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Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

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Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#231

Post by Supraperplex »

snnn wrote: post #204
ISL wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Working real hard and getting shut down is more personally-negative than doing nothing and having someone else profit. Both ways, you get no revenue, but one way, you waste a lot of time first. It's not worth compromising your principles in order to capture 18% of the world market. 82% is a lot bigger than 18%.

How do you think of Google is putting their best effort to head back to China ? They were working real hard and getting shut down.

I think that one founder had an array of reasons to leave China. This was not the only result of said array of reasons, which infuriated another founder. Regulations were met. Now one founder wants to undo unwelcomed results. It is his doing and what other founders and shareholders think gets circumvented through elegant solution implementation. Be evil by appearing good.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#232

Post by ytpete »

mey wrote: post #136
sharetea wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

echoing what vpalan2 said below: "If I wanted to do massive, irreparable harm to China, this is the law I would pass. And yet, they have done this willingly to themselves, without hesitation or incident." These aren't the smart engineering politicians with a 10 year view China has foisted its fable onto the world. These are the corrupt paranoid politicians who know they are one mass protest away from having all their…

For those who don't want to do the math 463.8/(106+97) = avg of ~2.28 billion per china congress critter Edit: as pointed out below, the math is more complex as there is 2987 seats in the NPC and I can't quickly find numbers for the number of total seats in the CPPCC, so the average is certainly drastically lower than the above.

You could put a lower limit on it by assuming the rest of the NPC members are flat broke: 463.8/2987 = $155 million per congress critter, or about 150x the average for US Congress critters.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#233

Post by phil21 »

jimbokun wrote: post #42
danmaz74 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Devalue Yuan by 50%. Don't like it, Apple? tough Why wouldn't Apple like this? Their manufacturing costs would become much lower, and they would rack up even more billions in profits.

Apple is looking to China for further sales growth. Fewer Chinese buying iPhones is probably a bigger problem for them than higher manufacturing costs. Tim Cook has already made a big deal about "currency headwinds" to explain Apple's slowing revenue growth.

Why would they care? They are selling a Chinese made product to the Chinese.

Maybe not as profitable due to exchange arbitrage, but still profitable since the costs go down exactly as much as the retail price does. Engineering for the Chinese market already exists due to all the other markets, so it's essentially money left on the table if they don't.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#236

Post by 1stop »

hackuser wrote: post #164
newjersey wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think China has any intention of attacking and occupying India. I'm sure they are more than capable if they wanted to but there is just no incentive.

> I don't think China has any intention of attacking and occupying India. I'm sure they are more than capable if they wanted to but there is just no incentive. They do not. Conquering and occupaying a country with the size, population, and nuclear weapons of India would be a massive undertaking, I think the largest such war in history. And remember that China would have to cross the Himalyas to reach India, maybe the…

Japan? The country that has in its constitution that it cannot hold an offensive military, nor take part in researching/developing offensive military technology... Which expert believes that?

Or do you mean historically? (Pre WWII)

I would hazard a guess that China's korean war "Human wave" tactics would be sufficient against Japan (assuming US was not also involved).

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#237

Post by chrischen »

prewett wrote: post #212
chrischen wrote: post #196

Any move China takes that blocks foreign competition can be seen as an extreme version of an import tariff. Instead of protecting low level industries like corn producers either subsidizing domestic production or taxing foreign imports, China focuses on higher level industries like technology companies, culture companies, etc. While China doesn't have the benefit of Google in the short term, by blocking them it gives…

This isn't about money or protectionism. This is about information control. The government states what they wish the truth were as if it were true. This is not believable if there is other evidence, or even a broad discussion. Hence, viewpoints contrary to the government's "truth" must be stamped out. Apparently Xi's predecessors did not think this was as important, but Xi seems to be old-school. I do not think this…

China's still not developed enough. Foreign media and foreign freedom of the press doesn't mean all press are publishing good things, or things good for the public.

In a developed nation this is OK because the public has fewer problems to worry about and can devote the time to punish bad press or filter out bad actors. In China where people worry about many things including clean water and corruption, having to have to worry about a large portion of the population being swindled by a bad acting foreign media propaganda is a real concern. In the US if some nazi propaganda publication gets published its ok. Most people know well enough to dismiss them. In an undeveloped country this could potentially result in a nazi takeover. See impoverished Germany after World War I as an example.

This doesn't mean the Chinese government isn't spewing its own propaganda, but at the least its working well enough to drive economic growth at the moment, and they don't want to derail that with chaos or dissent.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#238

Post by jensen123 »

kaonashi wrote: post #100
sharetea wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Umm...here - China's total debt risen to 346% of GDP in 2015. http://seekingalpha.com/article/3852886-chinese-debt-problem... - China exports fall 11.2% in January, imports down 18.8% http://www.cnbc.com/2016/02/14/china-releases-trade-data-for... - China’s $6.7 trillion bond market is flashing the same danger signs that triggered a tumble in stocks http://www.thestar.com.my/business/business-news/2015/10/10/... - Ch…

I can't think of a metric more meaningless than debt/GDP.

Maybe you should explain why.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#239

Post by chrischen »

rsanek wrote: post #200
chrischen wrote: post #196

Any move China takes that blocks foreign competition can be seen as an extreme version of an import tariff. Instead of protecting low level industries like corn producers either subsidizing domestic production or taxing foreign imports, China focuses on higher level industries like technology companies, culture companies, etc. While China doesn't have the benefit of Google in the short term, by blocking them it gives…

In the linked article regarding TOMS shoes: "While statistical significance is nowhere to be seen, by dint of their consistency the results are reasonably convincing." That's not how statistical significance works; if you don't reach it, you can't say anything about whether or not there is an effect. The actual research paper is here: http://repository.usfca.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1005... . In it, the author…

TOMs practice was small scale. But the effects of if they increased their impact and handouts would be anticompetitive to underdeveloped local competition.

Re: Beijing is banning all foreign media from publishing online in China

#240

Post by hga »

longcheng wrote: post #210
omegaham wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's how I would explain it to a 5-year-old - when you make laws like this, you make everyone else not want to do business with you. This means that you only get to business with people in your own country. 7 billion people with ideas is going to be much better than just one billion people with ideas. The 7 billion people have more money, more ideas, and more people to make cool things, and you're stuck with your o…

well, with this law, you got stability and can focus on things important. With 1 billion well educated ppl, I am not too worried about shortage of talent.

But this sort of "stability" without massively greater levels of repression† is only metastable, it sets the rulers up for things like preference cascades, such as the one that sparked the "Arab Spring". The PRC's nomenklatura ought to be worried about this recent example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceau%C8%99escu%27s_final_speec... 4 days later he and his wife were summarily executed (and large numbers of public/publicized executions remain a tool of control for the PRC's nomenklatura).

†In the context of the PRC, say a return to ration coupons being required to buy food, this allowed your local block or village committee to trivially starve you to death if you get on their wrong side. My 1988 roommates, straight from the PRC to the US for grad school, told me the development of an open market for food was the single greatest change on the ground, getting on the committee's wrong side "only" increased your cost of food.

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