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China In the Habit of Copying and Redirecting US Sites?
Want to know why US web companies have trouble making it in China? gaz_hayes passed us a link to the blog commiepod, which suggests that successful US websites are targeted by 'Chinese government backed companies.' "These companies copy the site, deploy it on a .cn domain, and then DNS poison or forcefully lower the bandwidth the US site. Just a few weeks ago google.com and google.cn were DNS poisoned across the entire Chinese internet and were being redirected to their Chinese competitor Baidu. This probably explains Google's 3rd quarter market share in China." This is a fairly serious accusation; anyone else have first-hand experiences that would back this up?
It's almost like the Chinese are a little leery of the US having a very large amount of control over the Internet. Not that I condone their actions (if this is true), but I can't say I'd be totally surprised.
If you can read this... 01110101 01110010 00100000 01100001 00100000 01100111 01100101 01100101 01101011
China proves that Fascism, not Socialism, works. China is a vindication of everything the post-Socialist Fascist movement thought was in need of change in Socialist ideology to make it work. As a result, China has many of the benefits of capitalism, but has the state control of the means of production that Socialism provides. If it's mostly high-ranking aparatchiks and military officers who own most of the corporations in China, it is only semantically different from the corporation, known as the "Communist State" in China, from owning it in its name.
Of course this would be a surprise to the morons who think that Fascism is just a dirty word you throw at someone you disagree with. Most people forget that Fascism was a movement with a clear-cut platform, that was a true hybrid of Socialism and Capitalism. It is "right-wing" in the sense that it is "to the right of Socialism and Communism." It is, in essence, where the "left and right" meet up on the spectrum. If you look at the Fascists' planks, you will see that they had many left-wing tendencies, such as seizing the war profits of the military industrial complex, heavy taxation of income, and strong government **control** of the means of production through counsels of industry and regulations.
Communism is utopian. It is built on 19th century pseudo-science, and it ought to be no more respectable to be a Communist than to be a Phrenologist.
I am not surprised at China doing this. It make perfect sense from the economic nationalism of Fascist policy.
Communism is utopian. It is built on 19th century pseudo-science, and it ought to be no more respectable to be a Communist than to be a Phrenologist.
All economic and political models are NOT true science anyhow. All economic and political models benefit different people in different ways and no math will tell you the "right" way unless you first prove that person X deserves more than person Y (or that there "should" be an imbalance in the first place). Plus, much of economic models depends on consumer psychology, which is also a fuzzy science. At best models may tell you how to maximize something based on assumptions, but those assumptions and the weights on them are usually subjective.
Table-ized A.I.
Works for whom? and in what sense?
They actually do worse things, like torturing Tibetan nuns, and you worry whether you can access your favourite search engine in China?
You make an intelligent and well stated argument. The meaning of the word Fascism is misunderstood this days. The common unwashed masses have no idea of what Fascism is other than a word you throw around to discredit those you disagree with. I'm sorry to see this modded down as it really makes me question the actual average IQ of the /.er to which I assumed in the past to be well above the mean.
Mod up please.
'Fascism should rightly be called Corporatism, as it is the merger of corporate and government power.'
'All within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state. '
Two descriptions of Fascism by Benito Mussolini which apply to today's China perfectly. Though as you rightly point out meaning of the word Fascist has been lost on those who nowadays use it merely as an insult. Those same people are those who usually cannot accept that China is the archetypal Fascist state, in my view even more Fascist than Italy ever was in the 20s.
For all intensive porpoises your a bunch of rediculous loosers
Huh? Models are used to predict future actions and behavior, at least in so well as human behavior can be modeled. I think you meant "system," not "model." For example, neoliberal economic policies are a type of 'system.' Modernization or dependency theory, however, are models used to make predictions. Though I'll give you that sometimes they become confluent, but the system is what manfests in reality and the model is used to try to, well, model that system so as predictions can be made that might, just might, help policy formation (whatever your idealogy).
So, systems may have parts which are most difinitely subjective. Models, though, are kinda like throwing yarrow sticks in I Ching - they're around to predict behavior. But, even though I want to make a career of poli/sci, I've gotta say that modeling human behavior is sometimes as futile of a predictor as is the I Ching. You know what I'm talking about, we've all read Asimov's Foundation on here... right?
Also, assuming you disagree with my above diatribe, we does it matter that this is subjective. We're dealing with humans here. And when dealing with humans there are a host of value judgements which must be made. That's just the way it is. In criminal and civil law, in deciding what OS you like best, what politician you want running your little burg, etc. These crys of "everything is subjective and therefore of little value" strike me as fatalistic and overly relativistic - at some point you must make a decision, knowing full well that not everyone will agree with you (b/c that's impossible) and that you might be wrong. Really though, I am surprised that we're still around to argue about it though :) How's the saying go, "World War Three will be fought with nuclear weapons, while World War Four will be fought with sticks and stones."
Don't worry about the mule, just load the wagon.
We (as a nation) still buy "Made in China" crap and help support their economy.
You really don't understand globalization, do you?
The Made in China "crap" is:
a) probably made by a US owned Chinese company or a Chinese company that bought technology/equipment from US firms, or licensed from a US company that gets a cut of the profits.
b) made for a lot less than any other country could ever DREAM of to produce it
The best bit is - China is only STARTING to become industrialized. They (along with India) have the potential to dominate the entire world economically. Sure, as an American you can "boycott" China. But Europe won't. Russian won't. The third world (which is starving for cheaper goods) won't. The only thing you will be doing is digging your own grave.
Globalization brings countries together. How can you go to war with a country that sells you the products you need, and buys the technology you produce, and imports raw materials from you, and exports engineers to you, etc etc etc.
Oh wait, war is about politics, and politicians are rarely rational. Sure, go ahead and call for a boycott then. Pardon me if I snicker when you shoot yourself in the foot.
Oh, and I'm Canadian, not Chinese. Not a drop of oriental blood.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
They pretty much have the rest of the world by the balls and they know it. It's amazing some of the stuff they get away with because they know exactly how to manipulate the rest of the world. The biggest thing they manage to do is to act both like a superpower and a developing nation that needs protection. They don't want to open up a lot of sectors of their economy to foreign competition, so they claim they are a developing economy and get various WTO/UN/other world body protections, however when it suits them they act like a super power and throw their weight around to get access to natural resources(oil in Africa being a prime example).
To be fair, both the US and EU are guilty of this to some degree, but nowhere near what China does. China has shown that it wants to be a superpower, so it needs to take all the responsibilities of one as well as reaping the rewards. However, they won't and nobody will make them because they have the world by the balls. They know how to get western countries to do what they want and will continue to act like they have been.
Monstar L
Ports, Airlines, etc ARE strategic resource. Imagine if China presses for some trade advantage from the US and is rebuffed. If they had the ability to go close some of your major ports, you'd be feeling the pain really quickly.
Not Meta-modding due to apathy.
Who are those alleged people you speak of? I use "fascist" as an insult, and I am totally with you on China being the archetypal Fascist state. You're even nice enough to explain why I think fascism is evil:
That is as good and succinct a definition of Fascism as I have ever seen, and it makes me sick every time I read it. It's the antithesis of democracy, and I, for one, quite enjoy my freedom thank you very much.
This is impossible. The port won't disappear - and the workers will still arrive for work. If China owned the port and tried this, the US would take it over that day and carry on operations.
If you own a port, you have no choice but play by the rules.
Honestly, the more I hear about China, the more it sounds like the (stereo)typical massive corruption scenario.
I.e., no need to assume that there's some government hand behind it, or some meaningful form of protest against the west. It can be simply that some guy running their DNS servers/proxies/great-firewall/whatever got a nice bribe to redirect the lookups to someone selling the same kind of product, or an importer, or really whoever was willing to pay.
The way the kleptocracy/corruption scenario goes is, basically, it doesn't matter how much you're paid, it only matters how much you can steal/embezzle/get-as-bribes. Whole hierarchies are formed where any job worth anything (in loot/bribes/whatever) is essentially either given to party leaders' relatives or auctioned to the highest bidder. And then it's considered pretty much normal and expected that you'd get your money back, and a nice profit, by stealing/embezzling/demanding-bribes/etc. Whatever works, really.
My favourite example of what corruption _can_ do, and incidentally also is (A) about China, and (B) nicely illustrates that there is no need for it to even be motivated by some higher ideals or nationalism, is the Battle of the Yalu River in 1894.
Among various surrealism of it all, many shells used by the Chinese fleet were filled with sawdust or cement, because some enterprising souls in the navy had embezzled the funds for cordite and split the loot with the manufacturer. Or stuff as monumentally surrealistic as that a battleship was missing two main guns, which again had been stolen and sold on the black market. Yep, you've read that right: big f-ing guns off a battleship, simply dismantled and sold on the black market.
You also find such surrealistic stuff, as that the fleet's second in command -- no doubt, some fellow with either high placed relatives, or who bought the job fair and square -- deliberately didn't relay the order to deploy into battle formation. The formation where the big ships could fire at the Japanese was also the formation where the Japanese could fire at the ship he's on, and, you know, he wasn't going to do stupid stuff like risk his own life for his country. At any rate, someone felt protected enough to ignore a direct order, even if it cost the country a humiliating defeat.
That's the kind of thing that corruption can do. Someone didn't give a fuck about their country or about sticking it to the foreigners. They just cost their country a humiliating defeat, simply because, you know, there was something to steal or he had bribed someone powerful enough to ignore a direct order.
So, regardless of whether you wish to see a continuity of that in China or not, well, that's how far corruption can go.
And you don't even have to look one century back, the (ex)communist block provides a ton of more recent examples. And not even just the commies. Just about anywhere where some people were given enough unchecked power, some enterprising souls proceeded to sell their influence for cash. With similar results.
The more devastating result being that they invariably destroyed a whole country's culture in the process. The little guys were allowed to steal or get a bribe worth maybe 1$, so they wouldn't mind when the party leaders stole a million bucks in one fell swoop.
So now look at this particular incident, and you tell me if you really need some higher reason or motivation than bribe to explain it.
It's freakin' sad, that's what it is.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
And find their ports taken by eminent domain in a flash.
They don't have anybody by the balls. If they had us by the balls, they could stop producing/selling goods to us. They can't do that. Ergo, they don't have any more control than we let them have by mutual agreement. That's how it works with globalization. They play by the same rules, its just that for now we see value in the lower cost of goods from them.
Yes, China can become a superpower perhaps. If they are smart, they won't bother with a huge military buildup a-la the Cold War because that's a true waste of money, and there is nothing to gain from it. Like the US, they don't really want to rock the boat *too* much, because uncertainty is just as bad for them as it is for us - after all you can't really do a good job of controlling your economy if you can't reasonably predict what is going to happen in the next few years.
The only 'danger' there is is that China will truly have to be dealt with as an equal and respected as a technological force - eventually. That's not a bad thing, it can only help all of us to have another set of bright people building stuff.
You have to be joking. Aside from Tibet, how many countries has China invaded in the last 50 years? The US has thrown it's weight around enormously more than China, right from installing Dictators (e.g. Shah of Iran) to direct invasions and much of this has been about securing access to resources and markets. The US even engineered the overthrow of the Guatemalan government just so that United Fruits could avoid paying taxes. China's brutality is mostly internal, in contrast to the US which is free internally but brutal externally.
The EU is not throwing it's weight around on a US level, but there are a few nasty examples. Britain was of course involved in the installation of the Shah of Iran (to secure access to the oil) but France has been waging a secret war in the mineral-rich Central African Republic for decades. Right now they have "peace keeping" troops there, but they used to control it directly and basically used the population as slave labour.
I'm sure that if/when China starts overthrowing governments all over the Middle East and in South America, we kill kick up a huge fuss and be on the brink of World War 3, but western countries have been doing this sort of thing for the last 50 years or more. We don't complain about it too much because we are rarely on the receiving end of all the violence but if we were, we would probably be just as angry as people like Chavez and Ortega.
Pure, unmitigated bollocks. Capitalism does not channel selfish urges "for the greater good of society" it channels them for the good of the individual. Sometimes that benefits society as a whole, sometimes it doesn't.
Oh, and you might have an urge to own everything and control everything, but don't project your megalomaniacal tendencies onto the rest of us.
Chernobyl 'not a wildlife haven' - BBC News
*sighs* Germany's problem with production was that it kept trying to produce the best and strongest, which is no way to win a war you're in the middle of. Instead you just produce the stuff that's good enough for your needs. Because they kept attempting to keept their war machine on the bleeding edge in a war of survival, they kept having to do things like retool production lines and tech the workers how to build the new tech. Britain did no such thing, instead relying on technology like the flipping Sten gun. THAT is why Britain was consistently able to outproduce the Germans.
The expression "A == C" can incorporate ("A == B" and "B == C"). There is no need to elaborate on the obvious. Capitalism benefits the society more than it hurts, or else it could not survive; just ask the corpse of feudalism, for example. My original statement is true.
Oh, and you might have an urge to own everything and control everything, but don't project your megalomaniacal tendencies onto the rest of us.
References to humans in general are of statistical nature. I can imagine that some people will refuse a free check worth $100M, but I strongly suspect that majority of the population of this planet will grab it as fast as they can (the current exchange rate notwithstanding.)
Fascism is the opposite of liberty, not democracy.
Liberty and democracy are not the same thing. One is far more valuable than the other.
Good for the rest of the world, good for the powers that be in China, not so good for the average Chinese worker.
Is it really good for the rest of the world? China has been destroying so much domestic production in so many different nations that I have to say it is not. The U.S. may be the biggest target in China's economic sights, but it is by no means the only one.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Vietnam, Korea, India.
That's three.
If you lived in China, you'd know it's more convenient to buy illegal DVDs off the street than where they sell legal copies, much like how downloading mp3s and movies is more convenient than purchasing it. If you want to discuss about piracy, read my latest journal entry here and comment or critique it.
You can't steal companies. You can imitate their product or business model, but companies are made of the people and the culture that makes it unique. You can't steal that. That's all Baidu can do to Google: Baidu needs to constantly sabotage Google in order to retain their market share, and that totally won't work in the long run. Of course, Google has other inherent weaknesses that needs to be addressed as well, like lack of awareness of the cultural context, which is the primary reason why Google is lagging behind in the Japanese and Korean markets where Google is not sabotaged.
I've had money, intellectual property, and other personal properties stolen from me on the soil of freedom of the United States of America. What's your point? Greed and coveting is universal.
Funny that's how I feel about some Americans. I guess we should call it a draw. I should mention that I'm honestly trying to start a living here in the U.S., but anti-Chinese, white-superiority sentiment like yours is constantly making me have a second thought. It's people like you who give me a hard time explaining to my nice American friends when they ask me if I want to stay in the U.S.; I don't want to hurt their feelings.
I once had a signature.
I basically agree. However, there are limited options. Who wants war with a nuclear armed China? Pretty much nobody. I think the best we can do is help China be stable and reasonably prosperous and hope that one day the children or grandchildren of today's leaders in China decide to grant human rights to China's people. It is very likely I will not live long enough to see that day, but I suspect that day will come. I think the path Nixon put us on with China is the right one.
Beer is proof that God loves us, and wants us to be happy.