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Romance of the Three Kingdoms: Semiconductor Edition

66 points by pantalaimon 5y ago

amelius 5y ago
And Apple built their castle in someone else's kingdom.
ngcc_hk 5y ago
Fundamental issue of a giant investing on alternative is that it is very hard to eat your own lunch. The essay strangely said arm was a threat but so would be risc-v. Not any risc is in play what is risc-v that cannot do but only arm can, any vice visa. And that also both is a threat to x86. By investing less or struggling upgrade to x86, it just weaken x86. For the china play given the geopolitics I am not sure Google and intel think they involvement can spell no USA attack.
- hangonhn 5y ago
  I read that as those who are going to switch away from x86 to ARM is already a loss for Intel. So RISC-V gives them a way to claw back some of those losses. At the end of the day Intel has always been a foundry and x86 is one way to drive up business for those expensive foundries. RISC-V can be another way to drive business towards Intel if Intel can establish a relationship with RISC-V designers early on.
djtango 5y ago
Tangential comment: I'm a fan of Kevin's blog - think he has quite a unique perspective having worked in US politics and Tech but having a good understanding of Chinese tech too. I also appreciate Lillian Li's Chinese Characteristics. Does anyone have any other good recommendations for coverage of Chinese tech? I worry that a lot of tech innovation is one-directional. There are far more Chinese tech workers who understand English (and have worked in the west) than the inverse (tech workers from the West who are Chinese speaking tech workers)
- TrainedMonkey 5y ago
  > There are far more Chinese tech workers who understand English than the inverse. This is a really interesting observation. I will make one as well - there are far more people speaking English on aircraft carriers than all other languages combined by a significant margin. No idea what that means in the grand scheme of things, but hey we are making geopolitical observations. See https://www.businessinsider.com/magnitude-of-us-naval-dominance-2013-11 https://www.businessinsider.com/magnitude-of-us-naval-domina...
  - djtango 5y ago
    That's a great share thanks - interesting to consider all the ways the English speaking world has exerted an edge indirectly. The observations don't necessarily have to be geopolitical (although it seems talk about China always is these days). For example, PinDuoDuo hit 800M users in 6 years[1] And from Kevin's InterConnected blog, the Chinese CBDC's initial "small-scale" testing did 70M transactions[2] Seems like Chinese dev needs to be prepared for scale in ways most of us never have to dream of - would be interesting to know if they're adopting best practices we could learn from. [1] https://stories.pinduoduo-global.com/articles/pinduoduo-intensifies-agriculture-modernization-drive-as-users-surpass-800-m https://stories.pinduoduo-global.com/articles/pinduoduo-inte... [2] https://interconnected.blog/e-cny-players-dcep-e-rmb/ https://interconnected.blog/e-cny-players-dcep-e-rmb/
  - agency 5y ago
    This is kind of a tangent but I recently watched Wolf Warrior, an over-the-top Chinese military action movie that is also basically wall-to-wall propaganda for the PLA (not that this military-entertainment complex stuff is unique to China of course. You don't get to put all the latest shiny military tech in the new Transformers movie unless you play ball with the DoD). In a climactic scene[1] after our heroes are attacked by the bad guys (a bunch of American ex-special forces mercenaries), while a voiceover speech is laying it on pretty thick ("To a soldier the most beautiful place in the world is the border of the People's Republic of China, because it is what they fight and die to protect"), they rip off the patches they were wearing for the wargames they were participating in before the attack and slap on patches with the flag of China which say "I fight for China" in English. Thought that was kind of interesting. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCc0DWSZHCs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCc0DWSZHCs
jevoten 5y ago
> Of course, that was a war over power, territory, and dynastic legitimacy. There is no antitrust regulators in war. I don’t see a “winner take all” ending happening among the three ISAs, whether it’s 35 years or 350 years. Romance of the Three Kingdoms: Semiconductor Edition is here to stay. Antitrust regulators aren't all-powerful or immune from influence. There is no guarantee on how long they can resist powerful interests, especially if there is a shift in the geopolitics.

66 points by pantalaimon 5y ago

And Apple built their castle in someone else's kingdom.

Fundamental issue of a giant investing on alternative is that it is very hard to eat your own lunch. The essay strangely said arm was a threat but so would be risc-v. Not any risc is in play what is risc-v that cannot do but only arm can, any vice visa. And that also both is a threat to x86. By investing less or struggling upgrade to x86, it just weaken x86. For the china play given the geopolitics I am not sure Google and intel think they involvement can spell no USA attack.

hangonhn 5y ago
I read that as those who are going to switch away from x86 to ARM is already a loss for Intel. So RISC-V gives them a way to claw back some of those losses. At the end of the day Intel has always been a foundry and x86 is one way to drive up business for those expensive foundries. RISC-V can be another way to drive business towards Intel if Intel can establish a relationship with RISC-V designers early on.

djtango 5y ago

Tangential comment: I'm a fan of Kevin's blog - think he has quite a unique perspective having worked in US politics and Tech but having a good understanding of Chinese tech too. I also appreciate Lillian Li's Chinese Characteristics. Does anyone have any other good recommendations for coverage of Chinese tech? I worry that a lot of tech innovation is one-directional. There are far more Chinese tech workers who understand English (and have worked in the west) than the inverse (tech workers from the West who are Chinese speaking tech workers)

TrainedMonkey 5y ago
> There are far more Chinese tech workers who understand English than the inverse. This is a really interesting observation. I will make one as well - there are far more people speaking English on aircraft carriers than all other languages combined by a significant margin. No idea what that means in the grand scheme of things, but hey we are making geopolitical observations. See https://www.businessinsider.com/magnitude-of-us-naval-dominance-2013-11 https://www.businessinsider.com/magnitude-of-us-naval-domina...
- djtango 5y ago
  That's a great share thanks - interesting to consider all the ways the English speaking world has exerted an edge indirectly. The observations don't necessarily have to be geopolitical (although it seems talk about China always is these days). For example, PinDuoDuo hit 800M users in 6 years[1] And from Kevin's InterConnected blog, the Chinese CBDC's initial "small-scale" testing did 70M transactions[2] Seems like Chinese dev needs to be prepared for scale in ways most of us never have to dream of - would be interesting to know if they're adopting best practices we could learn from. [1] https://stories.pinduoduo-global.com/articles/pinduoduo-intensifies-agriculture-modernization-drive-as-users-surpass-800-m https://stories.pinduoduo-global.com/articles/pinduoduo-inte... [2] https://interconnected.blog/e-cny-players-dcep-e-rmb/ https://interconnected.blog/e-cny-players-dcep-e-rmb/
- agency 5y ago
  This is kind of a tangent but I recently watched Wolf Warrior, an over-the-top Chinese military action movie that is also basically wall-to-wall propaganda for the PLA (not that this military-entertainment complex stuff is unique to China of course. You don't get to put all the latest shiny military tech in the new Transformers movie unless you play ball with the DoD). In a climactic scene[1] after our heroes are attacked by the bad guys (a bunch of American ex-special forces mercenaries), while a voiceover speech is laying it on pretty thick ("To a soldier the most beautiful place in the world is the border of the People's Republic of China, because it is what they fight and die to protect"), they rip off the patches they were wearing for the wargames they were participating in before the attack and slap on patches with the flag of China which say "I fight for China" in English. Thought that was kind of interesting. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCc0DWSZHCs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCc0DWSZHCs

jevoten 5y ago

> Of course, that was a war over power, territory, and dynastic legitimacy. There is no antitrust regulators in war. I don’t see a “winner take all” ending happening among the three ISAs, whether it’s 35 years or 350 years. Romance of the Three Kingdoms: Semiconductor Edition is here to stay. Antitrust regulators aren't all-powerful or immune from influence. There is no guarantee on how long they can resist powerful interests, especially if there is a shift in the geopolitics.