
Trump's WeChat ban threatens Apple's smartphone sales in China - harpratap
https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Technology/Trump-s-WeChat-ban-threatens-Apple-s-smartphone-sales-in-China
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golem14
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.

~~~
analyst74
Would it be legal for American companies to ignore American laws on foreign
land? It doesn't sound plausible

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valuearb
A presidential order is not a law, and if unconstitutional like this one,
never has to be obeyed anywhere.

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reaperducer
_never has to be obeyed anywhere_

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.

~~~
valuearb
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.

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leptoniscool
This is a very short-sighted move, it will lead to lower investments from
China to US in tech and other sectors.

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abc-xyz
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?

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benrbray
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.

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archibaldJ
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.

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aw1621107
> 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.

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mensetmanusman
Hmmm, China bans western companies, but complains when the behavior is
reciprocated.

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amaccuish
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.

~~~
tatrajim
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.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/22/technology/apple-no-
longe...](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/22/technology/apple-no-longer-
immune-to-chinas-scrutiny-of-us-tech-firms.html?_r=1)

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m3kw9
Apple can issue a custom certificate with unlimited installs to sort of side
load it outside AppStore. Similar to enterprise certs.

