Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–27 of 27 posts

Re: Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

#21

Post by StudentStuff »

shanghaiaway wrote: post #15
StudentStuff wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two distinct internets already, getting bandwidth to move data in and out of China is an expensive proposition, combined with the Great Firewall makes it such that domestic companies have significant advantages compared to overseas competitors. Those domestic companies seem to be starting to innovate on their own, though there is quite a bit of back and forth between US researchers and their counterparts in…

There's far more than two internets. Russian, Japanese, Chinese, South Korean, German, French, Italian, Brazilian. And on and on.

Don't forget the Iranian & Saudi Arabian internets, they all block different things and have restrictions you wouldn't see elsewhere.

For the point of my original comment though, none of these restricted networks are breeding challengers to the established tech giants like the Chinese Internet is. Kinda surprised there isn't an Indian Baidu/Google, or Tencent/Steam.

Re: Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

#22

Post by throwaway4799 »

vokep wrote: post #16
pochamago wrote: post #8

I think they make a good point about how the laxness of China's intellectual property laws is a boon to consumers, and maybe innovation.

Why make anything if someone is going to just steal it?

You're right. That's why no one ever makes anything in China. In fact, no one makes anything ever if they don't have the byzantine American copyright system to back them up.

Re: Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

#23

Post by code_duck »

yumraj wrote: post #19
code_duck wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because them stealing it doesn’t entirely deprive you of it since it’s IP

Yes, it does. IP has value. You create IP to generate value from it. When someone steals IP you lose value that you should have derived from it. Theft is theft, whether of IP or otherwise. And a thief is a thief, whether of tangible product or IP.

The key word is ‘entirely’.

One may derive benefits from creating something that does not depend on monopolizing it.

Re: Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

#24

Post by code_duck »

bassman9000 wrote: post #18
code_duck wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because them stealing it doesn’t entirely deprive you of it since it’s IP

If you're yet looking for a place to manufacture it, when they have already stolen the IP, and are beginning to produce it, you've lost already. It doesn't matter you have the IP if China doesn't respect it.

The idea is like open source software: you create something because you need it, and you benefit from it existing. What other people do with it may or may not be important.

Re: Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

#25

Post by throwaway4799 »

yumraj wrote: post #19
code_duck wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because them stealing it doesn’t entirely deprive you of it since it’s IP

Yes, it does. IP has value. You create IP to generate value from it. When someone steals IP you lose value that you should have derived from it. Theft is theft, whether of IP or otherwise. And a thief is a thief, whether of tangible product or IP.

You're literally wrong. Intellectual property can't be stolen by definition. You're probably referring to copyright infringement which is a completely different thing from theft, whose application is completely different from country to country and is not sentenced the same way.

Re: Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

#26

Post by bassman9000 »

code_duck wrote: post #24
bassman9000 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're yet looking for a place to manufacture it, when they have already stolen the IP, and are beginning to produce it, you've lost already. It doesn't matter you have the IP if China doesn't respect it.

The idea is like open source software: you create something because you need it, and you benefit from it existing. What other people do with it may or may not be important.

That's fine, but what happens to your R&D costs? Is everybody using the product contributing?

Example: a HW company spends millions, if not hundreds of millions, on developing a new chip/board, expecting the investment to be returned on sales. China steals the IP, and starts manufacturing and selling before them. Company loses all investment on R&D.

Example: pharma company spends hundreds of millions developing a new drug, including decade-long, gruesome FDA approval, expecting to return the investment on sales, including China. Someone steals the documents on manufacturing it. China starts producing the generic before the company even obtains permission. China patents the generic there, so chances for sales in a 1.2 billion economy are zero. India probably follows. Why bother then?

Re: Revisiting the West's view of China internet censorship

#27

Post by code_duck »

bassman9000 wrote: post #26
code_duck wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea is like open source software: you create something because you need it, and you benefit from it existing. What other people do with it may or may not be important.

That's fine, but what happens to your R&D costs? Is everybody using the product contributing? Example: a HW company spends millions, if not hundreds of millions, on developing a new chip/board, expecting the investment to be returned on sales. China steals the IP, and starts manufacturing and selling before them. Company loses all investment on R&D. Example: pharma company spends hundreds of millions developing a new…

To save lives??

Anyway, in your example the drug is still a monopoly in the US and EU and is likely to be profitable, is it not? Is there an epidemic of pharmaceutical companies going out of business because they can’t assert their IP effectively? Or are they making record profits? But I see your point.

My point is that while sure, that defrays the ability to completely monopolize an innovation, complete monopolization is not necessary to justify invention or development.

For the first example, a company would develop that because they are needed for supercomputers or higher performance for some application. If China wants to make them cheaper, great, it means we can do that application cheaper.

This seems to just be a debate about patents and IP in general. I doubt we can cover much new ground there.

Post reply on HN