About the apps that Apple censored in China(en.greatfire.org) |
About the apps that Apple censored in China(en.greatfire.org) |
Unfortunately for the most part western governments seem to have the same problem as western countries in not wanting to be frozen out of China and thus don't overtly question NTBs.
As Apple demonstrates all too well, there are companies willing to drop all their moral pretenses to do business there. What they will rant on and on about in their home countries they willingly turn a blind eye to so that they can secure their place in China's market.
Still what can you do? Companies like Apple are subject to investors and public pressure. There are more than a few bloggers who can rub Apple's nose in it enough to get attention. I still think if not for the recent concerted effort of bloggers earlier this year Apple would have ignored the Mac Pro market indefinitely. If Apple can be moved to state support for an embarrassingly languishing product line then why not force their hand when it comes to standing up for the same morals/standards here and there?
Considering the west censors also, the chinese would laugh in our face. Weren't there chinese tourists who got locked up and fined in germany for silly speech recently? Weren't we all celebrating the censorship of the "alt-right"? Didn't we have celebrate the attacks on russian "fake news"? At worst, the chinese would simply justify their censorship by labeling apps as spreading fake news just like we do.
> Unfortunately for the most part western governments seem to have the same problem as western countries in not wanting to be frozen out of China and thus don't overtly question NTBs.
There you go. You act like NTBs go one way. We also have non-tariff trade barriers. Not only that, we also force other countries to end business transactions with china due to "national security concerns".
> There you go. You act like NTBs go one way. We also have non-tariff trade barriers.
No you misunderstand my point. My desire is that western governments treat Chinese censorship as NTBs when negotiating trade but they currently do not for fear of being simply frozen out of that market.
I make no comment nor judgement on western NTBs nor do I have an opinion on what the Chinese government should do from their side of the negotiating table in response to what they see as imbalances or NTBs. They should obviously do what is best for them.
The argument that this encourages piracy is also weak since most money in the app store is made on IAP.
I have had to deal with Apple reviews for a long time, I am absolutely convinced that blocking sideload on iOS is 99% a business decision, not a security one.
To that end, 'evgen's post is extremely important to consider when it comes to malware and phishing. We could do that, and we were the "good guys"--opening it up even further would terrify me.
Making this worse would be an Android-level disaster for end user safety.