6 ms·

There's a difference, facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China, and Google voluntarily quit so it doesn't have to comply to censorship

There's a difference, facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China, and Google voluntarily quit so it doesn't have to comply to censorship law. Meanwhile Tiktok has a US branch and is complying with laws in the US. China has a restrictive internet where if you want to operate, you have to comply with a certain set of rules that are unsavory to say the least. Facebook, Google decided to not bother instead of complying to those rules, but they very well could have, Bing and Amazon is in China. Tiktok's US branch did not violate any US law and its being prosecuted with administrative action, which is why your equivalence is false - The actual equivalence would be to make laws that enforces ownership for social media companies and make them store their content in location. And enforce those laws, like China did.

baby 6y ago
I don't think you realize how impossible it is to enter the Chinese market... Google wasted a ton of money trying to enter the US market (I recommend watching this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XImsSgdr4fg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XImsSgdr4fg), and Facebook did too. Look at how it went for Uber. If you want to give an example of a US company that is doing much better in China, it's Apple, and the sole reason is that everybody who works for the Chinese government owns an iPhone. BTW I was living in China when Facebook got banned, it was in 2008 when it started becoming popular outside of the US. Nobody saw it coming, and obviously there was no way for Facebook to go back into that market once the CCP decided against that.
- Aperocky 6y ago
  There's probably a way, register facebook.cn and allow censors to censor content, store everything in a data center somewhere in China, people has to use ID to register, etc. At which point it doesn't make much sense to operate in China. This is also precisely why TikTok is not available in mainland China, because it doesn't meet those standards.
  - baby 6y ago
    tiktok is available in mainland China, it's called douyin
- typ 6y ago
  > the sole reason is that everybody who works for the Chinese government owns an iPhone. Not only that, a large portion of iPhones are manufactured in China, which sustains enormous supply chains and jobs there.
- lambdasquirrel 6y ago
  There are plenty of American companies that are doing fine in the China market. The automakers, Starbucks, even Disney does okay. Apple is doing alright, supposedly. Tech companies don't do well because they tend to be staffed by people who 1. rebel against authority and 2. think that the liberal / anarchist parts of Western culture are the best way of doing things. What Uber did pissed off people in San Francisco, so it's small wonder the authorities would come down hard on them in China. The word on the street is that people in China thought Googlers (and American software engineers by extension) were a tad insufferable and arrogant. One ought to be warned, that being arrogant is a surefire way to get people to beat you at any cost. And to be clear, I fit in that category myself. At some point, I got off the high horse as far as China-this, China-that. Why? Partly because it didn't really seem important anymore, and partly because a lot of things that you can criticize China about, the U.S. has done as bad, and I don't like being hypocritical to that degree. You know what politicians like to do when things aren't so great? Point fingers at someone who's "worse." So really, in my view of things, FB and GOOG not succeeding in China would be a small price to pay for actually paying attention to things not right in the U.S.
AlphaSite 6y ago
Aren’t there restrictions that the companies need to be 51% owned by local interests? And issues with IP transfer, etc.
- Aperocky 6y ago
  Precisely, that's what I'm talking about, if you think the US should adopt the same restriction, maybe ask your representative to pass such a law then.
- holografix 6y ago
  Do you think it’s a coincidence Xiaomi keeps producing very good smartphones and other tech?
  - Aperocky 6y ago
    Do you think it's a coincidence that after iPhone 4 all smartphone looks more or less the same?
- croes 6y ago
  These restrictions are gone. China changed their laws.
  - remarkEon 6y ago
    Citation? In all markets, or just in select non-essential ones?
    - croes 6y ago
      https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=9aca6c56-fe41-4e93-9c62-944994f1d892 https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=9aca6c56-fe41...
  - kube-system 6y ago
    They have decreased in scope but they are not gone.
holografix 6y ago
I get what you’re saying, it’s a very smart point of view. China has enacted absurd, oppressive laws which it interprets conveniently in favour of the party when it wants. However it wants to enjoy all the freedoms awarded to the rest of the western democratic and capitalist world, defended by their laws. It’s the old communist adage: Socialism for other, private property for me.
- Aperocky 6y ago
  > interprets conveniently in favour of the party when it wants. When the laws are written in such away you don't have to interpret it. Western companies that follows those laws like locals are fine - e.g. Apple. Apple Store/Cloud in China store all their info in Guizhou and presumably with agreed access for government on demand, just like all local businesses.
mikemotherwell 6y ago
I wonder under what circumstances this ban is acceptable. I'm no expert on international law, but even if the charges are Trumped up (pun intended), espionage / security concerns are very likely on the list.
tanilama 6y ago
> facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China This is not true: https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/24/17607992/facebook-allowed-china-censorship-ban-hangzhou-zuckerberg https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/24/17607992/facebook-allowed... Facebook attempts to open an office in China, but gets shutdown one day later. Ofc, this is China so nobody knows the reason why. Second, Chinese internet regulation is as opaque as its other operations, compliance with law is on the surface, they are tens of special government approved certificates to obtain if you want to actually operate there, like this one: https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E7%BD%91%E7%BB%9C%E8%A7%86%E5%90%AC%E8%AE%B8%E5%8F%AF%E8%AF%81 https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E7%BD%91%E7%BB%9C%E8%A7%86%E5%..., which is approved case by case and notoriously hard to get, basically make it impossible for foreign company to operate in China. So no, China's internet doesn't have only have a set of rules that once you comply you get a pass. It is mired in layers of regulations and bureaucracy that without guanxi, you can't crack it no matter how willing you are.
- Aperocky 6y ago
  > Ofc, this is China so nobody knows the reason why. I'd assume facebook know? Also your link does not seem related quote(Facebook opens a subsidiary in China, a breakthrough for the banned social media platform)
  - tanilama 6y ago
    There is the follow-up you requested: https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/25/17612162/facebook-technology-subsidiary-blocked-china-censor https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/25/17612162/facebook-technol... > The sudden rejection stems from a disagreement between Chinese authorities, the source told the Times. Local officials in Zhejiang, an eastern province that houses Alibaba’s headquarters, gave Facebook the initial permission, but the Cyberspace Administration of China, Beijing’s internet regulator, had not.
colordrops 6y ago
You are completely mistaken if you think simply complying with local laws will allow you to succeed in the Chinese market.
- Aperocky 6y ago
  I don't think that, nor do I think that is true anywhere on this planet.
  - eddieplan9 6y ago
    Parent’s keyword is “allow to succeed”, not “succeed”. I always warn people about false equivalence when it comes to China. The laws and rules in China are not the same concept as laws and rules in the West. There are implicit rules or 潜规则. The rules and laws are only there to make things look legit. There are very few places on earth where you can be forced into citizenship so you can be deprived of consular access and be dealt with using the convenience of Chinese rules and tools[1]. [1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-sentences-bookseller-gui-minhai-to-10-years-in-jail-11582614876 https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-sentences-bookseller-gui-...
    - strogonoff 6y ago
      This is insane. China abducts a Swedish citizen; recognizes and prosecutes him as citizen of China, denying Sweden access to the trial (note that China does not even have double citizenship); when concerns are raised over violations of Vienna treaty on consular relations—and hey, by this logic China can abduct anyone anywhere—China declares that (I am not joking) consular relations are on hold until COVID-19 is resolved. How on Earth is anyone OK with this?
      - aliswe 6y ago
        It's not like he is wholly unrelated to China, though. This is kinda similar to Davit Isak and probably numerous other people
kube-system 6y ago
Yeah, the “certain set of rules” that many western companies have followed are sometimes no different in result than what is being asked of ByteDance. It is fair to ask whether the US should be engaging in these tactics (I don’t think we should), but the suggestion that the US is doing something on a level that China wouldn’t is just false.
Jugurtha 6y ago
>There's a difference, facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China, and Google voluntarily quit so it doesn't have to comply to censorship law. Meanwhile Tiktok has a US branch and is complying with laws in the US. >China has a restrictive internet where if you want to operate, you have to comply with a certain set of rules that are unsavory to say the least. Facebook, Google decided to not bother instead of complying to those rules, but they very well could have, Bing and Amazon is in China. Is that an accurate portrayal of events? Google did attempt to get into China more than a decade ago, and more recently with Dragonfly[0] which was shut down after word got out. As for Facebook, one cannot look at all the relationship strengthening between its CEO and Xi Jinping and not think there is nothing behind that. The point is that to say that Facebook and Google voluntarily quit or didn't even bother because of the reasons cited in the comment surely could be improved for accuracy. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonfly_(search_engine) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonfly_(search_engine)
dicomdan 6y ago
This is pure disinformation.
ekianjo 6y ago
> Tiktok's US branch did not violate any US law and its being prosecuted with administrative action Seriously? That was already in 2019: https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/tiktok-pay-5-7-million-over-alleged-violation-child-privacy-n977186 https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/tiktok-pay-5-7-millio...
- mikechen233 6y ago
  This case it's fine. There is a due process. Hard evidence is brought forth, court ruled in according to law. Where is the due process for handing the sentencing that prevents tiktok from transaction with US persons in the first EO. White House also gets to define transaction as whatever they want. Salary to US employees? App store listing? Ad transaction? White House can play tiktok however they please.
m0zg 6y ago
> facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China It actually did attempt to do that, pretty hard. Zuck even learned quite a bit of Mandarin Chinese and spoke in it in China to students during a publicity tour. He's not stupid, he knows there's a lot of money in China. But Xi is also not stupid, so he's not going to let a US media company to have unimpeded access to almost all of his subjects, which it could then algorithmically brainwash. So it was not to be. Google didn't "voluntarily quit" either. It quit because it discovered it's being spied on and had its IP stolen - both of those things are a fact of life for any significant Western company operating in China. So yea, forgive me for not shedding a tear for TikTok.

baby 6y ago

I don't think you realize how impossible it is to enter the Chinese market... Google wasted a ton of money trying to enter the US market (I recommend watching this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XImsSgdr4fg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XImsSgdr4fg), and Facebook did too. Look at how it went for Uber. If you want to give an example of a US company that is doing much better in China, it's Apple, and the sole reason is that everybody who works for the Chinese government owns an iPhone. BTW I was living in China when Facebook got banned, it was in 2008 when it started becoming popular outside of the US. Nobody saw it coming, and obviously there was no way for Facebook to go back into that market once the CCP decided against that.

Aperocky 6y ago
There's probably a way, register facebook.cn and allow censors to censor content, store everything in a data center somewhere in China, people has to use ID to register, etc. At which point it doesn't make much sense to operate in China. This is also precisely why TikTok is not available in mainland China, because it doesn't meet those standards.
- baby 6y ago
  tiktok is available in mainland China, it's called douyin
typ 6y ago
> the sole reason is that everybody who works for the Chinese government owns an iPhone. Not only that, a large portion of iPhones are manufactured in China, which sustains enormous supply chains and jobs there.
lambdasquirrel 6y ago
There are plenty of American companies that are doing fine in the China market. The automakers, Starbucks, even Disney does okay. Apple is doing alright, supposedly. Tech companies don't do well because they tend to be staffed by people who 1. rebel against authority and 2. think that the liberal / anarchist parts of Western culture are the best way of doing things. What Uber did pissed off people in San Francisco, so it's small wonder the authorities would come down hard on them in China. The word on the street is that people in China thought Googlers (and American software engineers by extension) were a tad insufferable and arrogant. One ought to be warned, that being arrogant is a surefire way to get people to beat you at any cost. And to be clear, I fit in that category myself. At some point, I got off the high horse as far as China-this, China-that. Why? Partly because it didn't really seem important anymore, and partly because a lot of things that you can criticize China about, the U.S. has done as bad, and I don't like being hypocritical to that degree. You know what politicians like to do when things aren't so great? Point fingers at someone who's "worse." So really, in my view of things, FB and GOOG not succeeding in China would be a small price to pay for actually paying attention to things not right in the U.S.

AlphaSite 6y ago

Aren’t there restrictions that the companies need to be 51% owned by local interests? And issues with IP transfer, etc.

Aperocky 6y ago
Precisely, that's what I'm talking about, if you think the US should adopt the same restriction, maybe ask your representative to pass such a law then.
holografix 6y ago
Do you think it’s a coincidence Xiaomi keeps producing very good smartphones and other tech?
- Aperocky 6y ago
  Do you think it's a coincidence that after iPhone 4 all smartphone looks more or less the same?
croes 6y ago
These restrictions are gone. China changed their laws.
- remarkEon 6y ago
  Citation? In all markets, or just in select non-essential ones?
  - croes 6y ago
    https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=9aca6c56-fe41-4e93-9c62-944994f1d892 https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=9aca6c56-fe41...
- kube-system 6y ago
  They have decreased in scope but they are not gone.

holografix 6y ago

I get what you’re saying, it’s a very smart point of view. China has enacted absurd, oppressive laws which it interprets conveniently in favour of the party when it wants. However it wants to enjoy all the freedoms awarded to the rest of the western democratic and capitalist world, defended by their laws. It’s the old communist adage: Socialism for other, private property for me.

Aperocky 6y ago
> interprets conveniently in favour of the party when it wants. When the laws are written in such away you don't have to interpret it. Western companies that follows those laws like locals are fine - e.g. Apple. Apple Store/Cloud in China store all their info in Guizhou and presumably with agreed access for government on demand, just like all local businesses.

mikemotherwell 6y ago

I wonder under what circumstances this ban is acceptable. I'm no expert on international law, but even if the charges are Trumped up (pun intended), espionage / security concerns are very likely on the list.

tanilama 6y ago

> facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China This is not true: https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/24/17607992/facebook-allowed-china-censorship-ban-hangzhou-zuckerberg https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/24/17607992/facebook-allowed... Facebook attempts to open an office in China, but gets shutdown one day later. Ofc, this is China so nobody knows the reason why. Second, Chinese internet regulation is as opaque as its other operations, compliance with law is on the surface, they are tens of special government approved certificates to obtain if you want to actually operate there, like this one: https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E7%BD%91%E7%BB%9C%E8%A7%86%E5%90%AC%E8%AE%B8%E5%8F%AF%E8%AF%81 https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E7%BD%91%E7%BB%9C%E8%A7%86%E5%..., which is approved case by case and notoriously hard to get, basically make it impossible for foreign company to operate in China. So no, China's internet doesn't have only have a set of rules that once you comply you get a pass. It is mired in layers of regulations and bureaucracy that without guanxi, you can't crack it no matter how willing you are.

Aperocky 6y ago
> Ofc, this is China so nobody knows the reason why. I'd assume facebook know? Also your link does not seem related quote(Facebook opens a subsidiary in China, a breakthrough for the banned social media platform)
- tanilama 6y ago
  There is the follow-up you requested: https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/25/17612162/facebook-technology-subsidiary-blocked-china-censor https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/25/17612162/facebook-technol... > The sudden rejection stems from a disagreement between Chinese authorities, the source told the Times. Local officials in Zhejiang, an eastern province that houses Alibaba’s headquarters, gave Facebook the initial permission, but the Cyberspace Administration of China, Beijing’s internet regulator, had not.

colordrops 6y ago

You are completely mistaken if you think simply complying with local laws will allow you to succeed in the Chinese market.

Aperocky 6y ago
I don't think that, nor do I think that is true anywhere on this planet.
- eddieplan9 6y ago
  Parent’s keyword is “allow to succeed”, not “succeed”. I always warn people about false equivalence when it comes to China. The laws and rules in China are not the same concept as laws and rules in the West. There are implicit rules or 潜规则. The rules and laws are only there to make things look legit. There are very few places on earth where you can be forced into citizenship so you can be deprived of consular access and be dealt with using the convenience of Chinese rules and tools[1]. [1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-sentences-bookseller-gui-minhai-to-10-years-in-jail-11582614876 https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-sentences-bookseller-gui-...
  - strogonoff 6y ago
    This is insane. China abducts a Swedish citizen; recognizes and prosecutes him as citizen of China, denying Sweden access to the trial (note that China does not even have double citizenship); when concerns are raised over violations of Vienna treaty on consular relations—and hey, by this logic China can abduct anyone anywhere—China declares that (I am not joking) consular relations are on hold until COVID-19 is resolved. How on Earth is anyone OK with this?
    - aliswe 6y ago
      It's not like he is wholly unrelated to China, though. This is kinda similar to Davit Isak and probably numerous other people

kube-system 6y ago

Yeah, the “certain set of rules” that many western companies have followed are sometimes no different in result than what is being asked of ByteDance. It is fair to ask whether the US should be engaging in these tactics (I don’t think we should), but the suggestion that the US is doing something on a level that China wouldn’t is just false.

Jugurtha 6y ago

>There's a difference, facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China, and Google voluntarily quit so it doesn't have to comply to censorship law. Meanwhile Tiktok has a US branch and is complying with laws in the US. >China has a restrictive internet where if you want to operate, you have to comply with a certain set of rules that are unsavory to say the least. Facebook, Google decided to not bother instead of complying to those rules, but they very well could have, Bing and Amazon is in China. Is that an accurate portrayal of events? Google did attempt to get into China more than a decade ago, and more recently with Dragonfly[0] which was shut down after word got out. As for Facebook, one cannot look at all the relationship strengthening between its CEO and Xi Jinping and not think there is nothing behind that. The point is that to say that Facebook and Google voluntarily quit or didn't even bother because of the reasons cited in the comment surely could be improved for accuracy. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonfly_(search_engine) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonfly_(search_engine)

dicomdan 6y ago

This is pure disinformation.

ekianjo 6y ago

> Tiktok's US branch did not violate any US law and its being prosecuted with administrative action Seriously? That was already in 2019: https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/tiktok-pay-5-7-million-over-alleged-violation-child-privacy-n977186 https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/tiktok-pay-5-7-millio...

mikechen233 6y ago
This case it's fine. There is a due process. Hard evidence is brought forth, court ruled in according to law. Where is the due process for handing the sentencing that prevents tiktok from transaction with US persons in the first EO. White House also gets to define transaction as whatever they want. Salary to US employees? App store listing? Ad transaction? White House can play tiktok however they please.

m0zg 6y ago

> facebook did not attempt to run its social media business in China It actually did attempt to do that, pretty hard. Zuck even learned quite a bit of Mandarin Chinese and spoke in it in China to students during a publicity tour. He's not stupid, he knows there's a lot of money in China. But Xi is also not stupid, so he's not going to let a US media company to have unimpeded access to almost all of his subjects, which it could then algorithmically brainwash. So it was not to be. Google didn't "voluntarily quit" either. It quit because it discovered it's being spied on and had its IP stolen - both of those things are a fact of life for any significant Western company operating in China. So yea, forgive me for not shedding a tear for TikTok.