Live data from Hacker News

China is winning the global tech race

ft.com

71–80 of 102 posts

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#71
post #32

I know this article is more about tech companies, but China is winning everywhere. They have started a very ambitious OBOR to connect Europe, Africa and Asia. The Chinese investments in Europe is just mind boggling [0] and the infrastructure projects by the Chinese Govt are spread across the whole Asia, Africa and Europe. Unlike the USA which offers support and aid by offering money to other countries, the Chinese lo…

Kind of a United Fruit model of economic investing which resulted in the pejorative banana republic and resulting cries of American Imperialism, and subsequent loss in economic growth as AmCos pulled out due to instability. Wonder if they can avoid a similar fate. Maybe people are wiser on both sides, one can hope.

My impression is that much of this "instability" was largely the result of American military/intelligence intervention that came in response to the local government seizure and nationalization of these industries.

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. It's odd how some people can clearly see (and acknowledge) these things, while others seem literally unable to see them, almost as if they have some sort of a psychological filter hiding portions of the full spectrum of reality. I wonder if I suffer from the same thing, but different portions of the spectrum. I find it an interesting and useful way in which to observe the world and disagreements between peop…

It's kinda funny how Americans still thinks US is doing shit to help anyone else besides themselves and their business interests. China is now doing the same thing the west/ImF/world Bank have always done. But in the case of China they don't run around toppling government and the countries do get general infrastructure while the west usually just built the bare minimum to get the resources out. Yes its imperialism bu…

I think Chinese leadership have a different set of incentives than Americans do. American businesses are about minimizing production costs in order to sell as much as possible in the US market. While the Chinese government seems to prefer expanding the market for their domestic good by raising the stands of living in developing countries.

Similar to how the US handled Japan and South Korea instead of Latin America and the middle east.

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#73
I believe China is too unbalanced in their IP protection in order to 'win the tech race'. They either have a monopoly that controls the market via Chinese gov, or there are no rules at all and everyone will backstab you. I believe that these conditions are unfavorable for true technological innovation.

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking your last sentence literally, is that actually your honest assessment of this dispute, in its entirety?

Not op, but pretty much, yes. GDP per capita is still way lower for China compared to US. China is perfectly justified in playing a system built by the winners for the winners. Much luck to them in making the hypocrisy of the system more clearly obvious. The US is complaining about IP theft, where: 1) they are (were? mainly?) the ones with IP assets 2) the rules have been established by the US (mainly) 3) whenever th…

You must not have paid attention in history class. When the colonies, primarily the US, started doing better than the old European countries ... what happened ? And yes, immigrants in the US beat quite a few traditional industries at their own game, under rules set by people trying to sabotage them. Well done, right ? So what happened ...

Peace, love and prosperity ? Or something else ?

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Europe needs to build its own tech ecosystem instead of being a resource hub and market for US companies. There were some sense in the French driving Peugeot, the Germans VW and the Americans Ford, instead of all driving a generic car from a distant silicon valley company far away from local market and value chain.

I don’t really understand how Europe has struggled so much. Is it due to a lack of investors? Brain drain or some comparative lack of talent (I doubt it)? Regulations (also doubt it)? Cultural differences? Difficult domestic market?

The US goverment / military dumps obscene amounts of money into the development of technology. This provides a solid foundation on which to build a thriving consumer technology sector. It's totally viable to develop and bring to market devices that cost millions of dollars per unit as long as it possesses some modest degree of military application.

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#76
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look at Japan, their economy has been stagnant since the 80s, propped up by government market manipulation. They are almost completely irrelevant. Which innovative companies does China have that aren’t complete rip offs of American ones? Where is the penetration by those companies into the USA?

> Look at Japan, their economy has been stagnant since the 80s, propped up by government market manipulation. They are almost completely irrelevant. They're still "the third-largest in the world by nominal GDP and the fourth-largest by purchasing power parity (PPP). and is the world's second largest developed economy". I'd take that level of irrelevance any day. Besides that, Japan's situation doesn't tell us much. >…

Over Half of the Japanese stock market is owned by the government bank. The whole economy is a shell propped up by quantitative easing financial policies.

Great drones. We have google, they have cheap manufacture produced drones.

I keep hearing “China is coming”, “they will have more”, ....

It never comes to fruition. That have a massive population supported by manufacturing wages that will all lose jobs when automation takes over.

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#77
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Look at Japan, their economy has been stagnant since the 80s, propped up by government market manipulation. They are almost completely irrelevant. They're still "the third-largest in the world by nominal GDP and the fourth-largest by purchasing power parity (PPP). and is the world's second largest developed economy". I'd take that level of irrelevance any day. Besides that, Japan's situation doesn't tell us much. >…

Over Half of the Japanese stock market is owned by the government bank. The whole economy is a shell propped up by quantitative easing financial policies. Great drones. We have google, they have cheap manufacture produced drones. I keep hearing “China is coming”, “they will have more”, .... It never comes to fruition. That have a massive population supported by manufacturing wages that will all lose jobs when automat…

>Over Half of the Japanese stock market is owned by the government bank. The whole economy is a shell propped up by quantitative easing financial policies.

Well, different countries use different strategies. Half of the US economy is based upon the country's military might, and (through it) imposing favorable deals, bullying, controlling oil and trade routes, IP laws and so on (plus "quantitative easing financial policies" and trillion dollar bailouts, subsidies and handouts to Detroit and co). I'll take Japan's "quantitative easing financial policies" any day...

>Great drones. We have google, they have cheap manufacture produced drones.

Well, they also have their own Google: Baidu.

Heck even Google's page-rank style concept was pioneered by a Chinese (the founder of Baidu) before Google was a thing:

"A small search engine called "RankDex" from IDD Information Services designed by Robin Li was, since 1996, already exploring a similar strategy for site-scoring and page ranking.[18] The technology in RankDex was patented by 1999[19] and used later when Li founded Baidu in China.[20][21] Larry Page referenced Li's work in some of his U.S. patents for PageRank." (Wikipedia)

>That have a massive population supported by manufacturing wages that will all lose jobs when automation takes over.

They have a massive internal market, 4 times the US in population, strong growth, have been the world's largest economy back before (for many centuries), have a much older and more resilient culture, have the tech and the factories, and they will own the future, as the tired Europe and US give up the spirit.

Rome didn't last forever either...

>I keep hearing “China is coming”, “they will have more”, ....

Well, I don't know for how long you "keep hearing that", but if you hear it for e.g. the last 2-3 decades, then it's also accompanied by massive Chinese growth those last 2-3 decades.

So it's not like you merely hear it without anything coming out of it. On the contrary, it's one of the most well supported statements.

If you mean why they haven't already taken over the lead, well, it took US nearly a century, plus two whole world wars that torn and beat Europe up, to get to be the world player that it has been the last 70-80 years.

The world economy is not like the tech market, to expect something to go from start to domination in a few years...

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not op, but pretty much, yes. GDP per capita is still way lower for China compared to US. China is perfectly justified in playing a system built by the winners for the winners. Much luck to them in making the hypocrisy of the system more clearly obvious. The US is complaining about IP theft, where: 1) they are (were? mainly?) the ones with IP assets 2) the rules have been established by the US (mainly) 3) whenever th…

You must not have paid attention in history class. When the colonies, primarily the US, started doing better than the old European countries ... what happened ? And yes, immigrants in the US beat quite a few traditional industries at their own game, under rules set by people trying to sabotage them. Well done, right ? So what happened ... Peace, love and prosperity ? Or something else ?

>When the colonies, primarily the US, started doing better than the old European countries ... what happened?

Nothing much. There were 2 world wars that finished the old European countries, and the US took over the warmongering world leader game, and the colonialism (as neo-colonialism this time).

>And yes, immigrants in the US beat quite a few traditional industries at their own game, under rules set by people trying to sabotage them.

Not sure what you mean. Immigrants that succeeded in the US still played by US rules and laws. In fact most any immigrant that succeeded was totally Americanized - ending up like those "trying to sabotage them". Did you see any huge story where immigrants changed the underlying culture, ethics, etc?

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#79
post #39
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unlike the USA which offers support and aid by offering money to other countries how is the chinese doing any different than what the USA did/might've done with foreign aid and other strings attached loans? In the end, it's a form of empire building.

That's a breathtakingly ignorant assertion. The "strings attached" to U.S. foreign aid are there to benefit the country being helped, not the U.S. They are things like economic reforms and measures to limit corruption. There is definitely an ideology behind it, and its paternalistic, but it's not empire building. It's more like evangelical Christianity--the belief that we can uplift people not only by giving aid, but…

> That's a breathtakingly ignorant assertion. The "strings attached" to U.S. foreign aid are there to benefit the country being helped, not the U.S.

That seems like the ignorant viewpoint to me.

> It's more like evangelical Christianity

Yes, that's what the US government is known for.

> govern themselves like we do

ie Being open to capitalistic corruption

Re: China is winning the global tech race

#80
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Look at Japan, their economy has been stagnant since the 80s, propped up by government market manipulation. They are almost completely irrelevant. They're still "the third-largest in the world by nominal GDP and the fourth-largest by purchasing power parity (PPP). and is the world's second largest developed economy". I'd take that level of irrelevance any day. Besides that, Japan's situation doesn't tell us much. >…

Over Half of the Japanese stock market is owned by the government bank. The whole economy is a shell propped up by quantitative easing financial policies. Great drones. We have google, they have cheap manufacture produced drones. I keep hearing “China is coming”, “they will have more”, .... It never comes to fruition. That have a massive population supported by manufacturing wages that will all lose jobs when automat…

> It never comes to fruition.

In a number of gaming sectors, it's already done. Steam is majority Chinese players, mobile gaming revenue has been from China. Steel (until the tariffs) has been dominated by cheap Chinese offerings, killing off a bunch of suppliers in the last 15 years. I dunno what you're talking about, but reality doesn't care what you think anyway.

Post reply on HN