Musk hails China’s success in house journal of censors
Elon Musk sets out plans for colonies on Mars and robots made by Tesla while welcoming ‘like-minded Chinese partners’ in a magazine Beijing’s online censorship agency runs.
Elon Musk praised China’s “amazing” economic progress as he became the first foreigner to write for a magazine run by the agency overseeing Beijing’s internet censorship.
Musk, 51, wrote under the headline “Believe in technology, create a better future” for China Wangxin, a magazine that usually features contributions from government officials and executives at state-owned enterprises. Tesla, where Musk is chief executive, earns about a quarter of its revenue in China. The richest man in the world has often praised the country and its workers for their productivity and attitude while overlooking human rights concerns.
“I am pleased to share with my Chinese friends some of my thoughts on the vision of technology and humanity,” Musk wrote for Cyberspace Administration of China, according to a translation published by state media.
He set out his plans for colonies on Mars and robots made by Tesla. “I also welcome more like-minded Chinese partners to join us in exploring clean energy, artificial intelligence, human-machine collaboration and space exploration to create a future worth waiting for,” he added.
The cyberspace administration runs online censorship, encouraging internet users to report each other for posts that “deny the excellence of advanced socialist culture”.
On Sunday, Musk used Twitter, a site blocked in China, to celebrate Tesla’s Shanghai factory producing its one-millionth car. Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, the owner of Facebook, and Sundar Pichai, the Google chief executive, have courted China but without the success of Musk.
Kendra Schaefer, a chief editor at Trivium China, a research agency, said that one day Musk would be called before Congress to testify about his China links. She told Bloomberg: “Tech execs trying to maintain healthy relationships in China are increasingly seeing that decision being taken out of their hands.”
– The Times
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