Facebook Is Trying Everything to Re-Enter China—and It’s Not Working – WSJ (Jan 30, 2017)
This is a great in-depth take on Facebook’s efforts to get back into China following the 2009 moves that saw it effectively blocked from operating in the country. The phrase I saw repeated most frequently in the article? Some version of “[Facebook executive] declined to to be interviewed,” which is indicative of just how carefully Facebook is treading in China – it would clearly like to get back in and compete for those billion-plus potential users along with the local social networks, and has even suggested that it’s willing to put up with a certain amount of censorship, but doesn’t yet seem to feel like the time is right. There would certainly be a big backlash against any censorship-based re-entry, especially if it felt like Facebook was willingly complicit rather than doing the bare minimum to comply, just as Google and Yahoo faced criticism over their activities in China in the past. This is definitely a double-edged sword for Facebook, though it’s not even clear at this point that it would be allowed back in even if it decided to give it a try. The whole piece is worth a read – lots of interesting detail here, much of which is also applicable to other big US tech companies that would like to be more active in China (or already are).
via WSJ
The company, topic, and narrative tags below will take you to other posts with the same tags. The narrative link(s) will also take you to the narrative essay which provides additional context behind the post.
Vote for or share this post
Use the Like button below to vote for this post as one of the most important of the week. The posts voted most important are more likely to be included in the News Roundup podcast episode I do each week. Or use the sharing buttons to share a link to this post to social networks or other services.