Markets are never fully free - ask any US company that has tried to sell to the Chinese market. What we are seeing here is the first truly global Chinese app. The US is grappling with the fact that China makes it very difficult for American companies to access the China market, but the US generally does not do the same for foreign countries. However, maintaining that approach puts US companies in a distinct disadvantage.

> ask any US company that has tried to sell to the Chinese market

Like Boeing, Microsoft, GM, Apple, KFC, McDonalds, Proctor and Gamble GE, Nike, Coca-Cola? They all make billions annually and have dominant marketshare. American companies are everywhere.

Facebook and Google are the only two banned that I know of and it's because they didn't want to follow local regulations.

Here is a list of websites banned in China:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_websites_blocked_in_ma...

>I think America not allowing any Chinese product is not tenable and is a rejection of free markets.

Free markets are a two way street, if one party refuses to participate then why is it not okay for the other party to block them? China refuses to participate by blocking American companies from competing in many Chinese markets and requiring Chine ownership of most companies that are in China. So there already isn't a free market, the US is simply acknowledging that fact and acting accordingly.

American brands are way more prevalent in China than Chinese brands are in US though. 15% of Apple's revenue is from China. 17̀% of Boeing's revenue is from there. China only has a few big brands and it seems like America is quick to ban them for different reasons.

It would not surprise me if China retaliated and blocked american companies from selling in China.

Brands smands, what's behind the sticker? Boeing planes are made in America, but a great many American "brands" aren't.

That is not really relevant though. The point is that while its true that there are some american companies who are not allowed to operate in China, there are many more that are allowed to operate and have a large amounts of revenue from there. Conversely there are very few Chinese companies operating in US, and the successful ones like huawei and bytedance are being shut down by government intervention.

China could easily make the claim that Boeing have strong connections to the US government and using them is a threat to national security.

> That is not really relevant though.

It's at least as relevant as brand penetration is.

>Boeing planes are made in America

Most are, Boeing I believe opened an assembly plant in China a couple years back. Even for the ones assembled in America the components may be built in other nations by subcontractors.

What a bizarre viewpoint. So America should sell off these brands to the highest bidder and focus on companies that only produce and sell in the US? You are totally fine with letting China buy coke and kfc? Both have huge market penetration in China.

This makes no sense.

"Brands Smands" indeed, good luck getting consumers to buy PatriotSoda instead.

It makes no sense that you believe you know my opinion on what America and/or American companies should do when I didn't give my opinion on what American and/or American companies should do. The viewpoint you've ascribed to me seems bizarre to me; I don't recognize it.

Do you know nothing about how China works?

Should we sink to their level though? I'm not sure tit for tat fighting is going to fix anything, it just drags us all down. I'm not saying I have a solution, but I feel there's got to be a better one than the direction we're going.

Isn't Bytedance selling Tiktok to Microsoft the solution? As far as concrete worries are concerned, doesn't that solve everything? But I'm not seeing anybody paying any attention to that.