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Hurricane China: How to prepare

47 points by kleiba 6y ago

notriskfree 6y ago
An enjoyable read and being prepared is always good advice. I don't doubt that China has great engineers; I personally use a Huawei phone and Huawei tablet. I believe these are banned in the USA. I do doubt that Huawei have created their own operating system to rival android. Unless git clone constitutes an act of creation; if so I have also created lots of new operating systems. Not saying they couldn't develop an operating system; but the rest of the article did a pretty good job of explaining why they just wouldn't. If someone 'cheats', there is a pretty good chance that they also 'lie'. And enough with the cultural relativism. Some things people do are recognizably bad just at the human or even social animal level. Even dogs get embarrassed by their own behavior, if they are caught out.
- rmah 6y ago
  One of the author's points was that it doesn't matter if Huawei's new OS is a git clone of android. So what? Android itself is, at its roots, a variant (cline?) of Linux, after all. The author seems to believe that Huawei will build on their clone of Android over time and make it their own. The author's other point seems to be that many westerners don't seem to get that it doesn't matter. So what if they didn't "innovate". I'd guess that the author would say that they don't care about innovation for innovations sake. They care about winning in the market. They care about selling product and making money. Finally, about the cheating/lies thing... I think the author explained it rather poorly. Though perhaps he was simplifying to try to get his point across. The real core, IMO, is that what most people in the west think of as cultural differences -- food, clothing, music, etc -- are just a façade. Actual cultural differences are differences in what people of varying cultures think are good and bad, what they view as moral and immoral, ethical and unethical. To accept that other cultures actually exist, you have to accept that they actually accept that something you feel is good, they feel is bad. That something you think is immoral, they believe to be moral. Not everything of course (probably not even most things), there seem to be a lot of shared aspects between cultures. But some things. The author asserts that "stealing" intellectual property is one of these things. But.. don't lots of techies in America spout the whole "information must be free" rhetoric? Or do they mean only when it's someone else's IP? <shrug>
- rfoo 6y ago
  Disclaimer first: I'm a Chinese citizen who were raised up with (lots of) exposure to the so-called Western culture/value, partly because of the Internet and "the free flow of information", so the article is really really interesting to me. - Edit: except for the "Bloomberg big hack" part, I have to point out it died because it is extremely likely to be a fake story, by amending my comment. > I do doubt that Huawei have created their own operating system to rival android. Unless git clone constitutes an act of creation; As someone who had interviewed a few guys working on their so-called "Android compatible layer for HarmonyOS" and "automatic Android app to HarmonyOS migrator" (sounds like a source-to-source transpiler for mapping calls to Android APIs to mostly-same-to-Android-but-with-some-subtle-differences HarmonyOS APIs, nobody would create such a horrible thing if they really simply git clone), I believe they do. I don't know to what extent, though. I think your comment is an interesting example of the "dismissive tone" Steve referred to.
  - emptysongglass 6y ago
    Go read Ars Technica's take on HarmonyOS and then double take on the language Huawei has used to describe HarmonyOS as an original creation. It's absurdist lies all the way down. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/02/harmonyos-hands-on-huaweis-android-killer-is-just-android/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/02/harmonyos-hands-on-h...
    - rfoo 6y ago
      Thanks. Was a fun read. Indeed, Microsoft was lying on how they created WSL1! They must be using git clone-d Linux source code, because from a cursory look the "Bash on Windows" looks exactly same to a bash running on real Linux, I even tried grep, they are all the same! Then they finally cannot cover it up anymore so they released WSL2, publicly stating it is vanilla Linux running in Hyper-V, pretending they are not doing this from the beginning to save face, shame! /s
      - emptysongglass 6y ago
        You're not only being snarky, which is against this site's rules, you're also making a nonsensical comparison: Microsoft isn't beating around the bush implementing a Linux kernel inside Windows, it's right there in the name. Huawei has publicly declared HarmonyOS a wholly original creation, which as we can see from the previously linked article, is a total fabrication.
- neonological 6y ago
  You don’t understand China. They have a saying, “cheat or be cheated” The entire country is a country of scammers where the rules of the game are to cheat as much as possible. Like the article said, literally think of yourself as a member of a gang where killing people gets you “street cred”. Cheating is an aspect of street cred for Chinese people.. if you cheat and get away with it, it’s something to be proud of. The Chinese will ‘lie’ to authorities about cheating, but among friends it’s high fives all around. How do I know this? I’m Chinese. Born in the states but with ties to the east. I don’t know if it’s genetic or if it’s cultural but growing up I never purchased a single game or purchased a single movie or piece of music and I was proud of cheating the system. In fact me and many people in Asia think you’re stupid if you pay money for any form of electronic digital media when all of it can be pirated easily. This is the mentality of basically most of Asia with the exception of Japan and to a lesser extent Korea. I get your mentality though. The rules of US culture is basically fairness. It pervades the mentality of the country but you have to understand different games have different rules. For example in mafia the name of the game is to deceive everyone. Deception is therefore praised and you are proud if you win the game via deception. Just like how a simple game can flip a switch so can culture. China is playing mafia while the US is playing chess.
  - powerapple 6y ago
    The reason you don't purchase games or movie or music is that you are poor. Your behaviour is mostly determined by your financial status. I am a Chinese, and I haven't used pirated software since I started my first job. Of course, some people cheat, I hope they are not proud about it.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - neonological 6y ago
      No I pirate because it makes economic sense and also because I feel no shame in doing so. Neither do the chinese. Having money doesn't prevent people from picking lower prices options. The cultural attitude I talk about dominates most of the culture in china. You walk into shenzhen not only is software pirated but entire phones, products and hardware is pirated and sold publicly. It's completely normal in china. Not to mention many people are proud of their own businesses. Whatever your experience is I feel you're telling it from within some social strata that is largely different from the rest of china and this is only a minority opinion. Like the author I say this in the most non judgmental way possible.
- webmaven 6y ago
  > Not saying they couldn't develop an operating system; but the rest of the article did a pretty good job of explaining why they just wouldn't. I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here. If Google (or rather Danger) could have forked Android instead of creating a new operating system, they would have done that too. In fact, they did, in a sense, as Android uses the Linux kernel, after all. Sure, Google now actually is trying to create a new OS from scratch (Fuchsia), but it remains to be seen if it will be a success in the market (or if it will even ever be deployed in a commercial product). > If someone 'cheats', there is a pretty good chance that they also 'lie'. And enough with the cultural relativism. Some things people do are recognizably bad just at the human or even social animal level. I share your difficulty in wrapping your head around this idea, but a certain amount of cultural relativism is required here. And your own absolutism isn't a absolute as you think. Here is an exercise that may help: Why is cheating at poker considered, well, cheating, but bluffing (including deliberately faking tells, or other subterfuge) is not? If you say "bluffing is part of the game", try to understand that much of what is called 'cheating' is seen as part of the game in their context, and while getting caught cheating is cause for losing face, it isn't cause for feeling guilt. In fact, whoever is doing the catching is supposed to feel embarrassed for pointing it out, not self-righteous. > Even dogs get embarrassed by their own behavior, if they are caught out. Right. While the idea of 'Face' or shame is something that exists in Chinese culture, and is as powerful a force as guilt is in Western cultures, it doesn't work in the same way, and trying to guilt a Chinese person typically just shames them instead, and makes the shamer a target for anger and even revenge. This point perhaps could have been given more space in the essay. Aside: I think that this is part of what drives the 'social credit score' initiative: In a very real sense it is a system for measuring 'face', but there is never a 'shamer' that can be embarrassed or blamed.
simmerup 6y ago
China will find a lot of willing buyers for their internet surveillance and population management tech from autocratic countries. Hopefully the West will make them jump through hoops to sell their stolen IP in free countries though.
cheaprentalyeti 6y ago
The thing that kind of bothers me most is that he hasn't considered how much of his (and silicon valley's and the oligarches he defends) worldview might be the result of disinformation operations in and of themselves. IF China is amoral and doesn't see anything wrong with lying, why wouldn't they have an operation running to get the US to deindustrialize themselves and give up their manufacturing base to overseas countries, mainly China? It's like this guy is shocked, shocked to find out that gambling is going on at Rick's American Cafe.
- staticman2 6y ago
  Also if an intellectual property law is passed to benefit the silicon valley establishment as a result of silicon valley lobbying it is apparently not "cheating". Cheating is when those bad foreigners don't care about those intellectual property laws.
- iforgotpassword 6y ago
  Since his message is mostly that you should prepare for China rising, and that the US should put a huge load of focus on education, I think ultimately it doesn't matter whether the current decline of the country like the rapidly growing number of conspiracy theorists is a highly successful Chinese operation or not; the outcome and call to action is the same, while adding unnecessary speculation that would further derail discussion about the article. Half the comments here on hn are what Steve explicitly asked people to put aside for a moment: Trying to invalidate China's achievements by pointing out how evil they are, or how some news outlet somewhere ran a story on how they're not really lifting people out of poverty etcpp., so you conveniently don't even have to deal with the idea of China being the one running the show one day.
  - cheaprentalyeti 6y ago
    I'm not saying "OMG China is evil..." I'm suggesting that the Silicon Valley Gleichschaltung, of All Heavy Industry Is Evil and we'll just ignore the fact that we haven't banished it from the world, just exported it from the United States to China, all the while pretending to save the world from global warming, has been a huge contributor to the process. "Better Education" isn't going to help if it's just maleducation in things that don't help, and trying to build up the corporations that helped get us in this mess because their worldview can't really handle manufacturing probably won't help either.
konstmonst 6y ago
China didn't eliminate poverty, Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-k_ed7D7Dw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-k_ed7D7Dw China doesn't have a big middle class. Education in China does not produce a lot of creative people. China government can disappear any Billionaire or Actor or any influential person. Such regime will always be less effective, less creative. Solution to the Problem: remove trade advantages for china, add sanctions and wait while it degrades to the state Russia is now. If you cut them from the global markets, China will crumble. China is all about "face", to the determent of everything else and is the reason for a global Corona outbreak. I believe the author has too good opinion on them, they just lie a lot. Sure a lot of the products are assembled in china, but not created. As I look around my desk, I don't see anything beside mobile phone that was engineered in China. As a matter of fact I prefer to buy locally engineered German stuff even if it costs a bit more, because I have a better quality and after sale support than with any Chinese Product. I hate dealing with Chinese Traders after a sale and I started to pay more for European products, even if they cost more. The west and others can relocate supply chains and that would be the end of it.
- iforgotpassword 6y ago
  And here we have the perfect example of the denial the article describes. "Everything you say is not true and China will fail." Way to prepare for the hurricane. :-)
neonological 6y ago
This article speaks many truths that a lot of Americans don’t want to face or admit. It’s a wake up call. Though there is one truth that is inevitable that the author glosses over just like many do when talking about global warming. It’s hurtful but I have to say it. The worst case scenario of China being the dominant global economic super power is the most probable outcome of the future.
ilaksh 6y ago
The thing that scares me about this is the relationship between the US dollar and the US military. I have a feeling a lot of people will say they are not related. Unfortunately, I believe that we are going to find out how related those things are in the next few decades.
- 1996 6y ago
  Do not worry too much, China is getting stronger every year. As for the US dollar, we have a potential replacement that is enjoying global acceptation, while most of the mining is in China.
dzonga 6y ago
china copies a lot of stuff. but what most people don't realize, is after getting good at copying you become good at creating. if you've ever learnt by doing you know this is a hack to be good at something.
- albanread 6y ago
  I agree we all learn by example; and by copying. I remember in the 1970s people used to say that the Japanese could only copy the west; they couldn't create things of their own; their culture or even their different brains prevented them from original creativity. That was obviously just a load of garbage; it was just a stage their economy was going through. I think the article is light on historical context. There are good reasons why catching up with other nations; especially ones that once oppressed you could be regarded as a completely ethical thing to do; by any means necessary; to safeguard your peoples future. No one would be in any way surprised if Huawei had just said "we are forking Android and our fork will diverge over time; eventually becoming our own unique operating system." Understanding why they didn't say that is perhaps the interesting thing.
ceilingcorner 6y ago
I know this guy is Someone Important, but what's with the juvenile writing style? Is it really necessary to cuss every other word? Is this a blog post by an experienced tech commentator or a drunken sailor?
- cassepipe 6y ago
  Well I at least is not hiding the emotion that the matter causes him. What's wrong with druken sailors writing ? Btw I don't see the link between "being important" (debatable : I did not know who the guy was) and cursing ? Are you implying that he is somehow taking advantage of his social position to have the right to curse ? If so, It's a weird statement as I don't see many important people doing that.
  - ceilingcorner 6y ago
    It's simple. I like to read intelligent articles about technology and China. I don't like to read articles that have cussing every other sentence. It's just crass, vulgar, and serves absolutely no purpose. - fuck: found 40 times - shit: found 16 times Completely unnecessary. Get an editor and act like an adult, please, Mr. Yegge.
    - libertine 6y ago
      You completely missed the true simplicity of it: this article is not for you, and that's fine.
- istorical 6y ago
  Your so-called 'juvenile style' is what others would call not being as boring as watching paint dry. If Steve's goal is to write content that will spread and find as many eyes as possible, being entertaining instead of just pretentious and overly reverent seems to me to be a great strategy.
  - ceilingcorner 6y ago
    How is saying fuck and shit every other word entertaining? Idiocracy, here we come.
HDMI_Cable 6y ago
He replaces nuanced arguments based on facts and data with a crass writing style and anecdotes. --- His argument boils down to: China (as if they were some unified entity) likes taking intellectual property and will therefore rule over us. They have done rather well for themselves and are therefore better than the US in every aspect.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago
  Yeah, I didn't find this to be a very compelling argument. China has a ton of internal problems that will come due in the next few decades. I'd actually predict the exact opposite of this post: China will have serious internal turmoil around 2040 or 2045. They are not in a position to overtake the U.S. culturally or creatively. No one in Europe or Africa or India or the Middle East can name more than one or two cultural figures from China. I don't see this changing, because China is a traditional ethnic nation-state, whereas America is built on diversity. American culture is "open" by definition and it's easier for people worldwide to adopt it. Chinese culture, while incredibly rich and worthwhile, is almost universally centered toward China.
  - yumraj 6y ago
    > China has a ton of internal problems that will come due in the next few decades. While the may be true, unfortunately that argument is only leading to complacency on part of the rest of the world. CCP has shown remarkable resiliency so I won’t rule them out.
    - ipsocannibal 6y ago
      Remember when the Soviets were on top of the world in the 1950's, largest military in the world, Sputnik, ICBM and nukes, building a Communist Bloc to match NATO and the United States. Fast forward 40 years and it was all gone. Look at China now, gleaming ghost cities that will require massive infrastructure maintaince cost to maintain all funded with massive amounts of debt, a huge population bubble that will drag down China's productive capacity in the comming decades, a world that is more strongly and vocally resisting Chinese influence everyday. What looks powerful and inevitable now only does so because people tend to miss the whole picture.
p1anecrazy 6y ago
I was extremely put off by the racist rant at the beginning. Based on a multitude of personal experiences, I don’t think that Vietnamese, Spanish or Venesuelans are inherently cheating. Why trust the article if it begins with a doubtful accusation?
- cassepipe 6y ago
  I think you are misperceiving his point : All people that are the at the bottom of society are feeling the game is rigged against us (and it is) and don't embarass themselves with what is perceived as the winners rules. China's little know bloody colonial history should prevent "us" from being surprised that "China" has little care for intellectual property, the same I did not care about downloading music illegally while big labels were filling their pockets. I can relate. I don't know why he took the example of Vietnam but people there have endured forty years of war and extreme poverty so I would not be surprised surprised if there is a con mentality floating around as it is the case in every poor part of the world and in every poor layer of any country. I do agree that the detour by mentality/culture explanation was not really necessary but I think it was part of his "step out of your moral frame" endeavour to make people that think "China is bad/cheating" shut up.
- istorical 6y ago
  Is it racist to say that western cultures treat their elderly people like crap (relative to the cultural values of eastern cultures where seniors are treated with respect and care and not abandoned to uncaring nurses in a shoebox sized room)? Is it racist to say that American culture is cold and uncaring and inhuman when someone dies from a curable condition because they are too poor to afford healthcare (compared to a country with a culture of universal heathcare)? You should perhaps rethink your definition of the word racist, a better accusation would be to say the author mispresents this cultural value or overstates any real cultural difference between western and eastern cultures in terms of the cultural idea of 'fairness vs cheating'. But to call it racist seems a bit like calling all liberals communists or calling all conservatives fascist, no? Painting with too broad a brush. That is to say, it makes sense to ask whether this assertion about these cultures and their ideas around cheating are true, but to disallow any discussion about cultural values and the different ideas of various cultures comes across as a very "the emperor's new clothes' situation" where we aren't allowed to discuss things that are immediately apparent for fear of punishment. You are avoiding addressing any of the real arguments presented by the author by dismissing their entire piece wholesale with a casual accusation and label that tarnishes their reputation. And doing so in a casual way.
bigpumpkin 6y ago
TL:DR "Steve Yegge is ex-Geoworks, ex-Amazon, ex-Google, and ex-Grab, with nearly 30 years of tech industry experience. Nowadays he’s pretty much retired." "If you break up the Western Tech Giants, then they will be replaced with foreign companies that you cannot regulate. " "Elizabeth, please stop talking about breaking them up. "
- mariusor 6y ago
  And let's not forget: > Stop trying to kill your Golden Geese, and start milking them instead!
mig39 6y ago
He mentions the Bloomberg "big hack" story that seems to have never been confirmed or corroborated. What ever happened to that anyway? Did they ever find these supposed chips in servers at Amazon and Apple?
throwaway210222 6y ago
"We lied, we cheated, we steal", M. Pompeo Not so different after all. Those in power just like to chose when its "cricket" and when its a free for all.
specialist 6y ago
To understand how China may continue to develop, study the history of the USA and other hegemonies. The USA also lied, cheated, stole, murdered, etc. Just in my life time, I've read a lot of these alarmists missives. The Japan That Can Say No, the evil USSR, something something Islam, Latino immigration, etc. This too shall pass. What always seems to be missing is recognition that the USA also has agency. It's so weird to think we'll not respond, adapt, accommodate, or whatever. These things are always a dance, action then reaction, move then counter-move. -- That said: One thing that worries me is ethics around medical research. I have the impression that China's currently a free-for-all. Well. In time that will change. Not so long ago, the USA did a lot of horrible shit. Now we have institutional review boards and government oversight. (I'm purposefully not reading about anyone's atrocities. I acknowledge them. But I'm struggling mightily to keep my head in a positive space. If I think too much about the horrors, I just start crying. And that's not helping me or anyone else.) -- Yes, an emergent China presents a lot of challenges. But I'm more worried about scenarios where China that doesn't become a super power. Or worse, if China declines. People start acting stupid and lash out when the narrative flips. Further, I've been thinking having a sole super power has been bad for humanity. I'm hoping that if the USA feels a little heat, we'll pull our thumbs out and resume building towards a better future. Because whatever we've been doing these last 20+ years, it kinda sucks.
analyst74 6y ago
There are so many things the author got wrong that this is more of a creative writing than anything. One of the key thing he got wrong, was that Americans view cheating as bad but Chinese (and rest of the world) do not. 1, our tribal mind naturally groups who we deem as other in groups. so if you identify as American, and see reports that some Chinese groups/individuals steal something, it registers as "Chinese steal"; but if fellow Americans steal, it registers as "Group(like race)/Individual X steals", and the group X is probably not a group you are part of. Also, you hardly hear about people/companies following the law, because those are not news worthy. 2, developing countries tend to be behind not just in economy, but also public consensus and regulation. i.e. ponzi schemes ran rampant during the 80s/90s in China, that's not because Chinese love ponzi schemes more than Americans, but due to Chinese people and regulators not being familiar of those scams. Same is true for IP, copyright, etc, as more Chinese individuals get harmed by those types of theft, the public consensus has been shifting and regulations are catching up. 3, author touched on this, generally speaking, poor and rich people has a higher possibility to cheat, the former due to realization that the system is rigged against them, so taking from the man is justified; the latter, is more of a reverse effect of those who are most skillful at taking from others tend to rise to the top. Combine this with the effect that the law-abiding American middle class have a higher chance of interacting with the immoral (hackers, IP thieves or just ruthless corporations) or poor (refugees or illegal immigrants) foreign entities than the law-abiding foreign middle class citizens. It's quite easy to come to a conclusion that foreigners are less moral than Americans. 4, as an American, author is probably going to be more familiar with how foreigners steal from Americans than vice versa. For example, do you know that Chinese shows are more widely available on Youtube (illegally) than the reverse?
eunos 6y ago
Nitpick about the Surabaya bombing. The perps (a family) isn't really classified as poor. From the Indonesian Lawyers Club episode that I watched they are quite prosperous, have landed home and business. Of course what's behind (debt and so on) we don't really know.

47 points by kleiba 6y ago

An enjoyable read and being prepared is always good advice. I don't doubt that China has great engineers; I personally use a Huawei phone and Huawei tablet. I believe these are banned in the USA. I do doubt that Huawei have created their own operating system to rival android. Unless git clone constitutes an act of creation; if so I have also created lots of new operating systems. Not saying they couldn't develop an operating system; but the rest of the article did a pretty good job of explaining why they just wouldn't. If someone 'cheats', there is a pretty good chance that they also 'lie'. And enough with the cultural relativism. Some things people do are recognizably bad just at the human or even social animal level. Even dogs get embarrassed by their own behavior, if they are caught out.

rmah 6y ago
One of the author's points was that it doesn't matter if Huawei's new OS is a git clone of android. So what? Android itself is, at its roots, a variant (cline?) of Linux, after all. The author seems to believe that Huawei will build on their clone of Android over time and make it their own. The author's other point seems to be that many westerners don't seem to get that it doesn't matter. So what if they didn't "innovate". I'd guess that the author would say that they don't care about innovation for innovations sake. They care about winning in the market. They care about selling product and making money. Finally, about the cheating/lies thing... I think the author explained it rather poorly. Though perhaps he was simplifying to try to get his point across. The real core, IMO, is that what most people in the west think of as cultural differences -- food, clothing, music, etc -- are just a façade. Actual cultural differences are differences in what people of varying cultures think are good and bad, what they view as moral and immoral, ethical and unethical. To accept that other cultures actually exist, you have to accept that they actually accept that something you feel is good, they feel is bad. That something you think is immoral, they believe to be moral. Not everything of course (probably not even most things), there seem to be a lot of shared aspects between cultures. But some things. The author asserts that "stealing" intellectual property is one of these things. But.. don't lots of techies in America spout the whole "information must be free" rhetoric? Or do they mean only when it's someone else's IP? <shrug>
rfoo 6y ago
Disclaimer first: I'm a Chinese citizen who were raised up with (lots of) exposure to the so-called Western culture/value, partly because of the Internet and "the free flow of information", so the article is really really interesting to me. - Edit: except for the "Bloomberg big hack" part, I have to point out it died because it is extremely likely to be a fake story, by amending my comment. > I do doubt that Huawei have created their own operating system to rival android. Unless git clone constitutes an act of creation; As someone who had interviewed a few guys working on their so-called "Android compatible layer for HarmonyOS" and "automatic Android app to HarmonyOS migrator" (sounds like a source-to-source transpiler for mapping calls to Android APIs to mostly-same-to-Android-but-with-some-subtle-differences HarmonyOS APIs, nobody would create such a horrible thing if they really simply git clone), I believe they do. I don't know to what extent, though. I think your comment is an interesting example of the "dismissive tone" Steve referred to.
- emptysongglass 6y ago
  Go read Ars Technica's take on HarmonyOS and then double take on the language Huawei has used to describe HarmonyOS as an original creation. It's absurdist lies all the way down. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/02/harmonyos-hands-on-huaweis-android-killer-is-just-android/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/02/harmonyos-hands-on-h...
  - rfoo 6y ago
    Thanks. Was a fun read. Indeed, Microsoft was lying on how they created WSL1! They must be using git clone-d Linux source code, because from a cursory look the "Bash on Windows" looks exactly same to a bash running on real Linux, I even tried grep, they are all the same! Then they finally cannot cover it up anymore so they released WSL2, publicly stating it is vanilla Linux running in Hyper-V, pretending they are not doing this from the beginning to save face, shame! /s
    - emptysongglass 6y ago
      You're not only being snarky, which is against this site's rules, you're also making a nonsensical comparison: Microsoft isn't beating around the bush implementing a Linux kernel inside Windows, it's right there in the name. Huawei has publicly declared HarmonyOS a wholly original creation, which as we can see from the previously linked article, is a total fabrication.
neonological 6y ago
You don’t understand China. They have a saying, “cheat or be cheated” The entire country is a country of scammers where the rules of the game are to cheat as much as possible. Like the article said, literally think of yourself as a member of a gang where killing people gets you “street cred”. Cheating is an aspect of street cred for Chinese people.. if you cheat and get away with it, it’s something to be proud of. The Chinese will ‘lie’ to authorities about cheating, but among friends it’s high fives all around. How do I know this? I’m Chinese. Born in the states but with ties to the east. I don’t know if it’s genetic or if it’s cultural but growing up I never purchased a single game or purchased a single movie or piece of music and I was proud of cheating the system. In fact me and many people in Asia think you’re stupid if you pay money for any form of electronic digital media when all of it can be pirated easily. This is the mentality of basically most of Asia with the exception of Japan and to a lesser extent Korea. I get your mentality though. The rules of US culture is basically fairness. It pervades the mentality of the country but you have to understand different games have different rules. For example in mafia the name of the game is to deceive everyone. Deception is therefore praised and you are proud if you win the game via deception. Just like how a simple game can flip a switch so can culture. China is playing mafia while the US is playing chess.
- powerapple 6y ago
  The reason you don't purchase games or movie or music is that you are poor. Your behaviour is mostly determined by your financial status. I am a Chinese, and I haven't used pirated software since I started my first job. Of course, some people cheat, I hope they are not proud about it.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - neonological 6y ago
    No I pirate because it makes economic sense and also because I feel no shame in doing so. Neither do the chinese. Having money doesn't prevent people from picking lower prices options. The cultural attitude I talk about dominates most of the culture in china. You walk into shenzhen not only is software pirated but entire phones, products and hardware is pirated and sold publicly. It's completely normal in china. Not to mention many people are proud of their own businesses. Whatever your experience is I feel you're telling it from within some social strata that is largely different from the rest of china and this is only a minority opinion. Like the author I say this in the most non judgmental way possible.
webmaven 6y ago
> Not saying they couldn't develop an operating system; but the rest of the article did a pretty good job of explaining why they just wouldn't. I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here. If Google (or rather Danger) could have forked Android instead of creating a new operating system, they would have done that too. In fact, they did, in a sense, as Android uses the Linux kernel, after all. Sure, Google now actually is trying to create a new OS from scratch (Fuchsia), but it remains to be seen if it will be a success in the market (or if it will even ever be deployed in a commercial product). > If someone 'cheats', there is a pretty good chance that they also 'lie'. And enough with the cultural relativism. Some things people do are recognizably bad just at the human or even social animal level. I share your difficulty in wrapping your head around this idea, but a certain amount of cultural relativism is required here. And your own absolutism isn't a absolute as you think. Here is an exercise that may help: Why is cheating at poker considered, well, cheating, but bluffing (including deliberately faking tells, or other subterfuge) is not? If you say "bluffing is part of the game", try to understand that much of what is called 'cheating' is seen as part of the game in their context, and while getting caught cheating is cause for losing face, it isn't cause for feeling guilt. In fact, whoever is doing the catching is supposed to feel embarrassed for pointing it out, not self-righteous. > Even dogs get embarrassed by their own behavior, if they are caught out. Right. While the idea of 'Face' or shame is something that exists in Chinese culture, and is as powerful a force as guilt is in Western cultures, it doesn't work in the same way, and trying to guilt a Chinese person typically just shames them instead, and makes the shamer a target for anger and even revenge. This point perhaps could have been given more space in the essay. Aside: I think that this is part of what drives the 'social credit score' initiative: In a very real sense it is a system for measuring 'face', but there is never a 'shamer' that can be embarrassed or blamed.

simmerup 6y ago

China will find a lot of willing buyers for their internet surveillance and population management tech from autocratic countries. Hopefully the West will make them jump through hoops to sell their stolen IP in free countries though.

cheaprentalyeti 6y ago

The thing that kind of bothers me most is that he hasn't considered how much of his (and silicon valley's and the oligarches he defends) worldview might be the result of disinformation operations in and of themselves. IF China is amoral and doesn't see anything wrong with lying, why wouldn't they have an operation running to get the US to deindustrialize themselves and give up their manufacturing base to overseas countries, mainly China? It's like this guy is shocked, shocked to find out that gambling is going on at Rick's American Cafe.

staticman2 6y ago
Also if an intellectual property law is passed to benefit the silicon valley establishment as a result of silicon valley lobbying it is apparently not "cheating". Cheating is when those bad foreigners don't care about those intellectual property laws.
iforgotpassword 6y ago
Since his message is mostly that you should prepare for China rising, and that the US should put a huge load of focus on education, I think ultimately it doesn't matter whether the current decline of the country like the rapidly growing number of conspiracy theorists is a highly successful Chinese operation or not; the outcome and call to action is the same, while adding unnecessary speculation that would further derail discussion about the article. Half the comments here on hn are what Steve explicitly asked people to put aside for a moment: Trying to invalidate China's achievements by pointing out how evil they are, or how some news outlet somewhere ran a story on how they're not really lifting people out of poverty etcpp., so you conveniently don't even have to deal with the idea of China being the one running the show one day.
- cheaprentalyeti 6y ago
  I'm not saying "OMG China is evil..." I'm suggesting that the Silicon Valley Gleichschaltung, of All Heavy Industry Is Evil and we'll just ignore the fact that we haven't banished it from the world, just exported it from the United States to China, all the while pretending to save the world from global warming, has been a huge contributor to the process. "Better Education" isn't going to help if it's just maleducation in things that don't help, and trying to build up the corporations that helped get us in this mess because their worldview can't really handle manufacturing probably won't help either.

konstmonst 6y ago

China didn't eliminate poverty, Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-k_ed7D7Dw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-k_ed7D7Dw China doesn't have a big middle class. Education in China does not produce a lot of creative people. China government can disappear any Billionaire or Actor or any influential person. Such regime will always be less effective, less creative. Solution to the Problem: remove trade advantages for china, add sanctions and wait while it degrades to the state Russia is now. If you cut them from the global markets, China will crumble. China is all about "face", to the determent of everything else and is the reason for a global Corona outbreak. I believe the author has too good opinion on them, they just lie a lot. Sure a lot of the products are assembled in china, but not created. As I look around my desk, I don't see anything beside mobile phone that was engineered in China. As a matter of fact I prefer to buy locally engineered German stuff even if it costs a bit more, because I have a better quality and after sale support than with any Chinese Product. I hate dealing with Chinese Traders after a sale and I started to pay more for European products, even if they cost more. The west and others can relocate supply chains and that would be the end of it.

iforgotpassword 6y ago
And here we have the perfect example of the denial the article describes. "Everything you say is not true and China will fail." Way to prepare for the hurricane. :-)

neonological 6y ago

This article speaks many truths that a lot of Americans don’t want to face or admit. It’s a wake up call. Though there is one truth that is inevitable that the author glosses over just like many do when talking about global warming. It’s hurtful but I have to say it. The worst case scenario of China being the dominant global economic super power is the most probable outcome of the future.

ilaksh 6y ago

The thing that scares me about this is the relationship between the US dollar and the US military. I have a feeling a lot of people will say they are not related. Unfortunately, I believe that we are going to find out how related those things are in the next few decades.

1996 6y ago
Do not worry too much, China is getting stronger every year. As for the US dollar, we have a potential replacement that is enjoying global acceptation, while most of the mining is in China.

dzonga 6y ago

china copies a lot of stuff. but what most people don't realize, is after getting good at copying you become good at creating. if you've ever learnt by doing you know this is a hack to be good at something.

albanread 6y ago
I agree we all learn by example; and by copying. I remember in the 1970s people used to say that the Japanese could only copy the west; they couldn't create things of their own; their culture or even their different brains prevented them from original creativity. That was obviously just a load of garbage; it was just a stage their economy was going through. I think the article is light on historical context. There are good reasons why catching up with other nations; especially ones that once oppressed you could be regarded as a completely ethical thing to do; by any means necessary; to safeguard your peoples future. No one would be in any way surprised if Huawei had just said "we are forking Android and our fork will diverge over time; eventually becoming our own unique operating system." Understanding why they didn't say that is perhaps the interesting thing.

ceilingcorner 6y ago

I know this guy is Someone Important, but what's with the juvenile writing style? Is it really necessary to cuss every other word? Is this a blog post by an experienced tech commentator or a drunken sailor?

cassepipe 6y ago
Well I at least is not hiding the emotion that the matter causes him. What's wrong with druken sailors writing ? Btw I don't see the link between "being important" (debatable : I did not know who the guy was) and cursing ? Are you implying that he is somehow taking advantage of his social position to have the right to curse ? If so, It's a weird statement as I don't see many important people doing that.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago
  It's simple. I like to read intelligent articles about technology and China. I don't like to read articles that have cussing every other sentence. It's just crass, vulgar, and serves absolutely no purpose. - fuck: found 40 times - shit: found 16 times Completely unnecessary. Get an editor and act like an adult, please, Mr. Yegge.
  - libertine 6y ago
    You completely missed the true simplicity of it: this article is not for you, and that's fine.
istorical 6y ago
Your so-called 'juvenile style' is what others would call not being as boring as watching paint dry. If Steve's goal is to write content that will spread and find as many eyes as possible, being entertaining instead of just pretentious and overly reverent seems to me to be a great strategy.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago
  How is saying fuck and shit every other word entertaining? Idiocracy, here we come.

HDMI_Cable 6y ago

He replaces nuanced arguments based on facts and data with a crass writing style and anecdotes. --- His argument boils down to: China (as if they were some unified entity) likes taking intellectual property and will therefore rule over us. They have done rather well for themselves and are therefore better than the US in every aspect.

ceilingcorner 6y ago
Yeah, I didn't find this to be a very compelling argument. China has a ton of internal problems that will come due in the next few decades. I'd actually predict the exact opposite of this post: China will have serious internal turmoil around 2040 or 2045. They are not in a position to overtake the U.S. culturally or creatively. No one in Europe or Africa or India or the Middle East can name more than one or two cultural figures from China. I don't see this changing, because China is a traditional ethnic nation-state, whereas America is built on diversity. American culture is "open" by definition and it's easier for people worldwide to adopt it. Chinese culture, while incredibly rich and worthwhile, is almost universally centered toward China.
- yumraj 6y ago
  > China has a ton of internal problems that will come due in the next few decades. While the may be true, unfortunately that argument is only leading to complacency on part of the rest of the world. CCP has shown remarkable resiliency so I won’t rule them out.
  - ipsocannibal 6y ago
    Remember when the Soviets were on top of the world in the 1950's, largest military in the world, Sputnik, ICBM and nukes, building a Communist Bloc to match NATO and the United States. Fast forward 40 years and it was all gone. Look at China now, gleaming ghost cities that will require massive infrastructure maintaince cost to maintain all funded with massive amounts of debt, a huge population bubble that will drag down China's productive capacity in the comming decades, a world that is more strongly and vocally resisting Chinese influence everyday. What looks powerful and inevitable now only does so because people tend to miss the whole picture.

p1anecrazy 6y ago

I was extremely put off by the racist rant at the beginning. Based on a multitude of personal experiences, I don’t think that Vietnamese, Spanish or Venesuelans are inherently cheating. Why trust the article if it begins with a doubtful accusation?

cassepipe 6y ago
I think you are misperceiving his point : All people that are the at the bottom of society are feeling the game is rigged against us (and it is) and don't embarass themselves with what is perceived as the winners rules. China's little know bloody colonial history should prevent "us" from being surprised that "China" has little care for intellectual property, the same I did not care about downloading music illegally while big labels were filling their pockets. I can relate. I don't know why he took the example of Vietnam but people there have endured forty years of war and extreme poverty so I would not be surprised surprised if there is a con mentality floating around as it is the case in every poor part of the world and in every poor layer of any country. I do agree that the detour by mentality/culture explanation was not really necessary but I think it was part of his "step out of your moral frame" endeavour to make people that think "China is bad/cheating" shut up.
istorical 6y ago
Is it racist to say that western cultures treat their elderly people like crap (relative to the cultural values of eastern cultures where seniors are treated with respect and care and not abandoned to uncaring nurses in a shoebox sized room)? Is it racist to say that American culture is cold and uncaring and inhuman when someone dies from a curable condition because they are too poor to afford healthcare (compared to a country with a culture of universal heathcare)? You should perhaps rethink your definition of the word racist, a better accusation would be to say the author mispresents this cultural value or overstates any real cultural difference between western and eastern cultures in terms of the cultural idea of 'fairness vs cheating'. But to call it racist seems a bit like calling all liberals communists or calling all conservatives fascist, no? Painting with too broad a brush. That is to say, it makes sense to ask whether this assertion about these cultures and their ideas around cheating are true, but to disallow any discussion about cultural values and the different ideas of various cultures comes across as a very "the emperor's new clothes' situation" where we aren't allowed to discuss things that are immediately apparent for fear of punishment. You are avoiding addressing any of the real arguments presented by the author by dismissing their entire piece wholesale with a casual accusation and label that tarnishes their reputation. And doing so in a casual way.

bigpumpkin 6y ago

TL:DR "Steve Yegge is ex-Geoworks, ex-Amazon, ex-Google, and ex-Grab, with nearly 30 years of tech industry experience. Nowadays he’s pretty much retired." "If you break up the Western Tech Giants, then they will be replaced with foreign companies that you cannot regulate. " "Elizabeth, please stop talking about breaking them up. "

mariusor 6y ago
And let's not forget: > Stop trying to kill your Golden Geese, and start milking them instead!

mig39 6y ago

He mentions the Bloomberg "big hack" story that seems to have never been confirmed or corroborated. What ever happened to that anyway? Did they ever find these supposed chips in servers at Amazon and Apple?

throwaway210222 6y ago

"We lied, we cheated, we steal", M. Pompeo Not so different after all. Those in power just like to chose when its "cricket" and when its a free for all.

specialist 6y ago

To understand how China may continue to develop, study the history of the USA and other hegemonies. The USA also lied, cheated, stole, murdered, etc. Just in my life time, I've read a lot of these alarmists missives. The Japan That Can Say No, the evil USSR, something something Islam, Latino immigration, etc. This too shall pass. What always seems to be missing is recognition that the USA also has agency. It's so weird to think we'll not respond, adapt, accommodate, or whatever. These things are always a dance, action then reaction, move then counter-move. -- That said: One thing that worries me is ethics around medical research. I have the impression that China's currently a free-for-all. Well. In time that will change. Not so long ago, the USA did a lot of horrible shit. Now we have institutional review boards and government oversight. (I'm purposefully not reading about anyone's atrocities. I acknowledge them. But I'm struggling mightily to keep my head in a positive space. If I think too much about the horrors, I just start crying. And that's not helping me or anyone else.) -- Yes, an emergent China presents a lot of challenges. But I'm more worried about scenarios where China that doesn't become a super power. Or worse, if China declines. People start acting stupid and lash out when the narrative flips. Further, I've been thinking having a sole super power has been bad for humanity. I'm hoping that if the USA feels a little heat, we'll pull our thumbs out and resume building towards a better future. Because whatever we've been doing these last 20+ years, it kinda sucks.

analyst74 6y ago

There are so many things the author got wrong that this is more of a creative writing than anything. One of the key thing he got wrong, was that Americans view cheating as bad but Chinese (and rest of the world) do not. 1, our tribal mind naturally groups who we deem as other in groups. so if you identify as American, and see reports that some Chinese groups/individuals steal something, it registers as "Chinese steal"; but if fellow Americans steal, it registers as "Group(like race)/Individual X steals", and the group X is probably not a group you are part of. Also, you hardly hear about people/companies following the law, because those are not news worthy. 2, developing countries tend to be behind not just in economy, but also public consensus and regulation. i.e. ponzi schemes ran rampant during the 80s/90s in China, that's not because Chinese love ponzi schemes more than Americans, but due to Chinese people and regulators not being familiar of those scams. Same is true for IP, copyright, etc, as more Chinese individuals get harmed by those types of theft, the public consensus has been shifting and regulations are catching up. 3, author touched on this, generally speaking, poor and rich people has a higher possibility to cheat, the former due to realization that the system is rigged against them, so taking from the man is justified; the latter, is more of a reverse effect of those who are most skillful at taking from others tend to rise to the top. Combine this with the effect that the law-abiding American middle class have a higher chance of interacting with the immoral (hackers, IP thieves or just ruthless corporations) or poor (refugees or illegal immigrants) foreign entities than the law-abiding foreign middle class citizens. It's quite easy to come to a conclusion that foreigners are less moral than Americans. 4, as an American, author is probably going to be more familiar with how foreigners steal from Americans than vice versa. For example, do you know that Chinese shows are more widely available on Youtube (illegally) than the reverse?

eunos 6y ago

Nitpick about the Surabaya bombing. The perps (a family) isn't really classified as poor. From the Indonesian Lawyers Club episode that I watched they are quite prosperous, have landed home and business. Of course what's behind (debt and so on) we don't really know.