But if Chinese social media firms are freely operating in the USA why can't the likes of FB and Twitter be allowed same free access in their market. Let's not see this as harming anybody but this is one of the ways to force China to open up and allow foreign businesses(social media) to spread in their domain. Imagine being forced to open a WeChat account just to chat with someone in China. If this kind of business model is allowed to continue only Chinese companies would thrive in the future.

China does it, so it is okay for us to do it is just a very weak defense of this behaviour for us looking at this from outside of China and the US.

The US stood for free markets, democracy and human rights and (at least) pretended to make international decisions based on those values. Now the fig leaf is gone and it is clear that those are mostly used to make transactions to US benefit even if it comes at the cost to others.

If you value something like free markets, you stand by it even if it comes at a cost in the near future. If opaque TikTok recommendation engines are a problem, maybe regulate them in a way that solves the problem in general? That would hurt Youtube, Facebook and co. but it also would make the EU more comfortable in the negotiation for the Privacy Shield successor.

This is how trade has always worked.

A free market doesn’t exist if a country wants to sell their products cheaply in your country completely untaxed, while taxing your goods to the point of being unattainable. Just like a country can’t reasonably say they deserve unrestrained, free access to your social media market while banning every single product from their country.

A free market means companies compete on their own merits without imbalanced restrictions. This is balancing the restrictions.

US banning Chineese apps is an anti-China move and not an anti-free market move.

An anti free market move would be protecting their own companies against all global competition, irrespective of country.

They are protecting their own companies against all global competition, irrespective of country. It just happens that only China represents a serious threat to US hegemony in this market.

Edit: This comment was being voted positively (+4) until the US folks started to wake up (now sitting at 0) :)

+4 to 0 is not THAT much of a difference to be called out tbh. So not sure if it tells you enough about US folks starting to wake up.

It is both, and in its arbitrary application, it's even worse than a purely anti-free-market move, because it's not even principled. Isolationism and domestic protectionism, if those were the given reasons, would at least be principled.

The principle is that if you are in support of CCP, you get what you preach, and should be treated according to Marxist norms. Free market is for those who respect and support free market and fair competition.

The principle is just whatever Mr. Trump personally sees and understands as being something that hurts him personally or allows him to make a move that projects his personal image of strong man.

The problem is not even the goal, but the shallowness of the approach. He doesn't appear to be surrounded by people who craft comprehensive strategies that he then understands and ponders deeply before hitting the tweet button.

He had plenty of time to organize a cohesive policy to redefine the relationship with China; this all looks like improvised reaction based on a hunch or worse based on rumors that the Tulsa rally was tanked because of a viral video on tiktok.

I'd be happy to be proven wrong, please give me some stand of hope that we're dealing with a super smart 4d chess player that just behaves like an incoherent senile showbiz person. I might not agree with policies but I'd honestly prefer a competent person to this lunacy.

This whole thing is surreal. We have a chaos-monkey pulling the strings on global economy and order, and we're discussing whether he may or may not have a point on some things. He clearly has a point on something now and then. A random number generator would resonate with parts of the populace even more.

By that logic the US should ban transactions related to oil and gas supplies originating from OPEC countries.

The modern CCP bears zero resemblance to 19th-century Marxist theory.

This is how realpolitik works.

The U.S. was unique for a long time in that they did not ask for much in return for what they did, because they wanted the power (troop deployments in Europe, Hong Kong customs status, etc.).

Recently, Canada used tit-for-tat to deal with U.S. aluminum tariffs, but they're the "nice" country. This is how it all works.

It's a challenging situation a lot like freedom of speech and tolerance. The intolerant people who want to remove freedom of speech are given the freedoms to make those arguments.

I tend to think in the trade situation, it's best to play the long game and try and stay open. Once both sides start banning each other, then it's probably never turning around without some significant leverage gain by one of the parties.

> China does it, so it is okay for us to do it is just a very weak defense of this behaviour for us looking at this from outside of China and the US.

Hardly. Reciprocity is common place in all manners of international relations, be it trade, visas/travel, embassy restrictions, and even warfare. The fact that China has been allowed to conduct themselves this way with little to no retaliation is the outlier, not these new actions.

> China does it, so it is okay for us to do it is just a very weak defense of this behaviour for us looking at this from outside of China and the US.

This is how trade relationships work.

If china puts a tariff on us, for corn, or steel, or whatever, then the US is going to put the same exact corn/steel tariff on them.

Reciprocity is a foundational premise of trade relations.

> The US stood for free markets

We have tariffs against many countries for many different reasons... This is nothing new. That is just how trade relations work.

>We have tariffs against many countries for many different reasons... This is nothing new. That is just how trade relations work.

That's not trade, it's politics. Any economist would point out that tariffs hurt Americans by increasing the prices they pay. Yeah, let's teach those Chinese a lesson by making goods more expensive and reducing our standard of living!

I used to be on this train that tariffs are always bad, but when other countries have them I think there is a benefit to the US having them. It allows the US to capture some of the benefits that this other country is taking. Yes everyone is worse off than without tariffs, but the US is slightly better off from the world where only other countries have them. There is also the additional caveat of industries moving to other countries because of cheap export back to the US - there is a benefit to keeping people employed especially when other countries don’t have ethical labor laws. This results in more expensive goods, but prices in externalities like workers not working in sweatshops.

> That's not trade, it's politics

Exactly the words you should be addressing to CCP, as the modern mainland China is not involved in fair trade, doesn't respect IP laws, and doesn't treat US companies equally on its territory.

In this situation we would be taking one of their companies though, which benefits Americans.

A US company recieves this company, and we get it for cheap.

Agreed.

It's the China government started the trend of banning apps from foreign countries so that their own companies can grow and spread outside China.

I see this ban as a late but fair move.

> I see this ban as a late but fair move.

Governments ban apps at will? Sounds like a Communist Regime move.

>> I see this ban as a late but fair move.

A late but fair move to achieve what, exactly?

Reduce CCP's influence on the world.

Wouldn't that lead to USA having more influence, in the world? When it comes to such things as surveillance, I'm not sure they're any better. Behind, yes, but not by choice and not by far, either.

Pretty sure that's a goal of the US. Regarding surveillance of own citizens China is on a whole different level at the moment which is crazy considering the US is basically a lost cause in that regard too. Everywhere is if we're to be honest with ourselves.

CCP basically equals China and for most intents and purposes, Chinese people. Limiting their influence is just a way of saying to limit the rise and influence of China and the companies/people there, because there's no way for any Chinese person or company that has vested interests in the market there to escape the accusations and comply with any demands from the West except to completely cease operation of business there. Any person from China, or company from China, can simply be canceled by saying "they are a subject of the communist party."

China is far older than the cancer of the CCP and the Chinese people will cut that cancer out eventually. The CCP have been doing it to everyone else and their own for years. The difference is they go to far greater extremes to cancel everything and everyone who doesn't tow the party line. They deserve what's coming to them.

Regardless of how or why, the CCP has majority support by its citizens, even if you as a foreign national disagree. Even if they do not have democracy, they can still vote with their complacency.

How do we have any way of knowing this when punishment for dissent is so severe?

Nope. You don’t get to use false equivalence to conflate CCP with all Chinese people. You can’t equate adversity towards the Communist Party as an attack on all Chinese people. It’s sad that their government has such authoritarian control that it works that way, but it’s the Chinese people’s problem to solve if their government causes unacceptable consequences for them.

Maybe to show benefits of natural law.

What are the benefits? In this context they are not clear to me.

"If you punch me in the face then, later, I'll punch _you_ in the face".

This type of behavior may be par for the course in USA but how is it good for humanity?

May I offer my apologies for saying the USA act violent and dominant. You're not all violent and dominant. I'm sorry. Friends?

I've been asking the same question about Black Lives Matter causing hundreds of millions of dollars in property damage.

“Tit for tat”.

Not saying whether I agree or not, just saying that it is, according to at least some people, a reason in and of itself.

Yeah, show them the power of the free world by checks notes banning all their apps, which is only constitutionally possible because the app stores are controlled by two American companies, and the ban technically works on the companies rather than banning the apps directly, proving the value of a sophisticated Western legal system!!!

You can't show them anything anyway, it's all censored there.

What do two companies have to do with constitutionality?

This is just wishful thinking in the current situation. Don’t expect Chinese government to reverse what it has been doing for years in this political shitshow. Chinese living in US are unfortunately sandwiched in the between and helpless.

I recall that FB, Twitter, and Google were all available in China at one point, but they left because they didn’t want to follow China’s information and data laws.

yeah and fb and google still have ads revenue from China

The problem is lack of use of open protocols, not any single company in particular.

Having to sign up with FB or Google to be able to chat with people there is really no different to me (and it was not always the case in case of Goolgle). At least in case of Google, I can still send e-mails to Google accounts from anywhere.

This business model was allowed to continue in US, and now I can't communicate with Google users as I could in the past via jabber.

And how does following suit not in fact ratify the business model because now banning on security grounds is legitimate? (Note that nowhere is the justification or condition stated to be one of reciprocal market access.) Isn't it interesting that there are laws on the books and authority vested in a single man to do this already? If this isn't struck down by the courts, then it just shows to the world, not for the first time, that America's vaunted values are a pretty thin veneer, conveniently discarded when it suits.

This is nonsensical. Even if China bans American social media apps for no reason, that's no reason for us to copy their authoritarian, speech-suppressing tactics.

That being said, China levies rules on foreign companies that are levied across all companies, and some foreign companies don't want to play by those rules. That's totally different from an outright ban based on "national security." Just think about it, how is Wechat/TikTok supposed to even comply with US demands? It's clearly a political move. Plus, Wechat users in American know they're being watched by the communist party, whereas Facebook users don't even know how much they're being watched by the US government...

> Even if China bans American social media apps for no reason, that's no reason for us to copy their authoritarian, speech-suppressing tactics.

There absolutely is a valid reason to be authoritarian towards authoritarians. They get what they preach and deserve. It is the same principle of morality of an action of self-defense, when a physical force is applied on those who initiated a physical force in the first place.

It's not going to work. It's just going to cut off Chinese in America from talking to their friends and family. Evil.

US companies are not forbidden to operate, they don't want to comply with Chinese surveillance laws... Apple who decided to comply indirectly by letting a Chinese company manage the data, is offering all their services there.

This is a public image question for Western world companies more than anything.

The whole reason Apple let a Chinese company manage their customers' data is because the Chinese government changed the law to forbid them operate those kind of cloud services for Chinese customers themselves, the same reason other companies like Amazon have to let Chinese companies run their version of AWS: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-apple-icloud-insigh...

"In a statement, Apple said it had to comply with recently introduced Chinese laws that require cloud services offered to Chinese citizens be operated by Chinese companies and that the data be stored in China. It said that while the company’s values don’t change in different parts of the world, it is subject to each country’s laws."

Also note how the Chinese government effectively set up and runs this company, so the government more or less forced Apple to give their Chinese operations to them.

I guess, like China, USA is becoming authoritarian state. It is not about reciprocity. USA was considered the beacon of success and role model compared to China. Recent actions by USA justify other countries to do the same against foreign products and services. USA has no leg to stand on when other countries block US products and services. Good luck creating new Apple, Google, and Facebook scale companies.

Maybe the 36,000 US troops in Germany?

EU countries don't get to have "national security" that conflicts with the US to more than a trivial extent, like the Airbus/Boeing conflict. That's been a tradeoff that was accepted since the end of WW2. The US now complains about Europe not having strong militaries, having forgotten that for decades it was policy to discourage Europe from having strong militaries in case that started another war.

The US and China only get to play the national security card like this because of a high degree of conventional military and economic power.

> Maybe the 36,000 US troops in Germany?

Do german people really care about those? (besides the obvious economic benefits in the towns where those troops are stationed due to local spending)

I always thought it benefited the US more than germany (easier access to eastern europe and middle east).

My point was that any consideration of the US as a "national security threat" to Germany should take into account the physical national security and ask what national security actually means when there are troops from the other country stationed in yours (along with their associated CIA listening posts etc). It makes it very hard to suddenly treat the US as a hostile power. "The cars have to go but the troops can stay" is obviously nonsense.

I think GP meant to imply that parts of the EU are effectively still US client states and not totally void of US influence on their politics. It's pretty common for top politicians in Germany to be part of some transatlantic organisation set up by the US ("Atlantikbrücke", ...). Same goes for journalists in leading news papers, which will result in more favourable US press coverage.

Germany has the largest overseas hospital for Americans. Its an extremely important strategic resource.

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

Not really, Trump wants to pull over 10.000 troops out of Germany because of an oil pipeline deal with Russia. The public opinion pretty much is that, while he's at it, he should also take his bombs with him. But the public opinion probably not is the best deal politically.

The plan is to relocate them to other bases in Europe (mainly Italy and Belgium) so in the big picture it really doesn't matter.

Germans are actually happy that Trump wants to remove US troops.

The fact that we are allies with Germany and that the US probably buys a lot more from Germany than Germany buys from the US.

With China, well, they are already blocking lots of American software companies so this would be more of a proportional response than anything else.

US buys from Germany because German products are on average better than US products. Nothing else.

proportional? China gave a clear path forward to those companies if they want to operate in China (setting up severs in China, complying local laws, etc..) They chose not to do so and left. Did US gave any clear path how these tech companies can continue operate in the US other than selling themselves and giving the goverment a commission?

> proportional? China gave a clear path forward to those companies if they want to operate in China (setting up severs in China, complying local laws, etc..) They chose not to do so and left. Did US gave any clear path how these tech companies can continue operate in the US other than selling themselves and giving the goverment a commission?

The real question is, why did the West went along with that bad deal at first place and allowed China into the WTO under these conditions. It was extremely short sighted.

Because China was a poor country back then but had the potential to become a huge market. China was given all sorts of advantages to allow it to develop its economy on the hope that western companies could do business there. China is now a fully developed country (well, the cities are at least), yet it still retains the same economic advantages but market access is still a carrot they dangle before western companies.

Because it was actually a very good deal for the West, contrary to all the gnashing of teeth one hears.

China had to carry out massive economic reforms in order to join the WTO, such as the privatization or splitting up of many state-owned enterprises, large reductions in tariffs, opening up of many sectors to foreign investment, the creation of a legal system to protect IP, and much more. Moreover, China joined under unusual terms that allowed other countries to more easily retaliate against China - sort of a probationary status.

Western companies did extremely well in this relationship. Much of the growth in the West over the past few decades is thanks to China's opening-up.

you left out the parts about having to operate via a chinese 'partner' and having to transfer your IP to that partner (full source code)

Isn't that similar to the requirements[1] placed on Huawei in the UK if they want to sell any network equipment? Everything must be inspected and overseen by GCHQ.

[1] https://www.wired.co.uk/article/huawei-gchq-security-evaluat...

No, one is oversight and due diligence, the other is IP transfer so that your company can be cloned and then be given whatever resources needed from shady banks so that they can put you out of business.

Depends, do UK companies have a long history of stealing IP from outside companies and profiting off that IP with no repercussions from the UK gov?

this is a lie. I work for AWS and directly work with the partner in China. They do not get our source code, we build supporting tools for them to operate our software. I repeat, they do not get our source code.

AWS must have the means to bribe the right people then. GCP does not work in China at all.

Saying that the US companies chose not to obey China laws, etc is simplifying the situation dramatically in favour of China. In this case, don't the Chinese laws include a requirement for a Chinese "partner" company and obligations towards IP transfer? These requirements don't sound like a fair arrangement to me and, as far as I know, there are no comparable requirements in the US on foreign companies.

At least for fb and google, not the case.

Path that is harmful and injurious to conscience and business is worse than daylight robbery.

Being allys with the US is a special thing though. Just the other day the US threatened "crushing legal and economic sanctions" against a German port for being involved in North Stream 2.

"The US argues that the pipeline will increase Europe's dependence on Russia, which both Berlin and Moscow dispute. The US proposes selling European's American natural gas shipped across the Atlantic as an alternative."

But a greater dependency on the US is fine of course. The, as a champion of free trade, should be happy about more competition right?

This is not proportional at all. That you agree or not on Chinese laws is one thing, having to abide to the country laws makes sense. Being a us company doesn't grant a bypass card. To abide to an arbitrary decision based on nothing because the company is chinese is something quite different. The Chinese government would do this on Apple, for example, i'm quite sure it would create quite an outrage.

TBH I can see how Tesla could be labelled that, and if it was a Chinese company I'd suspect it would eventually, the spying potential from all those streaming cameras and AI without any insight or oversight of the process.

Germany is in bed with the US, especially the secret service.

Not sure how long Germany, or Europe for that matter, remains in bed with US. The current administration is isolationist and if the future ones adopt the same policies, we might see a decoupling of Europe and USA. Won't happen overnight but if I were a gambling man, I would wager on it.

I don't think after all this we can go back to the old world order.

I think a big part in this story will be Brexit and how much UK turns to US for trade partnership and how much friction that causes over EU industry interest groups.

> What's stopping Volkswagen from lobbying Germany to ban Teslas because all the cameras in it pose a "national security risk"?

Nothing. And it would not surprise me if Germany did it or at least put up a lot of barriers to help Volkswagen.

Hence Tesla is building the Berlin Giga.

It's not so much against straight out bans, but against Germany lobbying for all sorts of regulations in the EU to limit Tesla's market access.

With Tesla now having a huge factory in Germany, suddenly Germany will lobby in favor of Tesla.

Didn't people understand from the start that this was the primary reason why Musk chose Germany?

Well Tesla's sentry mode and sensor suite that is connected to the internet could actually pose a massive security risk. I wouldn't be surprised if they were banned from entering military installations and other sensitive areas, not that Germany has that many of them that aren't open to US military personnel.

Already happening in USA

https://forums.tesla.com/discussion/171515/not-allowing-tesl...

> This is, by all account, a shortsighted move

Politicians tend to be shortsighted (reelection, next term). That's partly why not enough has happened (or will happen, under this political paradigm) when it comes to the environmental issues our habitat is facing.

I'm not sure that having dash cam footage is analogous to having access to private conversations to the degree of a social media company.

In some ways, it is worse. At least the participants in a social media chat are volunteers. Cameras everywhere in cars with uploads to a central facility could be used to spy on the general public without their knowledge or consent.

Some people will probably argue at this point that there is no right to privacy in a public place. I disagree on both moral and pragmatic grounds with such an absolute statement in light of modern technologies and what privacy means (or should mean) now, but more importantly, the culture and laws in some parts of the world disagree too.

Restricting uploads of dash cam footage would be a rational response to that situation.

Dashcams are already regulated in Germany and Austria. People have been ticketed for always on dash cams; only those that are triggered activated (button pushed or shock detected) are allowed. (And yes, I know they use a buffer)

And even without that, there are other laws that would make it illegal for Tesla to just download cam footage without solid reasons. Hell even GDPR would apply, as it would contain personal information (license plates), and the penalties are severe ("€10 million, or 2% of the firm’s worldwide annual revenue from the preceding financial year, whichever amount is higher").

The understanding that the US would respond in kind by banning the import of VW Group vehicles or putting a very high tariff on them. In any case it wouldn’t be in Germany’s interest with the new Tesla factory going up there.

That's comparing apples and elephants. Also, there are already laws in Germany about how long such images may be stored and how they may be used.

They declared the touch controls for the windshield wipers a distraction, so that they can fine Tesla owners for using it. In my opinion, creating liability for the buyer will be much more effective than trying to battle Tesla directly. So they are taking action to protect their local car industry.

It's just that as long as the power dynamic is that Trump looks like a stubborn toddler while Merkel is the responsible parent, the US won't be able to do much about Tesla taking a hit. Plus, I'm not sure how much Trump likes Musk... so maybe he's willingly accepting it.

I think a better comparison/scenario is the PI data hoovering cadre of US SM companies.

The difference is that Tesla isn't headquartered in a communist nation that has the ability to take complete control of all business decisions.

Also, Tesla doesn't have 80 million monthly active users in Germany who are young & impressionable.

The US is stopping Germany from banning Teslas, it's a matter of power. The US wouldn't be acting that way if they weren't a military super power, and they certainly wouldn't accept it if anyone acted that way towards them unless that country has nukes.