He said “Chinese thinking: Why are you meddling with my business? You are deliberately provoking conflicts. I must push you back or I will look weak!”

This comes from a Chinese saying: 各人自扫门前雪，莫管他人瓦上霜 : Everyone swept the snow in front of their own door and not to worry about others. It may sound very selfish but it is very fundamental to the Chinese society harmony – You don’t poke your nose into other people’s business and likewise.

I replied “American thinking: With great power comes great responsibility.” 

Although the phrase comes from a comic book, it reflects deeply what it means to be an American and the sense of duty they have to the rest of the world. 

Back to the certain event, most people think it is like 1989 but I think the outcome would be similar to the 228 Incident instead. God help us.

Most Americans think US engagement with China starts with President Nixon. But Sino-US history goes back as far as back as the American Revolution and before that.

In the 17th century, China was already trading with the US, then a U.K. colony. Tea, silk, and porcelains were imported from China. After independence, the US became China’s number two trading partner after British.

Through the 300 odd years of engagement, the relationship between the US and China had good times and bad times, but more often somewhere in between.

In the mid-1800, a large number of Chinese labors came to California in search of gold. By the 1860s, the Chinese were the largest aliens in West America. Expectedly, the US pass laws to ban more Chinese from coming.

Around the same time, many US Christian missionaries went to China. They were impressed by Hong Xiuquan and supported him in the Taiping Rebellion. Taiping Rebellion is one of the bloodiness rebellions in human history that leaves 40 million death, in an attempt to create a new “Heavenly Kingdom” in China. Ironically, the US State Department supported the Qing government instead and squash the rebellion.

In the late 1900s, the Boxer Rebellion, an anti-Christian, anti-foreign peasant movement supported by the Qing government, massacre Christian missionaries, including Americans. In response, the US joins the other nations, in the Eight-Nation Alliance and loot and pillage Beijing and other cities in 1900 for over a year.

[Incidentally a lot of Chinese thought the Eight-Nation Alliance, including the US, was responsible for the Burning of Old Summer Palace. The Burning of the Summer Palace happens in 1860 by the Anglo-French expedition, nothing to do with the American]

The Qing government was then forced to sign the Boxer Protocol, in 1901 and have to pay 450 million tales of silver (about $10 billion) to the Eight-Nation Alliance over many years, of which 300 million is paid immediately.

President William McKinley, as an act of friendship, remitted the majority of that back to China, who then use the money to build what is today Tsinghua University, and sent students to the US to study.

At the beginning of the 20th century, during the Sino-Japanese war, Americans’ public sympathy for the Chinese was aroused by the Nanking Massacre in 1937. Volunteers from Army Air Corp and Navy and Marine Corps, recruited under President Franklin Roosevelt in 1941, went over to help the Chinese to bomb Japan cities. They are known as the Flying Tigers whom many Chinese still remember fondly. A Museum in Kunming is now dedicated to the Flying Tigers.

After World War II, China went into the Civil War between the Communists and Nationalists. Dixie Mission, in 1944, was one of the early contacts between the US and the Communists. The Americans travel through the dangerous war zone to Yan’an to negotiate unification between the Communists and Nationalists.

But then McCarthyism in 1947, followed by two wars, the Korean War and Vietnam War in 1950-60s, where US & China fought against each other altho technically not directly, US-Sino relationship soured.

It is not until President Nixon visited China in 1972 that the relationship finally warms up and eventually normalization in 1979. By 1983, the US State Department classifies China as “a friendly, developing nation”.

Then Tiananmen Square in 1989, and the relationship deteriorated sharply. It took 10 years to recover, until 1999 where US-China signed trade agreement where the US support the China accession into WTO.

[When Trump said China has taken US advantage for many years, he is referring to this agreement because, from the US perspective, China didn’t live up fully to the promises made in 1999 or other commitments in the 2001 WTO accession. This is why USTR Robert Lightnizer is negotiating very hard on the Chinese on the enforcement]

[Dec 24 Update] One cannot talk about 1999 without mentioning the bombing of Chinese embassy in Belgrade in May. While the US have give an official apologies as well as financial settlement, in addition to expediting US-China trade agreement, the Chinese never got over this transgression. Very few believe US excuse that it is an honest mistake and many don’t believe US apologies to be sincere.

2000 to 2010 was the best 10 years of US-China relationship, investments, trades, technology transfer, humanitarian aids as the China economy grows rapidly. The Sino-US relationship was so well that US government agencies were encouraged to help its counterpart in China. The prevailing view is that as China becomes more prosperous, it will become more open and the more the American helps them, the more the Chinese will be like America.

But the relationship starts to erode after 2010. US Intelligence was the first to become concerned. China counterintelligence systematically eliminated the informer network in China in 2010 & 2011. China also forms its “cyber army” in 2009 (China only admits to it in 2016) and then for the next few years, engaged in extensive unrestraint, high volume cyber espionages, pinnacle to the OPM hack in 2015 (the Chinese had denied they were involved).

But the Chinese never understood how damaging the OPM hack is to Sino-US relationship: while there are many higher value cyber espionages, the OPM hack makes the Chinese cyber espionages very personal to 4 to 20 million government senior employees, who have their privacy violated. Many of them have to change bank account and credit cards and their life affected many ways (family & friends overseas).

Such that President Obama and President Xi met in 2016, the main discussion was cybersecurity. Altho they agreed on a set of codes of conducts, it has not followed up after President Trump was elected in 2017.

President Trump was especially focused on US-China trade deficits. So after President Trump hosted President Xi in Mar-a-Lago in April 2017, both sides agreed to start trade negotiations. According to people familiar with the trade negotiations back then, the Chinese find the US demands one-sided, and the US finds Chinese requests unrealistic and most importantly, the Chinese attitude “hubris”.

But President Trump was distracted by the North Korea crisis, that he needed President Xi assistance, so he willing to overlook that. To the extent, Trump said he is willing to give a good deal on trade if China can help in North Korea.

Several months later, it became clear to President Trump that the Chinese do not have effective control over North Korean. In Oct 2017, Trump decided to decouple the North Korea issue with the China trade issue.

So beginning 2018, Trump imposed the tariff on solar panels and washing machines under Section 201 and then tariff on steel and aluminum under Section 232.

But the big one is Section 301 in June of 2018. In May 2018, every Chinese media and many Chinese do not believe Trump would dare to impose the 25% tariff on the $50 billion of Chinese goods as he threatened.

They were all wrong. And then wrong again in Sep 2018 when the second $200 billion of good was hit with a 25% tariff. Finally, the Chinese comes to their sense in Oct 2018 and come back to the negotiation table.

But then, it was too late. Up until June 2018, there are still voices within Washington that the US should not pick a fight with China and that a trade war with China would be very damaging to the US economy.

By Oct 2018, the mood in Washington had a consistent voice, that the US must deal with the “Chinese problem”. The only debate is how.

Within a year, the mood in Washington on China had deteriorated. It went from “Strategic Coopetition (cooperative competition)” to “Strategic Rival”. Today, the most hawkish voice is calling to define China as an “enemy” towards decoupling between US & China.

Today, the Sino-US disputes include not just trade but also military, intelligence, national security, foreign affairs and international policy, human rights, economic and technology race. Trade is probably the easiest among them.

Once the US established China as a threat, the echo-chamber within Washington ecosystem of think tanks, national security, and military departments, media, and politicians will inevitably frame China as an “enemy”, as everyone tries to one-man up another, that “I am a bigger enemy of China”. It is difficult to reverse and will not end with trade resolution.

We are at the beginning of the next down cycle of the US-Sino relationship that would last at least 10 years or more. Particularly, decoupling scared the shit out of me. US and China are the world number one and two economies, and if they were to be decoupled, everyone else would be forced to take sides.

2012 Anti-corruption campaign (反腐：不作为、央企民企脱钩)

2013 Circular No. 9 (9号文：质疑改革开放)
2013 Back to Real economy (回到实体经济：金融退场)

2014 Property market slowdown (房地产降温：地方政府没钱)

2015 Chinese stock market turbulence (股灾：一天回到解放前)

2016 Beidaihe signaled only SOE is favoured (北戴河：国进民退)

2017 Deleveraging (去杠杆：借不到钱)
2017 Arrest of high profile businessmen (抓钱袋子)
2017 19th Politburo – New Era (19大后新时代：政治博弈改金融博弈)

2018 Tax collections reformation (税务机构改革）
2018 P2P/ICO collapse (金融难民）
2018 margin call on at least 600 listed company (600家上市公司跌破平仓线)
2018 US impose tariff on China (美国增加关税)

2019 China grow rate at 6.6% in 2018 (2018中国GDP增长6.6%)

至于你们信不信，我反正信了!

For my friends who wonder why Chinese can lie with a straight face, watch this video to get inside the mind of a Chinese … pic.twitter.com/NVZNXl084O

— James Seng (@jseng) June 8, 2018

The world’s economy is quickly approaching a potential crisis, and the impact could be far reaching. The crisis stems from a collision of conflicting expectations involving one of the largest economies ever, and includes tangible, large-scale impacts on real communities. At this late hour, it is unclear whether the crisis can be averted and if so, what the consequences of trade-offs might be.

In July, 2001 China concluded negotiations with the World Trade Organization (WTO) and an agreement was ratified in December, 2001. Part of China’s understanding was that they would be granted Market Economy Status (MES) on the 15-year anniversary of the agreement, which will occur in December of this year. However, that understanding is not held by the other countries of the WTO and this disagreement has the potential to significantly impact economies around the world.

The accession to WTO opened up opportunities for Chinese industries, but has also brought about a number of unintended consequences. In the 90s, Europe was moving aggressively towards the use of renewal green energy, however manufacturing of solar cell in Europe was very costly because of the European environment protection regulations. The Europeans found a manufacturer in Wuxi, China who was able to provide solar cells very cheaply because of China’s less restrictive environmental protection regulations. The manufacturer became very successful and soon other companies began making solar cells. Unfortunately, the new manufacturers did not seek to enhance the original product, but chose to simply produce exact copies, which is usually the case in China. The “copycat” mindset often leads to overcapacity, and such was the case for solar cells in Wuxi. The European Union took notice of the situation and in 2011 cut back on demand, resulting in a large glut of solar cells, causing prices to plummet by nearly half.

The city government of Wuxi was faced with a dilemma: let the solar cell manufacturers go out of business and put tens of thousands of people out of their jobs, or help these companies. They decided to prop up these companies while encouraging them to seek out new markets. Armed with cheap loans and a huge oversupply of solar cells, these companies quickly undercut US and others solar cell companies. As a result, the US Department of Commerce imposed an anti-dumping tax (as high as 240%) on solar cells made in China. The Wuxi city government was forced to make painful adjustments and many solar cell companies went bankrupted, costing many workers their jobs.

The West saw this as an example of China dumping solar cells into the market at unreasonably low prices with government subsidies. The Chinese, however, viewed it as the West protecting its own industry rather than letting the free market, as introduced by WTO accession, deal with this overcapacity.

The steel industry has also become a problem for the Chinese government on a much larger scale. Fueled by years of double digit growth, especially in property, Chinese demand for steel skyrocketed, and many companies were formed to meet the demand. Just as in the solar cell market, steel companies chose to simply copy the market leaders rather than seeking to innovate and improve. In times of growth, the Chinese domestic market was able to absorb the production and despite the thin margin, the manufacturers were still able to make a profit. Despite the global recession in 2008 and 2009 and the slowdown of the Chinese economy in 2013, China steel production continued to grow, peaking in 2014 at 822.7 million metric tons. This output represents over 50% of the total world steel production.

Competition has driven the price for Chinese steel to below cost, yet factories continue to produce steel, supported by local government subsidies and loans. These government loans and subsidies continue because China fears the loss of millions of jobs and the closing of factories. The steel industry has become “Too Big to Fail” in China.

In 2015, the Chinese central government debated how to address overcapacity. Many expected the government to act on overcapacity, but in 2016, with the weakening of the Chinese economy and political maneuvering, nothing had been announced. In June of 2016 a weak notice was released, warning that the government would act on industries with overcapacity, but little action has been seen since then.

China is hoping that the world will absorb some of the steel capacity, but the European and US tariffs imposed on China’s steel have become a key focus for China’s trade representatives. China had assumed that it would be granted Market Economy Status (MES) this December, and that status would mark the cessation of what they consider unfair methodology for the calculation of anti-dumping tariffs. Until China is granted MES, the importing WTO member may use a methodology that is not based on a strict comparison with domestic prices or costs in China, and this allows the imposition of high import tariffs. The WTO agreement does not guarantee MES, but instead states that China has to establish to each WTO member that China qualifies for MES under the national law of each WTO member.

The European Union will likely require domestic prices to be used as the benchmark, which is probably still very much higher than Chinese prices. Both sides believe they are protecting their industries and workers – the West by preventing what they view as the dumping of cheap steel and China by seeking to keep their steel industry afloat and their workers employed.

Complicating this further is the Western view that China has failed to fully comply with the WTO accession agreement in other areas. As part of the agreement, China had agreed to allow, by no later than December 2007, foreign ownership of 49% of basic telecommunication and 50% of the Value-Added Telecommunications (VATS) and paging services, including Internet services. Two basic telecommunication operations, one a joint venture between AT&T and Shanghai Telecom, and another joint venture between Cable & Wireless and Shenzhen Telecommunications Development Co. were operating in China, but the former has been restricted to the Shanghai region, despite China’s promise to remove all restrictions by 2007, and the other has ceased operation. VATS have faced similar problems, where few foreign financed operations have been approved. For those that have been approved, foreign investors are forced to use a structure that allows economic interest but denies control, leaving that with the Chinese.

So, while China has left some doors open for foreign investors, it is a far cry from what most expected of a liberalized Telecom market. It appears that the current Chinese view is that since the US and Europe have not granted MES to China as they believe is implied by the WTO agreement, there is no need for China to comply either.

Failure to receive MES will likely have a significant impact on the Chinese economy, and may result in large unemployment. This may be necessary for Chinese entrepreneurs to realize that simply copying market leaders is not a road to success, but rather a formula for overcapacity and ultimately failure. While it may be a necessary lesson, learning it will be painful – a pain that China may not be willing to endure at this time. It is also possible that China will begin unwinding some of the WTO agreements that currently exist, and that will likely impact other economies around the world. China is a leading supplier of information infrastructure for the world. China has more Internet users than any other country by a substantial margin, and that is with only about 50% of the population on-line. Failure to reach an agreement on China’s MES status could certainly impact the rest of the world’s ability to reach this huge market and vice versa.

December 2016 is a critical time. China expects to receive MES, and will be very unhappy if they don’t. This is but one indicator of the economic tension that exists between China and the West. With time so short a collision of these expectations seems inevitable. The question that remains is how far reaching the shock waves from the collision will be.

”为什么来拉萨？”

哥们多次邀请我去拉萨，因为工作原因次次推迟。所以周日我到拉萨，完成多年前给哥们的承诺。同时也希望能为西藏祈祷和平。

然而，上飞机前的痛风，下飞机后的高原反应，缺氧、呼气困难、胃口不好、痛疼、感冒、肺水肿。导游说所有可能有的高原反应我都中了。

拖拉行李，一半都是药。

”为什么来拉萨？”

”西藏是个神秘的地方，有着灿烂的阳光，洁白的云朵，纯净的天空，稀薄的空气，连绵的雪山，安静的湖泊。“

这里风景太漂亮了。这5天走过拉萨（罗布林卡和大昭寺）、纳木错、桑耶寺、 雍布拉康、羊湖。如果自己开车自驾游，路上的风景美如画。

然而，缺氧的感觉就是困。路途上大部分时间都在睡觉。而且缺氧严重感觉好像要死掉了。高原走起路来感觉老了20岁，上一层楼梯都会喘不过气。在蓝天白云绿水的纳木错，一步一步慢慢走着，一手拿着手机拍照，另外一只手拿着氧气筒。

风景再美，也无福消受。

”为什么来拉萨？”

藏民与大自然共存。风马旗代表蓝天白云红火黄土绿水赐予的生命。大多数藏民也是佛教徒，有浓厚的信仰。信仰给他们了做人的道理，没有贪心、嗔恨心，没有坑、蒙、拐、骗。这里纯朴善良。（当然也有害群之马！我也是受害者！）

路上的风马旗都是藏民自己搭建，为开车路人祈福平安。在桑耶寺，我看见藏民自愿者与乐融融在一起唱歌建庙。

他们知道如何与天共存与地共存与人共存。他们领悟真正的快乐来自你能贡献多少回给社会。

藏民明白： 天地人合一。

”为什么来拉萨？”

美国人的宣誓里函”One Nation Under God”。他们有浓厚的道德观点，认为他们是上帝的子民。仗义勇为，替天行道。

西藏是中国最后一片净土。时时刻刻提醒我们都是天地之儿女，龙的传人。

”为什么来拉萨？”

在新加坡，我们华人能搭建一个公正廉洁而且高效的政府。在香港，我们华人能搭建世界顶级的金融中心。在台湾，我们华人能搭建国际工匠精品和服务水平。

在拉萨，我看见了中国的信仰文化。这些传统信仰可以改变中国，也能改变世界。

“But really why go Lhasa?”

Because God has a Plan and He will show me at the right time. For now, I come to pray for peace and reconciliation.

来拉萨的领悟

来拉萨后，感觉老了20岁。走路慢慢来，脑子想的是要大口呼吸，考虑前面是否有楼梯，要爬多少楼梯，该不该走另外一条路。

同时，虽然缺氧，但是脑子想事情反而更清晰了。当你连呼吸活命都需要用脑子的时候，剩下能想的东西才是跟生命差不多重要的事。其他的事，真tm无所谓。

1）身体最重要。身体不舒服什么事情都干不了。老前辈说的都有道理。坚定拿出时间养好身体。看中医，多运动，少吃肉，少喝酒。饭局时间就留给家人和兄弟。陌生人就喝茶不吃饭了。

2）关系第一位。最近因为工作上的事，得罪了很多人，也忽略了家人和朋友。第一、陪好家人。第二、之前有意无意的误会该是处理下。第三、被忽略的哥们该聚聚了。

3）朋友的信托。许多哥们找我帮忙的事，因为工作的事，有些被耽误甚至肯能黄了。该是一一处理。对哥们的承诺有个交代。

未来，朋友找我帮忙首先说对不起。如果不回来找我帮忙也说明我对他并不是这么重要。除非是非常有意义的事。有意义的事通常跟钱没关系。

4）自己的事业。这一段时间一直都忙于不能对外说的事而忽略自己的事业。家人，大哥、兄弟和朋友都说我不务正业。

设立资金是我来中国的事业终点。是时候我专心把资金的事业搞起来。愿意的哥们、跟我一起干；不愿意帮忙、不怪你们。

As a boy scout as a kid, we used to play a game around campfire. The adult would form two teams and make two lines with 10 kids. He would the whisper the same exact message to first kid of the two teams, whereby they would repeat it to the next kid and so on until the last kid have to write the message down on paper. We always have a good laugh what comes out at the end compared to what went in.

“Citizen Score” is what happens when official news gets reposted, added with the journalist opinions, mixed in some new information (relevant or not), and repeated the process 10 times. To make it worst, most journalists in the process didn’t bother to, or was not able to do fact checking as the source is in Chinese.

Anyway, here is what I know:

1) The origin of these is State Council Notice (2014) No. 21, concerning the guidelines to building a Social Credit System (2014-2020) (国发〔2014〕21号《社会信用体系建设规划纲要（2014—2020年）》)

加快社会信用体系建设是全面落实科学发展观、构建社会主义和谐社会的重要基础，是完善社会主义市场经济体制、加强和创新社会治理的重要手段，对增强社会成员诚信意识，营造优良信用环境，提升国家整体竞争力，促进社会发展与文明进步具有重要意义。

Accelerating the construction of a social credit system is an important basis for comprehensively implementing the scientific development view and building a harmonious Socialist society, it is an important method to perfect the Socialist market economy system, accelerating and innovating social governance, and it has an important significance for strengthening the sincerity consciousness of the members of society, forging a desirable credit environment, raising the overall competitiveness of the country and stimulating the development of society and the progress of civilization.

Translated into English, the motivation looks very nefarious.

Reading official documents is an excellent test of the political awareness of the reader. Every reader has his own understanding, each is right at his own level. However, simple reading is most certainly the wrong interpretation, especially if the words get translated without the context.

CCTV Chinese News is as boring as hell, but if you ever watch it with someone who is well-verse with Chinese political environment and can explain to you the context behind each story, you will find CCTV News more interesting than House of Cards.

For this particular case, one must remember that Chinese is a “low-trust” culture. (See Social Trust)

Very often, Chinese would trust a Western stranger over a Chinese stranger. This is why Chinese depends on relationships or “Guanxi” to do business.

A Guanxi-based society, in a positive light, means you prefer to do business with people you know or people you trust recommended but it also gives rise to multiple other problems, corruption been the top of the list. It is also not a scalable as one cannot only do business with your circle of friends.

For most Western society, since it is a high-trust culture, solving the “credit worthiness” is about the balance of privacy and transparency specifically on personal financial credit worthiness. This gives rise to credit bureaus whose key role it to assets credit rating of a person or business.

But in Chinese society, where there is low level of trust, assessing someone credit worthiness is more than financial, but also the his position in the society, his friends, and his political alignment (and sad to say, is a real risk in China). This is why it is called “Social Credit System”, or a way to turn “Guanxi” into a rating.

2) Mayi Financial (蚂蚁金服) and JD.com P2P Lending (京东白条).

Mayi Finance is a subsidiary of Alibaba and JD.com is invested by Tencent. Both are billions dollars company that compete in Internet Finance (FinTech) in China, a new brave frontal that has thousands of startups in China alone.

One Shanghai Internet Finance startup I invested did over 10m yuan of transactions in the first 48 hours of launch. It’s obvious how big an opportunity for big businesses and how big a headache it must be to government regulators.

In July 2015, People’s Bank of China issues Notice (2015) No. 221, Guidelines to promoted healthy development of Internet Finance (银发〔2015〕221号《关于促进互联网金融健康发展的指导意见》)

推动信用基础设施建设，培育互联网金融配套服务体系。支持大数据存储、网络与信息安全维护等技术领域基础设施建设。鼓励从业机构依法建立信用信息共享平台。

Promote the construction of a Credit System foundation that Internet Finance companies could rely upon. Such Credit System should support Big Data Storage, building upon Network and Information Security technologies. Encourage companies to share credit information legally.

In Dec 2014, Alibaba’s Alipay decided to have a bit of fun letting users check how much they spend accumulative in 10 years, and that you rank with your friends.

It does not take long for them to figure out these Big Data they have on the users spending on Taobao over the years could be an excellent data points to assets a person credit rating that could complement Mayi Financial.

This is when they launched Zhima Credit System (芝麻信用) where they would provide a rating between 350 to 950 based on a set parameters, including how much they spend over the years, what they spend on, how many disputes. They also collect data from social networks, recruitment sites, match making sites, logistics, search engines, and so on compiling a comprehensive profile of a person. And then, they made that available as a public service that would make anyone who has a faintest idea of privacy goes “WTF!”

To make such credit system useful, Alipay provides credit lines (backed by Mayi Financial), the higher your rating, the more credits you get. And they also negotiate VISA waiver, or more accurately, in lieu to submit your personal banking financial, property ownership etc during VISA applications, so Chinese users could obtain VISA easier.

JD.com P2P Lending (京东白条) name comes from a Zhejiang’s practice, where businessman would lend money to each another based on a written promissory on a white piece of paper (白条). No collateral, no guarantor, just a piece of white paper saying how much was lend, what is the interest rate and when it shall be return. It works within a small circle of friends (See above on Guanxi) in Zhejiang where everyone knows everyone, and everyone helps out each another especially competing in “outside” business.

But when JD.com extends such business norm to a nation-wide scale, there comes a point where you have to assess the credit rating of a person. JD.com is the number 2 e-commerce site in China so you don’t need to be Sherlock Holmes to deduct what they did.

To quote Hanlon’s razor : “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.”

In this case, the stupidity of Alibaba and JD.com, or their lack of privacy considerations is worrying. The Chinese government in comparison has more understanding of citizen privacy than most of the Chinese enterprise. But I don’t think the what Alibaba and JD.com is doing with their credit rating is a result of any direct Chinese government intervention.

There are other Chinese government audacities that are “nightmare” and “worrisome” but not in this case. At least, not until we see how “Social Credit System” is going to be implemented.

Initially, I tried to stay out of this as I know all the players behind this. But given there are at least 3 people who have email me to ask me what’s going on, I think let me clear the air here.

It started with a report by Brandma on China’s “Special Operation” to regulate Domain Name Registrations which warns that “Getting the license requires understanding on how the regulatory system works and how one should respond as it evolves. It’s also like a mini ICANN application process, but this time in Mandarin.”

Contrary to these “doomsayer” report, there is really no need to panic.

China’s regulation on domain names are stipulated in 中国互联网络域名管理办法（信息产业部第30号令） loosely translated as “China Internet Domain Name Management Regulation, MIIT Regulation No. 30” was published on 5th Nov 2004. So what we are dealing with here is nothing new.

MIIT has been working on a revision of this regulation since 2012 to deal with the new TLDs but this have not been put forward for public comments, least implemented. However, the changes are kind of an open secret to those who are familiar with China but that is not what we are dealing with here.

What kicks off Brandma’s report is that MIIT¹ have issued formal notice to all the China registrars to remind them that they have to adhere to Regulation No. 30, and that MIIT will do random inspections and audits². Registrars are given advance notice so they can resolve any non-compliance from April to June and inspections will start from July onwards.

So what’s about the “mini-ICANN applications” that Brandma is talking about? In 2012, just before closing of ICANN applications for new gTLD, MIIT released 关于互联网通用顶级域申请有关问题的通告 or “Notice on Internet Top Level Domain applications” (Regulation No 89, 2012) that requires any TLDs that wants to be approved by MIIT to register with them. It is more or less a subset of the ICANN AGB except it is to be submitted in Chinese.

As of today, there 14 TLDs approved by MIIT to operate in China which you can do a quick google search, such as “cn”, “中国”, “ren”, “citic”, “wang”, “top”, “商城”, “网址” etc³.

Also contrary to the some speculation this is going to damper the domain names registrations, new gTLDs take up have been pretty robust. 3 out of the top 10 new gTLD (“网址”, “wang”, “top”) are focus on Chinese market. When “公司” and “网络” goes lives, it will also be among the top 10.

In fact, Zodiac just ran some auctions of reserved “wang” names and the results have been pretty impressive. Names like 888.wang was auctioned for 190,000 yuan, jiaju.wang for 118,000 yuan and yiyao.wang for 114,000 yuan. Based on the on going auction of 360.wang, it is likely to cross 500,000 yuan which would be a record for new gTLD in China.

I suspect there are a lot of new gTLDs who might be interested in China market but not on the approved list. Brandma report is one way to tell the industry they can help but instead seem to pissed off some quarters which I won’t translate here.

So far the approved TLDs so far are only the ones from governments (CNNIC & CONAC) or the ones affiliated with KNET and Zodiac. This is not to say outsiders are not welcome in China (Zodiac is majority non-Chinese owned) but if you know your way around, China could be a very interesting market right now.

¹ Brandma original report make a mistake that it comes from Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) which is a totally different entity from Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT)

² The exact mechanism of regulations is a complicated combination of two set of lists, a list of MIIT approved TLDs to be sold in China, and another list of TLDs approved to be sold by the registrars but that’s not the story here either.

³ Public Disclosure: I am one of the largest shareholder of Zodiac, which is involved applications for “ren”, “citic”, “top”, “wang” and “商城” among others.

我与David认识近20年，上周他来北京我们一起吃饭。我们聊起中国”互联网＋”的口号和三版对于互联网公司的疯狂。对于我们这个经历第一代互联网的dot-com泡沫，第二代web 2.0的时代，到第三代移动社交互联网的世界，中国互联网＋第三版就好比第一次NASDAQ Dot-Com的泡沫。

NASDAQ 1994-2005

那时候有很多奇妙的公司如webvan.com，96年成立，99年上市融3.75亿美金（估值48亿），01年破产。还有98年成立的pets.com, 99年NASDAQ上市，破产时候只有268天的公司。我也经历过那个疯狂。99年我成立的公司，2000年融资2400万美金，01年卷商估值5亿美金推我们上NASDAQ。当时董事会认为没有10亿美金估值不上，所以没上市。

很有辛在中国又遇到这同比的疯狂。

乐视 2010-2015

也不是说所有的dot-com的公司都破产了。当年留下来的互联网有很多。AOL，Yahoo，Amazon都是那个时代的公司。也有很多人因为那个时代而起家，比如Mark Cuban，99年把broadcast.com以50亿美金的价格卖给Yahoo而从此树立他在美国富豪的地位。

经过dot-com的泡沫的时代，有什么感触呢？

1）现在是融资的时代，而不是投资的时代

有人找我说一起搞资金投资互联网公司，我坚决不干。如果看美国VC的情况，98-02年Vintage的收成能有单位回报率算不错了。加上Hurdle，GP基本都没赚到钱。

互联网创业者，这个是我们的时代。能容多少钱容多少

2）现在是忽悠时代，而不是做实业的时代

要融资靠讲故事。而故事要动人，能画出大饼，但是不需要啰嗦。

懂行业在这个时候决策很快，不会多问怕错过机会。不懂的不会问太多也就投了。那些问很多问题大部分的是不懂行业但是犹豫不决，所以也不要和他们浪费时间。当年我融资2400万美金就只靠24页的PPT，拿的还是行业顶尖老大的战略投资，决策就一周时间。

踏踏实实做业务，把收入利润做出来而不会讲故事反而没有投资人理会。

3）现在是守钱时代，而不是烧钱时代

融钱后，要懂得守钱。在这疯狂的时代，很多人会鼓励你做很SB的烧钱的事。收购公司，买用户，做收入，高薪请人才，等等。

不要以为烧钱越多就有更多人投资。泡沫总归会破。先死的公司一定是没钱的公司。泡沫破后，手上有钱的公司绝对有优势。那时候大把破产公司资产可以收工，也会有之前高薪都请不动的人才。

泡沫破后才是真正的战场。能活下来的公司都不简单。

不是不花钱，但是要时时刻刻提醒自己泡沫会破后花这个钱能留下什么。比如说市场品牌投入基本不会错。泡沫时候可以提高知名度容易拿到融资，泡沫后品牌认知度还是会留下。

祝大家好运！

正和岛的朋友大家好。很荣幸被邀请在这个群内与大家分享与交流。今天我要说的话题是「传统企业互联网转型」。

在开始之前。。。

一，在过程中，我将稍作暂停以便大家提出意见与问题。我希望这是个互动交流。三人之行，必有我师。我更希望能有互动也能向各位学习。

二，我会分享预先准备的演讲稿。交流完毕后会整理发给大家。我也会把内容发布在网上微博微信。为了保证各位的隐私，我不会发布各位在群内的互动内容，所以请大家放心畅所欲言。

三，今天参与的这个互动我仅代表我个人意见。

好的，言归正传：「传统企业互联网转型」

有些跨行业的大集团，从地产行业起家，然后进入媒体行业，再进军金融行业。在他们眼里，互联网就只是一个行业，所考虑的是：是否要进军这个山头，值得不值得。

互联网确实是个行业。因为互联网产生了巨大的腾讯，阿里巴巴，和百度（简称：BAT）。

但同时，互联网其实也是个「道」。它如空气一样无所不在。在我们呼吸这个空气的当儿，它已经在我们体内慢慢地影响并改变了我们。

互联网的「道」最初改变的是电信行业。在还没有互联网之前，电信网络是单一为语音服务的集中式网路。而今天的电信网路架构已经因为互联网的道而有巨大改变。 很多基本电信与互联网技术的界限已经模糊了。

一百多年的Circuit-Switching技术理念在短短的几十年内被Packet-Switching技术理念替代。其实还在不久前，许多电信专家认为Packet-Switching技术概念是个笑话，是不可能取代Circuit-Switching的 。

同样的，互联网的「道」也改变了媒体行业。传统纸媒，因为互联网的冲击，在国际上已经多年走下坡。前两年中国纸媒也开始意识自己的业务已经停滞不前。

随着上网速度从512kbps增长到4兆以上，互联网用户开始大规模享受高清的互联网视频。传统广电行业也因此受到严重的打击。就不到半年前，广电还通过政策（181号文与292号令）尽力保护传统广电企业制止OTT的发展。

虽然可以理解广电的担忧，但是这个是无谓的挣扎。互联网改变媒体行业不是政策能抵挡的趋势。广电总局也深深理解这个道理，所以在给予传统广电行业一定的政策保护同时，也大力鼓励传统媒体拥抱互联网（1号文）。

中国经济的三大支柱：地产，铁路，外贸。四个现代化：农业，工业，国防，科技。金融，能源，服务，等等等，未来会因为互联网发生巨大的改变。

这也是为什么在两会上，总理李克强提出「互联网+」的概念，鼓励传统企业与互联网的融合。其实不是国家要重点发展「互联网+」而是总理李克强领悟互联网的「道」。

传统企业如果现在不因为互联网而改变，那么互联网也必然改变传统企业。

曾经在网上流传的经典的一段话：「钱多人傻快来」

其实互联网再强大，其实互联网行业占中国经济就几个百分点而已。而中国的经济命脉还是掌握在传统的行业里。2014年阿里巴巴收入525亿元，而中石油为500强企业之首收入是28803亿元。

这也是为什么互联网公司在征服互联网中的领域后，开始用互联网的手段进军传统行业。今天BAT如果不进军传统行业，那么BAT就没有在中国的增长点。

腾讯已经在互联网社交独霸天下。如果你是腾讯，你会选择进军金融行业与传统金融竞争或者进军电商与阿里巴巴京东竞争？

那么互联网会用什么手段进入传统行业呢？这个需要从传统与互联网企业做个对比开始说起。

我开始从商时候，有位老前辈就对我说，「在中国做生意：先做人，后做事」。

关系人脉都是做生意的资源，可能比钱更重要。很多大型企业今天的成就靠着的是关系人脉，或政策的庇护，换取某个重要的资源的垄断。在垄断或者资源不放开的市场中获取巨大的利润。

以上的话当然有些不公平。也有传统企业是在一个相对竞争的市场中打拼出来的。就算靠上述的手段，传统企业也需要付出很大的努力，而不是天真地等钱从天而降。

无论如何，传统企业在中国改革开放后崛起，大家都是希望找到自己赚钱的渠道，而办法往往就是以上的套路。只要能赚钱，赚钱就是王道。

但是在互联网企业内，很少听到「先做人，后做事」这样的话。

互联网企业最关注的就是「产品，用户」。做出比竞争对手更好的产品，获取比竞争对手更多的用户。每天看的是用户数据，分析用户行为，总结用户要什么，紧盯竞争对手的一举一动，筹谋做最有效的推广，以争取更多的用户。

互联网是个竞争非常残酷的行业。胜者为王。只有第一名，没有第二名。唯有其他公司出局，剩者为王。所以为了能赢，就不停的投入烧钱。要投入就要融资。

互联网创业公司都很缺钱。平均互联网创业公司寿命（称为Runway）只有6到12个月。融资完毕后马上就要开始下轮融资。每年一两次。互联网公司的CEO至少50%以上的时间在从事融资相关的活动。

只有用户和流量，在市场能排得上名，才可能获取投资。只有拿到投资才有用户流量排名。互联网企业就在这样的恶劣循环的环境闯出来。

不同的环境造就不同的生物。

看到一块大肥肉，狮子会独占吃饱而蚂蚁却会通知同伴一起来分享。

有利润可图的时候，传统企业会设法利益最大化。而互联网企业会为了用户可以把原本有利润的生意变成赔钱的生意。

2013，乐视推出50寸电视，2499元。海信自豪自家电视的优点是性价比高。但是海信47寸的电视生产成本也要3000元。

海信的首席科学家黄教授问我怎么看。我回「玩资本对比玩成本 」。

为了进军市场，为了有用户，为了概念故事，为了公司估值，赔钱的生意可以做。只要有疯子继续投钱，就可以一直做一直烧。而且中国疯子还很多很有钱，不弄死你不罢休。

如果把传统和互联网企业的老板放一起对话， 就会如图的结果。

传统企业想的是生意如何赚钱，而互联网考虑的就是用户。两者都听不懂对方说什么。

也许大家也会想互联网这个模式够SB，这样烧钱而不赚钱不是生意。

2014诺贝尔经济学奖授予法国经济学家让·梯若尔（Jean Tirole）。得奖原因是他在2002年与Jean-Charles Rochet一起发布的论文「Platform Competition in Two-Sided Market 」。

用个网络俗语来解读就是「羊毛出在狗身上让猪买单」。

海信卖电视，靠卖电视赚钱。

乐视卖电视要用户。然后可以卖广告，也可以经过付费服务把用户转客户。乐视50寸电视，2499元，另外加980元的24月服务费。未来可能有广告和增值服务收入。

互联网企业不是不考虑赚钱，而是赚钱方式与传统企业思路完全不一样。

小小的蚂蚁窝，如果不及时处理， 因细微不慎而酿成大祸。

当你看不明白互联网企业的商业模式，觉得这样烧钱一定不是常态，不理会就最容易铸成大错。

小蚂蚁最后可以吞噬大狮子。

那么，如果你下定决心准备投入互联网行业，请先看以下的故事。

其实我也没烧人民币取暖过所以不知道需要烧多少。

不过这个故事要表达是互联网烧钱的速度非比一般。现在大家都听过的互联网服务（淘宝，京东，优酷，爱奇艺，大众点评，微信，微博，滴滴打车，等等）没有不是烧出来的。

2011年，千团大战。5000多家团购公司拼得你是我活。大部分都获得了风险投资，少者几百上千万美金，多的几亿美金，就这样每天烧钱，补贴用户。记得当时网络传的团购笑话：「美国人请中国人吃饭」。

2014年，打车软件大战。滴滴打车与快的打车半年耗资几十个亿。腾讯阿里请大家打车，要你的钱包。

只要能烧出个春天，不怕烧钱。最怕烧到一半放弃，那么之前所烧的就会血本无归。

所以如果决定要投入互联网业务，先做好烧钱的心里准备和拥有坚定的决心。不然最好不要开始。

每个行业都有自己的特性，不同的行业会有不同的转型办法。在这边我没法每个说清楚，只能笼统归类。而在归类过程发现其实与金庸小说的「武功」十分相似。

用武功来描述不同转型办法虽然有点土气，但是如果能让大家更容易记住也是好事。

五行拳以虎鹤龙蛇猴的象形武术。

在行业已经有共识的，有样学样，依样画葫芦，别人干嘛，你也干嘛。可能会出错，但是也不会偏差太多。

做医药企业想要研发能超越微信的APP，就好比互联网企业想要研发能治艾滋的药。各行业都有自己的专家与窍门。不会爬就先不要想飞的事。

「以人为本」是做企业的基本道理。传统企业是「 仁义」的仁而互联网是「人才」的人。你看甲某做电商，你学习甲某也做电商。网站，网店，流程都抄得一模一样。但是甲某的电商收入可以比你高100倍，因为「人才」不一样。

传统企业重制度，互联网企业重人才。互联网员工的工资都让一般传统企业人事受不了。随便刚毕业的程序员就要年薪十万八万。 好的产品经理年薪过百万都很正常。更不要说总或总经理的工资股份激励福利。作为传统企业，你拿什么吸引互联网人才加入呢？

所以这个基本功其实可以锻炼企业在转型必要的内部改革。虽然是外家功夫，同时也需要修点内家功夫方能成功。

太极拳，阴阳融合武功。

有深厚的传统行业的经营，也同时懂得互联网的思维。

利用互联网的迭代开发模式，用户体验AB测试把传统产品改良升级。融合互联网的应属把原来无趣的功能与互联网链接。开放API接口让第三份与产品能对接，等等。

但是正真的高手玩的是互联网资本。把boring的传统资产与exciting的互联网公司合并重新包装故事。传统资产向银行贷款， 包装后的公司向私募做融资，拿着传统与互联网结合的巨额资金打压竞争对手。经营一两年后再翻盘上市。

美国有很多案例可以学习 。搭配了解传统业务的老前辈与熟悉互联网的年轻人，看他们能作出什么业务。美国人本来就是资本高手，所以整合合并对他们都不是问题。2000，AOL Time Warner的合并创造出3500亿美金估值的公司。虽然多年后合并宣告失败与分家，但是在战略上确实是非常漂亮的一步棋。

能随心所欲使出太极拳的企业就炼成总理李克强说的「互联网＋」，融合传统与互联网的企业就会诞生。

吸星大法是吸取别人内功的上乘功夫。

吸星大法的入门功就是收购并购互联网企业 。收购的困难是收购后如何消化吸收的团队和业务。

1万人的传统企业收购100人的互联网公司，然后融合一起。靠这100互联网公司的人能改变传统企业吗？所以很多时候，收购其实变成「 化功大法」，收购后业务无法继续做，而人受不了文化的差异也离开，最后人财两空。

懂得收购的公司会保留互联网公司为独立实体，不融合而是保留对立团体的互联网文化。留下互联网人才为我所用。

正真的高手其实连收购也省了。互联网公司除了人才以外，其实最大的商业价值不是能为传统企业赚多少钱，而是互联网公司的估值特别高。那么倒不如传统企业设立投资资金专门投资互联网公司。可以享受互联网公司创造的价值，又不影响传统企业的正常业务。

美国企业基本打法是企业设立投资资金。但是中国很多传统企业不愿意放弃所谓的「 控制权」。也有企业高言自己还是能搞定互联网。

能像医药研究的步长集团拿出（据说）5亿美金做风险投资几乎没有。

最厉害的功夫当然是「 葵花宝典」。「欲练神功，引刀自宫。即便自宫，未必成功 」。

传统企业要全放弃现有的业务，把自己现在的财路割断，全面转型互联网商业模式。听起来就很可怕了。

说个小故事。

大家都知道微信吧？在手机上可以随意发文字，图片和语音的强大APP。现在估计全球超过5亿用户。

其实在微信前有个软件已经实现这些功能，而且安装量比现在的微信还要大？你们知道是什么吗？

WhatsApp？比WhatsApp还早。iMessage安装量只限于苹果。小米的米聊？米聊确实差点就是今天的微信但是我说的不是米聊。知道是什么吗？

答案： MMS 多媒体彩信。

当年微信的迅速的卷起的时候，移动公司其实已经拥有比当年微信更强大的MMS应用。所有智能非智能手机都已经有此功能。

移动联通如果要主档微信的威胁，其实有个很简单的战略：彩信免费。

但是移动联通做不到。彩信每条3到6毛 。要把这个财路阉割，太困难了。

导致微信有空间可发展到今天的规模。微信不单单把 MMS 的收入完全消灭，微信把最赚钱的短信也吞噬。而且微信也开始提供语音与视通话。未来在移动买个流量卡就可以，还需要电话号吗？

而面对微信的威胁，移动联通的反应不是在市场面对，而是向工信部投诉。但是用户已经尝到甜头要回去彩信的时代已经不可能了。

彩信的故事在未来不同的行业也会发生。当企业遇到同样的危机，是否能果断自宫，就看企业的领导人的英明程度了。但是「 即便自宫，未必成功 」。

人在江湖，身不由己

有时候不是传统企业要去进攻互联网，而是互联网已经在改变传统企业。

自己不革命，就必然等别人来革你的命。

在这么多武功之中，哪个适合你，根据不同情况有不同结论。

最后再留两句话。

「五行拳打天下」

不要小看五行拳。模仿不好就和山寨产品一样。但是利用它来改革企业，把「制度」融合「人才」，吸引并能留下懂互联网的人，那么在互联网转型的道路上就可以派上用场了。

还记得「羊毛出在狗身上让猪买单」吗？其实五行拳多数都是养猪赚钱的事。

炼成者在互联网闷声赚大钱。

「移动互联网是浮云」

70年代开始互联网链接主框架计算机。90年代链接个人计算机，开始互联网PC时代。08年后链接移动设备，开始移动互联网时代。未来互联网将链接电视与家庭设备（家庭互联网），也会链接智能化的硬件（M2M/IOT/物联网）。互联网之父Vint Cerf在与NASA多年研究太空互联网（Interplanetary Internet）。

其实这些都是互联网，基于TCP/IP互联网五层架构。就如道德经说的「道生一 一生二 二生三 三生万物」。其实PC，移动互联网，互联网电视，IOT，M2M未来太空网都是互联网之「道」衍生的万物，一切都还是互联网。

理解互联网「道」就明白为什么没有所谓的移动互联网。其实就是互联网与人或设备不同的交互形势和服务罢了。

在准备材料之前，他们跟我说群内都对移动互联网非常有兴趣。想知道更多移动互联网，比如：如何能打败微信？

年前K2聚会我和朋友确实讨论过这个问题 。所以辉民就邀请我来给大家讲讲我的「分久必合，合久必分」的观点。

集中式平台就像酒吧，可能会非常火但是必然会out的一天。而分布式就向自己的家，平淡但是再晚各自都会回家。

再火的平台都有走下坡路的时候。MySpace被Facebook取代。人人网被微博，微博被微信，等等。微信再方便好用，都不是属于你自己的空间。

你认为在微信发的内容属于你的吗？账号封了你的数据能取回吗？你把工作的机密都带上微信，你肯定微信不看吗？哪天你与小马哥还是大龙哥喝茶，也许他们之前已经把你大数据分析得彻彻底底了。

但是以微信现在的气势，说打败微信可能还言之过早。

下次有机会再深讨论这个话题。​谢谢！

English subtitle is available (click on the “cc” icon on the player)

你问：“四核双核？”他答：“买回去试试，就知道啦”。
你问：“硬盘多大？”他说：“越贵越大，但不做保证。”
你问：“可以玩游戏吗？”他答：“运气好可以。”

你还会买这台电脑吗？一个拳头都不过分。

但是很不幸，作为中国互联网网民，在安装家庭宽带这件事情上，我们不可避免地面临着明知被骗，也要心甘情愿掏钱的讽刺。因为宽带接入是一个黑即是白，不公重复多次即为标准的行业。

猜一猜，你家的网速实际是多少？

当他们保证你4M宽带时，打开淘宝，网页却“千呼万唤始出来”；当他们收取你10M宽带的年费，你看爱奇艺，缓冲时间却约等于放映时间；他们当然也不会事先告诉你，20M的网速意味着和家人Skype时，他们的笑容永远在凝固状态。

去质问宽带接入商：说好的流畅网速到哪儿去了？接入商耸耸肩，并迅速地根据对你“柔弱程度、白痴程度、气愤程度”的判断，流利地提供给你以下说辞的一种或几种。

说辞一：“（傻B）这个网速是正常的”。

这种说辞，其实很容易被一个测速工具推翻。但是根据我的观察，经过每天铺天盖地的投诉的洗礼，中国的宽带接入商已经很熟练地练就了说谎话不眨眼的本领。

说辞二：“你家的路由器摆放位置太低…你家的路由器不好…是不是你家猫总是碰到路由器…”如果任由他说下去，他可能还会免费帮你分析一下你家的风水，最后得出此处上网，宜遇障碍的结论。

说辞三：“上网高峰时间段，网络拥堵，是正常现象。”

说好的独享带宽哪儿去了？鸟蛋正常！

将责任推诿至用户是不折不扣的流氓说辞。事实是，任何一个宽带接入商在规划网络时都应该根据预计的用户数量和数学模型来计算出应该投资多少带宽，从而保证用户享受到应有的服务。如果上网体验很差，那么有两个可能性：带宽不足，或者实际用户太多，而这两个问题，都是供应商去解决的问题 。

就好比我们开场说中关村买电脑的故事，说好英特尔i7四核，4GB内存，500GB硬盘。送到家时候发现只是i5双核，2GB内存，250GB硬盘。打电话去投诉，回应你的是“这是正常的。”

中国网速到底有多快？

2013第一季度全球互联网网速排名数据显示，中国的平均网速只有1.7兆比特每秒（居然还比2012年同期下降了5.6%），全球排名第98位，远远落后于全球3.1兆比特每秒的平均网速。这个网速，与韩国及日本相差将近10倍。

以一个北京东城联通用户提供的数据为例，声称是20M的网速的宽带，下行速度只能达到5M左右，上行速度大家自己瞧瞧。

不信大家自己可以测测自己的上网速度。

运营商售卖宽带套餐时，标称的是技术上所能达到的最大理论速率值。我们购买的，只是一个可能性，是一种美好的愿望。事实上，用户实际享有的速率远低于套餐标称的速率。而关于实际速率需要达到理论值的百分之多少，并没有一个明确的行业要求。
在中国，宽带服务不是山寨，而是赤裸裸的假货。在宽带行业里，做假是“正常”。中国宽带千篇不仅是假的，而且坑蒙拐骗，手段下作。

监督部门的工信部干嘛了？

2012年，在做完一项关于家庭宽带测速的全民发动之后，得出中国需要提升网速之后，就偃旗息鼓了。明知在自己职权范围内存在不公平的游戏规则时，选择放任纵容，就是鼓励。明知是假，为何不打假？不作为不代表不犯错。

“宽带中国”战略高瞻远瞩，令人神往，国家领导人对于“建设互联网强国”的呼吁让我心驰骋。但是低下头脚踏实地，敢问什么时候才能为网民们提供真正的宽带呢？

Support the Kickstarter project, please :-)

对一个互联网工程师来说，互联网的最大魅力，不在于它可以让我和远国外的亲人只隔着一个屏幕那么远，不在于我可以随时知晓埃博拉的传播动态，也不在于我可以将我电脑中的电影推送到好友家中的NAS上。互联网的振奋人心之处，在于上世纪70年代创立互联网的那群极客的政治理想：端到端，去中心化，分布式，平等、开放，所带来的创新性。

互联网精神是共产主义的美好信念。它讲究无产阶级，人人公平，共建共享和开放奉献。TCP/IP协议是自愿遵循的，接入的同时意味着索取和奉献，我们获取信息，也生产内容；但互联网不是一个单一的主张：它不是狂热口号下人性穿上统一的衣裳。互联网没有统一的政治理想，哈耶克还是马克思，女性自由或者男权至上，全球变暖是不争的事实还是政治手段，都可以辩论。互联网拒绝理所当然，欢迎异见分子。

在互联网精神的核心下我们有了一张巨大创新能力的网。 有开源的Linux，免费的邮箱（SMTP），也有了腾讯，阿里巴巴与百度这些伟大的互联网企业。

然而，在过去的40年间，互联网精神在中国步履蹒跚。08年起，我开始在中国定居，从事互联网创业和互联网项目的投资。很快我发现，中国互联网与国际互联网差异巨大。

举例说明。92年起，我开始做互联网，也多年在亚洲与欧美国家为互联网事业走动，对于全球很多国家的互联网状况都不陌生。然而来到中国后，我第一次听到“南北互通”这个名词，在此之前，我在任何国家都未听过不同的网络需要解决互联互通的问题。我记得当时问我的下属：“不能互联互通的网还是互联网吗？”

这是属于中国的互联网难题。

国际互联网是由一张张没有中心节点，互联互通的网组成。这也是当时设计互联网的理念，并将它开放的初衷：只有当每个节点都独立、相互关联但互不制约时，一个点被摧毁才不会导致整张网的瘫痪。虽然不同的点有不同的权重，但没有一个点是绝对的权威。互联网的技术结构决定了它内在的精神，是去中心化，是平等。

今天国际的互联网是这样的拓扑（每个点是张网）：

有人说，互联网由美国人发明，所以互联网属于美国人。但以上的拓扑图说明，互联网不属于任何个人，不属于任何国家。它属于全人类。它由千千万万的运营商的网组建起来。没有人能控制互联网，没有人能把互联网关掉。

再看看中国互联网的拓扑图：

在中国的互联网是一个高度中心化的封闭架构。电信联通运营商两家独大的的局面，使得想要创新的民营运营商在夹缝中举步维艰。缺乏竞争，使得用户选择受限。网络无法单独设计和开发，也无法按照其特定环境和用户对网络的要求进行设计。

在国内，基层网络层面的从业者都知道，电信和联通对于带宽的控制，成为它们排斥潜在竞争对手的手段。价格垄断和漫天要价，使得底层运营商寸步难行。

所谓的中国互联网，只是一张用了“TCP/IP协议的电信网”而已。

也正式这样的环境，使得像世纪互联这样在中国专注于基层网络的互联网公司屈指可数。几乎所有的互联网公司都集中在应用层面，BAT三巨头，小米，京东，新浪，各类app，无一例外。

TCP/IP 五层模型

这样的失衡性结构，使得中国的互联网精神全然不同于美国的互联网精神。中国人推崇的，是在应用层面的互联网精神；中国人崇拜的，是在应用层面做出成就的乔布斯，雷军，马化腾；中国互联网精神追求的，是垂直性，是社区，是用户体验…这样的思维本身没有错，但是，这不是互联网精神。

互联网精神，是互联网之父Vint Cerf为首的那群极客在70年代所苦心钻研的互联网基层网络精神，是去极权的平等，是去中心的分散，是生而自由，是共享共建。

在中国，互联网公司所向往的，不是TCP/IP开放开源，而是苹果和小米的垂直封闭。我坚信在互联网创业上，失败是必然的，成功才是偶然。封闭的苹果的成功是偶然中的万分之一，但很多人把乔布斯的成功视作必然，也把封闭生态视作成功的必要条件。
在中国，我所看到的每一家互联网企业都追求小而全，五脏俱全什么菜都有，而美国互联网追求小而专，点到点。在一个封闭的生态体系中打造一条完善的供应链条，尽可能地做到人有我有，并拒绝兼容。

封闭不是互联网。谷歌的基本框架，NASA飞行器，美国22%的新网站（wordpress）, 75%的智能手机用户（android）都是建构在开源软件之上。开放让每个人更加多产，个人成为了竞争优势的有效来源。在很多时候，在已有基础上建立和改进别人的产品比自己闭门造车或者从头开始开发一款新产品简单很多，这就是为什么要开放互联网：协同工作，各取所需。

通过统一标准，生产一个可以流畅衔接上下游不同生态的产品，将一个产品做到极致，才能看出一家公司的勇气。互联网的善意，是让人控制产品，而不是让产品控制人；用产品服务用户，而不是用产品胁迫用户。

情怀不是借口，开放才是王道。

从这个角度说，中国距离国际互联网还很远。

今年3月14日，NTIA（美国国家电信和信息管理局）宣布有意将IANA（互联网号码分配机构）的监督权移交至全球多利益相关方社群。NTIA称，它不会接受采用以一家政府主导或一家政府间合作组织来取代NTIA职责的解决方案（也就是说，不能让联合国或类似主体接手）。而从1998年起，ICANN（互联网名称与数字地址分配机构）一直在通过与NITA的合同行使IANA管理职能。所以，美国政府希望ICANN召集多利益相关方来制定一套移交提案。

先从美国政府的这一声明说起吧。与业内同行聊天，达成的共识是，美国政府选择在这个时间点宣布放权IANA，从国际政治的角度看，是明智之举。

这个时间点是指什么？

是指巴西时间4月23日召开的全球互联网治理大会之前。这场全球大会的诉求，缘起2013年的美国窃听事件。随着全球被美国NSA窃听的政要名单大白于天下，巴西总统罗塞夫和德国总理默克尔的名字赫然在列，二者都对美国的窃听行径怒不可遏。巴西总统罗塞夫表示，巴西将会避免使用服务器在美国的网络服务；德国总理默克尔发表声明，她支持建立一个独立欧洲网络。在经过多个互联网机构协调，ICANN CEO于巴西总统罗塞夫见面后， 共同牵头在4月23日主办这场旨在推动互联网“多利益相关方模式”治理模式的全球大会（NetMundial），以此批判美国行为，挑战单一的全球互联网政治格局。

美国赶在这场即将要被众矢之的的国际大会前发表声明，放权IANA，是一个先发制人的姿态。然而，这个姿态可能带来的改变到底是什么，很多媒体都误读了。

国内很多媒体宣称，美国宣布移交IANA监督权，是美国放权互联网的表现，是国际互联网政治格局的重新洗牌。但我不以为然。

互联网分布式的网络，真正的控制权在很多个环节上。而在IANA控制是最重要的基础IP地址和域名资源，但是美国放权IANA完全不等同于放权互联网。

美国主动展现改革的姿态，更多的是减少自身面临国际压力的一种手段而已。为什么这么说呢？

第一，虽然美国对IANA修改互联网根目录文件有最终否决权，但它从未使用过自己的否决权，也就是说，美国从未否决过IANA修改根目录文件的行为。因此，从政治角度来说，IANA监督权对美国政府的重要性可能是被放大的；

第二，互联网根目录文件管理的现状是，ICANN就域名系统制定政策，而IANA负责在技术层面落实政策。也就是说，IANA主要是将ICANN的政策决定转化为具体的技术指令，但IANA并不是亲手修改互联网域名根目录文件。IANA需要将这些技术指令传递到域名根目录文件的维护商Verisign公司，由这家公司做出具体修改。而所谓的美国移交IANA监督权是否包括修改其和Versign的合同，并未出现在政府声明或后续解释中。如果不包括，那么移交并无太大意义。

第三，美国政府放权IANA只是一个可能性，而不是一个最终选择。美国政府对ICANN需要提交的最终提案设置了一些要求，而最终提案是否满足这些要求的决定权在美国政府手中。比如，NTIA就最终提案提出了四项原则，并明确表示，如果提案未能达到这四项原则，则将放弃放权声明。这四项原则是：1支持和加强多利益相关方模式；2维护互联网域名系统的安全、稳定和弹性；3满足IANA服务全球客户和合作伙伴的需求和期望；4维护互联网的开放性。同时，美国政府对于ICANN最终提案有明确时间表，截至2015年8月，如果提案尚未通过，美国就会延期与ICANN的IANA管理合同。届时，ICANN将继续行使IANA管理职责。而ICANN虽然是一个非营利机构，但因为总部位于美国境内，必然接受美国法律政策的约束……由此可见，美国最终是否真的会放弃IANA监督权，完全取决于它是否愿意。

接下来再来看看ICANN是如何完成IANA监督权移交提案这个大Project的吧。

继美国政府3月14日声明后，在3月23日至27日举行的ICANN第49届新加坡会议上，ICANN启动了一套多利益相关方流程，并讨论该如何汇集社群对IANA移交流程原则和机制所提出的观点和建议。4月23至24日，ICANN在NETMundial(巴西互联网治理大会)大会上也召开了一场会议，讨论这一流程。除了召开公共会议以外，ICANN也通过互联网接受公众意见。

同时，ICANN成立了一个IANA监督权移交协调小组，负责收集IANA监督权移交事宜所涉及的利益相关方的声音和诉求，并提出最终移交方案。协调小组由来自13个社群的30位代表组成，这些社群是IANA监督权移交的直接／间接利益相关方，社群选派代表加入协调小组。

协调小组构成图如下：

协调小组第一次工作会议于2014年7月17至18日在伦敦举行。协调小组采用了参与式的工作手法，会议上充满了针对IANA权力移交、ICANN可问责性、协调小组职责等不同议题、声音和立场的碰撞。民主的效率嘛，你懂的。工作会议确定，协调小组的职责在于，在NTIA与ICANN合同到期之前，找到一种合理的安排，来保证IANA的功能以一种可问责的、被广泛接受的方式延续。为了实现这个目标，协调小组需要履行四方面的功能：

第一， 作为与IANA权力移交的全球利益相关方的联络人。IANA的功能大致分为三类：IP地址、域名以及其它参数管理，每个功能都涉及直接／间接利益相关方社群。直接利益相关方社群是指与IANA有直接关联，例如服务往来的社群，间接利益相关方社群则包括所有会受到IANA权利移交影响的社群。协调小组负责动员，召集这些社群，使他们参与到社群提案撰写、意见反馈的程序中来；
第二，评估不同直接利益相关方社群提案的兼容性和可行性；
第三，撰写最终提案；
第四，信息共享和公众知晓。

看到这儿，我忍不住吐槽几句，这是故意想要不完成作业的节奏嘛。以这种安排，30个代表，看似符合多利益相关方原则。但是以这个体制进行，需要耗费几个月，最终讨论出来的结果，可能只是一个无实质解决方案的框架和一堆可以想象的原则指导。依我之见，既然IANA是负责落实技术问题的机构，而监督权移交，亟需解决的也是技术问题，请工程师在短时间内提出移交方案，然后将方案共享给全球利益相关方社群，收集反馈，不断修正，才是一个既以结果为导向，又维护全球多利益相关方模式的方式。

由此引出业内黑ICANN的一个段子。众所周知，ICANN成立之前，IANA职能是由美国工程师、互联网创始人之一Jon Postel完成的。但是ICANN接管IANA之后，马上形成了一个庞大的机构和体系：“ICANN是一项社会试验－测试一个机构需要花多少律师才能实现一个工程师的功能。”

而这一切，都是互联网治理过度政治化的结果。过度政治化的结果，就是人们乐忠于夸大事件的政治意义，并花费大量时间来设计游戏规则。而在我看来，互联网治理，需要更多的技术方案产出，而从现在看，这些产出，被互联网治理的过度政治化拖后了。就如同在巴西互联网治理大会，我代表中国唯一的参会民营企业-世纪互联所呼吁的，在NITA将互联网域名根服务器管理的关键职能的管理权移交至全球多利益相关方社群之际，根区文件应该如何被管理至关重要，而由于13个字母的限制被政治化，使得对互联网治理至关重要的根区文件的重要性没有被凸显出来。这个议题也被国际社会忽视了。

协调小组第二次工作会议将于9月6日在土耳其伊斯坦布尔举行。关于大会产出，让我们拭目以待吧。

But all that could change. In 2012, an organization called the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) created a new email standard that supports addresses with non-Latin and accented Latin characters (e.g. 武＠メール.グーグル). In order for this standard to become a reality, every email provider and every website that asks you for your email address must adopt it. That’s obviously a tough hill to climb. The technology is there, but someone has to take the first step.

Today we’re ready to be that someone. Starting now, Gmail (and shortly, Calendar) will recognize addresses that contain accented or non-Latin characters. This means Gmail users can send emails to, and receive emails from, people who have these characters in their email addresses. Of course, this is just a first step and there’s still a ways to go. In the future, we want to make it possible for you to use them to create Gmail accounts.

So I called up my friends in Ministry of Industry and Information for lunch to find out what’s going.

Background

The document is called 电信业务分类目录 (Category of Telecommunications Services) that is now calling for public comments. This has been something MIIT have been working on for a quite some time now. Many companies, domestic and international companies, have been consulted and provided feedback before this publication.

First, Telecommunication Services in China that are broadly classified into two categories: (1) Basic Telecommunication, e.g. Fixed, Mobile, Satellite, etc and (2) Value-Added Services. In 2003 version, the VAS covers the following:

• Online Transaction Based Service (e.g. E-Commerce, Online Banking)
• Domestic Multiparty Conferencing
• IP-VPN
• Internet Data Center
• Store and Forward (e.g. X.400, Email, Internet Fax etc)
• Call Center
• Internet Content Provider
• Internet Service Provider

Considering the advancement of Internet over the last 10 years, obviously the list is due for an update.

What’s the big fuss?

Essentially, the 2013 update has expanded the category drastically, especially the part on Value-Added Services covering every possible Internet-based operation you can imaging right now and a catch-all requirements to 备案 or “open a file” with MIIT for any services not listed.

The ones that have been making the most noises are the usual suspects: Microsoft, Google and Amazon.

In particular, this effectively put a dent on their plans on “Cloud Computing” because it is part now part of the VAS that is under the direct regulatory control of the Telecommunication Division under MIIT.

Now, for most net-heads who has resisted government regulation on anything related to Internet, and worst, under the old regime of Telecommunication banner, the 2013 update is indeed a big deal.

Unfortunately, this is really nothing new within China. All these years, China has always considered Internet as just a Value-Added Service under the Telecommunication Services. If the 2003 category is does not give you the hint, then check the definition of “Value-Added & Paging Services” in the China’s Commitment under the WTO Agreement.

The original article claims “Classifying services such as cloud computing as Value Added Telecommunications Services appears to be an attempt on China’s part to avoid their WTO accession commitment not to impede market access to foreign suppliers of computers and related services, most of which are now captured by the revised catalog.”

Sorry but no. Internet has always been part of “Value-Added & Paging Services” under the China WTO accession document and according to Liberalization Schedule, foreign companies are allowed to own up to 50% of such ventures.

What does the 2013 update means for Microsoft, Google and Amazon who is trying to roll out their cloud service in China?

Microsoft Azure, Google AppEngine, Amazon AWS have not been allowed to operate within China before this update since there is no licensing classification prior. In theory, the China clones such as Shanda Cloud, Aliyun and Huawei Cloud are also operating in a grey area as they do not have license either.

With the new update, there is now a licensing classification but they can only own up to 50% of the venture … in theory. In practice, it is practically impossible to do so since only four sino-foreign joint venture have been approved by MIIT since 2003.

But at least it is possible to get a license. And they may try to push for it to get it via WTO. If not, there are structures for a foreign company to “control” the license while not owning it. Most lawyers may not even sign off on these structures but it could be done and have been done.

What does it means for the rest of the Chinese Internet companies?

It means much clearer licensing regime, at least from MIIT. One ICP license* and One VAS license that may have multiple approved categories.

You still probably need other licenses from other Ministry and Department depending on the nature of the business (e.g. video streaming requires additional licenses from SARFT) but at least for MIIT, it is more streamline.

What about domain names industry?

I assume the audience in CircleID may be more interested relating to domain name industry.

Domain names are considered a Telecommunication Resource, like Telephone numbers and IP Address. As such, there are other regulations for the domain name, namely China Domain Name Regulation, 2004 Regulation No. 30. But that is also due for an update that may be coming anytime soon with the pending release of new gTLDs.

But if you are providing domain name services, e.g. Registrars, then you might want to take a look at Category B12 “Internet Resource Allocation Services”, Category B21 “Transaction Services” and Category B26-1 “Domain Name Resolution Services”.

Conclusion

If this sound complicated, I am sorry to say I haven’t really even go into the details.

But this is China and I have learn a long time ago to live with the system, like it or not.

* ICP License (ICP 备案) is a story for another which is also due for an update.

台北有一位建筑商，年轻时就以精明著称于业内。那时的他，虽然颇具商业头脑，做事也成熟干练，但摸爬滚打许多 年，事业不仅没有起色，最后还以破产告终。在那段失落而迷茫的日子里，他不断地反思自己失败的原因，想破脑壳 也找寻不到答案。论才智，论勤奋，论计谋，他都不逊于别人，为什么有人成功了，而他离成功越来越远呢？

百无聊赖的时候，他来到街头漫无目的地闲转，路过一家书报亭，就买了一份报纸随便翻看。看着看着，他的眼前豁然一亮，报纸上的一段话如电光石火般击中他的心灵。后来，他以一万元为本金，再战商场。

这次，他的生意好像被施加了魔法，从杂质铺到水泥厂，从包工头到建筑商，一路顺风顺顺水，合伙伙伴趋之若鹜。短短几年内，他的资产就突飞猛进到一亿元，创造了一个商业神话。

有很多记者追问他东山再起的秘诀，他只透露四个字：只拿六分。又过了几年，他的资产如滚雪般越来越大，达到 一百亿元。有一次，他来到大学演讲，期间不断有学生提问，问他从一万元变成一百亿元到底有何秘诀。他笑着回答，因为我一直坚持少拿两分。学生们听得如坠云里雾里。

望着学生们渴望成功的眼神，他终于说出一段往事。他 说，当年在街头看见一篇采访李泽楷的文章，读后很有感触。记者问李泽楷：“你的父亲李嘉诚究竟教会了你怎样的赚 钱秘诀？”李泽楷说：“父亲从没告诉我赚钱的方法，只教了我一些做人处事的道理。”记者大惊，不信。李泽楷又 说：“父亲叮嘱过，你和别人合作，假如你拿七分合理，八分也可以，那我们李家拿六分就可以了.”

说到这里，他动情地说，这段采访我看了不下一百遍，终于弄明白一个道理：做人最高的境界是厚道，所以精明的 最高境界也是厚道.细想一下就知道，李嘉诚总是让别人多赚两分，所以，每个人都知道和他合作会占便宜，就有更多 的人愿意和他合作。

如此一来，虽然他只拿六分，生意却多了一百个，假如拿八分的话，一百个会变成五个。到底哪 个更赚呢？奥秘就在其中。我最初犯下的最大错误就是过于精明，总是千方百计地从对方身上多赚钱，以为赚得越多，就越成功，结果是，多赚了眼前，输掉了未来.

演讲结束后，他从包里掏出一张泛黄的报纸，正是报道李泽楷的那张，多年来，他一直珍藏着。报纸的空白处，有一 行毛笔书写的小楷：七分合理，八分也可以，那我只拿六分。

这位建筑商就是台北全盛房地产开发公司董事长林正家。他说，这就是一百亿的起点。

个人发展的可持续观就是合作共赢。 小胜靠智，大胜靠德，厚积薄发，气势如虹。 只懂追逐利润，是常人所为；更懂分享利润，是超人所作。 人生百年，不可享尽世间所有荣华；惠及百人，能够得到人间更多真爱。

当我读完这篇房产人物传记时我明白了：人的一生给别人借过时实际是在给自己修路，厚道的人，你的人生路总是很宽很长…

Even some of the strongest opponents of the ICANN new gTLDs program have acknowledge the there is a case to open up new gTLD for Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs). So I am going to focus and analysis about the IDN applicants.

1) There are 116 applications for IDN , which is less than the 10% estimate I have prior. But what’s surprising is the numbers for Chinese new gTLDs, 73 applications¹.

The simple conclusion is that most people are still not certain of the future of IDN TLDs but if it is successful, it is likely to be in Chinese gTLDs.

2) The next two languages are 15 Arabic and 9 Japanese new gTLDs. But what is interesting is the lack of Korean, only 3 applications. Of the 3, only one comes from Korea (Samsung).

This is not to say Korean don’t use IDN as KISA has obtained “.한국” via IDN ccTLD Fast Track. What I learn is that the Korean government has discourage Korean companies to participate in new gTLD but to garner around .KR and .한국 for local usages.

Commercially, there is also less interest in domain names as Korean Internet market has predominately used to Keywords and Search Engine as the mean for navigation.

3) Verisign applied for the 12 IDNs in different “transliteration” of COM (Thai, Japanese, Hebrew, Arabic, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Russian, Hindi, Korean) and NET (Hindi, Simplified Chinese, Korean).

However, not all seem to be transliteration. Specifically, “.点看” altho may sound like “dot com”, but has a literal meaning of “click and see” in Chinese. For example, I could have “汽车.点看” which when you pronounce in Chinese (inclusive of the .), “car, click and see”.

Another example is “.大拿” that is Verisign say to be the transliteration of “.NET” (it is a stretch) has a very interesting local Beijing phrase for “Number One” or “Best”. I applaud Verisign for having very creative Chinese staffs :-)

4) Of the 73 Chinese new gTLD, about half of them comes from Greater China but the other half comes from non-Chinese companies.

While there is no rules to forbid any organization to apply for any languages, and there are certainly many Chinese (nearly 50m) that is not within Greater China, the primary market for Chinese domain names I guess would still be in China.

Given the complexity of dealing with Chinese market as well as the government, I am not sure how many of these companies are ready to take on China. Personally, I have been in and out of China for more than 10 years and based in Beijing for the last 4 years in preparation for new gTLD. My experience is that China is not for the weak hearted.

Nevertheless, I hope they are prepared because there are some really good names which would be sad if it goes to waste.

5) Due to ICANN does not allow single-characters (see previous article on the background), there are applicants whose intention is to apply for “网” (web) going for “网站” (website) and “店” (shop) going for “网店” (web-shop) instead. Both of these are going into contention with more than one applicant.²

6) Speaking about contention, there is a “non-contention” between “政务” (government affairs) and “政府” (government). These are not classified as the same at this moment as the string is obviously different but unfortunately the meaning is similar.

What makes this “non-contention” challenging is that the first is applied by China and the latter is applied by Taiwan. ICANN is going difficult times resolving these.

7) Also on contention, we saw two Chinese Internet Giants, Sina and Tencent both applying for .weibo and .微薄 (the Chinese name for Twitter-like services). Both Sina Weibo and Tencent Weibo are having a cut throat competition in China right now. Sina Weibo claims 300m users and Tencent Weibo claims 400m users.

The fight for auction over this name is going to be interesting to watch.

8) The single largest gTLDs applicant based in China is Zodiac with 15 applications. This is followed by Hu Yi (a China-based registrar) with 4 applications. Surprisingly, the largest registrar in China HiChina has made only one application.

9) Some of the “funny” gTLD in Chinese includes: “点看“ (click and see), “大拿” (Best), “八卦” (Gossip) and “我爱你” (I love you).

These are what makes this domain names going to be much more interest industry moving forward. I hope to see more of these!

¹ There is one application for 普利司通 for Bridgestone which interestingly comes from Japan. But Bridgestone in Japanese is ブリヂストン so I assumed the intention should be for Chinese IDN.

² Disclosure: Zodiac is applying for both of them and is in contention with Namesphere.