Written April 2010
by Cliff Feldwick
OK, so is this an economic story, a political one, or about technology? Like many things, they are often intertwined – the whole idea of a “global economy” wouldn’t work if we still had to send a letter to a supplier in China or Indonesia and wait weeks for its return. And information has been used to free people (the news that borders were open led to the fall of the Berlin wall) and confuse them (hacking of each other’s news systems during the recent Georgia-Russia flare-up).
It may end up being a business story. For instance, if you had a customer who produced about 1% of your revenue with little real potential for growth, but was a constant pain in the rear, would you consider kissing them good-bye? I have, and boy is it fun. As an accountant once told me, “You know you’ve made it when you can fire your first client”.
China has always produced split reactions among people trying to penetrate its markets. There is the old story about two salesmen arriving decades ago who were selling oranges. One cabled back “Bad news – no one here eats oranges”. The other cabled back “Great news – no one here eats oranges yet!” So it has been – the great potential of 1.3 billion people has always mesmerized companies seeking to grow – what if we could get just a teeny bit of that market? Wow!
What we may be seeing here is confusion between capitalism and democracy. Many people use them interchangeably, but China may be the best example of why that’s not true. No one would call China democratic – suppression and constant control are their mantra and you better believe it. But they also promote capitalism at its most robust – just go to www.madeinchina.com and browse around among the 6,006,865 items listed if you doubt that. Its also capitalism at its most unregulated – note that a Beatles Remastered Stereo set can be had for $41.48 and wonder whose basement workshop that came from.
Freedom strikes
So Google has decided to not follow China’s suppressive instructions in order to remain there. No censoring of results (China will probably do a pretty good job of that anyway with its own firewalls) and a willingness to walk away if necessary. The temporary fix of moving its servers to Hong Kong will no doubt collapse by the time you read this, and so Google will move on.
Anyone who wonders why I (among others) calls Microsoft “the Evil Empire”, by the way, need only look at their response to this – they have publically announced that they intend to do business there no matter what, and complying with whatever missives the Chinese government imposes will be accepted. In what may be one of the few bipartisan responses to anything lately, Senators from both parties have expressed anger at Microsoft’s willingness to bend over. Maybe MS thinks this is one market where Bing can pick up market share. Doubtful.
Google is pretty lonely on this. Of the major computer/software players, only GoDaddy seems to side with them. GoDaddy has refused to register any more domain names there since China asked it to collect photographs of people requesting a name. Talk about repression at its finest. Certainly any hardware manufacturer of any size whatever has manufacturing facilities there and wants all this to go away. Yet just last year a united front by computer makers, backed by the US government, caused China to back off its requirement to build in a censoring chip called Green Dam on all PC’s sold there. Shows you what standing up can (at least occasionally) do.
Hey, wait a minute. Business Week has reported that Dell CEO Michael Dell was talking with India’s Prime Minister and mentioned that they may be looking for a “safer environment” for manufacturing. This came out a day after the Google move to Hong Kong. Not shabby – Dell currently spends about $25 billion for components from China. Of course, the next day everyone denied it and the Prime Minister’s speech heralding this was quickly removed from the government website, but this could be big. India has a long way to go to build up its infrastructure to support this kind of competition, but is willing to put effort into it. Could get interesting.
Spring has sprung
You know its spring when the Summer catalog arrives from Land’s End, as it did today.
And the forsythia are in full bloom, the daffodils (or are they jonquils – I’m never sure, are you?) are blooming and a stand of four flowering trees on Oakland Mills Road were pink and wonderful. Yet I’m sure, resting in a shady spot in some shopping center parking lot, a grimy pile of snow remains. It will be a long time before we all forget this winter, but the constant revival of the human spirit and the joy caused by the first warm days is wonderful. Just don’t tell this to the Chinese.