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WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

reuters.com

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Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#81

Post by sudosysgen »

aerosmile wrote: post #75
paganel wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> with complete disregard on how the stock market might react. I personally regard this as a positive fact, and I'm generally against the policies of the current Chinese authorities. The stock market should not be the be-all and end-all of our modern society.

Does it make sense to have strong principles and not be guided by financial incentives alone? Sure. But would it make more sense to have a solid regulatory framework to start with, as opposed to being loosey goosey for a very long time and then course correcting in a way that evaporates billions in value overnight from domestic and foreign investors? Countries and companies have a lot in common. Consider this analogy…

It's not possible to have a solid regulatory framework from the beginning. You can't predict the advance of cutting edge tech. Sure, you can do it earlier, but never from the start.

Also, billions of dollars of value didn't disappear overnight. No jobs are or will be lost, and very little utility is lost, except being able to sign up for 1-2 weeks.

I'm not absolutely thrilled by the rise of China either, but we gotta stop lying to ourselves. Not every single action by the Chinese government is a stupid and reckless calamity that will cause untold harm. We're often blind to the good and to the utility of these decisions, and on the balance a government that's not scared of the stock market is going to be more effective assuming they're competent to begin with.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#82

Post by sudosysgen »

marderfarker2 wrote: post #71
refenestrator wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an interesting phenomenon, specific to US tech, where there are a ton of Chinese who quietly have a problem with the recent anti-china rhetoric, but they're not going to put a target on their back over it, they stay quiet. How do you even engage with someone who doesn't speak a word of Chinese and is so confident that they know all about China? Meanwhile, the anti-china folks blithely go on about how much bet…

I feel like a lot of frustration in the west are due to a lack of voice from within China, who can explain the context and give their point of view. Instead all you get are these disjointed news and headlines without any depth to it. People then make assumptions based on it.

Well, yes and no. Go to reddit for example, you can find endless amounts of people explaining the Chinese perspective and getting voted down and accused of being wumaos, and you'll get banned for it in many places too. At some point I imagine it gets tiring.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#83

Post by sudosysgen »

starfallg wrote: post #78
georgeecollins wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The problem is that the CCP has nothing to replace this cultural vacuum with. I am no expert, but I disagree and I think this is the kind of thinking that has failed the west for the last thirty years. I think the idea started with the fall of the Soviet Union. That culture and ideology was bankrupt. So a lot of western people thought that when there was a free exchange of ideas with China, the Chinese would event…

>My experience of people in China-- admittedly a long time ago-- was they are generally very patriotic or nationalistic, like Americans. They appreciate the CCP and what it has accomplished. They have a strong domestic arts industry making movies, books, games. Sure lots of people disagree with the party, but that doesn't that they want a western liberal democracy. Having been on the inside, it's not that they don't…

I think this position is very valuable. By far the best way for us to effect change in China politically, and every other major ideologically opposed nation, is to effect change at home, and be so sucessful that the superiority of our approach cannot be refuted.

Bonus point that there is a lot less chance of war this way.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#84

Post by refenestrator »

marderfarker2 wrote: post #71
refenestrator wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an interesting phenomenon, specific to US tech, where there are a ton of Chinese who quietly have a problem with the recent anti-china rhetoric, but they're not going to put a target on their back over it, they stay quiet. How do you even engage with someone who doesn't speak a word of Chinese and is so confident that they know all about China? Meanwhile, the anti-china folks blithely go on about how much bet…

I feel like a lot of frustration in the west are due to a lack of voice from within China, who can explain the context and give their point of view. Instead all you get are these disjointed news and headlines without any depth to it. People then make assumptions based on it.

Go one level deeper and ask why you're never exposed to that viewpoint.

Washington Post and NYT will happily run Adrian Zenz all day long, even though he's a right wing religious nut and they're secular liberals, but you never see them print the majority viewpoint of actual Chinese people.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#85

Post by hamburgerwah »

There seems to be a lot of misunderstanding in this thread that there can be chinese companies that are somehow separate from the government. All chinese companies are defacto part of the government. The CEO of all chinese enterprises is Xi Jinping.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#86

Post by bllguo »

tablespoon wrote: post #73
georgeecollins wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The problem is that the CCP has nothing to replace this cultural vacuum with. I am no expert, but I disagree and I think this is the kind of thinking that has failed the west for the last thirty years. I think the idea started with the fall of the Soviet Union. That culture and ideology was bankrupt. So a lot of western people thought that when there was a free exchange of ideas with China, the Chinese would event…

I think you're broadly correct. With regard to China, a lot of people's understanding is driven in large part by wishful thinking, which is a serious weakness and vulnerability. > Sure lots of people disagree with the party, but that doesn't that they want a western liberal democracy. So lots of people will speak in favor of a benevolent elite and against populism or what they see as western chaos or oppression. When…

> When educated Chinese people were better exposed to ideas about liberal democracy, they were very clear that they wanted it

This falls flat for me. So the implication is that there are no educated Chinese today with exposure to liberal democracy? I think we take for granted the supposed superiority of a system that empirically has delivered many recent failures.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#87

Post by websites2023 »

infofarmer wrote: post #60
websites2023 wrote: post #46

How many native Chinese don’t have WeChat already? WeChat has 1.2B users. China has 1.4B people. I suspect the rest are too old or too young. Basically, it’s impossible to operate in a city without it.

50 thousand people are born in China every day. It's not like the world is static.

Well, luckily babies are are too young to use WeChat and won’t be old enough by early August for this to impact them.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#88

Post by websites2023 »

hamburgerwah wrote: post #85

There seems to be a lot of misunderstanding in this thread that there can be chinese companies that are somehow separate from the government. All chinese companies are defacto part of the government. The CEO of all chinese enterprises is Xi Jinping.

No idea why you’re being downvoted. This is 100% correct, China requires party members to be on the boards of companies and Xi is the head of the party.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#89

Post by jjaammee »

tablespoon wrote: post #73
georgeecollins wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The problem is that the CCP has nothing to replace this cultural vacuum with. I am no expert, but I disagree and I think this is the kind of thinking that has failed the west for the last thirty years. I think the idea started with the fall of the Soviet Union. That culture and ideology was bankrupt. So a lot of western people thought that when there was a free exchange of ideas with China, the Chinese would event…

I think you're broadly correct. With regard to China, a lot of people's understanding is driven in large part by wishful thinking, which is a serious weakness and vulnerability. > Sure lots of people disagree with the party, but that doesn't that they want a western liberal democracy. So lots of people will speak in favor of a benevolent elite and against populism or what they see as western chaos or oppression. When…

That's maybe true when young people in China first learned western democracy ideas. Nowadays I think most of educated Chinese believe democracy is not suitable for China. They didn't get the whole picture of western world, but who does nowadays. They see signs of culture revolution in western social movements and rejected those wholeheartedly.

Re: WeChat suspends new user registration for security compliance

#90

Post by ren_engineer »

m3kw9 wrote: post #35

Looks like tech will inevitably one day circumvent all the barriers China has set up. It seem there is a panic with in the govt as they notice the trend. Delays the inevitable, but for how long?

based on trends of Western companies bending over backwards to fulfil China's whims, I'd say the odds are more likely this gets exported around the world
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