The big news is that I will be joining Google full-time as a policy advisor and the lead for free expression in Asia-Pacific as of June 27th, 2011. I will continue to be based in Hong Kong. But I will no longer serve as an assistant professor of the Department of Media and Communication at the City University of Hong Kong. I leave with a heavy heart: I had a great time and enjoyed working with the wonderful colleagues and terrific staff there. Furthermore, I really enjoyed teaching the students, whom I found very responsive, hard working and intelligent. I will always be grateful to Professor CC Lee for believing in me and City University for giving me my first job fresh out of graduate school.
Having said that, I am very excited about my new job at Google. As most of you probably know, the future of the internet and the networked public sphere is an issue I deeply care about and have dedicated much of my research to. I believe the upcoming period will be a critical juncture in the institutionalization of the internet. Now I am offered the opportunity to translate and apply directly into policy what I have learned over the past few years. Perhaps idealistic, but hopefully also without much illusions, I see it as a chance to “give back” to “the internet”, which has given me so much. In short, I am excited about the opportunities and challenges the policy team and I will be facing, and most of all, I look forward to work with you in my new capacity as policy advisor at Google.
