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US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

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Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#651

Post by jariel »

yorwba wrote: post #538
hintymad wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't this just reciprocity? China banned a long list of media companies: FB, Google, YouTube, Twitter, Netflix, and every traditional media. Now the US is banning two apps made in China.

It's only reciprocity if you divide the world into two tribes, the "China tribe" and the "US tribe". Someone from the "China tribe" did something bad to the "US tribe", so now we're going to grab a random member of the "China tribe" and punish them for it, even if they're not the one responsible. I used to think the Western world had abandoned that kind of collective punishment, but apparently not. It ceases to be re…

"It's only reciprocity if you divide the world into two tribes, the "China tribe" and the "US tribe". Someone from the "China tribe" did something bad to the "US tribe", so now we're going to grab a random member of the "China tribe" and punish them for it, even if they're not the one responsible. I used to think the Western world had abandoned that kind of collective punishment, but apparently not."

So no - this is not it at all.

Reciprocity is a much more appropriate term.

Trade is a big deal, trade deals are big deals.

'Free Trade' deals usually imply reciprocity on all fronts, otherwise, it's a lop-sided situation.

Nation A selling services into nation B, but B not allowed to sell such services back is usually an untenable situation.

If this were any other sector this 'tit for tat' would have happened a long time ago.

It seems a little outlandish because these app bans affect our lives directly, instead of say a 'steel tariff of 50%' which we don't materially witness.

And of course, despite the legitimacy or not of this ... this is a least 50% 'Donald Trump Campaigning'.

The 'censorship' and or 'TikTok' having done something wrong are side issues.

Purely on a trade basis, this is fair.

Now enter the security issue, which is very real: China wants to control everyone's lives down to every passing thought. They observe, control, censor every single conversation in China. They have the means and wherewithal to do it around the world. Large Chinese companies are 'state organs' and the notion that TikTok data would be used for all sorts of advantage is legit. Google and FB can be used as tools of the US, but this is not remotely the same comparison.

It's a new world order, and this action only seems unreasonable because of the person doing it, and the shocking terms.

I expect a little bit more of this to happen, not less.

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#652

Post by markus_zhang »

throw33432 wrote: post #586
ejanus wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But if Chinese social media firms are freely operating in the USA why can't the likes of FB and Twitter be allowed same free access in their market. Let's not see this as harming anybody but this is one of the ways to force China to open up and allow foreign businesses(social media) to spread in their domain. Imagine being forced to open a WeChat account just to chat with someone in China. If this kind of business mo…

I recall that FB, Twitter, and Google were all available in China at one point, but they left because they didn’t want to follow China’s information and data laws.

yeah and fb and google still have ads revenue from China

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#653

Post by hakka-nyu-su »

SkyBelow wrote: post #628
yorwba wrote: post #538

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only reciprocity if you divide the world into two tribes, the "China tribe" and the "US tribe". Someone from the "China tribe" did something bad to the "US tribe", so now we're going to grab a random member of the "China tribe" and punish them for it, even if they're not the one responsible. I used to think the Western world had abandoned that kind of collective punishment, but apparently not. It ceases to be re…

>Someone from the "China tribe" did something bad to the "US tribe", so now we're going to grab a random member of the "China tribe" and punish them for it, even if they're not the one responsible. Isn't it more like someone from the leaders of the tribe did something so we are holding leadership of the tribe responsible, given the extent that private companies are really extensions of the government? >But having the…

WeChat isn't some app for government leaders. Its userbase in America are ordinary people in the Chinese diaspora who use it to stay in contact with family and friends worldwide. Like banning Kakaotalk for Koreans or Line for Japanese.

Also, if "all companies in China are really extensions of the government", then what do you call this relationship where Trump forces Bytedance to sell Tiktok to Microsoft and give the U.S. government a share of the profit?

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#654

Post by anthonypasq »

tonfa wrote: post #404
pjc50 wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the 36,000 US troops in Germany? EU countries don't get to have "national security" that conflicts with the US to more than a trivial extent, like the Airbus/Boeing conflict. That's been a tradeoff that was accepted since the end of WW2. The US now complains about Europe not having strong militaries, having forgotten that for decades it was policy to discourage Europe from having strong militaries in case that…

> Maybe the 36,000 US troops in Germany? Do german people really care about those? (besides the obvious economic benefits in the towns where those troops are stationed due to local spending) I always thought it benefited the US more than germany (easier access to eastern europe and middle east).

Germany has the largest overseas hospital for Americans. Its an extremely important strategic resource.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landstuhl_Regional_Medical_Cen....

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#655

Post by anthonypasq »

euix wrote: post #106
thewarrior wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thats how world wars break out.

I might get downvoted for this but I think it's a very real possibility. Withdraw the embassy from Beijing, recognize Taiwan and force a embargo of all Taiwanese/Korean and Japanese semiconductor supplies and components to Mainland China. Then sit back and let China then make the first move. Might not work, but at this point I wouldn't put it past somebody in the White House having already gamed it. There has never b…

There is absolutely zero political will for a war with China. It will never happen

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#656

Post by hakka-nyu-su »

free_rms wrote: post #610
api wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But having the president order arbitrary punishment without proof of guilt (what happened to presumption of innocence?) looks like a dictatorship to me. It is. There's a faction in the US that believes the US has to have a dictatorship to compete with China. We've been here before. The USSR looked like an unstoppable juggernaut until the late 1960s / early 1970s. Like China they started from a state of relative bac…

I see this pattern of comparisons to the USSR again and again. The USSR collapsed a long time ago, and China saw it happen. Why would they go the same way? I'd say it's Americans, moreso than anyone else, who took the wrong lesson from that collapse. History isn't on anyone's 'side' and destiny doesn't exist. We take too much for granted.

"Collapse" is a bit too passive to describe what happened to the USSR. Gorbachev was a pro-American advocate of Social Democracy (aka the Denmark-style state that Bernie likes).

He thought that Russia would become prosperous by adopting capitalism. Instead, GDP shrank by 50% and Russia went from a global superpower to being encircled in its own backyard.

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#657

Post by pgrote »

hintymad wrote: post #381
tannhaeuser wrote: post #324

I don't get it. It's US companies standing to loose their stronghold (near monopoly) on social, advertisement, and other forms of monetizing the web if the US creates a precedent for "national security" in this way, as in "we're welcoming social networks and free speech as long as it benefits the US and can be searched without warrant." Quite predictably, governments all over the world will be pressurized to question…

Isn't this just reciprocity? China banned a long list of media companies: FB, Google, YouTube, Twitter, Netflix, and every traditional media. Now the US is banning two apps made in China.

>Isn't this just reciprocity? China banned a long list of media companies: FB, Google, YouTube, Twitter, Netflix, and every traditional media. Now the US is banning two apps made in China.

This really could be the end of the thread. For years China has banned systems and applications from other parts of the world. The fact it has taken this long to respond with action is stupefying. China would like the benefits of an open internet, but don't want to participate.

The decision is 100% appropriate, but wasn't handled in the best manner.

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#658

Post by sinoskeptic »

dominotw wrote: post #621
yorwba wrote: post #538

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only reciprocity if you divide the world into two tribes, the "China tribe" and the "US tribe". Someone from the "China tribe" did something bad to the "US tribe", so now we're going to grab a random member of the "China tribe" and punish them for it, even if they're not the one responsible. I used to think the Western world had abandoned that kind of collective punishment, but apparently not. It ceases to be re…

> It's only reciprocity if you divide the world into two tribes, the "China tribe" and the "US tribe". It also works if we divide the world into "China tribe" and "rest of the world tribe" . Infact thats the way it always have been, now china is getting kicked out of "rest of the world tribe" . India and USA are just taking the lead, rest will follow. I am ok with that.

I am from India, and I created an account to agree with exactly this, and add a few more comments.

To every country which is actually in China's proximity, what China has been doing has been nothing short of imperial - in the bad sense of the word.

The "China tribe", if you look a little closely, consists of two types of people - those who are so far away that their notion of China is mostly in the abstract - in the same way I might (not at all) be alarmed if Somalia and Kenya had a war, say. The second group is the "satellite" which depends on China to counter a common enemy - a good example being Pakistan which needs China to counterbalance India's power in the region. Interestingly, but only anecdotally, I have never once heard anyone from Pakistan criticize China's treatment of Uighur Muslims, even though the world is finally catching on that something really fishy is going on. I mention this because the same folks are often seen loudly complaining about the treatment of Muslims in pretty much every other part of the world.

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#659

Post by joyeuse6701 »

FooBarWidget wrote: post #573
mytailorisrich wrote: post #519

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a fallacious argument. For example when Google worked in China they were ripped apart for doing that, and so decided not to. Most of these companies could work in China if they followed Chinese rules. They decided not to, so they don't.

Not sure why people downvote the above. Do they dispute the truth of the parent's statement? Google and Facebook were in fact active in China, until the 2009 Urumqi terrorist attacks happened. The Chinese government then asked for Facebook to release personal details of suspects. Facebook refused. They only got banned after that. The Chinese government installed new monitoring and censorship laws. Google didn't want…

I see your view, but I think you’re comparing a US company operating in China on equal footing with a Chinese company operating in the US which they aren’t either because of monopoly reasons, state backing, or cultural advantage (US company in China has to deal with Uighur backlash and censorship which is intolerable, but not so for Chinese businesses).

We also can’t dismiss the nature of a law. A law may be sufficiently heinous that it loses its validity, which I think many Chinese laws qualify as they are so broad they are as some CCP members have stated, being like the sword of Damocles with the specific intent to terrorize and allow the government flexibility to do what it wants under the image of ‘rule of law’ which it obviously isn’t.

Re: US to ban transactions with ByteDance and WeChat in 45 days

#660

Post by dominotw »

hakka-nyu-su wrote: post #647
dominotw wrote: post #621

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's only reciprocity if you divide the world into two tribes, the "China tribe" and the "US tribe". It also works if we divide the world into "China tribe" and "rest of the world tribe" . Infact thats the way it always have been, now china is getting kicked out of "rest of the world tribe" . India and USA are just taking the lead, rest will follow. I am ok with that.

What is this comment trying to say, by putting China outside of the "rest of the world tribe"? Does this mean that Chinese people are a different species, or what?

> Chinese people are a different species, or what?

Yes according them, maybe. They created their own internet.

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