Blocked in China, why are Internet & social media giants protecting the protectionist?

last few weeks have witnessed tech and social media giants come under microscope like never before over kind of content y allow on ir platforms, and logic and consistency that y apply while implementing ir policies. matter is multifaceted and geopolitical, and seems to put forth a new question for almost every new example cited. 

However, one aspect of this that sticks out like a sore thumb is se mostly US-based giants' squeamishness about China. As world finally unshackles itself from commercial compulsions to speak up (belatedly) against China's atrocious policies, tech companies that have arguably suffered most at hands of China's protectionism appear t only hesitant but also evidently pro-China.

From 'Kck-offs' to cutting-edge

Over last few decades, as India's giant neighbour has grown inexorably to become  second-largest ecomy in world and a ruthlessly aggressive and expansionist one at that, it has routinely flouted numerous rules of doing business and profited immeasurably. Copyright law, for instance, appears to be n-existent in China. Cheap kck-offs of physical branded products have been flooded into global marketplaces for years, and over time, this modus operandi of business has allowed China to scale up its manufacturing to such an extent that it is a world leader both in terms of quantity and quality. For sure, 'kck-offs' aren't cheap anymore.

Internet giants' hypocrisy

where is this same model more apparent than in Internet . Search and social media giants like Google, Facebook and Twitter aren't available in China. To understand scope of what this means, just consider - you land in Beijing, connect your phone to Wi-Fi, open Chrome, and find that thing works. Typing something in search bar will result in response, to such an extent that it feels like you're t connected to Internet. Only if you enter full URL directly, instead of 'searching' for it on your Android OS phones, will you get anywhere. Google Maps 'works' in way that it allows a rudimentary map of Beijing to be downloaded, but try GPS and you'll find that it doesn't kw top from bottom. 

Google, Facebook and Twitter and sub-products that y run to such great effect worldwide have local analogues in China. Baidu, Tencent, Weibo, WeChat, TikTok are multi-billion dollar products and companies on ir own right, and hypocrisy here is that y are freely allowed to list ir apps and services on what rest of world considers Internet. TikTok, for instance, is most widely used app of its kind in India. Locally developed competitors haven't ever stood a chance.

In just last few weeks, TikTok has come under spotlight for allowing objectionable, fake and downright dangerous content on its platform. India's National Commission For Women has asked for it to be banned. Given rising anti-China sentiment, and to encour India to become t only self-reliant but also a globally acceptable democratic alternative to China, engineer and education reformer Sonam Wangchuk appealed to people to stop using Chinese products and apps. Amid this, an app floated by an Indian company to delete Chinese-made apps from Android phones went viral, but was n taken down from Google Play Store. In its explanation, Google touted 'healthy competitive environment' - like China, right?

Twitter, meanwhile, is in its own world of pain. While criticism of Facebook in this regard is currently mostly just perfunctory - almost like 'and what about Facebook?' - Twitter has fallen afoul of President Donald Trump in US, and continues to make inexplicable and controversial decisions in India, such as brief blocking of Amul's handle for putting up a customary news-oriented Topical creative.

Human biases versus 'Machine learning'  

In Twitter's case, and presumably in ors as well, what this has led to is a sort of 'lifting of corporate veil' - that it is individual choices and leanings and t 'machine learning algorithms' or committees of unbiased independent experts/vetters/moderators who make se decisions. After Trump's tweet about mail-in vote rigging was flagged, his team pointed out that Twitter's head of security had been publicly anti-Trump in past, while White House asked why a war-mongering tweet filled with religious untruths by Iran's supreme leader was allowed?

In India, Twitter has been accused of having a leftist bias (by those on right) on a range of things t limited to moderation and even 'blue tick' handles. Republic TV has had to question Twitter in past for allowing viciously edited fake news to be proliferated over ultrasensitive matters. company's CEO Jack Dorsey landed himself in a soup after unwittingly taking up cause of 'Smash Brahminical Patriarchy'. 

But question still stands - why protect protectionist China so much? Dragon has been in room a long while, and it's about time that techlogy companies start smarting from fire it has been breathing at m just as much as all or furniture.