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

Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

asia.nikkei.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 473 posts

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#21

Post by mickael-kerjean »

jeswin wrote: post #10
earthboundkid wrote: post #3

Why is this interesting? Taiwan has to compete in the Olympics as Chinese Taipei or whatever. Yeah, any place that China can influence, it makes Taiwan call itself China.

It is interesting because it exposes Apple, which as a company often tries to present itself as a champion of freedom, and other modern values. Yet as is reaffirmed here (and previously with AppStore etc), when profits are involved it is willing to overlook the most egregious forms of injustice and violence. Literally every tech company stands up for good causes like BLM and LGBTQ+ rights; but the true measure of cou…

A couple years ago, they removed the VPN apps from the chinese app store, anything after that is nonsense marketing blabla for everyone not living in the US

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#22

Post by melling »

lucasjans wrote: post #2

This company pretends it has the moral high ground, but like most of corporate America, they always have an eye on Chinese profits. America's future is at stake and we won't wake up until it's too late.

“America’s future is at stake”

Please. It’s 2022 and the China buildup was funded by the American consumer over the past 3 decades.

It’s already too late but it’s easy to criticize companies that gave us they cheaper products we so desired by offshoring

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#23

Post by ncr100 »

jjulius wrote: post #20
ncr100 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, Apple is acting exactly as it claims are its ethics, here. The part that needs discussion is how it prioritizes adhering to laws versus less specifically defined ethical values. In my view, China acts abusively in many ways. And the country is currently important to modern global manufacturing. In my understanding changing where a physical product company manufactures everything is horrifically difficult.…

>Change is typically hard, in my understanding of life, and changing where a physical product company manufactures everything is horrifically difficult. Yes, but if any company has the money and the power to make those changes happen, it's Apple.

[edited op] Yes.

Yeah I agree.

I don't think Apple is overtly advertising any morality in it's policies.

I think that's something that we have to do as shareholders of Apple. Shareholders and customers. We have to say, "Hey we don't like how your company is from our moral perspective. Please change your policies so that they conform to our morality."

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#25

Post by BiteCode_dev »

I have a friend working for a company whose biggest clients are in the Emirates. One of said client is the government, and it is asking them to buy some very specific equipment, knowing fully well this equipment is only sold in Israel.

However, the Emirates cannot trade with Israel, and refuse to pay for any equipment labelled as coming from this country. Calling one of the officials, they asked for a solution. They told them to ship everything first to the UK. There, they should unpack every single object, and package them again with different country labels. Once the box has passed custom, nobody will raise the topic about the equipment origin.

And so this is what they do.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#26

Post by traceroute66 »

lucasjans wrote: post #2

This company pretends it has the moral high ground, but like most of corporate America, they always have an eye on Chinese profits. America's future is at stake and we won't wake up until it's too late.

> This company pretends it has the moral high ground, but like most of corporate America, they always have an eye on Chinese profits.

To be fair, it's not fair to use this as an occasion for Apple bashing or America bashing.

The whole Taiwan thing goes much deeper. For example, if you look at ISO3166, the country code standard.

If you look up Taiwan in ISO3166[1], you will see it listed as "Taiwan (Province of China)".

So, if a supposedly neutral international body sees it fit to maintain the link, then what hope have you got for individual countries or their companies ?

N.B. The UN does the same [2]

[1]https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/#iso:code:3166:TW [2]https://service.unece.org/trade/locode/tw.htm

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#27

Post by josephcsible »

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #25

I have a friend working for a company whose biggest clients are in the Emirates. One of said client is the government, and it is asking them to buy some very specific equipment, knowing fully well this equipment is only sold in Israel. However, the Emirates cannot trade with Israel, and refuse to pay for any equipment labelled as coming from this country. Calling one of the officials, they asked for a solution. They…

> the Emirates cannot trade with Israel

Is "cannot" really accurate? Isn't it more like they voluntarily chose not to do so?

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#28

Post by chmod600 »

przemub wrote: post #17

Trade is really a matter for the government, and the US (sadly) adheres to the One China Policy. This just reflects the official policy, and having the companies pick this fight instead of the country is hypocritical.

There's some nuance here.

We have free speech in the US. Freedom means choice, so there's still an obligation to act morally. China is more than willing to manipulate cultural messages with money, so we need some kind of cultural counter to that.

For instance, see how China manipulated the NBA and Activision Blizzard during the Hong Kong protests.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#29

Post by sneak »

przemub wrote: post #17

Trade is really a matter for the government, and the US (sadly) adheres to the One China Policy. This just reflects the official policy, and having the companies pick this fight instead of the country is hypocritical.

I disagree. The largest company in the country is not a passive participant in the government's policies.

Re: Apple warns suppliers to follow China rules on 'Taiwan' labeling

#30

Post by ericbarrett »

josephcsible wrote: post #27
BiteCode_dev wrote: post #25

I have a friend working for a company whose biggest clients are in the Emirates. One of said client is the government, and it is asking them to buy some very specific equipment, knowing fully well this equipment is only sold in Israel. However, the Emirates cannot trade with Israel, and refuse to pay for any equipment labelled as coming from this country. Calling one of the officials, they asked for a solution. They…

> the Emirates cannot trade with Israel Is "cannot" really accurate? Isn't it more like they voluntarily chose not to do so?

I read that as shorthand for "Emirates-based entities cannot..."
Post reply on HN