westiseast

9 ms·

31.
by westiseast 8y ago
I’m not sure that passes a basic sniff test. It’s much more likely after decades of poor economic management and a weak economy, Italy is willing to sacrifice some principles/accept some risk in return for Chinese investment in ports
32.
by westiseast 8y ago
Art imitates life I guess (or the other way around). I always thought the book had its own set of ironies, in that this perfect beach existed, and it was the people that brought their troubles and fucked it up, regardless of how ideological
33.
by westiseast 8y ago
Why have you made ~5-6 comments in this thread, and all about some version of whataboutism?
34.
by westiseast 8y ago
It’s fascinating to read stuff like this and try meta-analyze the sentiments behind it. One huge irony that strikes me is the idea of these ‘middle class bloggers’ raging against Western oppression whilst living lives that are basically upp
35.
by westiseast 8y ago
I often chat with my wife (Chinese, runs her own business) about relative wealth in her home country. She’s easily 1%, but living in big east coast Chinese cities, it often feels like we’re pretty average, even sub-average. The hundreds of
36.
by westiseast 8y ago
“where’s there’s muck, there’s money”
37.
by westiseast 8y ago
Absolutely - it’s probably a common feature of stay-at-home dads in the 21st century that it’s a good deal. There’s going to be a much larger percentage of stay-at-home mums who have awful ‘deals’.
38.
by westiseast 8y ago
I’m a stay at home dad and have been for the last 5 years. My wife works for herself, spending anywhere from 10-14 hours a day working pretty much 6-7 days a week (she loves her job and gets paid well to do it). Personally I don’t see it as
39.
by westiseast 8y ago
I kind of agree. Western consumers are so removed from clothing production that they’ve lost sight of how vast the gulf is between real and perceived value. Paying 10x or 20x the manufacturing cost for what is essentially a commodity item w
40.
by westiseast 8y ago
That’s not correct. Especially with low-tech products like clothing, you can easily buy fakes that have equivalent (or better) quality than originals at 1/5th of the US/EU price. You’re not paying expensive EU/US staff wages,
41.
by westiseast 8y ago
As a real world example, the fashion industry in China is hopelessly awash with fakes and copies. There’s very little enforcement of that kind of intellectual property, and also such high barriers to entry for say small/medium European
42.
by westiseast 8y ago
I think this is the correct answer. State sponsored theft of highly secret commercial/military information is one issue, rampant intellectual property abuse is another (eg. in fashion or entertainment industries). However potentially l
43.
by westiseast 8y ago
I don’t think the ethical grounds for objecting to gene editing are vague at all. Taken to logical extremes, the ability to edit out ‘undesirable’ qualities in our descendants should ring alarm bells in anyone - who decides what is undesira
44.
by westiseast 8y ago
The timescales are slightly shorter than many people think - the 1970s-90s were basically a whole scale westernization of Chinese society. Big economic reforms in the mid-late 1990s really freed up the economy from the burdens of inefficien
45.
by westiseast 8y ago
I think that point in the original article isnt 100% accurate. The ‘People Nearby’ feature can be turned off in the settings, but you also have to click into it to use it - it’s by no means automatic (ie. you sign into Wechat and suddenly i
46.
by westiseast 8y ago
I think you’re right about the value of Made in America and societies where honesty (even about problems or risks) is valued. The book I referenced included a number of instances where factories actively undermined individuals so that the
47.
by westiseast 8y ago
A good read is 'Poorly Made in China'. The product is different, but the problems are the same. * They drop changes and problems at the last minute, so you're over a barrel with your customers. * Relationships take months, ma
48.
by westiseast 8y ago
In China you’re talking about those in power actively hiding important public information from those without power. If you are one of the ‘without’, then there’s very little you can do to challenge official viewpoints. A Facebook bubble can
49.
by westiseast 8y ago
It’s been a fair trade off of benefits/drawbacks in the past - you don’t have to hold gold, you can hold a currency that is stable and reliable, you can use it to trade around the world for modern goods and services. You put yourself a
50.
by westiseast 8y ago
One thing worth bearing in mind about the restaurant analogy: The life cycle of restaurants in China is often very short - they open with investment and fanfare. They’ll have a great chef on board, a new and interesting signature dish, good
51.
by westiseast 8y ago
I assume he means because nationalism stokes tensions between citizens while companies quietly extract value from society.
52.
by westiseast 8y ago
Because juice tastes good. Fruit tastes good, and juice is a 10x more cool, watery, refreshing, and sweet. Anyone who says chugging a half litre of cold apple juice after a long run isn’t heaven on earth is dead inside.
53.
by westiseast 8y ago
It's more like he's refuting the claims you usually hear from the CCP as part of their external (and internal) propaganda and national narrative.
54.
by westiseast 8y ago
In my experience, it honestly isn't even close. Think about it this way: In the US, you have an army of groups who will actively/passively work against a corrupt person: free media, lawyers, civilians with strong rights, judges,
55.
by westiseast 8y ago
It's perhaps best to think of guanxi as an umbrella term for a number of different things you'd definitely see in any Western society too - crucially, that would include both 'good' and 'bad things. So it encompasse
56.
by westiseast 8y ago
Yeah, fantastic book - I remember specifically the section about his wife teasing him because he hadn’t experienced nirvana or something.
57.
by westiseast 8y ago
Also, aside from traditional lending, Alipay and Wechat are both competing to basically own all social and consumption data - in a sense I’d agree they don’t want to become traditional banks: they want to create closed payment/purchasi
58.
by westiseast 8y ago
FYI Alibaba/Alipay has a range of loan and financial products. My wife’s Taobao business does well, and so she’s eligible for huge, insane loans on Alipay. On the other side, micro-loans to fund consumer purchases are also available.
59.
by westiseast 8y ago
The beauty of China-style massive adoption of mobile payments is leaving the house without taking your cards or wallet or cash with you. So kind of agreeing with you - Apple Pay is great because then I don’t need to take my card (whereas
60.
by westiseast 8y ago
Don’t worry, the Chinese government stores all your Wechat data for you on a cloud ;)

More ›