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China has been kidnapping people from Hong Kong for some time now (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causeway_Bay_Books_disappearances https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

China has been kidnapping people from Hong Kong for some time now (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causeway_Bay_Books_disappearances https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causeway_Bay_Books_disappearan...) so I'm kind of surprised we're even having this debate. It's already too late to fix this perception for me, HK is dead as an autonomous, law-oriented region for my requirements. I pulled production servers out of HK in 2015. Singapore is awesome and close enough that it fills the role that HK previously did before China started ruining it, and it's where I now run my Asia CDN edge. I'd rather run them in HK and get close hookups to China, but what can I tell you, I don't want dumbshit kommissars rummaging through my servers because someone put up a web site about how they murdered innocent people in Tiananmen square and are still trying to pretend it didn't happen.

majia 7y ago
At least in HK you can still protest. In Singapore you’d be put into jail for public disturbance.
- digianarchist 7y ago
  Singapore is still a democracy albeit a deeply flawed one.
  - chvid 7y ago
    If I was a professional cyberpunk I would still go for Hong Kong over Singapore.
    - chvid 7y ago
      And PS: Singapore is the big inspiration for modern day China.
      - justicezyx 7y ago
        This is definitely overblown. There is official training program for government officials from China to Singapore. Probably inspired China's confident rejection of western government model and insist on strict top-down control. But China's inspiration is from USA. Everything, literally, everything is set to use USA as the inspirational counterpart. I mean, literally, everything. Name anything you can think of, I can tell a story how the daily life has the USA reference or influence.
        cryptonector 7y ago
        Examples?
        i_am_proteus 7y ago
        I choose to name: lack of de facto individual rights and coincident lack of independent judiciary.
DeonPenny 7y ago
singapore seems like where people are going
radicaldreamer 7y ago
Singapore is more of an autocracy than Hong Kong... at least when it comes to freedom of expression, freedom of assembly etc.
- arcticfox 7y ago
  Singapore, not being tied at the hip to a superpower w/ enormous and diverse geopolitical interests, is less likely to use that iron fist unfairly to the detriment of foreign commerce.
  - baybal2 7y ago
    > Singapore, not being tied at the hip to a superpower w/ enormous and diverse geopolitical interests I lived in Singapore for 2.5 years as an exchange student. Singapore almost made me to believe it being the "Chinese Dream" come true. I was fortunate to meet two former TSMC engineers closing on their mid fifties who pretty much took patronage of me back then and corrected my attitudes. I thank them for pulling out that "Singapore dream" porridge out of my brain. I was of very high opinion of LKY as a leader, but later I realised that he was a very cheap man, just with a lot of charisma and verbal skills he got from British education. First, he was the most ardent anti-colonialist, but the moment Malaysia got independence, he was first to cling to "mama Britania" He was oratorising on inter-ethnic unity through early independence years, but was first to jump the moment talks of separation started He was an ardent democrat in his talks, but used red scare to purge all credible opponents, including ones from his own camp He claimed to firmly be on side of capitalism, but spent 30 years running Sing as a borderline statist/socialist state (the notion of Sing as a freewheeling capital hub is relatively new thing, and would've been completely contrary to country's self image in Seventies) He said, on the record, many times, promising to keep his family out of power, but you see yourself how it went. He promised to go when it will be the time for it, yet he spent his last decade in power in semi-demented state, and ill health. And finally, despite him almost screaming all those 50 years of Singapore being a neutral country, the story of him doing "special relationship" ("selling out", in plain language) with the USA and American business is what every Sing citizen knows too well I bet, would US government get interest in your servers, they would not need even to go through formal diplomatic channels, a single call to Istana would do that.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
bane 7y ago
Out of curiosity, what about Taiwan?
- JBReefer 7y ago
  How much longer will Taiwan choose to be an independent country? They seem to be getting pretty cozy with the mainland.
natal60 7y ago
Unfortunately the core problem with Singapore is it doesn't have the same access to China.

majia 7y ago

At least in HK you can still protest. In Singapore you’d be put into jail for public disturbance.

digianarchist 7y ago
Singapore is still a democracy albeit a deeply flawed one.
- chvid 7y ago
  If I was a professional cyberpunk I would still go for Hong Kong over Singapore.
  - chvid 7y ago
    And PS: Singapore is the big inspiration for modern day China.
    - justicezyx 7y ago
      This is definitely overblown. There is official training program for government officials from China to Singapore. Probably inspired China's confident rejection of western government model and insist on strict top-down control. But China's inspiration is from USA. Everything, literally, everything is set to use USA as the inspirational counterpart. I mean, literally, everything. Name anything you can think of, I can tell a story how the daily life has the USA reference or influence.
      - cryptonector 7y ago
        Examples?
      - i_am_proteus 7y ago
        I choose to name: lack of de facto individual rights and coincident lack of independent judiciary.

DeonPenny 7y ago

singapore seems like where people are going

radicaldreamer 7y ago

Singapore is more of an autocracy than Hong Kong... at least when it comes to freedom of expression, freedom of assembly etc.

arcticfox 7y ago
Singapore, not being tied at the hip to a superpower w/ enormous and diverse geopolitical interests, is less likely to use that iron fist unfairly to the detriment of foreign commerce.
- baybal2 7y ago
  > Singapore, not being tied at the hip to a superpower w/ enormous and diverse geopolitical interests I lived in Singapore for 2.5 years as an exchange student. Singapore almost made me to believe it being the "Chinese Dream" come true. I was fortunate to meet two former TSMC engineers closing on their mid fifties who pretty much took patronage of me back then and corrected my attitudes. I thank them for pulling out that "Singapore dream" porridge out of my brain. I was of very high opinion of LKY as a leader, but later I realised that he was a very cheap man, just with a lot of charisma and verbal skills he got from British education. First, he was the most ardent anti-colonialist, but the moment Malaysia got independence, he was first to cling to "mama Britania" He was oratorising on inter-ethnic unity through early independence years, but was first to jump the moment talks of separation started He was an ardent democrat in his talks, but used red scare to purge all credible opponents, including ones from his own camp He claimed to firmly be on side of capitalism, but spent 30 years running Sing as a borderline statist/socialist state (the notion of Sing as a freewheeling capital hub is relatively new thing, and would've been completely contrary to country's self image in Seventies) He said, on the record, many times, promising to keep his family out of power, but you see yourself how it went. He promised to go when it will be the time for it, yet he spent his last decade in power in semi-demented state, and ill health. And finally, despite him almost screaming all those 50 years of Singapore being a neutral country, the story of him doing "special relationship" ("selling out", in plain language) with the USA and American business is what every Sing citizen knows too well I bet, would US government get interest in your servers, they would not need even to go through formal diplomatic channels, a single call to Istana would do that.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

bane 7y ago

Out of curiosity, what about Taiwan?

JBReefer 7y ago
How much longer will Taiwan choose to be an independent country? They seem to be getting pretty cozy with the mainland.

natal60 7y ago

Unfortunately the core problem with Singapore is it doesn't have the same access to China.