In a glass tower in a trendy part of China's eastern city of Tianjin, hundreds of young men and women sit in front of computer screens, scouring the internet for videos and messages that run counter to Communist Party doctrine. References to President Xi Jinping are scrutinised, as are funny nicknames for state leaders. And any mention of the Tiananmen protests in 1989 is immediately excised, as are sexual innuendo and violent content. Welcome to China's new world of online censorship, where Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four meets Silicon Valley start-up. The young censors - or "auditors" - work for Beijing ByteDance Technology Company, better known as Toutiao, a popular and fast-growing news feed app. Surrounded by noodle restaurants and construction sites, the Wisdom Mountain Twin Towers, where the censors do their work, don't exactly look Orwellian. There are team-building sessions typical of start-ups the world over. And the dress code is casual. Chilling effect "Our corporate cultu...
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