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Chinese Tech Firms Forced to Choose Market

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Chinese Tech Firms Forced to Choose Market

Home or Everywhere Else

The New York Times,

5 min read
5 take-aways
Audio & text

What's inside?

China’s Internet isolation creates division in the tech world: Will China’s tech firms choose home or the rest of the world?

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Editorial Rating

7

Qualities

  • Overview
  • Background
  • Concrete Examples

Recommendation

Facebook and Google are the best-known examples of successful companies that failed to crack the Chinese market. At the same time, China’s Internet giants have been struggling to gain a foothold in the West. Hong Kong-based technology reporter Paul Mozur explains why the Great Firewall divides the Internet in a way that makes it almost impossible for any technology company to thrive both in China and elsewhere. As a tech entrepreneur, you need to decide on whose Internet you would like to set up shop. It’s one or the other. getAbstract recommends this article to tech entrepreneurs and anyone interested in global markets.

Summary

Alex Zhu hatched the idea for his app while working in the United States. Observing how some people listened to music during their commute while others browsed social media sites, it occurred to him that someone should link the two. He co-founded Musical.ly, an app which allows its users to lip-sync and dance to music videos and share those videos with peers. While the company is Chinese, the app only exists in Western markets.

Chinese censorship has partitioned off its own version of the Internet so successfully that Chinese tech companies must choose...

About the Author

Paul Mozur is a Hong Kong-based technology reporter covering topics such as cybersecurity and censorship in Asia. He joined The New York Times in 2014.


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