whatyoucantsay

It is very surprising users would have even seen a comment buried deep in an old thread within minutes, but it is possible and I'm inclined to believe you in this case (though the next most likely case is a 五毛党 vote brigade). Nothing in the comment was a violation of guidelines, nor was the previous comment at all what it was maligned as.

That said, it's now clear that the very attempt "to voice minority opinions I believe to be true" is counter to the goals of the forum. While they're ideas and issues where one voice has a relative chance of making a difference, they're also very likely to lead to flamewars. It's hard to let go of the human rights issues, especially those I've seen some of first hand, but it's not productive here.

I'd be lying if I said YC's recent moves weren't terrifying, but I'll give up on voicing it in this way.

It's your forum and if you choose rule by law rather than rule of law, I am powerless to improve the situation. In ten years time, if you remember any of this, I hope that you might have a new perspective this topic.

It's hard to imagine HN suppressing any similar story from a similarly credible source about a million people being detained in any predominantly white or English-speaking country.

There's a lot of money for YC to make in China, but this is a million human lives. Please at least try to think about that.

(And yes, the story is certainly drawing flags from Chinese patriots and wumaodang alike)

It's not a good one, though.

> China has its own functioning tech ecosystem, so entrant companies need to play by its rules if they want to make a profit there. Period.

Nazi Germany also had "its own functioning tech ecosystem". So did Stalin and Mao's even more murderous regimes.

Moral obligations don't stop at borders.

It's like talking about "reunifying" Austria with Germany based on the previous borders of the Holy Roman Empire which once contained both.

Beijing is likely far ahead. Beijing's total VC investment is much higher, it accounts for over 1/3 of Chinese domestic VC and Chinese firms have accounted for over 40% of the biotech investment in US drug startups in the beginning of this year.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-18/chinese-m...

How uncharitable of you to write that. I didn't "forget" it. It wasn't relevant to my point. The first line was specific to this situation, but the final two I quoted represent a very universal and timeless position.

In fact, ancient Athens suffered greatly when "silence the voices of the enemies of democracy" became the dominant position in their society:

http://quillette.com/2018/01/25/free-speech-matters/

> Remember, these people are against the idea of democracy.

Oh, the irony of following the one sentence with the other.

That power cannot be underestimated. Consider how the leaders of both China and Russia have overwhelming popular support and poll better than any democratic leaders in the world. Google doesn't have anywhere near the influence over media that the CCP does, but its influence is considerable and its reach is nearly global.

Doubtful. The EU, and France in particular, has been selling China weapons for over a decade.

> Supporting pro-China elements in Taiwan, spending a generation 'educating' (i.e. propaganda) Taiwanese that they are in fact part of 'mainland China', using coercive economic incentives ... I think that Taiwan may ultimately join China through a slightly shady but nevertheless 'legal' popular referendum.

You are ignorant. Taiwanese identification with China has been falling steadily for decades. According to current polling, somewhat less than half would support a declaration of independence and the inevitable conflict that would come with it, but a small single digit percentage are willing to join the PRC.

The entire crux of post WWII US geopolitical strategy rests on a promise to defend Japan, Korea the Philippines, Taiwan and various other territories in exchange for those territories not pursuing nuclear weapons or aggressive military forces of their own. In the very unlikely even that the US chose not to defend Taiwan despite the TRA, Japan, Korea, Thailand and half a dozen other neighboring countries would nuclearize within weeks, days or even hours.

This would be a nightmare scenario not only from the US perspective but also from China's.

And yet trivial compared to what MS, Oracle, AOL, Yahoo and Amazon generated in the 90s (or 80s as well in the case of MS). The best part of Facebook's growth went to founders and accredited investors such as Peter Thiel, not the public markets the wider public could invest in.

A five-bagger is nothing when you're cherry-picking winners.

Network effects.

The growth in fines will likely continue, given their sheer size and the GDPR. YouTube's continued movement away from being a "dumb pipe" and towards a curatorial role may also become a point of regulatory concern.

The NYT has fallen far in the past 5 years. It still clears a higher bar than most print media, but is now a mere simulacrum of journalism.