westiseast

Having meaning, yes.

Meaningful WORK? Not necessarily.

Any insight into why the lockdown hasn’t worked? By all accounts lockdowns have worked in other places (obviously with lots of other measures taken at the same time).

Late to the party but...

I think another way of saying it is, any views coming from a country that doesn’t allow even a modicum of free speech should be discounted.

I think there’s two reasons: trust and reciprocity.

Trust - the fact that information in China is so heavily censored and moderated means that opinions are necessarily censored and moderated too. It’s as if somebody admitted that their single source of all political information was Alex Jones - it wouldn’t be unreasonable to treat their opinions with a high degree of suspicion.

Reciprocity - I don’t think China should be able to have its cake and eat it. ie. if your neighbor thinks you are too dirty to eat at their house, then they surely wouldn’t be welcome at yours whenever they please?

I think that’s the point - simply asking people to fly less and drive less and eat les meat will never ever ever work.

We need big carrots and big sticks in order to achieve things like less flying - that means government regulation, huge material incentives for not flying/driving/etc.

The central government almost certainly ‘profited’ (ie. benefited) from this whole situation.

1) Strategically, it cornered the market and has been able to use that dominance to great geopolitical effect.

2) Economic development: environmental regulation and ‘fair’ competition with foreign firms would’ve held back the industry in China, costing jobs and the bottom line for the Chinese state. The breakneck economic growth has been achieved in large part because the Chinese state put economic development ahead of all other concerns.

3) Internal politics. The basic balance between local and central government since the 1990s were that local governments had to fend for themselves financially, and in return central government wouldn’t bog them down with regulation and oversight. The lack of environmental regulation of what is a nationally and strategically vital industry reflects that balance.

Perhaps it’s churlish to mention, but...

China was happy to ignore environmental standards in order to corner the market in rare earth minerals. American miners couldn’t compete because they were already “internalizing” the environmental costs, and were priced out of the market.

Once China had put everyone else out of business (and blocked foreign businesses from mining inside China), it started not only reducing output to increase prices, but also started to very slowly apply environmental standards it previously ignored.

The Chinese government also showed how willing they were to now use this almost complete monopoly for political purposes in 2010.

And now in 2019 they’re calling for consumers and global companies to contribute to the costs of “internalizing” the pollution?

I think because it’s pretty cheap (free) to make inspiring speeches to privileged American students about an esoteric ‘right to be human’.

Meanwhile Apple effectively withholds tax from a range of countries who would probably use that to provide basic social services to those in need of them, or runs (through its contractors) factories that withhold basic human rights from staff.

I think if you look at media and propaganda within China, my original point is true - America (and often Europe) is presented as an enemy, an example of the failure of democracy, a chaotic place, a dangerous place to live/visit, a country that intrinsically hates China.... there’s no way in which Chinese people are told ‘American democracy is good, our system is also good, let’s just learn to get along’

edit: in addition, things that we’ve seen in recent years like ‘purges’ of Western influences in Chinese universities - those directly contradict your point that China doesn’t consider the West an ideological enemy.

Personally I think it’s not a ‘sudden’ paranoia, it’s an overdue one.

China has made it abundantly clear for a long time that it considers the US to be an ideological enemy, a military rival and a target for economic and geopolitical warfare.

Since ~2008 / Xi Jin Ping took over, its also been fairly clear that China has no intention of liberalizing in any sense, and the government is actively working to undermine the US/European model of a harmonious world.

However, US government policy pre-Trump basically assumed that China was going to liberalize and play by the (US/EU) rules.

I’m not a Trump fan by any means, but regarding China I think he is the first to drop the pretense that China is a friend of America, and now the China hawks in the media, government and military are all piling on.

Personally, it’s a great example of amazing sales and how to build a brand.

There’s no reason why brands today couldn’t learn from Nike’s sales/branding story without having to emulate their manufacturing sins.

Sports is probably very specific. Amateurs will mostly buy what professionals recommend, or what their coach wears. These days you see sports stars and brands through social media and on TV, but in those days less so. Going to clubs, track meets, talking to the professionals/enthusiasts/hardcore fans, he would’ve been talking to the equivalent of Instagram influencers today.

I did wonder, what other brands existed at the time? I have no idea.

Was coming to a track meet with branded, fashionable shoes in 1964 the equivalent of turning up in 1998 with an awesome animated Flash website?

Yes, there’s a lot of people who know nothing of Tiananmen at all, but often those that do would characterize it as a riot by agitators who forced the governments hand.

They don't share pandas at all - the pandas are 'rented out' to zoos around the world and subject to intense negotiation and strict contracts. Any baby pandas born on foreign soil still belong to China. So, no, they don't 'share' pandas at all.

I for one feel like there’s actually limited play in this - America already is and has been the boogeyman for years.

Whipping up nationalistic sentiment and expecting consumers to fall in line is a transparent tactic and younger, affluent consumers are fairly cynical. It rarely has any long term effect either (see previous nationalistic anti-Japan and anti-Korea consumer boycotts).

Also don’t underestimate the power of Apple brand - it’s not like banning Google or Facebook which had very limited presence in Chinese minds. Moves to limit access to Apple products, tax them, ban them etc would not go down well.

The government could offer more subsidies to domestic companies, better credit terms or financial incentives, but then that’s just China paying for the cost of Trumps tariffs - Trump wins.

That said, Huawei and other phone makers have been taking chunks out of Apple by making better phones at competitive prices - that’s what actually moves consumers.

That’s a disingenuous argument.

eg. in 2019, nobody is ‘forced’ to give their data to Google/Apple/Facebook, but actually avoiding those companies entirely is extremely difficult/nigh impossible.

Not engaging with China as a market or producer is practically impossible for many companies. When the choice is (a) give up your business by handing your IP over to Chinese competitors or (b) give up your business by losing access to critical supply chain/logistics, then that can be correctly characterised as ‘being forced’.

This sprang to mind:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-15396956

Letwin had a habit of reading correspondence whilst in a public park in the mornings and then dumping it in public bins once dealt with. Mirror reporters just followed him around and fished sensitive material out of the bins.

Maybe - the neoliberal dogma of the last 40 years has been that you can’t have economic prosperity without democratic reform and liberal politics. China has shown categorically that this isn’t true.

However, China might still prove the West correct in the long term. The breakneck economic development and oppressive political system has stored up a lot of huge problems, any of which could see the country slump into serious decline or worse.

Not to belittle your experience, but one of the key issues in an authoritarian state is that nobody is held to account.

So, if you’re a politician or a big businessman, you can say whatever you like. We have a 3 year plan to eradicate X. We will completely redevelop the entire southern sector of the city and everyone will be rich and happy. And we’ll do it in 2 years.

China does a lot and achieves a lot, but for example, each time you read something China related in the news, check how many times it says “China plans to....” or “Government announces plan to.....”

I disagree with why Western commentators struggle to accept China’s ‘success’ - it’s not sour grapes or jealousy as you suggest.

China is breaking all of the established rules that have guided western societies for decades/centuries: Governments work for the people. Authoritarianism doesn’t work. Faking and copying will fail. Hubris leads to a fall.

China’s political model and economic models have worked exceptionally well on a number of levels for 3-4 decades now, but to a lot of people, it still just looks like an authoritarian government forcing present and future generations to make vast sacrifices (health, quality of life, freedoms, rights) for the benefit of the CCP.

Time will tell.

I guess I’m saying, marketers aren’t persuading me I need a car. I made a fairly practical choice that I needed a car (maybe I’m not typical?).

But perhaps instead of buying the cheap Japanese one, I bought the expensive German one. So marketers persuaded me to spend 20% more?

The idea that marketers are somehow controlling people’s lives assumes that without marketers, we’d all be living some kind of radically different lives. I doubt we would.

I think thats a bad cliche.

If I break down my spending, most goes on food (I have no rent/mortgage), the next biggest item are essentials like utilities/council tax/bills, then car bills (insurance, petrol, repairs), then the kids then personal luxuries for me and my wife.

Marketers might shape how I spend my food budget (ie on which brands/products) but I still need food. Marketers influenced my choice of car, but I still need a car with certain qualities (big, room for kids and bikes, reliable). If I had to pay rent, a vast portion of my income would go on that - how is this being influenced by marketers?

If PR/advertising/marketing became illegal tomorrow, people would still continue to spend most of their income on a place to live, food to eat, utilities, a car and their kids education.

I think the hacking and being cut out of domestic markets is fairly closely linked.

If you’ve already stolen the IP, you don’t need to let the foreign business in to provide that service.

Possibly even more widespread though has been the standard practice over the last 20 years of lettin foreign businesses setup shop in China, hacking/stealing all their tech, then the state uses its legal/political resources to make life horrendously difficult for the original foreign business.

I suspect the amount is a mix of things:

* Investment in IP that then gets stolen. * Loss of potential earnings as American companies are locked out of Chinese markets * Loss of actual earnings as American/global consumers switch to Chinese companies (eg huawei) that are accused of unfair business practices or receiving unfair government subsidies.

Some companies “don’t care” because they aren’t actually losing money, they’re just not making as much as they could be.

But other companies are ‘coerced’ into not caring because what happens if they complain? They lose Chinese government contracts. They effectively admit to shareholders that their IP has been stolen and lost. They waste time and resources fighting unwinnable legal battles against Chinese national champions (ie. the Chinese state).

I’ve met plenty of small/medium sized business owners who are so sickened by their experiences with China and the Chinese market that they’re happy to just ignore it all and save themselves the heartache.

It’s nice for two reasons:

* I get an independent confirmation that money has actually left my account (eg we’ve all shopped on websites when the payment pages crash and you don’t know if something has gone through or not)

* it’s comforting knowing that if for some reason someone else was illegally using your card, you’d be getting instant push notifications about it.

Agreed.

I have a fancy colored debit card now, which is cool.

Tend to use my HSBC for direct debits and bills, and Monzo for daily life/luxury/fun items.

It just seems like the legacy banks are awful rather than Monzo is breaking boundaries. I have a Chinese bank card and I get opt-in text notifications for my spending and have done for years.

What shocks me about this is... Monzo to me (a regular user of about a year) is just a normal bank card without a branch and with a basic app.

Are established banks so incredibly ossified they can’t keep up with that?

This seems to be a non-AI system monitored by humans or simple algorithms - nevertheless the irony of the promise of AI and hi-tech revolutionizing the workplace just resulting in more oppression of low-wage workers is glaring.

Best when it isn't raining and the wind isn't too strong.

So.... never then?

Yeah was going to say this might be relevant

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/f5et2r4-IePUTv8AvElpsQ