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> Chinese companies, however, have no such limitations, and will bend the rules all the time, often with minimal consequences. Do you mind point some examples?

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
seanmcdirmid 9y ago
Ya, for the big one, Baidu is the ultimate search engine for porn and health care scams, where they used to derive most of their revenue. Compared to Chinese Bing which is pretty clean with pretty effective porn filters (but also makes almost no money). Payments via AliPay and WePay were technically illegal before they were legalized post facto after they became popular. A western company could have never gone near that. All the western companies pay income tax on private health insurance benefits, while all the Chinese companies don't, because the law is unclear.
- hellbanner 9y ago
  I'm familiar with users searching for porn but not health care scams. Are you saying that Baidu was directing traffic to health care scams willingly? Interesting remark on AliPay & WePay. I wonder what kind of agreements Chinese gov made with those companies after the fact. Here's as good as any point to remember that a warrant canary disappeared from Apple's privacy text about a year ago. Before it was about "we will protect user's privacy".. then there was a big "privacy" announcement that had text about following the law etc. IMHO gov got to them and it's understandable - companies exist in frameworks set by governments. It's in Apple's best interest to comply with them. To suggest otherwise is a political stance, not an economic one.
  - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
    Ya, Baidu got caught last year and got a slap on the wrist. Oddly enough, they were in it with a military hospital for that case, which should raise a lot of other eye brows. China doesn't have rule of law, so everything is illegal but nothing is, if you can navigate that contradiction, then you just have to make sure your context isn't bad enough to be cracked down on. The same was true with Didi and anti-black cab laws (but Uber operates in the gray margins of those laws all the time, so there was no point in mentioning that). China doesn't really care about your idealism. If you go against the government's interests, they will beat you down. This is one thing the Chinese companies get really well and allow them to play fast and lose with the law as long as they adhere to that one principal.
    - dis-sys 9y ago
      how about stop selling your single sided story? Baidu's involvement in those healthcare scams got its reputation totally trashed, which in turn failed numerous Baidu products. As a direct consequence, Baidu is now considered a tier-2 Internet company with almost weekly news reports talking about company XYZ is replacing Baidu. it is also highly laughable for your private health insurance joke. there is _no_ Chinese law requiring any company to provide _private_ health insurance to anyone. Public healthcare levy is required by the law, that is all.
- madeofpalk 9y ago
  > Payments via AliPay and WePay were technically illegal before they were legalized post facto after they became popular. A western company could have never gone near that. Huh. Sounds like a certain transportation company...
  - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
    See below. I didn't bother talking about Didi because of Uber.
adventured 9y ago
Jack Ma stealing tens of billions of dollars from Softbank and Yahoo by giving himself a very large stake in Ant Financial (completely unsupported by his ownership % in Alibaba), divesting it out of Alibaba without proper compensation. Something like that is nearly unthinkable in the US or Western Europe. It would be equivalent to Jeff Bezos spinning off AWS and giving himself 2/3 ownership of it, without approval from AMZN shareholders.
- thr1234 9y ago
  You aren't making a fair comparison here. You will never be able to make a 1-1 comparisons between individuals in two countries. Jeff Bezos and Jack Ma are different people and live in different countries; their actions are based on their environment. The heart of your argument is that a corporation is executing a transaction that could possible be illegal elsewhere: the US or Western Europe is better because this would not be possible here. If that is your argument, I can think of two examples off the top of my head: 1. Goldman Sachs executive in 1MDB scandal 2. Banks offloading their mortgage-back securities positions by selling the directly opposite positions to their clients Corporations executing shady transactions in the US or Western Europe is not as uncommon or "unthinkable" as you might imagine. Your argument stems from a enthocentric point of view and romanticizing one system over another by neglecting all the bad from one side.
  - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
    What aboutism Malaysia's 1MDB? It ain't just American companies involved in that mess, plenty of Chinese companies are as well.
    - djdjfjd 9y ago
      Tim Leissner was allegatedly involved in helping transfer money out of the funds for money laundering.
    - thr1234 9y ago
      You are not using the term "What aboutism" right. My argument isn't about Americans does it also, but rather providing counter argument to op's that it is "unthinkable" to think it would happen in the US or Western Europe. I also fail to see how Chinese companies has anything related to my argument. Just because Chinese companies were involved doesn't weaken it. You are seeing things through tinted shades before you even have the chance to analyze my argument. You are framing the argument as China vs US. I am pointing out the flaw in op's argument. See the difference ;). Your reply was rude.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

seanmcdirmid 9y ago

Ya, for the big one, Baidu is the ultimate search engine for porn and health care scams, where they used to derive most of their revenue. Compared to Chinese Bing which is pretty clean with pretty effective porn filters (but also makes almost no money). Payments via AliPay and WePay were technically illegal before they were legalized post facto after they became popular. A western company could have never gone near that. All the western companies pay income tax on private health insurance benefits, while all the Chinese companies don't, because the law is unclear.

hellbanner 9y ago
I'm familiar with users searching for porn but not health care scams. Are you saying that Baidu was directing traffic to health care scams willingly? Interesting remark on AliPay & WePay. I wonder what kind of agreements Chinese gov made with those companies after the fact. Here's as good as any point to remember that a warrant canary disappeared from Apple's privacy text about a year ago. Before it was about "we will protect user's privacy".. then there was a big "privacy" announcement that had text about following the law etc. IMHO gov got to them and it's understandable - companies exist in frameworks set by governments. It's in Apple's best interest to comply with them. To suggest otherwise is a political stance, not an economic one.
- seanmcdirmid 9y ago
  Ya, Baidu got caught last year and got a slap on the wrist. Oddly enough, they were in it with a military hospital for that case, which should raise a lot of other eye brows. China doesn't have rule of law, so everything is illegal but nothing is, if you can navigate that contradiction, then you just have to make sure your context isn't bad enough to be cracked down on. The same was true with Didi and anti-black cab laws (but Uber operates in the gray margins of those laws all the time, so there was no point in mentioning that). China doesn't really care about your idealism. If you go against the government's interests, they will beat you down. This is one thing the Chinese companies get really well and allow them to play fast and lose with the law as long as they adhere to that one principal.
  - dis-sys 9y ago
    how about stop selling your single sided story? Baidu's involvement in those healthcare scams got its reputation totally trashed, which in turn failed numerous Baidu products. As a direct consequence, Baidu is now considered a tier-2 Internet company with almost weekly news reports talking about company XYZ is replacing Baidu. it is also highly laughable for your private health insurance joke. there is _no_ Chinese law requiring any company to provide _private_ health insurance to anyone. Public healthcare levy is required by the law, that is all.
madeofpalk 9y ago
> Payments via AliPay and WePay were technically illegal before they were legalized post facto after they became popular. A western company could have never gone near that. Huh. Sounds like a certain transportation company...
- seanmcdirmid 9y ago
  See below. I didn't bother talking about Didi because of Uber.

adventured 9y ago

Jack Ma stealing tens of billions of dollars from Softbank and Yahoo by giving himself a very large stake in Ant Financial (completely unsupported by his ownership % in Alibaba), divesting it out of Alibaba without proper compensation. Something like that is nearly unthinkable in the US or Western Europe. It would be equivalent to Jeff Bezos spinning off AWS and giving himself 2/3 ownership of it, without approval from AMZN shareholders.

thr1234 9y ago
You aren't making a fair comparison here. You will never be able to make a 1-1 comparisons between individuals in two countries. Jeff Bezos and Jack Ma are different people and live in different countries; their actions are based on their environment. The heart of your argument is that a corporation is executing a transaction that could possible be illegal elsewhere: the US or Western Europe is better because this would not be possible here. If that is your argument, I can think of two examples off the top of my head: 1. Goldman Sachs executive in 1MDB scandal 2. Banks offloading their mortgage-back securities positions by selling the directly opposite positions to their clients Corporations executing shady transactions in the US or Western Europe is not as uncommon or "unthinkable" as you might imagine. Your argument stems from a enthocentric point of view and romanticizing one system over another by neglecting all the bad from one side.
- seanmcdirmid 9y ago
  What aboutism Malaysia's 1MDB? It ain't just American companies involved in that mess, plenty of Chinese companies are as well.
  - djdjfjd 9y ago
    Tim Leissner was allegatedly involved in helping transfer money out of the funds for money laundering.
  - thr1234 9y ago
    You are not using the term "What aboutism" right. My argument isn't about Americans does it also, but rather providing counter argument to op's that it is "unthinkable" to think it would happen in the US or Western Europe. I also fail to see how Chinese companies has anything related to my argument. Just because Chinese companies were involved doesn't weaken it. You are seeing things through tinted shades before you even have the chance to analyze my argument. You are framing the argument as China vs US. I am pointing out the flaw in op's argument. See the difference ;). Your reply was rude.