript
Source: NPR
Questions:
Questions:
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- Who will be the first "missing" new gTLD registry operator, registrar, registrant?
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Tweets: Missing Booksellers
