Happy Nice Mall

As the world’s two superpowers move further away from each other, internet environments in the US and China are increasingly separate digital worlds. US internet companies have mostly failed in China, and with notable exceptions, apps from China haven’t made it outside their home country.

Digital life in each country is largely walled off from the other, but the two online spaces are not completely isolated. There are issues of cross-fertilization and interdependence of digital ideas between the US and China, suggesting that rigid borders and political divisions are not absolute barricades of the internet and bring a divided world a little closer.

The crumbs of ties that still exist between the parallel digital spaces of China and the US show both. the failure of the idea that the internet can break down nationalist walls, and that online innovations can transcend borders and censorship.

Of course, divisions are real. It’s hard to overstate how different online experiences are for people in China and the US.

The most popular websites and apps in the West – included GoogleFacebook, Amazon, Spotify, LinkedIn and Uber – they were essentially banned by the Chinese government or fell on their faces in the country.

Airbnb, the last major US internet company left in China, this week close six-year rental service there. But my colleague Erin Griffith reported that the company will continue to operate a business that serves Chinese tourists traveling abroad.

Airbnb’s decision was effectively an acknowledgment that the company had been outpaced by Chinese competitors like Google, Amazon, and Uber. These US companies probably never had much of a chance with the government. tightly controls the internet and many foreigners (and recently, also China) technology companies.

On the one hand, you can count the Western technology companies that are successful in China. there is apple and that’s it? Maybe you could include companies like Microsoft that have had mild success selling software or technology equipment to companies.

happened almost rare For Chinese digital stars to make progress in the USA or many countries other big countries. TikTok, owned by Chinese internet conglomerate ByteDance, is a notable exception. There’s also China’s on-demand ride giant Didi. spread to Latin America and other regions, despite the Chinese government’s technology pressure hurt the company.

But the digital domains of the two global superpowers are not entirely separate.

People in China don’t officially have access to Facebook or Google, but companies sell billions of dollars of ads to businesses located in China that want to reach Chinese citizens or Chinese-speaking people anywhere in the world.

Brian Wieser, head of global business intelligence at advertising firm GroupM, says China-based companies are responsible for nearly $10 billion in Facebook’s 2021 ad sales. That’s a lot of money for companies with zero official users in China.

There would be no Amazon as we know it Without a boom in traders from China As I wrote in On Tech yesterday, it has expanded the product range of the digital mall.

Trends and business ideas are also moving between separate internets in China and the US Maybe you remember that every new smartphone is smaller than the last? Later, smartphones with larger screens became popular with Chinese consumers, adding to the dominance of super-sized phones now everywhere. If you love your massive iPhone, you can partially thank the 2010s smartphone buyers in Beijing and Shanghai.

There are other Chinese trends that are shaping Americans’ online experiences. US internet companies failed but relentless attempts emulating live internet shopping programs as entertainment from China. And the hopes of managers and investors for food delivery services in the US and Europe are in part, Prevalence of meal delivery services in China.

Copying goes the other way too. Didi started as a shipping app for traditional auto services. But when Uber opened its doors in China in 2014, connecting people with non-professional drivers, it also affected the way Didi works. Uber gave up on China in 2016, but the company has made its mark on Chinese transportation.

Don’t get me wrong: the splits far outweigh the vague interconnections between internet systems in China and the US, and it’s hard to imagine that changing. China and the US are drifting apart both politically and online.

But I do find some hope that China’s authoritarian internet controls and hostilities between the US and China won’t completely shut down the two countries’ digital worlds.

Before you go …

• More signs of fear and disruption in technology: Lyft I said it will slow down hiring and reduce the budgets of some departments. Uber recruitment freezes. blow up warned He said ad sales this week were weaker than the company had expected. Recently a leading start-up investor recommendation Young businesses to save cash. Amazon reduce warehouse space. All this is proof of that. sinking stock pricesvolatile sales and uncertain economic conditions frighten many tech companies.

• Do-it-yourself phone repair gone terribly wrong. My Colleague Brian X. Chen broke your iPhone Trying to use Apple’s new guidelines and tools aimed at helping people and independent repair shops repair their devices. Brian concluded that Apple’s repair program had some benefits, but “failed the customer,” as one technician told him.

• It’s an anachronism, but it’s nice: Bloomberg CityLab wrote about vending machines at Bay Area transit stations: distribute printed short stories For people to read and pass. Why not display a QR code or other digital doodad? “It wouldn’t be the same!” wrote the publication.

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View from a person’s remote work point in a cafe: A duck (apparently wearing shoes) wandered into the sidewalk seating. Someone brought the duck a glass of water.

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