p2pnet - rss feed: Yahoo nixes online reforms
p2pnet.net news:- Yahoo priorities for the immediate future were clearly marked out at a recent shareholder meeting.
The principal item of interest dealt with executive pay.
Number two? Whether or not the company should officially oppose online censorship, and shareholders resoundingly dumped the idea.
Yahoo is deeply on the hook for alleged human rights violations under which its Hong Kong arm is said to have released material to Chinese police authorities which directly resulted in local Yahoo subscribers being jailed.
As a consequence, the company is now being sued by family members of two cyber dissidents, both of whom have been imprisoned for 10 years.
But Yahoo shareholders shot down two proposals, “to alter the Internet company’s behavior in China,” says MarketWatch, going on:
“One shareholder proposal asked the company to avoid hosting user data in ‘Internet-restricted’ countries such as China. That proposal was defeated with only 15.2% of shareholders voting in its favor.
“Another shareholder proposal requesting that the company create a ‘human rights committee’ to ‘avoid corporate complicity in the violation of human rights’ was also rejected, with only 4.1% of shareholders voting in its favor.”
On the defeated move to “tie executive pay to competitive performance,” Eric Jackson, who said he represented a group of current and former Yahoo employees who own 2.1 million shares, told Yahoo chairman and ceo Terry Semel, “I am surprised that you didn’t apologize for the last three years of performance,” says International Business Times, adding towards the end of the story:
Also See:
human rights violations - Yahoo ‘dismayed’ by China jailings, June 12, 2007
MarketWatch - Yahoo shareholders vote down pay proposal, June 12, 2007
International Business Times - Yahoo shareholder vote challenges board, June 12, 2007
If your Net access is blocked by government restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, and here for details. And if you’re Chinese and you’re looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
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Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local politicians. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance. Don’t just complain. Do something!
June 13th, 2007 at 6:28 pm
Human Rights vs. Profits/stock value
Gee wiz Virginia, which one will prevail?
Standing up for Chinese citizen’s human rights sounds great until it threatens to cost stockholders a few shekels. Rights Shmites, give us the money. What a bunch of self serving greedy assholes we are.