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One crucial difference between China and other western countries is that, China government won't try to break WeChat up in the name of antitrust or anti monopol

One crucial difference between China and other western countries is that, China government won't try to break WeChat up in the name of antitrust or anti monopoly.

modo_mario 6y ago
As if this happens in the West nowadays?
- malandrew 6y ago
  It’s happened numerous times. Maybe not as much as you personally think it should. Even then however, the mere threat that it could happen is a much bigger deterrence to abusive behavior than what you have in China.
Cthulhu_ 6y ago
Is that because China's government has direct access to the data in WeChat? I mean the US government has that as well with Google and FB and co (see Snowden revelations), but apparently not as much as they'd like.
- mensetmanusman 6y ago
  Yes, and they can implement their digital social-credit based punishments through WeChat, e.g. controlling what the user can spend currency on through the app, what types of travel they can use, etc. Political enemies will have a rough life there.
  - 6510 6y ago
    We similarly can't abandon google because they "accidentally" banned someone without any explanation. (a false positives) Trial by robot can be even more unreasonable than a dictator.
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  That can't really be a motivation for not breaking monopolies though, because as you point out, both China and the US have access to everyone's data. So it is reasonable to assume that China and US would have access to everyone's data if a different company was the monopoly or even if multiple different companies provided the access. From the perspective of the government, they don't care. They just require you to tell them what they want to know whenever they ask. Controlling the population via control of the population's digital activities, which often translates to control of the population's physical activities. China is just more ruthless on the level of the market in that if you win in China, it really is winner take all. There are no controls on the market to stop monopolies forming.
- JoeSmithson 6y ago
  What part of the Snowden revelations showed that the US government has "direct access" to Facebook and Google data?
  - _iyig 6y ago
    >The NSA's top-secret black budget, obtained from Snowden by The Washington Post, exposed the successes and failures of the 16 spy agencies comprising the U.S. intelligence community, and revealed that the NSA was paying U.S. private tech companies for clandestine access to their communications networks. >The NSA was shown to be secretly accessing Yahoo and Google data centers to collect information from hundreds of millions of account holders worldwide by tapping undersea cables using the MUSCULAR surveillance program. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#Revelations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#Revelations
    - JoeSmithson 6y ago
      These two quotes refer to different things. The first refers to PRISM, which gives the US a privileged position as it involves companies bound by US law, however, all participating companies denied it involved direct access to their data. See the quotes in the wiki article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#Initial_public_statements https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#I... From the slides; it appears it works by the agencies (via the FBI DITU) sending the cooperating company a selector (e.g. email address), and then those companies sending back the actual material (e.g. emails); https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Prism-slide-7.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Prism-slide-6.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/... From transparency reports it is clear that the receiving company can see how many selectors are coming in and how much data is being "exfiltrated" under this scheme (and it is roughly 10,000 targets). --- The second quote refers to a program of passive surveillance which - while probably the most underhand thing revealed by Snowden - did not rely on any privileged position of the US government, and could have been pulled off by an adversarial nation as well. It didn't rely on the cooperation of those companies, and in fact they were outraged by it and implemented encryption in an attempt to thwart it.
- rorykoehler 6y ago
  There is no wechat. Everything is a subsidiary of the CCP
xster 6y ago
I think you're not quite hitting it on the point. WeChat itself doesn't offer or bundle any of the mini-apps or services it hosts as a platform (and then behaves anti-competitively against its competitor mini-apps). i.e. you can order meals, order taxis, read blogs in WeChat but doesn't prioritize an "Internet Explorer" taxi company above all other results. Sure the Tencent company invests in a whole bunch of other companies like Comcast owning The Verge etc, but that has nothing to do with super apps.

One crucial difference between China and other western countries is that, China government won't try to break WeChat up in the name of antitrust or anti monopoly.

modo_mario 6y ago

As if this happens in the West nowadays?

malandrew 6y ago
It’s happened numerous times. Maybe not as much as you personally think it should. Even then however, the mere threat that it could happen is a much bigger deterrence to abusive behavior than what you have in China.

Cthulhu_ 6y ago

Is that because China's government has direct access to the data in WeChat? I mean the US government has that as well with Google and FB and co (see Snowden revelations), but apparently not as much as they'd like.

mensetmanusman 6y ago
Yes, and they can implement their digital social-credit based punishments through WeChat, e.g. controlling what the user can spend currency on through the app, what types of travel they can use, etc. Political enemies will have a rough life there.
- 6510 6y ago
  We similarly can't abandon google because they "accidentally" banned someone without any explanation. (a false positives) Trial by robot can be even more unreasonable than a dictator.
bilbo0s 6y ago
That can't really be a motivation for not breaking monopolies though, because as you point out, both China and the US have access to everyone's data. So it is reasonable to assume that China and US would have access to everyone's data if a different company was the monopoly or even if multiple different companies provided the access. From the perspective of the government, they don't care. They just require you to tell them what they want to know whenever they ask. Controlling the population via control of the population's digital activities, which often translates to control of the population's physical activities. China is just more ruthless on the level of the market in that if you win in China, it really is winner take all. There are no controls on the market to stop monopolies forming.
JoeSmithson 6y ago
What part of the Snowden revelations showed that the US government has "direct access" to Facebook and Google data?
- _iyig 6y ago
  >The NSA's top-secret black budget, obtained from Snowden by The Washington Post, exposed the successes and failures of the 16 spy agencies comprising the U.S. intelligence community, and revealed that the NSA was paying U.S. private tech companies for clandestine access to their communications networks. >The NSA was shown to be secretly accessing Yahoo and Google data centers to collect information from hundreds of millions of account holders worldwide by tapping undersea cables using the MUSCULAR surveillance program. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#Revelations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#Revelations
  - JoeSmithson 6y ago
    These two quotes refer to different things. The first refers to PRISM, which gives the US a privileged position as it involves companies bound by US law, however, all participating companies denied it involved direct access to their data. See the quotes in the wiki article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#Initial_public_statements https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#I... From the slides; it appears it works by the agencies (via the FBI DITU) sending the cooperating company a selector (e.g. email address), and then those companies sending back the actual material (e.g. emails); https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Prism-slide-7.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Prism-slide-6.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/... From transparency reports it is clear that the receiving company can see how many selectors are coming in and how much data is being "exfiltrated" under this scheme (and it is roughly 10,000 targets). --- The second quote refers to a program of passive surveillance which - while probably the most underhand thing revealed by Snowden - did not rely on any privileged position of the US government, and could have been pulled off by an adversarial nation as well. It didn't rely on the cooperation of those companies, and in fact they were outraged by it and implemented encryption in an attempt to thwart it.
rorykoehler 6y ago
There is no wechat. Everything is a subsidiary of the CCP

xster 6y ago

I think you're not quite hitting it on the point. WeChat itself doesn't offer or bundle any of the mini-apps or services it hosts as a platform (and then behaves anti-competitively against its competitor mini-apps). i.e. you can order meals, order taxis, read blogs in WeChat but doesn't prioritize an "Internet Explorer" taxi company above all other results. Sure the Tencent company invests in a whole bunch of other companies like Comcast owning The Verge etc, but that has nothing to do with super apps.