China has been going on a ban spree lately. First, they turn the Bitcoin and cryptocurrency world on its head banning Bitcoin and other restrictions and now WhatsApp is being banned. What is banned next?
China Blocks WhatsApp
481–490 of 648 posts
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#482Earlier quoted context omitted.
"It's surprising that any country would allow that to continue unchecked." Hold on now - Google still provides immense value. And what does it cost? Nothing . The 'consumer surplus' value of G and FB are quite immense. Google captures a tiny fraction of the value they create via ads. What would Canada do without Google? There is no Google here. If we started with with 'government backing' it would be a s -show. I und…
> Google still provides immense value. Absolutely. But so does Baidu. And while doing so, Baidu provides jobs and tax revenue in China with little national security risk for China. And at the same time Baidu creates thousands of extremely skilled Chinese software engineers.
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Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#483Earlier quoted context omitted.
Another alternative is that you may get a Galapagos island effect where Chinese firms do innovate, but their innovation is tied to the cultural and regulatory norms and not very applicable outside of China. The same effect was seen with Japanese cell phone companies pre-smartphone era.
If Chinese start an economic and cultural expansion which includes PRing their culture, movies, tech, products and building special relationships with developing world in Asia, Africa, south American and Europe they may end up being the globalization leader.
Especially if America keeps electing republicans.
As an European America is shitting on me a lot more than China is.
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#484"The blocking of WhatsApp text messages suggests that China’s censors may have developed specialized software to interfere with such messages"
They don't need any 'specialized software'. You can just block the list of hostnames and IP address, found here: https://github.com/ukanth/afwall/wiki/HOWTO-blocking-WhatsAp...
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#485I have no privileged state secret information to disclose. But a former employee of mine (and Orbital Sciences, NSA before that) was in Queen Noor Of Jordan's entourage. WhatsApp was one of the dominant messaging apps in the Arab Spring aftermath. I suspect the miraculous purchase price might reflect that. I could be wrong. Boy genius working class hero miracle narratives should be discounted however possible for better business lesson learning. WhatsApp is a rounding error in China and likely a genuine military or trade secrets security threat. Our proclamations of self-identity as guardians of democracy are as important to us as our own enforcement and good example. Focus on what and who matters where.
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#486Earlier quoted context omitted.
1. These are foreign-owned infrastructure platforms and China is protective about its markets. Foreigners can't set up businesses of any kind, let alone infrastructure. 2. You seem to assume the bulk of innovation is going to be happening outside China and that blocking consumer access to Western platforms would somehow inhibit a flow of information to China. I'd disagree on both counts. The Chinese government is act…
This has little to do with China and innovation. The problem is mostly economical. China probably wants Chinese clones, clones that are incredibly valuable and based in China. All the wealth generated therefrom stays in China. That's it, it's likely an economical manipulation. And frankly, from an economical standpoint, well-played. (Hope I don't get downvoted to hell!)
Not far from mercantilism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#487Earlier quoted context omitted.
China's not blocking out the sharing of ideas though. Until a few months ago, Andrew Ng worked at Baidu! They are isolating data , but hoarding data is a competitive advantage in a way that isolating knowledge isn't.
> China's not blocking out the sharing of ideas though. Until a few months ago, Andrew Ng worked at Baidu! Ok they are bottlenecking data... As I've already mentioned this is an extremely inefficient way to share data. Sharing data using physically present word of mouth is a lot more expensive and slower than sharing it instantly via an open internet connection.
Is there any indication that scientists predominantly use whatsapp, so this would block innovation? When you say "this is an extremely inefficient way to share data", what do you mean? It's not like China doesn't have its own messengers, and it's not like whatsapp is the only way for people to communicate over the Internet..
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#488Earlier quoted context omitted.
Alternative: Innovation happens within the context of Chinas censorship and political regime. Blocking of entrenched western competitors allows home grown solutions to spring up, and local technological know how to develop faster. Capitalism and innovation turn out to work within the context of an illiberal society just fine. Especially as China avoids the mistake of closing itself off to the rest of the world, but s…
China will reach some predetermined level of technology that The Party decides they are comfortable with, then close their borders and just get on with being the Middle Kingdom in splendid isolation. That is my prediction. I don't think they feel the need to project power and remake the world the way the US and previously the UK do/did. Maybe they will disengage from the world and look spacewards.
China invests heavily into Africa and the whole continent will be under its sphere of influence, with all its growing-out-of-poverty economies. They're hardly the isolationists you imagine.
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#489Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm a China hawk, but this is what has been happening and what will continue happening unless something massively more drastic than blocking a single minority foreign app happens. I think there's a tendency for people to overestimate the importance of foreign apps to Chinese consumers and to underestimate the Chinese market. It's almost laughable that people think blocking WhatsApp will make any difference to Chinese…
> I think there's a tendency for people to overestimate the importance of foreign apps to Chinese consumers Then why take the trouble of blocking something so small and unimportant? ;) > eg., the Chinese tech/online market is so huge it can sustain multiple competitors of its own in each sector Doesn't China have bigger aspirations than just the mainland? People are missing the bigger point. I'm not talking about the…
Russia has had an unrestricted Internet access until recently. I still don't see booming tech sector (or actually, any) there or people revolting against authoritarian government. There's language and cultural barrier that must be taken into account -- free access to information won't do much if people still prefer their information and social bubbles and actively maintain them. Russians also have copy-cat versions of many western sites/services that are more popular than original ones, even though they can access these too.
Re: China Blocks WhatsApp
#490Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I think there's a tendency for people to overestimate the importance of foreign apps to Chinese consumers Then why take the trouble of blocking something so small and unimportant? ;) > eg., the Chinese tech/online market is so huge it can sustain multiple competitors of its own in each sector Doesn't China have bigger aspirations than just the mainland? People are missing the bigger point. I'm not talking about the…
Russia has had an unrestricted Internet access until recently. I still don't see booming tech sector (or actually, any) there or people revolting against authoritarian government. There's language and cultural barrier that must be taken into account -- free access to information won't do much if people still prefer their information and social bubbles and actively maintain them. Russians also have copy-cat versions o…
What about Yandex and vk?