[ouid]

The rest of the world, which for simplicity's sake we'll call the EU and china, have fairly powerful protections in place. EU law applies to companies operating in the EU, and China effectively bans all foreign apps. If Chinese businesses were not de facto arms of the Chinese state, and we had the diplomatic resources to investigate and prosecute chinese companies serving american citizens under american laws, then it might make sense to leaev well enough alone.

[jpgvm]

China does not ban foreign apps, that is pure misinformation.

I think lack of success of foreign apps in China comes down to a much simpler dynamic. Foreign apps are simply not launched concurrently in China and optimised for the Chinese market from the outset. The exception to this are mobile games titles which are generally overly optimised for the Chinese market if anything and generally fail to succeed outside of it.

This results in Chinese clones of said new foriegn app/service appearing very quickly and gaining dominance before said app can "expand" to China. By the time that happens, if it does, they have to compete with an established service that is language and culture native.

Essentially if you aren't launching in China day one and have a great understanding of the -very- competitive Chinese Internet platform economy you are screwed before you even start.

[ouid]

China blocks all sorts of apps, what the fuck are you talking about?

[jpgvm]

No application is banned from operating in China if they are willing to follow the rules. Generally speaking companies like Google just don't like the rules so they don't operate there.

The US has many laws that cause apps to be pulled from the App Store or forcibly be shutdown by hosting companies (even non-US entities!).

Why is it different when the laws are from a different country?