6 ms·

The issue is that it's a government owned entity, one that's totalitarian, genocidal and their technologies are largely stolen.

by zeb88 5y ago

chrischen 5y ago
The grandparent was alleging that their photo tech was better than Google’s. So from whom did they steal it from?
- iamgopal 5y ago
  They were stealing the talent.
  - Daho0n 5y ago
    You can't steal people. You can kidnap people and you can hire people. Maybe if you kill them you can steal the body? You sound like an anti-piracy advertisement. "Piracy is theft".
    - dgellow 5y ago
      Just to nitpick, because we are on HN: I remember a story of a cartel in Latin America kidnapping networking experts to force them to develop their technology stack. That may count as "stealing" talents? Not sure if that's what I remember, but here is a Wired article: https://www.wired.com/2012/11/zeta-radio/ https://www.wired.com/2012/11/zeta-radio/ Edit: of course I'm not implying that Huawei does this...
    - tester34 5y ago
      "steal" is other way of saying "hired" because it feels kinda differently when you want to buy $competitor's top people
      - Daho0n 5y ago
        You can only "buy" top people if your offer is better though. I see nothing wrong in people switching jobs for a better offer. Calling it stealing makes it sound as A Bad Thing while in truth it is a good thing for the person getting hired. If businesses shared the profits equally this wouldn't happen but then we are not in capitalism anymore..
  - dgellow 5y ago
    You mean, paying them well?
    - novium 5y ago
      You could make the case that "stealing" talent is in terms of targeting hiring people where the training and research costs were footed by someone else. Then again, as you pointed out, you could also make the case that they weren't properly compensated.
      - ansgri 5y ago
        In Moscow, major Asian companies like Samsung, Huawei, LG all have research centers where they hire some of the best science students from top universities, in particular by organizing joint study programs. This seems to be a widespread practice around the world for them, and actually profitable for both students and universities.
        throwawaybbqed 5y ago
        Interesting observation about Moscow having a lot of research labs. I never thought to wonder why Moscow had so many but this is an interesting point. What do you mean by join study program? Can you explain? Also, is there anything that stops top talent from moving to Silicon Valley (or some place else?) after they finish school?
        ansgri 5y ago
        Many top universities here are not like self-contained research universities of the West — they mostly deal with education, and research is conducted at non-educational academic institutions. So, for their Masters work, and maybe earlier, students do research in various organizations that have contracts with university. These are either academic institutions or commercial research departments or tech companies like Yandex. As for SV, it’s not that simple, it seems — most emigrants that I know either got job at something like Swiss Google after building a solid resume here or got into some academic program (PhD or postdoc) abroad.
- raverbashing 5y ago
  It would be an interesting conversation to try and understand why/how are they better. Is it the sensors? The software? The lenses? In which conditions? In that specific case I think they probably had better ideas than Google?
krageon 5y ago
> government > totalitarian, genocidal These go together anywhere on earth, so the main point you're making is about stuff being stolen. Even if it were true (which is very much not a given), who cares? Lots of good stuff was stolen and changed a little. Turns out sometimes things get better when you do that, it's a time-honored human tradition.
- cyrksoft 5y ago
  So, in your view, every government in the world is totalitarian and genocidal? How can you compare the Chinese government, a dictatorship, with most democratic governments from western countries? Of course some governments do bad things, but tell me something genocidal the US government or Canadian government or any EU country is currently doing. There is no logical way to compare the Chinese government with any other government from the west. People in China aren’t free and can’t do anything unless the CCP dictators let them. Imagine insulting the CCP leaders the way everybody does in television in the US to their own government. You’d had the military involved and everybody would disappear and get ‘re-educated’ or murdered. And, btw, I don’t think the Chinese steal, I think they mostly copy.
  - Ceezy 5y ago
    Slavery /native american genocide, Philippine colonisation, no reason whatsoever to attack Iraq...
    - cyrksoft 5y ago
      Except for recent and pointless wars (mostly US here) you mention things that are more than 100 years old... China does all those things today. Your point makes no sense whatsoever.
      - Ceezy 5y ago
        US is still in Irak now... It's really not hard to find where the US is military active. The US jail population is 2 M, China, 1.5 M. It's little stuff like this that make the US look worse than China. Be sure that once China is finished killing Uyghur they will say that's an old story like ... hum ... the US. So yeah continue justify crimes, just remember one day, it could be your turn.
Ceezy 5y ago
So you mean that the US is not genocidal country and didn't still their technology from Europe?
- yhoneycomb 5y ago
  You're 100% right, but people on hacker news are so Murica-centric that they'll downvote the truth to oblivion. I would guess that at least 70% of people on here voted for Trump. Say anything negative about China and you get instantly upvoted. Anything positive about China or even slightly negative about the US and you get downvoted.
severino 5y ago
That may be an issue for you. For me (and for most people) it wasn't when I bought my Moto G or my current iPhone.
rurban 5y ago
On hand a rising communist regime dominating the markets, on the other an aggressive, genocidal, fascist regime, which once dominated the markets. Both backdooring their devices for global mass surveillance.

The issue is that it's a government owned entity, one that's totalitarian, genocidal and their technologies are largely stolen.

by zeb88 5y ago

The issue is that it's a government owned entity, one that's totalitarian, genocidal and their technologies are largely stolen.

chrischen 5y ago

The grandparent was alleging that their photo tech was better than Google’s. So from whom did they steal it from?

iamgopal 5y ago
They were stealing the talent.
- Daho0n 5y ago
  You can't steal people. You can kidnap people and you can hire people. Maybe if you kill them you can steal the body? You sound like an anti-piracy advertisement. "Piracy is theft".
  - dgellow 5y ago
    Just to nitpick, because we are on HN: I remember a story of a cartel in Latin America kidnapping networking experts to force them to develop their technology stack. That may count as "stealing" talents? Not sure if that's what I remember, but here is a Wired article: https://www.wired.com/2012/11/zeta-radio/ https://www.wired.com/2012/11/zeta-radio/ Edit: of course I'm not implying that Huawei does this...
  - tester34 5y ago
    "steal" is other way of saying "hired" because it feels kinda differently when you want to buy $competitor's top people
    - Daho0n 5y ago
      You can only "buy" top people if your offer is better though. I see nothing wrong in people switching jobs for a better offer. Calling it stealing makes it sound as A Bad Thing while in truth it is a good thing for the person getting hired. If businesses shared the profits equally this wouldn't happen but then we are not in capitalism anymore..
- dgellow 5y ago
  You mean, paying them well?
  - novium 5y ago
    You could make the case that "stealing" talent is in terms of targeting hiring people where the training and research costs were footed by someone else. Then again, as you pointed out, you could also make the case that they weren't properly compensated.
    - ansgri 5y ago
      In Moscow, major Asian companies like Samsung, Huawei, LG all have research centers where they hire some of the best science students from top universities, in particular by organizing joint study programs. This seems to be a widespread practice around the world for them, and actually profitable for both students and universities.
      - throwawaybbqed 5y ago
        Interesting observation about Moscow having a lot of research labs. I never thought to wonder why Moscow had so many but this is an interesting point. What do you mean by join study program? Can you explain? Also, is there anything that stops top talent from moving to Silicon Valley (or some place else?) after they finish school?
        ansgri 5y ago
        Many top universities here are not like self-contained research universities of the West — they mostly deal with education, and research is conducted at non-educational academic institutions. So, for their Masters work, and maybe earlier, students do research in various organizations that have contracts with university. These are either academic institutions or commercial research departments or tech companies like Yandex. As for SV, it’s not that simple, it seems — most emigrants that I know either got job at something like Swiss Google after building a solid resume here or got into some academic program (PhD or postdoc) abroad.
raverbashing 5y ago
It would be an interesting conversation to try and understand why/how are they better. Is it the sensors? The software? The lenses? In which conditions? In that specific case I think they probably had better ideas than Google?

krageon 5y ago

> government > totalitarian, genocidal These go together anywhere on earth, so the main point you're making is about stuff being stolen. Even if it were true (which is very much not a given), who cares? Lots of good stuff was stolen and changed a little. Turns out sometimes things get better when you do that, it's a time-honored human tradition.

cyrksoft 5y ago
So, in your view, every government in the world is totalitarian and genocidal? How can you compare the Chinese government, a dictatorship, with most democratic governments from western countries? Of course some governments do bad things, but tell me something genocidal the US government or Canadian government or any EU country is currently doing. There is no logical way to compare the Chinese government with any other government from the west. People in China aren’t free and can’t do anything unless the CCP dictators let them. Imagine insulting the CCP leaders the way everybody does in television in the US to their own government. You’d had the military involved and everybody would disappear and get ‘re-educated’ or murdered. And, btw, I don’t think the Chinese steal, I think they mostly copy.
- Ceezy 5y ago
  Slavery /native american genocide, Philippine colonisation, no reason whatsoever to attack Iraq...
  - cyrksoft 5y ago
    Except for recent and pointless wars (mostly US here) you mention things that are more than 100 years old... China does all those things today. Your point makes no sense whatsoever.
    - Ceezy 5y ago
      US is still in Irak now... It's really not hard to find where the US is military active. The US jail population is 2 M, China, 1.5 M. It's little stuff like this that make the US look worse than China. Be sure that once China is finished killing Uyghur they will say that's an old story like ... hum ... the US. So yeah continue justify crimes, just remember one day, it could be your turn.

Ceezy 5y ago

So you mean that the US is not genocidal country and didn't still their technology from Europe?

yhoneycomb 5y ago
You're 100% right, but people on hacker news are so Murica-centric that they'll downvote the truth to oblivion. I would guess that at least 70% of people on here voted for Trump. Say anything negative about China and you get instantly upvoted. Anything positive about China or even slightly negative about the US and you get downvoted.

severino 5y ago

That may be an issue for you. For me (and for most people) it wasn't when I bought my Moto G or my current iPhone.

rurban 5y ago

On hand a rising communist regime dominating the markets, on the other an aggressive, genocidal, fascist regime, which once dominated the markets. Both backdooring their devices for global mass surveillance.