@InevtaibleList

Chinese people are much more nationalistic than their government is. If it were a democracy it would have invaded Taiwan long ago.

What a rubbish.

Did you even click the link?

Your quote is not accurate, it is edited.

The entire text is about more (re-)decentralization, more individual autonomy, open source.

Yeah, so to intensify the ‘peace talks,’ the Chinese government should take down its Great Firewall, allowing all non-Chinese apps to be downloaded in the country, and stop censorship. We can then discuss and learn better from each other, the good things and the bad ones, like the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989, forced labour in Xinjiang, or people like Xu Zhiyong, Cao Shunli, and many others.

Let Chinese people download apps from outside China, and ‘peace talks’ will even improve.

(As a personal note: I am really wondering whether the author of this article has ever been to China or knows some Chinese at least. I have been in the country and know a lot of Chinese citizens, but I never felt we needed ‘peace talks’ because we never were at war. Such an assumption, which the article appears to make, is complete rubbish. Such rhetoric comes from governments, not from the people. And in this case, it is particularly the Chinese government that is ‘firewalling’ the country and bombarding its own citizens with propaganda. If governments -in China and elsewhere- would work for the people in developed democracies, we don’t need peace talks as there is no war.)

China Punishes Activists and Families to Quash Dissent, Report Says – (April 2024)

Addition as I have just seen it: Thailand must immediately halt deportation of 48 Uyghurs to China: UN experts - let’s add this issue to the peace talks, right?

[It] will not generate responses about certain topics like Tiananmen Square or Taiwan’s autonomy, as it must “embody core socialist values,” according to Chinese Internet regulations.

China is trying to sell its self-defined “core socialist values” in AI along with other projects, it’s so-called called “AI Capacity Building and Inclusiveness Plan” which is aimed particularly at the Global South.

[Chinese] Government rhetoric draws a direct line between AI exports and existing initiatives to expand China’s influence overseas, such as Xi Jinping’s signature Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and Global Development Initiative (GDI). In this case, the more influence China has over AI overseas, the more it can dictate the technology’s development in other countries […]

[According to the Chinese government] AI must not be used to interfere in another country’s internal affairs — language that the PRC has invoked for as long as it has existed, both to bring nations of the global south on board in China’s ongoing efforts to seize Taiwan and to deflect international criticism of its human rights record […]

China’s decision to co-launch its AI Capacity Building plan with Zambia also had a symbolic element. PRC state media reported that the African nation was the recipient of thousands of Chinese workers and hundreds of millions of RMB in loans in the 1960s, making it the beneficiary of one of China’s earliest overseas infrastructure projects — another thread connecting the latest in AI cooperation with China’s long-held ambitions to lead the developing world, even as it becomes a superpower in its own right. In a 2018 meeting with the Zambian president, Xi said they must jointly “safeguard the common interests of developing countries.” […]

Yeah, I also feel somehow that this news comes 10 years or so too late.

@[email protected]

This new comment is even more ignorant. But feel free to comment what you suggest instead of downplaying this analysis.

Here is a video by Matt Brown analyzing RedNote.

Chinese RedNote App Exposes Sensitive User Data — (18 min, here is an alternative Invidious link)

TLDR: It’s sending most of the app data in cleartext HTTP instead of TLS, while some of the TLS are not done in a secure way. It is true that other social media apps send data back to the servers, but here it appears to be less safe, enabling attackers to do so in transit.

@technocrit

For the few months that I have been here you have been flooding the comms with 1 or 2-sentence messages like this one and literally every single of them conveys one and the same narrative. Are you really this braindead or do you need the 50 cents so urgently for always the same derailed comments?

[Edit typo.]

Now jolly old Elon wants Xitter being allowed in China …

While TikTok is allowed to operate freely in the US, Musk pointed out that his platform, X, is banned in China. Musk stated that the situation is “unbalanced” and added, “Something needs to change."

“One of the most horrible features of war is that all the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.” ― George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia

@bungalowtill

I suggest you read the study before commenting (the link works fine here, but you’ll find it also in the article).

The study finds, among others, that TikTok users exhibited significantly more positive attitudes towards China’s human rights record as reports on forced labour and other human rights violations by the Chinese government are suppressed.

The Chinese government is actively silencing the views of Americans who try to criticize the Chinese government and the Chinese Communist Party, according to the study.

Free speech doesn’t mean that foreign autocratic governments can silence Americans (nor other countries’ citizens) from expressing their opinion in public forums. This is what happens on Tiktok, and, even more so, on Red Note.

There is a recent study on Tiktok and how it compares to Instagram and Youtube – (pdf)

An article about the study says:

The three-level study, which has now been peer-reviewed, looked at TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.

Typing in four politically-loaded key words – “Tiananmen,” “Tibet,” “Uyghur,” and “Xinjiang” – the team first looked at what content the respective algorithms delivered.

The researchers found that while TikTok might not deliver more pro-CCP content, it did deliver less anti-CCP content than the rival platforms. It also, interestingly, delivered more content that researchers say was irrelevant to the keywords.

The team next looked at engagement to see if this explained why anti-CCP content was performing less well. But it found that TikTok users “liked or commented on anti-CCP content nearly four times as much as they liked or commented on pro-CCP content, yet the search algorithm produced nearly three times as much pro-CCP content”. This didn’t happen on Instagram or YouTube.

The last element of the study looked at the impact the content was potentially having on users. The researchers surveyed 1,214 Americans to find information on their social media usage, and their opinion on China’s human rights record. What they found was that the more time users spent on TikTok, the more positive their attitude towards the CCP was.

The researchers came to the damning conclusion that “taken together, the findings from these three studies raise the distinct possibility that TikTok is a vehicle for CCP propaganda.”

Another widely ignored issue regarding Tiktok and other Chinese apps is that European digital rights organization Noyb has filed GDPR complaints against TikTok, AliExpress, SHEIN, Temu, WeChat and Xiaomi for unlawful data transfers to China.

Yeah, a bunch of 2 billion people in the SE Asia.

This is a related comment by a Nigerian author:

Decoding China’s Nigerian Charm Offensive

The pledge of $140 million in military aid and the promise to train 6,000 military personnel across Africa sounds impressive until you do the math. It’s pocket change compared to what China earns from African trade. Yet, we [Nigerians] a’re supposed to see this as a major commitment to African security. Talk about strategic investment on a shoestring budget!

[It is] particularly intriguing that China is supporting Nigeria’s bid for a permanent United Nations (UN) Security Council seat. Don’t get me wrong – we [Nigerians] absolutely deserve that seat. But China’s support comes with strings attached, whether we admit it or not. It’s no coincidence that this backing comes alongside discussions about currency swaps and infrastructure projects. Beijing’s diplomatic support always comes with a price tag.

[…] “Don’t let others bully you – let us protect you instead.” It’s like switching landlords and calling it independence.

What’s particularly noteworthy is China’s support for “Africans addressing African issues in the African way.” Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? But this is coming from the same country that has voting rights in African development banks and significant control over numerous African infrastructure projects. The contradiction is glaring.

The proposed expansion of military cooperation deserves special scrutiny. Yes, we [Nigerians] need all the help we can get in tackling our security challenges. But military aid often comes with hidden costs. Just ask any African country that has ever tried to balance military cooperation with maintaining strategic autonomy.

The details of these agreements [with China] often remain shrouded in secrecy. […]

Other African nations have already learned the hard way that Chinese loans can be a double-edged sword. Just ask our neighbours about their experiences with Chinese debt restructuring. […]

China’s overcapacity (and weak domestic demand) is a well-known fact even if we look at the official Chinese numbers.

[Edit typo.]

@Tolookah

It’s hard to determine in this shemozzle, but this is probably the best part:

The situation reached peak chaos when several influencers attempted damage control using AI-generated Mandarin apologies, which accidentally included the phrase “Taiwan is a sovereign nation” in traditional characters with extra flourishes.

Yes, that’s right. The ~9% is the core inflation. Food prices, for example, are even in the 30% range.

No, they didn’t ‘agree’ on more investment and cooperation, Sri Lanka rather hadn’t any choice as to accept deals whose “specifics […] were not disclosed at the signing ceremony.”

The debt-trap diplomacy seems to work once again.

Sri Lanka’s Dissanayake in Beijing: Why Sri Lanka must look harder at what it’s signing on with China

When Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake meets his host, Chinese President Xi Jinping, at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing […], he may be captivated by the charm of Chinese hospitality. Yet, behind the warm smiles and firm handshakes, he is likely to remain mindful of the immense challenges his country has endured. Beneath the surface of cordiality lies a complex equation that Sri Lanka might find daunting to confront […]

The Hambantota Port deal is the most well-known example, where Sri Lanka leased this strategically vital facility to a Chinese company for 99 years. This agreement highlights the risks tied to such investments. […]

China’s involvement in Sri Lanka’s economy began with grand promises of boosting infrastructure. Projects like the Hambantota Port, Colombo Port City and Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport were introduced as transformative initiatives. However, these projects, funded mostly through high-interest loans, soon exposed their hidden challenges […]

Similarly, the Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport [in Sri Lanka], often called the “world’s emptiest airport”, shows the risks of investing in projects with little economic viability. These initiatives have added to Sri Lanka’s debt, with China holding around 10-15 per cent of the country’s external debt. These investments serve China’s strategic interests more rather than meeting Sri Lanka’s developmental needs […]

The government struggled to access foreign currency reserves to pay off debts and import necessary items leaving the economy in ruins. China’s reluctance to restructure its loans during this time revealed the dangers of relying on unclear financial agreements.

For ordinary people in Sri Lanka, this meant soaring prices, a lack of fuel and medicine and growing frustration across the country. […]

[Edit typo.]

I agree, and I also thought to post it in ‘News,’, but the commodities are needed for things like semiconductors, solar PVs, LED lights, circuitry, … I am unsure. But I would be interested to know what others and the admins and mods say. Please let me know what you think about it and I post such things elsewhere.

@[email protected]

the average American worker has more in common with the average Chinese worker than they do with an American oligarch

The average American worker has also more in common with the average Chinese worker than they do with an American oligarch Chinese oligarch and Chinese dictator. So your argument is not very valid.

all of the American propaganda about how Chinese people are inherently untrustworthy and nefarious is gonna fall apart as people interact with actual Chinese people and realize “oh they’re pretty much just like me, other than the language barrier”.

No one says that Chinese people are worse or better than Americans or any other people on this planet. We’re all the same. The problem here is the dictatorship in China that collects data of Americans and other people around the globe as others in this thread already have said. The Chinese people are fine, the Chinese government is not.