[shalmanese]

People outside of China have wildly unrealistic ideas about the true relationship between large Chinese tech companies and the government.

https://www.ft.com/content/760142e6-740e-11ea-95fe-fcd274e92... is sadly paywalled but it's an excellent account of the actual negotiations that have been going on between Tencent, Alibaba and the many different bureaucratic layers of the Chinese government.

[freetrial]

Does anyone actually believe these long-winded articles that attempt to paint some sort of contentious, arms-length relationship between the CCP and their state-funded tech companies?

Obviously, the relationship is messy. But it's undoubtedly basic cronyism, and these companies succeed because they are the 'chosen ones' and their direct ties to government officials.

[tehlike]

http://archive.is/ApUOz