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China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

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Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#241

Post by sofixa »

User23 wrote: post #168
sofixa wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't see how the two examples you cite are problematic, i don't know what to tell you. There's a difference between protest and sedition, and the Catalan independence movement went full in on treason. The second is doxxy, so it is understandable to an extent.

> There's a difference between protest and sedition Is there? Please elaborate, because to me it merely looks like a matter of perspective.

Protesting is within the legal framework of the country. In France, i have the right to protest under certain conditions (organisers have to receive an authorisation from the police on the route the protest will take, things have to be kept civil, e.g. no running around burning cars). I do not not have the right to start an independence movement and/or rebellion in Brittany.

So it's not the perspective, it's the legality of goals and methods. For instance in Russia, you can't protest the war in Ukraine, so going on the streets about it isn't "just protesting", one is willingly breaking the law for the cause.

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#242

Post by inglor_cz »

411111111111111 wrote: post #172
TeeMassive wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jack Ma was a figurehead and didn't know anything about tech (see his interview with Musk). Musk has a very deep understanding of tech of his companies (at least for a CEO), so are most other American tech CEOs. As was pointed out, you can't siphon away tech like you can do with oil and other commodities without making things stop working.

> Musk has a very deep understanding of tech of his companies Like with his white paper for the Hyperloop which was fundamentally wrong and couldn't have worked? Or with his idea of putting Hyperloop segments on.... Wheels? Or with his idea to make the whole rocket reusable, until SpaceX accepted reality and pivoted to at least partial reusability? Or to cite current examples: full self driving that doesn't actively…

"Or with his idea to make the whole rocket reusable, until SpaceX accepted reality and pivoted to at least partial reusability?"

What do you dislike about this particular idea? It is not inherently wrong, it is "only" very technically challenging.

What SpaceX did was not a pivot, rather introduction of an intermediate step because full reusability proved too hard at that point. But they never gave up on the ultimate goal of full reusability and the Starship rocket that is now under development is intended to be fully reusable.

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#243

Post by sofixa »

vkou wrote: post #189
kmonsen wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support the Catalan movement as I believe in all people’s right to self determination but that is fundamentally different. Catalonia does not have a legal right to just break free from Spain. It would also be difficult for any country if the richest region could break free at will. On the other hand Hong Kong has a legal right for local rules for at least 50 years after the handover in 1997. That treaty was broken…

Legality is meaningless when there was no meeting of minds when the law was drafted. Catalonia's current situation was created by an authoritarian, fascist government. The law in question was drafted without the consent of the governed, and is thus illegitimate, if it does not have ongoing consent of its constituents.

> Catalonia's current situation was created by an authoritarian, fascist government

No, significantly more authority was devolved to the region from the democratic governments following Franco. However there was no point in history where Catalonia breaking away was an explicitly allowed option (of course).

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#244

Post by fvv »

vkou wrote: post #189
kmonsen wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support the Catalan movement as I believe in all people’s right to self determination but that is fundamentally different. Catalonia does not have a legal right to just break free from Spain. It would also be difficult for any country if the richest region could break free at will. On the other hand Hong Kong has a legal right for local rules for at least 50 years after the handover in 1997. That treaty was broken…

Legality is meaningless when there was no meeting of minds when the law was drafted. Catalonia's current situation was created by an authoritarian, fascist government. The law in question was drafted without the consent of the governed, and is thus illegitimate, if it does not have ongoing consent of its constituents.

and current situation in HK has what you are saying should be a requirement for a law (let alone an act of force ) : the "without the consent of the governed," you are citing..

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#245

Post by inglor_cz »

Beltalowda wrote: post #205
411111111111111 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Musk has a very deep understanding of tech of his companies Like with his white paper for the Hyperloop which was fundamentally wrong and couldn't have worked? Or with his idea of putting Hyperloop segments on.... Wheels? Or with his idea to make the whole rocket reusable, until SpaceX accepted reality and pivoted to at least partial reusability? Or to cite current examples: full self driving that doesn't actively…

Musk has a "I am very smart and thus can never be wrong"-problem, has gravitational bending amounts of arrogance, and seems to have some personality issues. But he's not stupid or ignorant, and has a better understanding of tech than most CEOs. I don't think that's putting him "on a high pedestal".

Well, SpaceX is quite notable for how swiftly it alters its designs and abandons semi-finished work if a better idea comes along. Few technical corporations avoid the sunk cost fallacy as efficiently as them. They seem to be absolutely willing to throw away an expensive prototype and innovate again if it makes technical sense.

Musk has a lot of negatives and comes off as arrogant sometimes, but I never heard a story about him forcing the SpaceX engineers to keep some design flaw there because it was his precious idea and thus can't be wrong.

IDK about Tesla, I am not that interested in cars.

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#246

Post by samsonradu »

senttoschool wrote: post #176
CoastalCoder wrote: post #19

The linked story kind of buries the context info: > Nomura said the refusal to pay mortgages stems from the widespread practice in China of selling homes before they’re built. Funds from presales are kept in escrow accounts to use for construction. But confidence that projects will be completed has weakened as developers’ cash woes intensified. > “Inappropriate usage of presale proceeds and the lack of adequate super…

>widespread practice in China of selling homes before they’re built. Literally how every condo project in Asia is sold. Not sure how it is like in Europe.

In Romania it varies, but you get a better deal (small discount or get a parking spot, better orientation etc.) when you pay down 20-40% of the price before construction starts so many buyers go for it.

Waiting until the construction is finished usually means many units are sold (the good ones).

It also depends on the builder’s reputation of course, if it’s a big name they can charge more in advance.

IMO it sucks a bit for the buyer as delays are quite often and hard to attack in court. It also attracts speculators who sign the pre-contract just to sell for a profit when the units are delivered.

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#247

Post by robocat »

thriftwy wrote: post #232
anarmorarm wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This deserves to be on the front page. Fantastic read.

Not without stretching the narrative though - he shows the images of Mexican mafia with armoured vechicles and guns and then arches towards calling Russian oligarchs and friends mafia: those don't rely on armoured vechicles and guns but on connections inside the Russian Federation state, making the whole piece somewhat dubious.

Oh, I think the articles theme is mostly bunkum armchair theory. Reads great, but is nonsense. The author’s premise is that:

* oil+gas are not complicated

* metallurgy is somewhat complicated

* a drilling machine has a very complicated dependency

Like, duhhhh, oil+gas is fiendishly complicated (drilling, transport, refining, organisational), with extremely complicated (and often single-source) dependencies; certainly more complicated than the CNC-machine-needed-to-make-a-mining-machine small business example. “Metallurgy” is complicated with complicated dependencies too (although plenty of Russian expertise available). Both of those are massive industries with very deep complexity.

The story also has a strong “geek inherit the earth” narrative - which always scores well with engineers here on HN.

The “mafia” metaphor didn’t work for me either.

It does make me wonder who the author(s) want to influence and why?

But still, I liked the links, I liked the story, and they wrote well (I am guessing English wasn’t their first language?).

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#248

Post by tsimionescu »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #201
tsimionescu wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a common legend, but it's hard to accept. China is way more innovative than much of Europe for example. The USSR was actually an extremely innovative place as well. Also, huge corporations are themselves extremely centrally planned, and that is where much of their strengths lie. There's a reason why Apple was able to capitalize on the smartphone, and it wasn't some market of suppliers. The problem with centra…

China’s population is double that of Europe, so China would need to produce twice the quantity of innovation to be comparably innovative. I’m not saying it doesn’t achieve this, but we should be wary of comparing two places with vastly different populations. > But when done right, as it was in China after the 90s and before the Pooh, it has also caused the single biggest reduction in poverty in world history, measure…

> This was largely China moving away from a planned economy and toward a more market oriented economy.

Possibly, though they still retained much more control than the capitalist economies they outgrew.

> Also, you have to take care about how you measure “largest reduction in poverty” here as well because poverty was declining all over the world at the same time, largely driven by advancements from the capitalist west and globalization.

That is not true. The rest of the world outside China has remained at the same or worse poverty levels, largely.

> I’m sure economic planning can be credited with something, but the key element was “allowing western money to pour into the country” which looks a lot more like capitalism than central planning to my eyes.

If China had played by free market rules, Huawei, Alibaba and Xiaomi would not be competing with Samsung, Apple or Amazon right now. A large part of China's advantage came from the state using its negotiating power to force foreign companies to trade their IP for cheap manufacturing, thus propelling China's intellectual elite back from the dark age that it had been plunged into. Individual Chinese companies probably lost profits for a long time because of this, and much more US, Japanese or European money would have pourn in if they didn't enforce this policy; but, they would be much poorer today.

Edit: note that China is and has always been a capitalist country. They were centrally planned state capitalists, and have moved somewhat in the direction of free market capitalism. But there has never been a period in China's history when production or wealth were democratically controlled.

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#249

Post by inglor_cz »

thriftwy wrote: post #78
cuteboy19 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Externally, the US has been eager to strengthen its control over Canada, Mexico and Cuba, the 'backyard' of the US This is so true. China has either directly invaded or has bad relations with every one of its neighbours. Even the communist ones. Even those seperated by sea. Only reason why this bullying is tolearted is because they are rich now

It looks to me that China has decent relations with Russia, Mongolia, and even central asian Kazakhstan/Kirgisia/Tajikistan (of course there are some ethnic and economical tensions dragging this back, not to mention the issue of Uighurs who are related). China also has good relations with Pakistan.

Mongolia is an interesting case. Its independence is guaranteed by Russia, otherwise China would likely have swallowed it in the 1950s or so, much like Tibet.

But Mongolia, sitting between two authoritarian powers, is nowadays a stable democracy with regular transfers of power between opposing parties.

I wonder if this can last. Their best chance is actually the fact that they aren't very prominent on the international stage and probably not worth a conquest or hostile takeover right now.

Re: China mortgage boycott data erased by censors as crisis spreads

#250

Post by tsimionescu »

petre wrote: post #200
tsimionescu wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a common legend, but it's hard to accept. China is way more innovative than much of Europe for example. The USSR was actually an extremely innovative place as well. Also, huge corporations are themselves extremely centrally planned, and that is where much of their strengths lie. There's a reason why Apple was able to capitalize on the smartphone, and it wasn't some market of suppliers. The problem with centra…

> China is way more innovative than much of Europe for example Of course they are, having built upon stolen EU and US tech and having trained their people in the West. But they learn fast and incrementally improve those designs. The difference is the Russians had their very own designs. Even in electronics, their concepts are fundamentally different from western concepts.

Of course, all innovation is built on copying and improving others' ideas. Calling this "theft" is as absurd as saying that the Greeks "stole" mathematics from Ancient Egypt, or that Renaissance Europe "stole" natural philosophy from the Islamic world (who in turn "stole" it from the Greeks etc).
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