Politics not a wise way to cover failure

Starting Tuesday, Chinese netizens looking for google.cn found their browsers redirected to google.com.hk.

The Hong Kong site calls itself the "new home" for the popular Chinese language search engine, but the move extinguishes any hope that Google might reverse its self-destructive course and maintain google.cn on the mainland.

Over the past five years, Google has cultivated tens of thousands of followers in China. Many people, myself included, are sorry to see google.cn disappear from our desktops. Some, like a colleague of mine, fear that Google's withdrawal will prevent Chinese on the mainland from keeping up with the latest technologies.