Hacker News Reader

Comment by aritmo | Hacker News Reader

It looks like it is more about causing pain to Myanmar than actual spying concerns.

Xiaomi, the Chinese consumer electronics company, which definitely does only consumer products, is restricted from buying microchips. The excuse was an award that was granted by the CCP to the chairman of Xiaomi, a type of award that is given away to 100 people EVERY year.

View on HN

The US government has designated Xiaomi as affiliated with the Chinese military. I know full well that the situation is complicated and there are multiple things going on. However it’s got to be a hair splitting exercise in a totalitarian state, as keeping onside with your overlords requires a degree of cooperation.

http://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/02/01/xiaomi-sues-us-to-overtur...

Xiaomi is very competitive in the consumer electronics and in mobile phones. They are top in sales for mobile phones in many countries. There is an economic war with China that Trump started, and Biden continues.

The ban on Xiaomi is more of an attack as part of the economic war. The supposedly military ties due to a silly award were definitely shoehorned into this.

> The ban on Xiaomi is more of an attack as part of the economic war. The supposedly military ties due to a silly award were definitely shoehorned into this.

Xiaomi's ties to the military are not _only_ expressed in some silly award.

Several of their, and their subsidiaries, have found to have servers operating out of IP ranges generally assigned to China's APT teams and so on. (Several times. Like this one: [0]).

It's worth noting that the reason given for adding them to the list of companies is to prevent the Military/Civilian fusion that is taken as normal when doing business with China. It does not stop them operating in the US - only investment.

[0] https://blog.12security.com/wyze-essay-2-aresflare/

Cause Myanmar Pain?--That is not a reasonable take imo. It is a joint project with Japanese Universities involved. The Myanmar coup is very real, and it is prudent to review these things before making decisions anyway. After your unreasonable take, you segue to an unrelated China point; it feels shoehorned in.

There is, almost by definition, no way to have business in China without cooperating with government. The award is inconsequential.

Every American consumer buys multiple products manufactured in China every week of her life. If this is the standard, we'll all be suspect. Perhaps that's the point...

That seems... High? Does every, or even most people in the US buy non-grocery items every week? AFAIK most food is domestic, and I imagine most if not all the packaging for that is domestic as well.

Sure if you buy semi-durable items: clothes, shoes, electronics, etc.

Clothes and shoes don't even really come from china, either.

There is a substantial difference between buying a product from a company and running one in terms of the relationships the individuals have with government involvement and the impact on directing the company to support said governments agenda.

American tastes aren't totally different from Chinese tastes, but neither are they precisely the same. Very few products could be created in one place and then profitably sold on the other side of the globe without some input from local marketers. If the end consumer is to be spared a McCarthyist show trial, what about the distributor? What about the importer?

Besides, this is silly. Firms operating in China obey Chinese laws for the same reasons that firms operating in USA obey USA laws. If they didn't operate in accordance with local custom, they would not continue to operate. Presumably many manufacturers in China (or USA) could have had a "Are we the baddies?" moment, but if so they are now necessarily no longer manufacturers in China (or USA).

Your fear and distrust of the Chinese government is perfectly rational. Even more rational would be to fear and distrust USA government just as much.

Resorting to whataboutism instead of directly addressing the point I made indicates you are not interested in discussing this in good faith.

"Resorting to whataboutism"? You replied to me, bub. That TPTB in USA and China are eerily similar in their goals and methods is the point of this thread. You may not be tall enough for this ride.

https://theoutline.com/post/8610/united-states-russia-whatab...

Same thing as with Huawei - when USA can't compete technologically, they start competing in... other ways.

This was an independent decision by Japan.

And in fact by a single university, not even the government.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com