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Alibaba breaks itself up in six

economist.com

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Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#261

Post by HWR_14 »

kdmccormick wrote: post #249
SkyMarshal wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that’s the problem - the risk of losing a power struggle in a democracy with rule of law, separation of powers, an independent court system, and regular elections is vastly different from the risks of losing a power struggle in the CCP, which controls all branches of government, law enforcement, and the military and is accountable to no one. The former has a limited downside, the latter unlimited. Whatever the Ce…

As reasonable as your argument is, let's apply Occam's Razor. Which is more likely? 1. Jack Ma knows things you don't, and those things made mouthing off seem worthwhile to him. Still, he miscalculated, but not out of sheer cluelessness. 2. You, HN commenter, understand Chinese politics and power better than Jack Ma, a prominent Chinese billionaire. He is clueless. Doesn't 2 seem a little arrogant to you?

Missing option (3). Jack Ma, prominent billionaire, was surrounded by kiss-asses for the past 5-10 years. In doing so, he developed a distorted sense of his own intelligence/power/allies which caused him to make a calculation about the current state of Chinese politics and power that is obviously false to an outside observer.

See also, Twitter is was not worth $44 billion in 2022.

Missing option (4). If you have billions, sacrificing a lot of wealth and power to do something you want is just another valid option.

See also, sacrificing 20% of your net worth to support "freedom of speech" is a reasonable choice, especially if you are left with an objective fortune.

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#262

Post by refurb »

jihiggins wrote: post #42
poszlem wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I came across a comment that resonated with me and seems relevant in this context, so I saved it. It says: "The arc of communism is long and it leans towards oppressing the fuck out of people. It’s a tendency of all governmental systems. Communism rests most of its power in the hands of government without a moneyed elite to oppose them, so it tends to move to authoritarianism faster and with less resistance."

Maybe from the perspective of the moneyed elite, but in what universe is China breaking up a monopoly an indicator of "authoritarianism"

There is no rule of law, that's the indicator of authoritarianism.

In the US, if the FTC decides to block your merger or the government wants to split up a company, the company can bring the government to court, on a equal footing and argue it's case.

That's not happening in China.

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#263

Post by jessaustin »

alexandre_m wrote: post #252
littlestymaar wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One doesn't need to be clueless in order to lose a power struggle. But one has to be clueless in order to start a power struggle with Xi. He's not like the old school CCP head at all (not even Mao), he's much more of an all-powerful tyrant like Stalin was. Starting a power struggle against such a ruthless despot is clueless.

Are you suggesting that Xi is more of a tyrant than Mao?

Don't expect rational history on HN. We regularly see e.g. comparisons of Putin to Hitler.

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#264

Post by WalterSear »

robocat wrote: post #230
philipov wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People thought he had some engineering skills, until he took over Twitter and started talking about all the idiotic engineering decisions he was making.

Musk could simultaneously be a numpty at Twitter and a superb engineer at SpaceX. You imply that skills are context-free black or white - that is a terrible way to think about people or the world IMHO. And you can’t ignore changes over time either.

Not the kind of engineering numpty he's shown himself to be. All engineering absolutely requires humility for situations outside the realm of your expertise.

But, the fact that he so clearly doesn't know when he is out of his depth in the first place is the real tell.

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#265

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #246
ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

your post does a good job of explaining how Apple's behavior is monopolistic, by that very definition, even despite not controlling the entire market: the "something" need not be the entire market as for like vs dislike, the company isn't important enough for me to form such personal opinions about it, they're simply a company engaging in monopolistic behavior just like any other company engaging in monopolistic beha…

Again, the definition is clear. By the definition generalized in that way, any company building a proprietary system would be guilty of monopolistic behavior. If that's the case, then I guess it is a meaningless distinction anyways, and really not my worth much of my time to ponder either.

your own conclusions, whether about what other companies do or don't do (whataboutism) or anything else, are neither convincing nor here nor there, since the topic at hand is simply, is this one company in question (Apple) engaging in monopolistic behavior (they are)

the same goes for your personal opinions as to the meaning of such a conclusion -- while I'm sure you are a great person, and appreciate you respectfully commenting, such opinions are neither convincing nor relevant to the topic at hand: whether this one company in question (Apple) is engaging in monopolistic behavior (they are)

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#266

Post by zoom6628 »

crop_rotation wrote: post #100

The media and HN seem to be seeing this as a AT&T style breakup, which is not. It is starting with an Alphabet style restructuring, which sounds big in theory but nothing big might happen in practice. The biggest unit (Taobao/Tmall) will be fully owned by Alibaba and would not seek any external investment (Taobao/Tmall is responsible for >70% of their profits). The new Unit CEOs were not even invited to speak at the…

Agreed. This is a restructure so that CCP can show they have caused changes and for Alibaba to appear to acquiesce to instructions. Corporate “window dressing” basically.

If the units all get too independent, based on my view at ground level in China, is that they will all get more powerful in their respective markets. Nobody was happy with the value erasure.

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#267

Post by nemothekid »

bioemerl wrote: post #40
quonn wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't make sense to split Apple into hardware and software since the integration and simplicity that comes from it is the very thing that makes Apple unique.

Unfortunately this is also the source of all their monopolistic behavior. Apple hardware should be incentivized to make great hardware for any operating system. Apple software should be incentivized to sell to many manufacturers and also to not obey apple hardware's demands for locks to prevent things like the replacement of batteries. Their union could be a great thing, but apple decided to use it to be a bunch of m…

>Apple software should be incentivized to sell to many manufacturers and also to not obey apple hardware's demands for locks to prevent things like the replacement of batteries.

Is there any money in writing operating systems? I don't see a world where people suddenly start paying for Operating Systems

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#268

Post by dirtyid »

zoom6628 wrote: post #266
crop_rotation wrote: post #100

The media and HN seem to be seeing this as a AT&T style breakup, which is not. It is starting with an Alphabet style restructuring, which sounds big in theory but nothing big might happen in practice. The biggest unit (Taobao/Tmall) will be fully owned by Alibaba and would not seek any external investment (Taobao/Tmall is responsible for >70% of their profits). The new Unit CEOs were not even invited to speak at the…

Agreed. This is a restructure so that CCP can show they have caused changes and for Alibaba to appear to acquiesce to instructions. Corporate “window dressing” basically. If the units all get too independent, based on my view at ground level in China, is that they will all get more powerful in their respective markets. Nobody was happy with the value erasure.

>Nobody was happy with the value erasure.

On the other hand a fuckton of value has been irrevocably erased - entire ed tech sector isn't coming back to pre crackdown levels. If anything CCP hasn shown little regard for crippling soft tech since it will redirect talent towards strategic hard tech where job and wages have been booming. Baba getting proper rectification if it incentivizes future talent to reorient towards SMIC seems to be part of the plan.

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#269

Post by smackeyacky »

midasuni wrote: post #144
andy_ppp wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always do wonder about the reverence shown to billionaires around here, given the quite frankly ludicrous purchase of Twitter ($44bn!!!) and what has happened afterwards I really am not convinced they aren’t just as able as the rest of us.

Americans tend to equate wealth with ability and set aside luck, everyone is a temporarily embarrassed millionaire. Musk certainly used to have decent business accuumin - he hit it big several times, that’s not just luck. From all accounts he’s a half decent engineer too, which is rare in many CEO levels. However his behaviour over the last 3 years has been very surprising. He seems to be less interested in the tech…

As an external observer, I don't square the two different conclusions in your first statement: "equate wealth with ability", "everybody is a temporarily embarrassed millionaire".

There is a far stronger underpinning to the American attitude to wealth: It's not "equate wealth with ability", it's more "equate wealth with virtue and morality" - that the owners of wealth "did something right" generally has nothing to do with ability. Even the founders of Hewlett-Packard aren't remembered for their technological advances but for the "HP Way", a marker of virtue rather than business acumen.

The absolute veneration of "hard work" as a marker of success over connections/which hoo-ha you accidentally fell out of is rarely raised, despite their being overwhelming evidence that to be successfull in the US, you have to be born on 3rd base.

When it comes down to it, it should be absolutely no surprise that these billionaires with feet of clay rarely live up to the image that is built for them by the fanboys. Musk's family had a history of bizarre, he has simply not fallen far from the tree.

Re: Alibaba breaks itself up in six

#270

Post by lupire »

FormerBandmate wrote: post #145
andy_ppp wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always do wonder about the reverence shown to billionaires around here, given the quite frankly ludicrous purchase of Twitter ($44bn!!!) and what has happened afterwards I really am not convinced they aren’t just as able as the rest of us.

The Twitter purchase really just shows how rich and apathetic Elon Musk is. A Ferrari is a difficult to impossible purchase for almost all of us, but rappers buy them for no reason and then trash them all the time. Twitter is that on a much larger scale, and Musk is treating it the same way because he doesn’t care. You don’t build the first successful auto startup in 70 years and revitalize the space industry by bein…

Don't know why you went to rappers. When Musk first got rich, he bought a $million car and immediately destroyed it, uninsured, nearly killing himself and Peter Thiel. Imagine if he succeeded.
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