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The irony of this comment is that this intellectual property theft is what America did in the 1700-1800s to get ahead. And America eventually eclipsed the Brit

The irony of this comment is that this intellectual property theft is what America did in the 1700-1800s to get ahead. And America eventually eclipsed the British that they were stealing from, so don't expect China to be "punished" too much.

bigfudge 7y ago
And the Japanese after in the 19th C
oh_sigh 7y ago
Maybe there's a difference from wholesale copying of blueprints, design docs, and millions of lines of software, and someone remembering how things work and going somewhere else.
- mattmanser 7y ago
  No, read about it if you want. Yours really is another ironic comment. The British at least tried to stop it by making it illegal to take the machines out of the country The Americans sent the machines to China themselves to save a few bucks on labor.
  - oh_sigh 7y ago
    I have "read about it", and nothing I read has seemed to justify China's wholesale tech stealing extravaganza. Modern export restrictions are akin to making it illegal to take machines out of a country. Even if it was somehow exactly the same thing happening, saying "you did this 200 years ago so I'm going to do the same thing now" isn't any kind of acceptable reasoning. Mauritania can't say that they are cool to have slaves because America had slaves 170 years ago. Or rather, they can say that, it just isn't very convincing.
    - mattmanser 7y ago
      Is it really stealing? It's ideas, it's not a human right. America has MADE it illegal, forced it through with their trade deals. Enforced anti-free trade copyright and ip ideals on everyone else to try and protect their advantage. One rule for them, 'free' trade for everyone else apart from knowledge, of course. One rule that they themselves ignored in their ascendancy, using those same 'illegal' means China uses. It's just history repeating itself, delude yourself however you want that Amrrica holds some moral high ground by holding life improving knowledge to ransom. I'm no China fan, but Inthis defending America is pathetic.
ng12 7y ago
Isn't this exactly why the US should be worried?
chrischen 7y ago
And how everyone developed their own nukes... the moral of the story is that if someone copied your product and can beat you, then your product is not defensible in the first place.
- jvanderbot 7y ago
  The allegation is not copying, the allegation is fraudulent agreements with US companies, and dishonest corporate espionage. Can anyone really develop new technology, bring it to market, have it immediately brought by a competitor with zero R&D investment, and expect to compete? Is there something that is supposed to be magical about US technology that this scenario does not apply?
  - chrischen 7y ago
    The articles cites some of the examples as "taking a photo of a disassembled circuit board" and "copying source code." While I agree copying source code is bad, but doing so and maintaining someone else's code is a monumental task.
    - jvanderbot 7y ago
      I think design, prototyping, commercialization, and iterations are a bigger task than maintaining an active product line. It's not 100% of the work when you can simply copy someone's work, but it might be 80%
- ISL 7y ago
  Everyone except the United States, who figured out how to build them first.
  - pinkfoot 7y ago
    Then use the car industry as an example: the American car manufacturers' internal combustion engines looks identical to those of the the Germans. To quote you: "who figured out how to build them first."
mythrwy 7y ago
The amount of invention and technological achievement developed in and by the US I would guess be an order of magnitude higher (at least, maybe 3) then any amount intellectual property theft from other nations in the 17-1800s. I would not guess this to be true of China nor likely to become true for a very long time at least.
- mattmanser 7y ago
  It's actually vastly accelerated this time around, China are already overtaking America as experts in certain fields. Because the Americans so helpfully moved all their manufacturing to China, they had to teach manufacturing and engineering to their Chinese workers to troubleshoot problems, and are now losing that ability themselves. Turns out when you're designing a product it useful to have practical manufacturing experience, which the Americans have lost.

bigfudge 7y ago

And the Japanese after in the 19th C

oh_sigh 7y ago

Maybe there's a difference from wholesale copying of blueprints, design docs, and millions of lines of software, and someone remembering how things work and going somewhere else.

mattmanser 7y ago
No, read about it if you want. Yours really is another ironic comment. The British at least tried to stop it by making it illegal to take the machines out of the country The Americans sent the machines to China themselves to save a few bucks on labor.
- oh_sigh 7y ago
  I have "read about it", and nothing I read has seemed to justify China's wholesale tech stealing extravaganza. Modern export restrictions are akin to making it illegal to take machines out of a country. Even if it was somehow exactly the same thing happening, saying "you did this 200 years ago so I'm going to do the same thing now" isn't any kind of acceptable reasoning. Mauritania can't say that they are cool to have slaves because America had slaves 170 years ago. Or rather, they can say that, it just isn't very convincing.
  - mattmanser 7y ago
    Is it really stealing? It's ideas, it's not a human right. America has MADE it illegal, forced it through with their trade deals. Enforced anti-free trade copyright and ip ideals on everyone else to try and protect their advantage. One rule for them, 'free' trade for everyone else apart from knowledge, of course. One rule that they themselves ignored in their ascendancy, using those same 'illegal' means China uses. It's just history repeating itself, delude yourself however you want that Amrrica holds some moral high ground by holding life improving knowledge to ransom. I'm no China fan, but Inthis defending America is pathetic.

ng12 7y ago

Isn't this exactly why the US should be worried?

chrischen 7y ago

And how everyone developed their own nukes... the moral of the story is that if someone copied your product and can beat you, then your product is not defensible in the first place.

jvanderbot 7y ago
The allegation is not copying, the allegation is fraudulent agreements with US companies, and dishonest corporate espionage. Can anyone really develop new technology, bring it to market, have it immediately brought by a competitor with zero R&D investment, and expect to compete? Is there something that is supposed to be magical about US technology that this scenario does not apply?
- chrischen 7y ago
  The articles cites some of the examples as "taking a photo of a disassembled circuit board" and "copying source code." While I agree copying source code is bad, but doing so and maintaining someone else's code is a monumental task.
  - jvanderbot 7y ago
    I think design, prototyping, commercialization, and iterations are a bigger task than maintaining an active product line. It's not 100% of the work when you can simply copy someone's work, but it might be 80%
ISL 7y ago
Everyone except the United States, who figured out how to build them first.
- pinkfoot 7y ago
  Then use the car industry as an example: the American car manufacturers' internal combustion engines looks identical to those of the the Germans. To quote you: "who figured out how to build them first."

mythrwy 7y ago

The amount of invention and technological achievement developed in and by the US I would guess be an order of magnitude higher (at least, maybe 3) then any amount intellectual property theft from other nations in the 17-1800s. I would not guess this to be true of China nor likely to become true for a very long time at least.

mattmanser 7y ago
It's actually vastly accelerated this time around, China are already overtaking America as experts in certain fields. Because the Americans so helpfully moved all their manufacturing to China, they had to teach manufacturing and engineering to their Chinese workers to troubleshoot problems, and are now losing that ability themselves. Turns out when you're designing a product it useful to have practical manufacturing experience, which the Americans have lost.