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Comment by manfredo | Hacker News Reader

Politics moves slowly. 10 years is barely more than 1 presidency.

China bans Facebook despite the company offering to comply with censorship/propaganda rules (and Zuckerberg even offering Xi to name his child). The ban is unambiguously due to strategic concerns over a foreign company having access to user data. The change in US policy towards Chinese apps is not retaliation, it's just the US coming to the same conclusion as China that letting rivals foreign powers control media companies is unwise.

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> The ban is unambiguously due to strategic concerns over a foreign company having access to user data

So Europe/India/everyone else should ban US apps? It becomes a slippery slope.

> the US coming to the same conclusion as China that letting rivals foreign powers control media companies is unwise.

If you’re worried about a foreign company manipulating media then put in laws and regulations. That way American companies can be hold accountable to the same standards by other countries as non-American companies and creating a level playing field.

If Europe is concerned that the US is a threat to its collective security they might want to start with getting rid of all our military bases and alliances before worrying about comparatively trivial matters like apps.

These media platforms are unaccountable, they sway electrions, enabled breaches of electoral law in UK referendum, spread popularity of Nazism, etc.

On the other hand i am not aware of any major damage caused by 10K or so troops stationed here or there.

> So Europe/India/everyone else should ban US apps? It becomes a slippery slope.

Are Europe and India concerned by a US company controls popular social media companies? Evidently not enough to ban them, and if in the future if they are then that's their prerogative.

> If you’re worried about a foreign company manipulating media then put in laws and regulations.

They did: The US put laws in place that allows the executive to block commerce when it is deemed a strategic threat. And now those laws are being exercised against a media company controlled by a geopolitical rival.

>> "Zuckerberg even offering Xi to name his child"

Seems like this idiotic move did not win him any favours. Maybe for once they made the right call.

I don't think FB agree to comply the China's Internet data law.

There were negotiation and Zuck showed the flexibility of a seasoned political acting genius (I am sure he will regret this segment in his life eventually). But there were never fully public conformation that FB intends to bend over the law in China.

Please provide a link.

If GB indeed plan to comply the law, then I can assure anyone that Zuck intends to use it's business empire to advance his political ambition. That probably would be worse than Hitler's ascension...

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