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Wow. This, alongside Jack Ma being "missing", is really curious. https://au.finance.yahoo.com/news/jack-ma-missing-232138645.html https://au.finance.yahoo.com/

Wow. This, alongside Jack Ma being "missing", is really curious. https://au.finance.yahoo.com/news/jack-ma-missing-232138645.html https://au.finance.yahoo.com/news/jack-ma-missing-232138645.... Best, semi-legit source I can find, there's other news postings, but from more tabloid and sources that aren't as sincere as Yahoo Financial News. Which, itself is curious, because CNBC spins it differently: "https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/05/alibaba-founder-jack-ma-is-laying-low-for-the-time-being-not-missing.html https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/05/alibaba-founder-jack-ma-is-l..." Which also falls under the AU-CN struggle, but also curious about how CNBC did not outright say he's missing yet. And technically, both could be correct, imprisoned means missing from society but not exactly "missing" in terms of knowing general wherebouts.

toomuchtodo 6y ago
I am most surprised about how surprised everyone is about these events. Did Jack Ma think he was going to tell the CCP how it is? China is executing an executive for bribery and corruption [1] (a lot of bribery and corruption though!). Perhaps it's simply the Overton Window [2] delta between the US and China. [1] https://www.dw.com/en/china-sentences-ex-banker-to-death-for-corruption-bribery/a-56132658 https://www.dw.com/en/china-sentences-ex-banker-to-death-for... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window (nothing in this comment should be construed as approval, support, etc for the actions of the CCP; this is only intended as an observation)
- xiphias2 6y ago
  Isn't that overton window closing though? Twitter, Facebook and Apple is doing the same thing at the same time with the US president means that US control is getting more centralized over time, which makes sense with the FED's money printing going on. The real question is why this wouldn't be able to happen in the US in 10 years.
- cbozeman 6y ago
  > Did Jack Ma think he was going to tell the CCP how it is? Yes, I did actually. There's every reason to believe that the people installed to run Alibaba / Ant after Jack gets sent off to "re-education camp" will be unable to propel it to further heights. Stagnation is likely as good as it'll get and there's every reason to believe it'll be run into the ground eventually. I see Jack Ma as a sort of Chinese Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos. Shooting yourself in the foot like this seems to be incredibly stupid. American government officials would never consider even hobbling someone like Jeff Bezos... that could be partially out of fear (he could literally just liquidate a portion of his wealth and have someone else elected in your place through campaign contribution), but its more because of the incredible value someone like a Bezos, Musk, or Ma brings to your economy.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - whimsicalism 6y ago
    > There's every reason to believe that the people installed to run Alibaba / Ant after Jack gets sent off to "re-education camp" will be unable to propel it to further heights. We in America are much too obsessed with "one great man" theories of history. I also think we are inclined to underestimate the competency of Chinese governmental figures, which is structured very differently from the West. > that could be partially out of fear (he could literally just liquidate a portion of his wealth and have someone else elected in your place through campaign contribution), but its more because of the incredible value someone like a Bezos, Musk, or Ma brings to your economy. I think it is actually much more about the former than the latter.
    - klmadfejno 6y ago
      > We in America are much too obsessed with "one great man" theories of history. I also think we are inclined to underestimate the competency of Chinese governmental figures, which is structured very differently from the West. Eh... Do I think Bezos is a visionary responsible for all of Amazon's success? No. But culture comes from the top. There's a lot of ways to run a company poorly, especially if it's doing something novel and not just churning out mundane products. The big ones involve bureaucracy and short term profits. If Jeff Bezos died, I'm sure Amazon would be just fine. Tesla maybe not. How mature is Alibaba and Ant?
      - oh_sigh 6y ago
        People thought the same thing about apple when Jobs died but it's up 900% in the 9 years since his death
        klmadfejno 6y ago
        Stock price isn't especially meaningful in the context of the current economic times. I'd say Jobs dying is more or less along the lines of what my worldview expectations are. Apple is fine. But its product offerings tend to be a lot shittier and generic.
- mc32 6y ago
  I think Bribery in China is like the book/film the firm with regard to “having the goods” for blackmail or in this case Control of party officials via corruption. They look bribery the other way the great majority of the time. Everyone does it, but when they want you, they have air tight, iron clad evidence against you and everyone they need to take down.
  - whimsicalism 6y ago
    > They look bribery the other way the great majority of the time. Everyone does it, but when they want you, they have air tight, iron clad evidence against you and everyone they need to take down. Perhaps in the China of the past, but I don't think the low-level bribery you see in places like Nigeria or India is incredibly common in China anymore.
    - toomuchtodo 6y ago
      I imagine CCP support of WeChat and similar digital currency systems is to suss out this activity.
      - whimsicalism 6y ago
        WeChat and Alipay are effectively the only two, and you're almost certainly right. I'm not opposed to that per se either.
- rootsudo 6y ago
  You're right, but also, it's quite compelling news how you think change is coming - yet it doesn't and it falls back under the old ways. I did kind of imagine that, yes, Jack Ma and CCP would be a bit different, but hey, goes to show that CCP still has all the power in China. Makes you wonder about other power vacuums in the world.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- Normille 6y ago
  >Did Jack Ma think he was going to tell the CCP how it is? The thing is that [even allowing for the fact that any news coming out of China that we get in the west is heavily spun to make China look bad] what Jack Ma is alleged to have said seems very mild to me, to be provoking such a massive response. Apparently he said "Chinese banks operate with a pawnshop mentality"[0] --hardly calling for the overthrow of the state, is it? It all seems so over the top that I'm almost convinced that the US has infiltrated the higher echelons of the CCP and is working hard to make China shoot itself in the foot economically. Is that any crazier a notion than the pretty widely held belief that Donald Trump's election was a Russian plot to undermine the US on the world stage? Because, the only results of this over-the-top crackdown by China are likely to be that: * More Chinese entrepreneurs are going to 'get the hell out of Dodge' as soon as they can, rather than risk the same fate. By emigrating from China and setting up elsewhere. * Western businesses are going to be extremely reluctant to enter into any partnerships / large contracts / investments with Chinese companies, for fear of the rug being pulled from under them. * AliBaba & Ant will stagnate under government management It just doesn't make sense to me: * Lots of reports recently predicting China will become the world's no.1 economy before the end of this decade. * China's economy first out of the starting blocks on the road to recovery, after the Coronavirus pandemic * Chinese companies outdoing technologically & commercially their US counterparts [so much so that it led to Trump's spurious sanctions against HuaWei et al]. All of this should have led to the CCP becoming more pro-capitalist in outlook and more supportive of Chinese entrepreneurship from people like Jack Ma. Why suddenly shoot yourself in the foot, when you're finally 'winning'? I just find it really hard to believe that the leadership of the CCP which, if nothing else, has demonstrated itself to be extremely pragmatic over recent decades, is so thin skinned as to risk massive and ongoing damage to their economy over such an innocuous remark. As I say, in my tinfoil-hatted opinion either the CCP has been infiltrated by the US who are attempting to destroy the Chinese economy from within, or there's a lot more to what Jack Ma has actually done than we're being told. [0] https://www.reuters.com/article/ant-group-ipo-suspension-regulators/how-billionaire-jack-ma-fell-to-earth-and-took-ants-mega-ipo-with-him-idUSKBN27L2GX https://www.reuters.com/article/ant-group-ipo-suspension-reg...
jihadjihad 6y ago
Here is a writeup about Ma being missing from a couple of days ago, from NPR: https://www.npr.org/2021/01/08/954046428/alibaba-founder-jack-ma-has-fallen-off-the-radar-here-are-some-clues-why https://www.npr.org/2021/01/08/954046428/alibaba-founder-jac...

toomuchtodo 6y ago

I am most surprised about how surprised everyone is about these events. Did Jack Ma think he was going to tell the CCP how it is? China is executing an executive for bribery and corruption [1] (a lot of bribery and corruption though!). Perhaps it's simply the Overton Window [2] delta between the US and China. [1] https://www.dw.com/en/china-sentences-ex-banker-to-death-for-corruption-bribery/a-56132658 https://www.dw.com/en/china-sentences-ex-banker-to-death-for... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window (nothing in this comment should be construed as approval, support, etc for the actions of the CCP; this is only intended as an observation)

xiphias2 6y ago
Isn't that overton window closing though? Twitter, Facebook and Apple is doing the same thing at the same time with the US president means that US control is getting more centralized over time, which makes sense with the FED's money printing going on. The real question is why this wouldn't be able to happen in the US in 10 years.
cbozeman 6y ago
> Did Jack Ma think he was going to tell the CCP how it is? Yes, I did actually. There's every reason to believe that the people installed to run Alibaba / Ant after Jack gets sent off to "re-education camp" will be unable to propel it to further heights. Stagnation is likely as good as it'll get and there's every reason to believe it'll be run into the ground eventually. I see Jack Ma as a sort of Chinese Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos. Shooting yourself in the foot like this seems to be incredibly stupid. American government officials would never consider even hobbling someone like Jeff Bezos... that could be partially out of fear (he could literally just liquidate a portion of his wealth and have someone else elected in your place through campaign contribution), but its more because of the incredible value someone like a Bezos, Musk, or Ma brings to your economy.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  > There's every reason to believe that the people installed to run Alibaba / Ant after Jack gets sent off to "re-education camp" will be unable to propel it to further heights. We in America are much too obsessed with "one great man" theories of history. I also think we are inclined to underestimate the competency of Chinese governmental figures, which is structured very differently from the West. > that could be partially out of fear (he could literally just liquidate a portion of his wealth and have someone else elected in your place through campaign contribution), but its more because of the incredible value someone like a Bezos, Musk, or Ma brings to your economy. I think it is actually much more about the former than the latter.
  - klmadfejno 6y ago
    > We in America are much too obsessed with "one great man" theories of history. I also think we are inclined to underestimate the competency of Chinese governmental figures, which is structured very differently from the West. Eh... Do I think Bezos is a visionary responsible for all of Amazon's success? No. But culture comes from the top. There's a lot of ways to run a company poorly, especially if it's doing something novel and not just churning out mundane products. The big ones involve bureaucracy and short term profits. If Jeff Bezos died, I'm sure Amazon would be just fine. Tesla maybe not. How mature is Alibaba and Ant?
    - oh_sigh 6y ago
      People thought the same thing about apple when Jobs died but it's up 900% in the 9 years since his death
      - klmadfejno 6y ago
        Stock price isn't especially meaningful in the context of the current economic times. I'd say Jobs dying is more or less along the lines of what my worldview expectations are. Apple is fine. But its product offerings tend to be a lot shittier and generic.
mc32 6y ago
I think Bribery in China is like the book/film the firm with regard to “having the goods” for blackmail or in this case Control of party officials via corruption. They look bribery the other way the great majority of the time. Everyone does it, but when they want you, they have air tight, iron clad evidence against you and everyone they need to take down.
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  > They look bribery the other way the great majority of the time. Everyone does it, but when they want you, they have air tight, iron clad evidence against you and everyone they need to take down. Perhaps in the China of the past, but I don't think the low-level bribery you see in places like Nigeria or India is incredibly common in China anymore.
  - toomuchtodo 6y ago
    I imagine CCP support of WeChat and similar digital currency systems is to suss out this activity.
    - whimsicalism 6y ago
      WeChat and Alipay are effectively the only two, and you're almost certainly right. I'm not opposed to that per se either.
rootsudo 6y ago
You're right, but also, it's quite compelling news how you think change is coming - yet it doesn't and it falls back under the old ways. I did kind of imagine that, yes, Jack Ma and CCP would be a bit different, but hey, goes to show that CCP still has all the power in China. Makes you wonder about other power vacuums in the world.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
Normille 6y ago
>Did Jack Ma think he was going to tell the CCP how it is? The thing is that [even allowing for the fact that any news coming out of China that we get in the west is heavily spun to make China look bad] what Jack Ma is alleged to have said seems very mild to me, to be provoking such a massive response. Apparently he said "Chinese banks operate with a pawnshop mentality"[0] --hardly calling for the overthrow of the state, is it? It all seems so over the top that I'm almost convinced that the US has infiltrated the higher echelons of the CCP and is working hard to make China shoot itself in the foot economically. Is that any crazier a notion than the pretty widely held belief that Donald Trump's election was a Russian plot to undermine the US on the world stage? Because, the only results of this over-the-top crackdown by China are likely to be that: * More Chinese entrepreneurs are going to 'get the hell out of Dodge' as soon as they can, rather than risk the same fate. By emigrating from China and setting up elsewhere. * Western businesses are going to be extremely reluctant to enter into any partnerships / large contracts / investments with Chinese companies, for fear of the rug being pulled from under them. * AliBaba & Ant will stagnate under government management It just doesn't make sense to me: * Lots of reports recently predicting China will become the world's no.1 economy before the end of this decade. * China's economy first out of the starting blocks on the road to recovery, after the Coronavirus pandemic * Chinese companies outdoing technologically & commercially their US counterparts [so much so that it led to Trump's spurious sanctions against HuaWei et al]. All of this should have led to the CCP becoming more pro-capitalist in outlook and more supportive of Chinese entrepreneurship from people like Jack Ma. Why suddenly shoot yourself in the foot, when you're finally 'winning'? I just find it really hard to believe that the leadership of the CCP which, if nothing else, has demonstrated itself to be extremely pragmatic over recent decades, is so thin skinned as to risk massive and ongoing damage to their economy over such an innocuous remark. As I say, in my tinfoil-hatted opinion either the CCP has been infiltrated by the US who are attempting to destroy the Chinese economy from within, or there's a lot more to what Jack Ma has actually done than we're being told. [0] https://www.reuters.com/article/ant-group-ipo-suspension-regulators/how-billionaire-jack-ma-fell-to-earth-and-took-ants-mega-ipo-with-him-idUSKBN27L2GX https://www.reuters.com/article/ant-group-ipo-suspension-reg...

jihadjihad 6y ago

Here is a writeup about Ma being missing from a couple of days ago, from NPR: https://www.npr.org/2021/01/08/954046428/alibaba-founder-jack-ma-has-fallen-off-the-radar-here-are-some-clues-why https://www.npr.org/2021/01/08/954046428/alibaba-founder-jac...