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I've listened to some of these interviews and agree completely with the basic premise. However, I don't think it's correct that China's success is entirely expl

I've listened to some of these interviews and agree completely with the basic premise. However, I don't think it's correct that China's success is entirely explained from simply copying America. Of course copying is responsible for part of their success, but there are clear examples of the reverse. For example, integration of payments into WeChat, which has been duplicated by Facebook and others (but not as successfully as in China). They certainly disruptively innovate by making extremely cheap electric cars that poor Chinese can afford.

istorical 6y ago
The language barrier is really making it difficult to see progress in China even for people interested in a particular space. For example, in just the VR space, if I follow the most popular VR related subreddits and podcasts I often miss important Chinese VR hardware and software. And sometimes the hardware is better than anything available in the US. I only found out about these cutting edge haptic gloves called Dexmo because I happened upon a review of an American product on an expert blog and the review compared them to a Chinese version. https://skarredghost.com/2020/04/07/senseglove-vr-haptics-gloves/ https://skarredghost.com/2020/04/07/senseglove-vr-haptics-gl...
tehabe 6y ago
China did what Germany did in the 19th century and Japan did after World War II but differently. Germany and Japan copied and made own things until they were experts and made better things than the original. China did that differently, they invited western companies through cheap labour and made officially those things, copied it then and became experts and eventually made their own products, which at least as good or better than the originals. It is also helpful, that the Chinese government can just do things w/o any meaningful interference. In the 1960s and 70s, German cities wanted to build huge motorway like road through the city centres, which would have destroyed the cities, many of those project could be prevented from happening. Thiel would have critised those protests as a barrier for progress. Like he does, when he is mentioning zoning laws prevented a high-speed railway in San Francisco.

istorical 6y ago

The language barrier is really making it difficult to see progress in China even for people interested in a particular space. For example, in just the VR space, if I follow the most popular VR related subreddits and podcasts I often miss important Chinese VR hardware and software. And sometimes the hardware is better than anything available in the US. I only found out about these cutting edge haptic gloves called Dexmo because I happened upon a review of an American product on an expert blog and the review compared them to a Chinese version. https://skarredghost.com/2020/04/07/senseglove-vr-haptics-gloves/ https://skarredghost.com/2020/04/07/senseglove-vr-haptics-gl...

tehabe 6y ago

China did what Germany did in the 19th century and Japan did after World War II but differently. Germany and Japan copied and made own things until they were experts and made better things than the original. China did that differently, they invited western companies through cheap labour and made officially those things, copied it then and became experts and eventually made their own products, which at least as good or better than the originals. It is also helpful, that the Chinese government can just do things w/o any meaningful interference. In the 1960s and 70s, German cities wanted to build huge motorway like road through the city centres, which would have destroyed the cities, many of those project could be prevented from happening. Thiel would have critised those protests as a barrier for progress. Like he does, when he is mentioning zoning laws prevented a high-speed railway in San Francisco.