China vs U.S. in an 'Internet Race'

avatar4d writes to mention an article on CIO about a new 'space race' on the internet between China and the U.S.. China is currently hard at work at what is being called the 'Chinese Next Generation Internet' (CNGI). With plans to unveil the project at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the network is part of a plan to leap ahead of the United States in innovation and technology. From the article: "The strategy, outlined in China's latest five-year plan, calls for the country to transition its economy from one based almost entirely on manufacturing to one that produces its own scientific and technological breakthroughs — using a new and improved version of today's dominant innovation platform, the Internet. 'CNGI is the culmination of this revolutionary plan' to turn China into the world's innovation capital, says Wu Hequan, vice president of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and the chairman of the CNGI Expert Committee, the group overseeing the project. 'We will use it as a way to break through and be competitive in the global economic market.'"

Comments

Good & Bad

[Kittyflipping]

I hear you won't be able to say anything bad about the Chinese government on this new internet; however you can get quite a deal on a Rolex and other brand name items...

How about China vs. Superstition?

[RobertB-DC]

While we in the US were watching Atlantis take off on what turned out to be a successful ISS construction mission, the Chinese were launching a quarter-ton of seeds into space:

Shijian-8 carries at least 2,000 types of seed samples from a variety of species including those grown in normal crops on Earth, as well as fungi. In all, about 474 pounds of seeds are stowed away aboard the satellite, according to the state-owned Xinhua news agency.

Heralded as China's first satellite primarily designed for space breeding, Shijian-8's seed payload will be returned to Earth after about two weeks of flight, the China Daily newspaper reported in July.

Sounds great, for them at least, doesn't it? Do some basic research. Get ahead of the Americans. So you can imagine the mental double-take at this tidbit from the same article:

After being recovered, the seeds will be used by researchers attempting to improve the quality and yield of terrestrial crops. Chinese officials contend that seeds exposed to space radiation and microgravity contain more vitamins and other crucial minerals.

WHAT? China's greatest minds put together a launch and re-entry vehicle, and "officials" load it with almost 500 pounds of seeds so that they will magically become superplants? WTF? Did someone in China not get the memo that their former occupiers are not *really* developing giant robots, and that Little Shop of Horrors is a work of fiction, not a battle plan?

The article claims that China will be a country that "produces its own scientific and technological breakthroughs". Sending a truckload of seeds to come back as food for the Fantastic Four sounds more like a continuation of the tradition that brought us tiger penis, rhinoceros horn, and bear bile therapies. And here I was, worried we were losing our edge.

Re:How about China vs. Superstition?

[timeOday]

I wouldn't be too quick to judge China's scientific community based on a translation of a one-line project synopsis by a buearocrat.

Re:How about China vs. Superstition?

[WilliamSChips]

As opposed to the government that claims it has freedom of speech and information while blocking science that disagrees with their corporate views.

Re:How about China vs. Superstition?

[oatworm]

Sorry, but China's growth rate is a prime example of the catch-up effect. In short, China's growth rate is double-digits (or near there) because they were using their labor so inefficiently until recently that they only have one direction to go. Besides, if GDP growth was proof of a country's greatness, perhaps China better look in their rear-view mirror, because Azerbaijan is catching up fast.

As for China being the next world superpower, call me when they get a navy. Sure, they can nuke us, but they can't even get past Chile's navy to hold the nuked territory, much less our own, and it's not like we don't have a few nukes to play with. Heck, the US has 2/3 of the quantitative aircraft carrier fleet in the world, and 4/5 of the deck space.

Re:How about China vs. Superstition?

[susano_otter]

Makes sense to me.

The way I see it, there's a world of difference between telling scientists to dissent from the government on their own time, and telling scientists not to dissent from the government at all.

Wake me up when approximately half the Chinese population is openly and vehemently opposed to their government, and we'll talk about U.S.-China moral equivalence.

Re:How about China vs. Superstition?

[geekoid]

and why would you want to send people to 'hold' the big pile of radioactive debri?

Superpower wars aren't about military force anymore(if they ever were). It's about economic force.

a challenge?

[User 956]

With plans to unveil the project at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the network is part of a plan to leap ahead of the United States in innovation and technology.

Given that ours is made of tubes, it can't be hard to come up with something better.

Innovation or Propaganda and Lies?

[Bryansix]

FTA:

The technology at the heart of CNGI is an emerging communication standard called Internet protocol version 6 (IPv6). The Internet protocol is the Internet's version of a postal envelope, containing information such as the destination and return addresses, and details about a package's contents. The current standard, IPv4 (IPv5 never made it out of the lab), doesn't have enough unique addresses for every would-be user in the world to connect to the Internet. IPv6 solves this problem, and is also more secure and efficient than its predecessor. For these and other reasons, most experts agree that a shift to an IPv6-based Internet is inevitable.

So in otherwords they plan to move to IPv6 and call the idea their own? Come on guys. You can do better then that! I've been an advocate of pushing IPv6 adoption for a long time. For some reason there is a lot of resistance to it.

Same place the US got its rocketry experts

[EmbeddedJanitor]

You get them from elsewhere (Europe, etc) .

The whole idea of "race" and needing decades of experience to get in front is very archaic. You don't need to follow the full technological evolution to get there.

Besides.... China has an amazing history of technological superiority over the last couple of thousand years or so, with only the last 100 or so years (a mere 5%) being a "glitch".

Made in China...

[Mini-Geek]

Now we'll start seeing "Made in China" stickers on web sites.

This Post Made in China

They want to move away from manufacturing?

[Anonymous Cowpat]

So, er, who's gonna make stuff? Oh, wait, that means that all the western nations who's economies are moving ever closer to being entirely reliant on intellectual property with a real value of nil and are banking on the force of law and international treaties to bouy their economies up whilst shifting the manufacture of real goods to China will have to start making stuff themselves again.
Right now China has got us all over a barrel because they're where we get the majority of our goods, why would they fritter it all away moving to an economic model like ours?

WTF

[oh_my_080980980]

It's nice to know that people's view of China haven't changed in 50 years. US Education system is doing it's normal bang up job.

Before you laugh too heavily about China's "space seeds," you might want to remember that most American believe:

1. The earth was created in 7 days
2. That god created people "as is"
3. Evolution is a myth

You see America can trump China in ignorance everytime.

But let's not also forget:

1. all the capital investment going into China - China leads the world in foreign investment.
2. the trade deficit - the US imports more goods from China then we export.
3. China has HUGE cash reserves, meanwhile the US is running a 6 trillion dollar deficit which will only get larger thanks to medicare and social security benefits, the war in iraq.
4. almost all electronics and manufacturing is done in china.
5. china's population - a sellers wet dream. the us' market dominance is fading as more and more chinese have disposable income.

Kudos to the morons who aren't paying attention.