I don't know why you are being downvoted. You put forward a valid point.
Perhaps the fanboys here could understand the desperation most of the world still lives in, even today!!!
Focus. Some people want to focus on the tech side. If you want to focus on politics side, go ahead and do it.
I understand the technology focus though, policy is probably the worst possible use of your time if you want to help, and it carries a great risk of turning you into an evil person.
There is no "tech side" or "politics side", it's all the same fucking side. You can't create the Internet without vast political consequence. You can't indefinitely extend life without the same. Every human action is steeped in political and social consequence.
You can't create tech without political consequence, no. But there are "sides" in a sense that tech can be driving changes in policy. So you can use tech to make political changes without getting directly involved in all the mess the politics is.
It's sad to see the recurring condescending attitude of HN crowd towards China and it's recent (and well deserved) technological prowess. C'mon guys, all said and done, China is kicking ass. You've got to give credit where it's due.
Cutting edge or not, the next century will be driven by China simply because the momentum that they have generated.
The only thing that still remains a red flag for me is China's lack of democracy and political instability that may come due to it.
I've been here for 9 years and am leaving in a couple of weeks. China kicks butt only when compared to itself, but lags in almost everything else. Many Chinese solutions (wepay) are merely solving problems that the west didn't have (lack of bankcard use, no NFC infrastructure, security..well). On the other hand, the internet is absolutely 3rd world for anything international: I get better access in the Philippines or Indonesia. Just this morning, reddit and HN weren't working on my phone/@home for whatever reason I don't know.
And all the countries around China, I visit them often, they use none of China's internet stack. Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp, are all very strong in SE Asia. This includes Chinese places around China, like HK, Taiwan, Singapore. If Chinese mobile innovation was so great...wouldn't they have even just a little bit of success outside of China?
> Cutting edge or not, the next century will be driven by China simply because the momentum that they have generated.
China will be continued to be driven by China, but the internet world has already began fragmenting into China and everyone else.
- prevented Google and Facebook to compete, even though they claimed to be open market to wto
As for your momentum, don't forget the trillions of state debt, the wto membership expiring this year, xi the dictator closing down news channels, billions in capital outflow
While it might be true in modern times regarding copying, Europe and US also did take a lot from them in past centuries and looking at historical documents, we didn't always pay for it.
So just like (my country) Germany. "Made in Germany" was introduced by Britain to mark inferior German copycat products.
Calling copying successful products, methods, inventions "stealing" is a very subjective statement. If you want to see what someone who doesn't "steal" can achieve look at the stories of children that provided the inspiration for the Mowgli story. A more reasonable description of not reinventing the wheel is "being smart".
To me, the impressive thing the China has done is making the technology ubiquitous and commercially successful within China. As a software developer, I don't see a lot of magic in writing applications. I feel confident that I could write a WeChat or a mobile payments platform given enough time. But to convince hundreds of millions of people or thousands of retailers to use it? That is beyond my comprehension.
When I hear about technological prowess, I am expecting things like rockets that land on barges, self driving cars, and even block chains. Not web apps and mobile apps.
China has enough of the pieces in place that I wouldn't be surprised to see some innovations soon that would impress me. But it just hasn't happened yet.
When I hear about technological prowess, I am expecting things like rockets that land on barges, self driving cars, and even block chains. Not web apps and mobile apps.
Most of Chinese people share the same opinion. There are huge resources poured into the areas you mentioned above. Though the progresses made on those fronts in China won't be covered by Western media, until they happened.
"Cutting edge or not, the next century will be driven by China simply because the momentum that they have generated"
(Almost) Nothing is led by China and (almost) nothing ever will.
I remember as a boy the stories of Japan taking over the world in the 1980's. The same will come of China.
The Bubble will burst, and they'll slowly find their way into the world order.
Bar codes? Give me a break.
They've done well with some type of commerce activities wherein the tech facilitated development given their needs (Ali Baba), but that's not really tech.
Everything is copy.
Tell me - what tech does anyone use that was conceived of, developed and made in China?
I think that's not a good example. This isn't an "invention", it's just an obvious engineering solution for a problem. So the reason others don't build buses like that is much more likely because they don't have a problem that can be solved by that design, not that they haven't thought or can't think of such a solution.
Thanks for that. Nifty invention - that nobody uses outside of China.
Meanwhile, talk to any rail car maker in the world, and they'll tell you that as part of the deal they had to sell trains in China, they had to hand over 100% of the IP, research, R&D, plans, schematics. And within 1 year the government had handed over the plans to a state owned competitor who had copied the entire thing from top to bottom.
When we see those nifty trains running over San Francisco, you'll have a point.
As far as I know, the modern trains that I've seen in China seem to be manufactured by Chinese companies.
The technology, if I am not mistaken, were transferred to China by Soviet Union and European companies post WW2 in a legal and friendly manner, i.e., they send their experts here to do manufacturing or China send some people overseas to learn about the technology.
And the same thing happened to Japan if I remember correctly, they were able to "learn" designs from the West and improve on it to build their railway system that is one of the best in the world.
He is not talking about 1980s communist-era trains, he is talking about HSR which was "technology-transferred" wholesale from Japanese and German companies under small-series licensing deals, then eerily similar trains were manufactured en masse locally.
If you have traveled in a Shinkansen in Japan and then been on Chinese HSR, you can see that the HSR interiors are almost identical copies of the Japanese equivalents.
However the key part that China cannot copy from Japan is the human software part, that is the training and service excellence of 50 years of history with hundreds of millions of passenger kilometers of operational history and zero passenger fatalities during operation.
China's HSR has already had multiple fatalities during operation, unfortunately.
"As far as I know, the modern trains that I've seen in China seem to be manufactured by Chinese companies."
Yes - because in order to do business in China, you have to give over your IP to a Chinese company and 'partner' with them to sell there, OR, after you give over your IP someone else gets their hands on it and copies you and you've wasted your time.
China is not an open market, most sectors are heavily protected.
Granted - it's arguably a smart thing for them to do during 'catch up phase' - but you can't remain competitive by doing those things.
Non-Chinese nations should impose tarriffs on all Chinese goods until we can freely sell things there without government interruption.
They can protect their banks, telecoms etc. like every country, but not every consumer good.
The companies that have been successful there are largely consumer retail like restaurants, clothing etc..
Sure they are kicking ass when it comes to money but I honestly don't think that a monolithic app the dominates the entire market is the right path forward for a free and open society.
Well, if you leave out the Lutyens' Delhi, pretty much all of Delhi is like that.
What shocks me the most is that how people here just accept the despicable state of their surroundings and just go on with their lives. I know of folks that own Audis and Mercs, but live next to a dumping yard. Now what is the point of having all that money, when you get see/smell only filth most of your life.
I had visited Delhi for the first time around twenty years ago, and it seems that despite of all the measures like CNG driven public transport and Metro, the situation has only gotten worse.
Unfortunately the political will here is too weak to effect a disruption to the current state.
> I know of folks that own Audis and Mercs, but live next to a dumping yard. Now what is the point of having all that money, when you get see/smell only filth most of your life.
The point is that one gets to compare it against the general population and thereby satisfy one's own ego. Generally, cars are a nice instrument for showing off wealth: they are highly visible.
Homes are another excellent example.
You highlight very well the absurdity of valuing such monetary wealth in a context where it makes little sense.
Problem is overpopulation and less number of cities. Delhi/Mumbai and other metros get weight of the whole country. Unless more metros get created situation won't improve.
I have been living in Delhi for around one year now, and as one of the other comments pointed out, this city is filthy and extremely polluted even by Indian standards (Note: I am an Indian and have traveled to and lived in many Indian Cities).
Here are some things that in my opinion make this one of the worst places to live:
- Filth, Garbage, lack of sanitation. Most of Delhi is filled with garbage. There is Garbage lying everywhere. People throw in out of their cars on roads while driving. People dump plastic bags filled with garbage to nearby streets on a daily basis.
- Pollution. Its monsoon season here in Delhi right now and for the first time in a year, I was able to spot a few stars in the sky last night. The rest of the year, the air is filled with a haze of noxious gases. I have seen vehicles emitting large plume of white smoke and no traffic policeman cares to stop them and ask for their pollution certificate. Garbage dumps mentioned by the OP are literally like mountains with smoke emanating from various parts all the time.
- Lack of space. Ok. There is no space in Delhi. For one to walk or jog.
- Angry culture. I am sad to say that I have never seen more road rage incidents anywhere else. People have very little patience and respect for fellow individuals seems to be missing more often than not.
Delhi resident here. Last winter, I developed severe breathing problems and had coughing fits. The doctor flatly told me "get out if you want to live well".
If they had not detected even once, then your points hold. But they did detect, so the point is that they were able to see? What more do you want? It simply shows that people can sense photons. Maybe not all the time, but sometimes for sure.
Internet has played an important role in developing countries. The western/rich countries may have already reached a kind of plateau of streamlining of services facilitated by Internet, but for the large part of developing world, Internet has started to emerge as a major force only in the last decade or so.
E-commerce, easy/free availability to information/knowledge etc .. are all changing the social and economic landscape in developing countries rapidly and this change is going to continue where there is even a partial political will for it do so.
That is quite strange ...
Here in India, most people own an android. And Radio App is pre-installed in almost all those phones. You just have to plug-in your earphones to start using it. I expected that behavior to be universal.
I spend a couple hours once or twice a month in a used book store. I browse the history, fiction, classics, science/math sections and look for titles that align with what I've been thinking about lately. I also have a mental list of authors that I will buy on sight.
I like the browsing atmosphere of the small bookstore. Also I find it hard to get past all the titles that are currently being hyped if I go to amazon. I read more old books than I do new ones. But if I have a title in mind that I want to buy right away, amazon is my first stop
