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Comment by bogomipz | Hacker News Reader

>"I don't think there's any reason for us non-US-Americans to care at all about the US internet. Just like we don't care about pretty much anything else that's happening in the US."

The "US internet" is the same internet that has allowed Google, Youtube, FB et al to flourish. Do you not use any those? Didn't all of those presuppose an open internet?

Can you really divorce Silicon Valley from you refer to as the "US internet"?

Heck even take a non-US tech company like Spotify. Do you think they would have been able to launch in the U.S 6 years ago if they had to pay ISPs not to de-prioritize their bits?

You say we don't really are about whats happening in the US, but presumably you do care what's happening in the US if you are interested in technology and read Hacker News where S.V. as well as other U.S tech company news features quite prominently.

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You do realize that not all technology originates in the US, yeah? The US isn't the center of the world. You don't have a monopoly on technology or IT and in fact, most of it wasn't even conceived in the US or by US inventors.

You need to get off your high horse about "US-America being the greatest country in the world" because it's not.

And to answer your question, no, I don't use Google, nor Youtube and especially not Facebook. I go out of my way to explicitly block them all to protect my privacy.

I didn't say that all tech originate from the U.S, I even referenced a Swedish company in my comment.

I never said the U.S was the greatest country in the world or even implied that. You are projecting. You also seem to have a quite a chip on your shoulder. You have no idea what my nationality is.

That being said please tell me the country that has produced more successful tech companies than the US? Or what country has more available funding for tech startups and the appetite for risk? What country is that if it is not the US? I would like to know.

Let me ask a counter question.

How much innovation in other countries was stifled because of the way the US companies operate?

And to get back to Google and Facebook, these two companies are building walled gardens not unlike the way ISPs in the US operate. They either force the competition out or buy them. They do everything in their power to keep you inside their bubble. In a few years down the road, we may just end up with only the services those companies offer and no alternatives to go to, because everything that threatens their dominance will be suppressed with everything they got.

Just like the US ISPs are doing it and the US government is doing it.

The US getting some of their own medicine certainly isn't a bad thing. Maybe it'll wake them up.

You didn't answer the question, who produces the most successful/influential tech companies if not the US?

>"How much innovation in other countries was stifled because of the way the US companies operate?"

So the reason the US leads in tech is because they have stifled other countries tech development? Can you provide some concrete examples of that?

Maybe you aren't aware but foreign talent is a corner stone of U.S tech. More than a third of top US tech companies(Tesla, Qualcomm, Google, FB to name a few) have founders born born outside the US[1].

This has been discussed many times on HN. So why did those people go to the US and start tech companies? Were they prevented from leaving the U.S and starting companies in their native countries?

In terms of companies building walled-gardens and consolidating market share that is called capitalism and it wasn't invented in the U.S. Additionally nobody is forcing anybody to use any of those platforms. You yourself said you don't use them.

I get it, you are anti-American and your entitled to that. But your statements are really naive and seemed to be informed solely by anger. I find your sense of victimization quite sad.

[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/top-tech-companies-founded-by...

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