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Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

nytimes.com

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Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#11

Post by Steko »

3pt14159 wrote: post #2

China has to play fairly carefully with Apple. On the one hand it's an American company that puts microphones and cameras into the cafes, offices, and bedrooms of many of their citizenry; but on the other hand, with decreasing competitiveness due to rising wages there isn't anything specifically _stopping_ Apple or other American tech companies from moving manufacturing out of China. Foxconn alone employs about 4.3 m…

I think you've got it backwards, it's Apple that needs China's market and China basicallly has them over a barrel on these secondary products.

What China has to be careful of is eventually the US/EU decide to get tough on Chinese protectionism and impose significant barriers to goods manufactured in China. And that would also be bad for Apple again since they make their stuff in China.

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#12

Post by draw_down »

3pt14159 wrote: post #2

China has to play fairly carefully with Apple. On the one hand it's an American company that puts microphones and cameras into the cafes, offices, and bedrooms of many of their citizenry; but on the other hand, with decreasing competitiveness due to rising wages there isn't anything specifically _stopping_ Apple or other American tech companies from moving manufacturing out of China. Foxconn alone employs about 4.3 m…

I dunno. Cook recently said in an interview their manufacturing is in China not due to cost but because the supply chain is simply stronger there, and they can do things there that they can't elsewhere. Of course they could make a bold move like make a big outlay to get their supply chain operating in another country/region, that strikes me as something they could do. But it would be a really big deal.

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#13

Post by _nedR »

bnolsen wrote: post #6

and this is a reason why china with the current government can never truly be a world leader in anything: Your entire enterprise can be distroyed at the whim of a few unrestrained individuals. Sort of like apple's app store, but at a much bigger level.

Being from india, i have come to the opposite conclusion.

Chinese protectionism (aided by the language barrier) has served chinese entrepreneurs quite well.

They have their own google. Their own fb. Their own twitter. Basically all services that India doesnt have. The list goes on. These services may or may not be inferior to the original but from an economic standpoint, its good since the money and data flows within the economy instead of going abroad.

India has its own taxi service but they are getting severe competition from uber (with rumours floating of a possible buyout by uber). We have flipkart but they are getting pummelled by amazon (which just walked in late to the indian ecommerce market after flipkart laid all the groundwork) and was recently down-valued by investors.

China is also successfully exporting to india- chinese smartphones are doing very well, much better than Apple.

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#14

Post by MBCook »

draw_down wrote: post #12
3pt14159 wrote: post #2

China has to play fairly carefully with Apple. On the one hand it's an American company that puts microphones and cameras into the cafes, offices, and bedrooms of many of their citizenry; but on the other hand, with decreasing competitiveness due to rising wages there isn't anything specifically _stopping_ Apple or other American tech companies from moving manufacturing out of China. Foxconn alone employs about 4.3 m…

I dunno. Cook recently said in an interview their manufacturing is in China not due to cost but because the supply chain is simply stronger there, and they can do things there that they can't elsewhere. Of course they could make a bold move like make a big outlay to get their supply chain operating in another country/region, that strikes me as something they could do. But it would be a really big deal.

I imagine that would be an incredibly huge investment to try to get even a small percentage of the supply chain in another country.

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#15

Post by pessimizer »

3pt14159 wrote: post #2

China has to play fairly carefully with Apple. On the one hand it's an American company that puts microphones and cameras into the cafes, offices, and bedrooms of many of their citizenry; but on the other hand, with decreasing competitiveness due to rising wages there isn't anything specifically _stopping_ Apple or other American tech companies from moving manufacturing out of China. Foxconn alone employs about 4.3 m…

> there isn't anything specifically _stopping_ Apple or other American tech companies from moving manufacturing out of China.

But it's about as credible as the Saudi's dumping all of their US treasuries. Apple enjoys a very high margin at a very high price point. Any move would be margin-killing, not price-raising. They're not manufacturing in China to be charitable.

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#16

Post by codecamper »

I think as the technical part of the population, we have the opportunity now to greatly change the structure of the world.

Government can be largely replaced by software. (just thinking long term here)

Democracy can be more pure. Corruption can be controlled. Economies can be stabilized and better planned. Environmental resources can be better managed.

We've got a lot more work to do past sharing images & allowing chats (though look at the massive affect of just those things)

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#17

Post by pi-err »

codecamper wrote: post #16

I think as the technical part of the population, we have the opportunity now to greatly change the structure of the world. Government can be largely replaced by software. (just thinking long term here) Democracy can be more pure. Corruption can be controlled. Economies can be stabilized and better planned. Environmental resources can be better managed. We've got a lot more work to do past sharing images & allowing ch…

Printing press changed the scale, idea and goal of government. Very slowly though because it changed _societies_, not actual rulers.

It may be that it takes 1-2 centuries to software-ize our govs.

And are we so sure it would be more efficient? GitHub as a constitution would be a blessing and a curse.

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#18

Post by sachinag »

There's a huge difference between iCloud not working and the content sale restrictions that this is. This is irritating but not key for Apple - but if iCloud and activation for iPhones and iPads stopped working, that would really be a big deal.

China doesn't want to be a dumping ground for western media, and they're rightfully concerned about not being able to build a content export industry.

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#19

Post by mtgx »

3pt14159 wrote: post #2

China has to play fairly carefully with Apple. On the one hand it's an American company that puts microphones and cameras into the cafes, offices, and bedrooms of many of their citizenry; but on the other hand, with decreasing competitiveness due to rising wages there isn't anything specifically _stopping_ Apple or other American tech companies from moving manufacturing out of China. Foxconn alone employs about 4.3 m…

Unfortunately, the Chinese government has only gotten bolder since the U.S. government has publicly become an enemy of encryption itself. The damage would be far greater if the U.S. actually passed a law mandating backdoors, but even just talking about it and making a "scandal" out of it, has probably encouraged Chinese government to be more aggressive about it in its own country.

Remember when the U.S. government at least pretended to care about things like privacy and human rights internationally. Now it seems to be more like "Wait, China did it? Why can't we do it then?!". Case in point, in a recent encryption hearing, law enforcement argued that if Apple showed its source code to the Chinese government (it didn't), then it should also show it to the US gov!

Re: Apple Services Shut Down in China in Startling About-Face

#20

Post by educar »

3pt14159 wrote: post #2

China has to play fairly carefully with Apple. On the one hand it's an American company that puts microphones and cameras into the cafes, offices, and bedrooms of many of their citizenry; but on the other hand, with decreasing competitiveness due to rising wages there isn't anything specifically _stopping_ Apple or other American tech companies from moving manufacturing out of China. Foxconn alone employs about 4.3 m…

You make it sound like Apple can easily move out of China. Think again. Apple's profits are largely due to the cheap labor market (just like many other companies)
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