It would be trivial for the admin to say that Apple only has to block wechat from the US app store, and trivial for Apple to implement it. There's little to gain from blocking wechat in china, so I don't think they will cut in their own flesh.
Unless there are ways (via VPN etc) to temporarily switch a phone to the Chinese appstore and install wechat for a US phone this way.
Can't you set up some sort of foreign subsidiary to do it for you? Apple already uses this model for storing icloud data in china, to comply with chinese laws.
I am willing to bet the App Store is an Ireland based entity with contracts back to Apple to provide service aka generate expenses for Apple's US entity. That way Apple can book all the app store revenue in Ireland.
You have it backwards, law enforcement has to go to court to attempt to have WeChat removed from Apple devices. They can’t just confiscate random iPhones to scrape it off their storage, and they aren’t bursting into Apple HQ to force its removal from their servers.
It depends on how intense the law/sanctions are. Example, no US company can trade/do business with Iran,even indirectly. The Trump administration also made it difficult for other countries to do business with Iran, makes it almost impossible for any other country to business with them.Hence, Iran's economy is in the toilet, and it can only trade with Russia, China and the middle eastern countries they have high-influence over(which are typically poor). Their oil can be sold to western countries, due to OPEC, but money that ends up in foreign accounts are inaccessible.
Plus, most of Trump's policies of late with China has to do with the new Silk Road. The new Silk Road is seeing China expand(land grabs) into other countries, and take over strategic points. Since, a lot of China's economy is from foreign trade, the more US makes trade difficult the harder it is for China to expand. Time, will tell if this strategy works or not, when China becomes the #1 superpower/economy in the world(speculation, but is looking more likely).
People regularly go to prison for violating US trade sanctions. The majority of Apple's employees including all of their executives are in the US and easy to find. I doubt any of them are volunteering to test the boundaries of US trade sanctions.
While the administration could say that Apple only has to block wechat from the US app store, it's not what they have done and they have not indicated that they want to go that way; the currently announced prohibition, as far as I understand, would prohibit Apple to support WeChat anywhere no matter if it allows installing WeChat for a US phone this way or not.
... because the current admin is not exactly in the habit of thinking ahead. I see no reason they intentionally want to hurt the goose laying golden eggs. I’d be happy to learn valid reasons why though.
You just described the past few decades of the whole of the DC elites thinking about China. The goose is a Trojan horse as any idiot can see. Sell out the future of democracy to keep apple stock price soaring. Short sighted indeed.
Did you watch the Senate hearing with the tech CEOs? Half were more concerned about “big tech being mean to conservatives” than they were about doing anything “for Democracy”.
And then you had the one representative grilling Zuckerberg about Twitter’s policies.
Haha. But yes, maybe, even if it's sad to see the US government at the level of a 6 year old.
Well there's 45 days to lobby. Apple will be inconvenienced even by Americans with Chinese background and iphones. A large chunk of them switching to rooted Android versions will not be good news to Apple (or Google, for that matter.) And I think they will, seeing how dependent many are on weChat.
I doubt he is not thinking ahead. Just seeing jobs start to come back to US when the previous one claimed no magic wand can do it already indicate the orange man are no ordinary tactician. He ended ISIS just by bombing them to hell while the previous with a Nobel, free helicopterloads of money and 2 terms couldn't. Look at the outcome. If the ends is good, the means may not be that stupid as you might perceived. The guy able to do Art of War even better than the people who read it as part of national educational syllabus since young.
The administration has not let constitutional limitations hinder any of their decisions.
The problem with Constitutional "authority" is that it relies on good faith, as the government is really just policing itself. If a President asks 'who is going to stop me?', they will quickly find out the answer is 'nobody.'
Which was the problem many people foresaw when the last administration did it. They set the precedent, or pushed at its boundaries. "If they can do it... so can we..." It's the main problem with any governmental structure. If it exists, sooner or later it's bound to cut in what we consider the wrong direction.
Cook has already kissed the Golden Ring with the “Apple is building Mac Pros in the USA” [1] photo ops where Cook stood silently by while Trump exaggerated what Apple is doing. Cook can easily get that limited to the US.
Besides, Apple is isn’t in the same boat as Google or Facebook where Trump is targeting because Apple is “unfair to conservatives” nor does he have the personal animosity he has toward Amazon because Bezos owns the Washington Post.
[1] Apple is only doing final assembly of MacPros designated for the US in the US. They are doing the same thing in other countries so they can say they are manufacturing Mac Pros in their country.
Does that mean western organizations will finally stop censoring western people living in western countries? Will they finally stop banning people for voicing support for democracy in Hong Kong? Or for condemning concentration camps in Xinjiang? Will they finally stop ruining their products in their attempt to be granted access to the Chinese market? Will western employees finally be able to ‘like’ a tweet thanking their company for listing Tibet, Hong Kong and Taiwan on their website without being fired?
I sure hope so. I have not agreed with this administration on hardly anything else, but I agree with this. The United States has its own dark history of censorship and oppression, but authoritarianism poses an even bigger threat.
At the moment, China is a huge market for technology and entertainment, and companies who refuse to do business with them, accept investments from them, etc. on moral grounds clearly cannot compete with companies who are willing to bend over backwards for the chance to dip their hands in the infinite money bucket.
We cannot let an authoritarian government exert so much control over our technology, movies, television, games, and social media. If we do, democracy is already lost.
you are not `long`-sighted either, once you get all these CCP money, then you have to bend your knees to china whenever they demand. just like Hollywood, NBA...etc.
This is meaningless. If Wechat is really banned Tencent (or a shell company owned by Tencent) will just spring up another app with a different name that connects to the same data centers and put it on the App Store. Wechat is pretty much the RPC-equivalence of Facebook+Whatsapp with Paypal integrated, used by pretty much everyone on the mainland as well as RPC who are overseas but still want or need to be part of the social networks, or just anyone that wants or needs to do business with people in China.
If people actually believe enforcing a ban like this will in any way hurt Tencent or CCP then that is just ridiculous. This will only accelerate the already growing Anti-American sentiment in China. And the new Wechat app with a different name will be out maybe in a week or something.
Wechat is a very different case as compared to TikTok with vastly different use cases and user groups. The reasons behind why people use the two apps are fundamentally different.
> If Wechat is really banned Tencent (or a shell company owned by Tencent) will just spring up another app with a different name that connects to the same data centers and put it on the App Store.
IIRC the executive order doesn't address WeChat/TikTok directly, but instead forbids interactions with their parent companies. I think this means that the ban can't be worked around by just reskinning the app. Not sure how it would work with shell companies, though.
Whenever someone says this, I ask them which companies are banned (far fewer than many Westerners seem to think), and point out that Western companies are far more ubiquitous in China than vice versa.
I think we're talking about Google, Facebook and gaming consoles.
Do you really think that is a strong argument? We're cutting some Chinese companies out for some reasons, some of which are privacy, some of which are ideological (protectionist/privacy), some of which are petty. They cut some western companies out for some reasons, some of which are content based, some of which are ideological (content/privacy), some of which are petty.
No, they are being cut out because they are owned by Communists who have over a million people in forced re-education camps and have ambitions of replacing the US as the global superpower.
No, this article is not about that. WeChat ban is about national security - privacy, because Americans are having their data mined.
The only sanctions levied because "they are owned by Communists who have over a million people in forced re-education camps" have been on 11 Chinese suppliers that have been barred from obtaining some US licenses.
So you have to accept that pretty absolutely nothing is happening because of that, and thats what you are going to have to tell your children when they are old enough to ask.
Yes, because it gets to the central misconception that these discussions always begin with: that Western companies somehow can't operate in China.
If we begin from an understanding of the actual situation - that Western companies have a massive presence in China, far beyond the presence that Chinese companies have in the West - then we can have a conversation. But these conversations almost always begin from the exact opposite premise.
China doesn't ban western companies because they're western, but because they refuse to follow local laws. LinkedIn and Bing show that when a company follows local laws, it can operate.
WeChat and TikTok are being banned simply because they are Chinese.
As in when Apple iTunes movies and books were suddenly shut down in China after six months of legal operation, with no explanation?
If you're Chinese, you'll appreciate the casual contempt openly expressed in the frequently referenced epithet "laiwai" 老外. And ask any foreign businessman in China if they're discriminated against.
The problem isn't that banning WeChat and TikTok hurts China.
The problem is that it hurts America and Americans.
It hurts Americans that want to use these apps, and it hurts Americans that work at these companies (TikTok has a lot of American employees). It also has broader ramifications (damages the rule of law, dis-incentivizes foreign investment in the U.S., and so on).
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 126 ms ] threadUnless there are ways (via VPN etc) to temporarily switch a phone to the Chinese appstore and install wechat for a US phone this way.
That's not how it works. It has to be obeyed until invalidated by a court.
You can't just tell a law enforcement agency, "I know the president said x, but that's unconstitutional."
Law enforcement is not lawyers, or constitutional scholars. That's for the judiciary to sort out.
Plus, most of Trump's policies of late with China has to do with the new Silk Road. The new Silk Road is seeing China expand(land grabs) into other countries, and take over strategic points. Since, a lot of China's economy is from foreign trade, the more US makes trade difficult the harder it is for China to expand. Time, will tell if this strategy works or not, when China becomes the #1 superpower/economy in the world(speculation, but is looking more likely).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belt_and_Road_Initiative
And then you had the one representative grilling Zuckerberg about Twitter’s policies.
the moral of the story was that the Greeks brought the horse to Troy, I'm unsure how forcing Apple to exist the Chinese market helps the US?
It makes them feel powerful. So there's at least one reason.
Well there's 45 days to lobby. Apple will be inconvenienced even by Americans with Chinese background and iphones. A large chunk of them switching to rooted Android versions will not be good news to Apple (or Google, for that matter.) And I think they will, seeing how dependent many are on weChat.
Who is going to reign him? The Senate? Federal judges who he appointed?
The problem with Constitutional "authority" is that it relies on good faith, as the government is really just policing itself. If a President asks 'who is going to stop me?', they will quickly find out the answer is 'nobody.'
International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA)
the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.)
section 301 of title 3, United States Code
Besides, Apple is isn’t in the same boat as Google or Facebook where Trump is targeting because Apple is “unfair to conservatives” nor does he have the personal animosity he has toward Amazon because Bezos owns the Washington Post.
[1] Apple is only doing final assembly of MacPros designated for the US in the US. They are doing the same thing in other countries so they can say they are manufacturing Mac Pros in their country.
At the moment, China is a huge market for technology and entertainment, and companies who refuse to do business with them, accept investments from them, etc. on moral grounds clearly cannot compete with companies who are willing to bend over backwards for the chance to dip their hands in the infinite money bucket.
We cannot let an authoritarian government exert so much control over our technology, movies, television, games, and social media. If we do, democracy is already lost.
For me, the big test will be the NBA.
It has stated that it will allow players to display social justice messages on their jerseys. It has also punished people for supporting Hong Kong.
If I had a million dollars, I'd pay some big name basketball star to put "Free Hong Kong" on his jersey, just to watch the fireworks.
If people actually believe enforcing a ban like this will in any way hurt Tencent or CCP then that is just ridiculous. This will only accelerate the already growing Anti-American sentiment in China. And the new Wechat app with a different name will be out maybe in a week or something.
Wechat is a very different case as compared to TikTok with vastly different use cases and user groups. The reasons behind why people use the two apps are fundamentally different.
IIRC the executive order doesn't address WeChat/TikTok directly, but instead forbids interactions with their parent companies. I think this means that the ban can't be worked around by just reskinning the app. Not sure how it would work with shell companies, though.
Except at Wal-Mart. Where non-Chinese goods are so rare they get special labels and promotion.
Do you really think that is a strong argument? We're cutting some Chinese companies out for some reasons, some of which are privacy, some of which are ideological (protectionist/privacy), some of which are petty. They cut some western companies out for some reasons, some of which are content based, some of which are ideological (content/privacy), some of which are petty.
The only sanctions levied because "they are owned by Communists who have over a million people in forced re-education camps" have been on 11 Chinese suppliers that have been barred from obtaining some US licenses.
So you have to accept that pretty absolutely nothing is happening because of that, and thats what you are going to have to tell your children when they are old enough to ask.
If we begin from an understanding of the actual situation - that Western companies have a massive presence in China, far beyond the presence that Chinese companies have in the West - then we can have a conversation. But these conversations almost always begin from the exact opposite premise.
WeChat and TikTok are being banned simply because they are Chinese.
That is against the law in the U.S.
e.g. https://citizenlab.ca/2020/05/we-chat-they-watch/
If you're Chinese, you'll appreciate the casual contempt openly expressed in the frequently referenced epithet "laiwai" 老外. And ask any foreign businessman in China if they're discriminated against.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/22/technology/apple-no-longe...
The problem is that it hurts America and Americans.
It hurts Americans that want to use these apps, and it hurts Americans that work at these companies (TikTok has a lot of American employees). It also has broader ramifications (damages the rule of law, dis-incentivizes foreign investment in the U.S., and so on).
https://citizenlab.ca/2020/05/we-chat-they-watch/