4 ms·

I'm not surprised or even judgemental about it - given a choice between respecting foreign-imposed IP law and the prosperity of your own people, who wouldn't ch

by deogeo 7y ago

I'm not surprised or even judgemental about it - given a choice between respecting foreign-imposed IP law and the prosperity of your own people, who wouldn't choose the latter? Especially after such wonderful things as the opium wars. What I am surprised by is how long the US ignored the threat of moving production and knowledge to China, under the dogma of free trade.

TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
When you have a culture where short-term returns trump long-term strategy - never mind political wisdom - it's absolutely predictable that you're going to be blindsided by the realisation that other countries can out-compete with you, and don't just exist to be used and discarded.
NeedMoreTea 7y ago
Neither am I. What does surprise me is that nations and industries keep doing it expecting "this time is different". Despite the regularity across history of first supplying the tools and training - whether shipbuilding, looms, steel making or iPhone assembly and chip fab, then claim they'll never be able to design as well, and can only copy. Sometime later another industry sails inevitably off to some far flung region. Since free trade almost nothing is considered strategic like the Chinese and others once thought tea, rubber, spices or early inventions that were guarded most carefully. Neither seems quite the right balance. :) > opium wars Palmerston's opium war, kicked off by an out-of-control East India Company giving themselves an opium monopoly, and the Tory party loosely falling into step. One of the two wars had parliament winning a vote against the government for entering an illegal war. Difficult to understand the thinking of the era yet at the same time feels strangely familiar. Course the French, US and others joined in, and the US was marketing cheaper Turkish opium. Roosevelt or Hoover had an opium smuggling ancestor, I forget which of the two.
- turtlecloud 7y ago
  I was surprised to read that some WASPs are distantly related to 19th vent opium smuggling. For example the Forbes family made their fortune in opium and now they have a business magazine

by deogeo 7y ago

TheOtherHobbes 7y ago

When you have a culture where short-term returns trump long-term strategy - never mind political wisdom - it's absolutely predictable that you're going to be blindsided by the realisation that other countries can out-compete with you, and don't just exist to be used and discarded.

NeedMoreTea 7y ago

Neither am I. What does surprise me is that nations and industries keep doing it expecting "this time is different". Despite the regularity across history of first supplying the tools and training - whether shipbuilding, looms, steel making or iPhone assembly and chip fab, then claim they'll never be able to design as well, and can only copy. Sometime later another industry sails inevitably off to some far flung region. Since free trade almost nothing is considered strategic like the Chinese and others once thought tea, rubber, spices or early inventions that were guarded most carefully. Neither seems quite the right balance. :) > opium wars Palmerston's opium war, kicked off by an out-of-control East India Company giving themselves an opium monopoly, and the Tory party loosely falling into step. One of the two wars had parliament winning a vote against the government for entering an illegal war. Difficult to understand the thinking of the era yet at the same time feels strangely familiar. Course the French, US and others joined in, and the US was marketing cheaper Turkish opium. Roosevelt or Hoover had an opium smuggling ancestor, I forget which of the two.

turtlecloud 7y ago
I was surprised to read that some WASPs are distantly related to 19th vent opium smuggling. For example the Forbes family made their fortune in opium and now they have a business magazine