Chinese reader here. When I was in college about 11 or 12 years ago, a previous version of it is considered as one of our textbooks for the Operating System course. Most assignment and homework is about to add or modify some modules into kernel 0.11.
The most terrible fact about GFW is that it makes people forget they have a chance to access the other part of internet. Most netizens here don't even have a idea to cross it.
Very sad. Though I have an alternative apple account outside CN, prepared for this long time ago, it still brings me some inconvenience. These days you can't trust any mega corp, they will eventually store our (Chinese citizen's) data in CN.
Another explanation is the upcoming 19th National Congress of CCP. Recently many policies have been published to restrict freedom of speech, indicating the leader now might desire another 5 year presidency.
Zhengzhou was a ghost city and hasn't been a capital for more than 2000 years. Its developing to major city in China in the modern sense only begins in 20th century, after the railway traffic prosperous here.
In CHN, lacking of credit card and personal credit records make internet industry find a efficient and fast way to receive payments —— that's why alipay and other third party payment such popular. Although just some Paypal copies in the beginning, they are such behemoths now.
I keep hearing this thing about lack of credit cards in China being one of the reasons Alipay and, later, WeChat payments, took off. But I don't see how credit cards are relevant here.
It takes 15 minutes to open a bank account and get a bank card which can be used at ATMs, POS transactions, and online. 'No credit card' doesn't mean 'no bank card'.
It basically means the lacking of credit systems and mature fraud detections. If you lose your (credit) card or leak your credit card number, the bank won't probably reimburse your financial losses. Compared to credit cards, mobile payments may be more secure.
For example, even in countries like Spain, buying a new car and making payments is a new concept.
Without functioning consumer credit, some industries have a hard time.
A functional credit system is fairly essential.
Alibaba in some ways solved that problem by providing guarantees, escrow-ish stuff. More than anything 'credibility' is the value add in a region wherein there is/was little.
the problem is on the merchant side. if you're selling $1 bowls of noodle in a small town, buying a POS to read cards is pretty darn expensive, the CC fees are expensive, and there is no real incentive to be the first guy on the block with a POS.
Though as a Chinese programmer, I have no doubt we will achieve some great innovation here, the author of this report apparently doesn't know internet industry well, for choosing a bad example. Xu Dandan himself is just a joke here, and himself is widely considered as a bragger.
Ha, you western guys just talk like us. I never think highly of Chinese innovation, there's just pirate. It's much more easier to protect your innovation in west, therefore easier to publish your innovation.
There's pirating, innovation, and both. For instance, the ShinWei processors seem like Alpha rip-offs that got improved way beyond what Alpha did in last models. That's their usual way of doing things: pirate for headstart, then innovate based on labor at least.
The original Red Flag Linux is ended in 2014, due to fail to get government subsidy. This is recorded on both Chinese and English wikipedia. And in later 2014, another company bought the remnant of Red Flag Linux and continued publishing it till now, though I don't know anyone still using it.
