zlacker

Even funnier is that there is no Social Credit System in China, not the way you think there is. There is no record of small offences by the billion and a half Chinese, we're barely even able to maintain proper records in general, let alone useless fluff like a score for each citizen.

I invite you to read this: https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/09/15/china-social-credit-sys...

I quote: "Contrary to common belief, the cities mainly target companies, not individuals. Nonetheless, legal representatives of a violating company are also included in the blacklists to prevent reoffending elsewhere or under a different company. Nationally, about 75 percent of entities targeted by the system end up on blacklists because of court orders they have ignored—the so-called judgment defaulters. The remaining companies are typically collared for severe marketplace violations—for instance, for food safety infringements, environmental damage, or wage arrears. But much of these cities’ day-to-day use of the SCS is banal thanks to the system’s fragmentation and inflation of results."

The gist of it is that it was a grading system for businesses, to distinguish the bad payers, often bankrupts people restarting business over and over. This is ofc not great because we would need a "start over" mindset like in the US, but stop reading buzzfeed-like news about this thing, it's a bit cringe.

We are oppressed maybe, but not THAT good at it. Most of the censorship in China is self inflicted and networked, from the bottom, think "shhh don't say that you'll be in trouble" or "I prefer not to answer that question, wink wink". No need for complicated expensive systems diverting taxpayer money away from the pockets of our dear leaders, when a simple 2-hour interview of one person at the police station can silence an entire social graph of hundreds of people for months :)

>>xwolfi+(OP)
My understanding was that financial info was the primary thrust of it these days, i.e. what we call plain old credit scores, without the "social." But I remember 15 or 20 years ago when they announced their ambitions for it, and I just realized, that announcement, and every panicky headline back then, right down to even the soberest Wikipedia article now, all tend to speak of the system in terms of its ambitions. So that's a good perspective, thanks.