Google's New Approach to China - Page 17

On January 21 2010 11:41 madcow305 wrote:
Just wanted to address a subpoint about Chinese culture and it's people:

I am Chinese. I recently visited Shanghai on vacation in December, 2009.

The people who have been commenting that Chinese morality and socially acceptable behavior are worlds different from western countries are correct.

China prides itself on its economic development and how close it has come to the west in the past decades. However, it only has a facsimile of a moral structure or social rules. The clearest way to describe how an average Chinese person thinks about right and wrong is this: get away with what you can, and don't get caught. That and "make as much money as you can, using any method you can get away with."

Anyone who's ever been in a Chinese city has probably ridden a taxi there. For most westerners, it was probably a frightening experience. 3 cars sharing 2 lanes on the highway. Lane changes in the middle of intersections. Not stopping for pedestrians unless they're about to hit and kill them. Etc.

Are there traffic laws in China? Sure there are. Use your turn signals, cars making turns yield to oncoming traffic, etc. However, drivers simply don't follow any of these laws unless there's a cop car near them. Their mindset is: "drive however you want, and as long as you don't hit anything, good for you." They will take any number of shortcuts and make erratic lane changes whenever they want to cut time.

Two examples: My family hailed a cab at an intersection. The cab was on the left turn lane, but we needed to turn right. As soon as the light turned green, the cab driver hit the gas, cut right across 4 lanes of traffic, and made a right turn from the left turn lane. Another one is, we were in a cab coming back from the airport, and the exit ramp we needed to take had a long line behind it. Our cab drove onto the shoulder, sped past dozens of cars, and continued riding the shoulder down the exit ramp until it closed, and finally merged into a proper lane.

Another example: People who've visited or lived in China have probably noticed that many people spit phlem on the sidewalks. Is it illegal to do this? Yep. Does anybody care? Not unless there's a cop around, and most times even the cops don't care.

Another example: Jaywalking. It's illegal. Next time you go to China, count how many jaywalkers there are.

Besides basic mannerisms, Chinese people are also amoral when dealing with business. Anyone who's been in China for a while has probably learned to bargain wherever they go. Those that don't soon find out they're getting charged 50%, double, or even triple more than the going price.

Why would a merchant knowingly rip off an innocent customer, charging them double the going rate? Simple, because they can.

Chinese businessmen don't view their clients as a valuable asset, the way many western businesses do. They view their clients as walking piggie-banks. They don't care if you find out that they charged you double, and never purchase from them again.

Is there customer service in China? Sure, but only because offering this service nets you more clients.

Example of merchants ripping you off: The place we stayed at in China needed the heating system fixed. My parents were out running errands when the handyman came. He was roughly my age, and a friendly guy. We talked as he worked. After he was finished, he wrote up a receipt for me, with a sum of 2000 RMB. My dad said the job was supposed to take 50-100.

I had no idea he was ripping me off, and after poking around, I could only come up with 1000 RMB in the house. He took it, and said he'd be back later. It was only after my Dad came back that I found out he'd charged me roughly 4-5 times what the actual cost was.

This guy was from a legitimate company, drove a company moped, and had a shirt with the company logo on it. He was perfectly nice and amiable. He also didn't blink an eye when he was price gouging me.

More common-knowledge examples of Chinese amorality are the "guanxi" or "connections" you have to have to do anything in China.

Are you sick? Do you want the best medical service? I hope you've got guanxi with the hospital adminsitrator, or one of the staff members.

Need a reservation on a busy night? Guanxi will get you a good table.

Long line at the bank? Guanxi. Cops harassing you? Guanxi. Want a good deal on a hot item at the mall? Guanxi. Want that promotion? Guanxi.

Do "connections" get you stuff in the west? Sure! But it's not ingrained to the level it is in China. Imagine if everything you did was affected by what connections you had.

And how do you get these connections? Well, some guanxi is formed though years of mutual friendship. Maybe your college buddy works at a restaurant, and since you know him, you can always get a good seat.

Most of the time though, guanxi is formed through money.

Common example: It's the norm for doctors, especially surgeons in China, to receive sums of money before operations. It's not part of the official bill, but you can be sure that you better have that little red envelope ready for your surgeon.

Another example that everyone knows about is how you have to have guanxi with the government if you want to do business in China.

On January 21 2010 17:39 jfazz wrote:
In europe, no. Europeans, for the most part speak multiple languages. Most tourists in europe are other europeans. Many caucasians have some idea of one of the main european languages (french, italian, spanish or german). It never seems like the Chinese have any idea.

On February 20 2010 09:49 Subversive wrote:


I'm impressed that all of my european friends who study or are travelling here (australia) speak a number of languages (because australians generally don't).

On March 15 2010 14:37 dybydx wrote:
Mgmt in google simply doesnt know how to do business in China. Most Wall Street businesses operate like how you would file a tax return - very systematic and plainly laid out. That model simply doesnt work in China.

A friend of mine works for a listed company that has operations in China. They regularly wine and dine gov't officials and offer them gifts, despite the law specifically forbids such a practice. They are not doing this to bribe the officials, but in practice, if you don't offer them gifts, they will use their authority to send wave after wave of inspectors after your company to hand pick problems out of you. In essence, they treat this as paying a license fee to operate business in China.

On January 20 2010 08:22 Saturnize wrote:


You never see communist countries either for that matter.

On March 15 2010 14:48 Spinfusor wrote:

But people charge expensive meals to their companies all the time here. It's hardly unique to China.

On January 13 2010 09:19 mucker wrote:
Google is a public company. They were happy to censor their results and put up with the Chinese government when they thought they could make money there. Most likely this means they aren't making enough money in China to justify staying there and have been looking for a way to pull out but get a public relations win out of it. Though I would imagine fending off the Chinese government's hackers would raise your operating costs quite a bit.

On March 15 2010 14:37 dybydx wrote:
Mgmt in google simply doesnt know how to do business in China. Most Wall Street businesses operate like how you would file a tax return - very systematic and plainly laid out. That model simply doesnt work in China.

A friend of mine works for a listed company that has operations in China. They regularly wine and dine gov't officials and offer them gifts, despite the law specifically forbids such a practice. They are not doing this to bribe the officials, but in practice, if you don't offer them gifts, they will use their authority to send wave after wave of inspectors after your company to hand pick problems out of you. In essence, they treat this as paying a license fee to operate business in China.

Google simply doesnt get this, if you want to operate there, you gotta live by their rules. Search providers are required to censor results long before Google.cn was active, Google simply walked into a wall.

On January 21 2010 17:16 jfazz wrote:
Without making too large a deal out of it, Chinese tourists in europe are the worst. No respect, no grasp of the foreign languages, and seemingly no inerest in learning about their cultures. Basically the opposite of Japanese tourists oddly enough.

On March 15 2010 16:31 Manifesto7 wrote:


When I worked for customs in Canada, German and British travelers were the absolute worst, nobody else was even in their league. Funny how anecdotal evidence works eh?

On March 15 2010 16:31 Manifesto7 wrote:


When I worked for customs in Canada, German and British travelers were the absolute worst, nobody else was even in their league. Funny how anecdotal evidence works eh?

On March 15 2010 17:05 Railz wrote:

On a more serious note, I go to a university that prides itself on Medicine and Engineering, so as expected, we have a pretty heavy emphasis on foreign student visas from the Asian region. I've seen all kinds. I find that in most cases, few international, non-English speaking countries in the south-east Asian area don't quite grasp social norms. This isn't a shot at them, not by a long shot, its just cultural differences. It seems like the idea of, "a common good" isn't as strong as it should be in a 'communist' country as it is in a republic.

On March 15 2010 14:37 dybydx wrote:
Mgmt in google simply doesnt know how to do business in China. Most Wall Street businesses operate like how you would file a tax return - very systematic and plainly laid out. That model simply doesnt work in China.

A friend of mine works for a listed company that has operations in China. They regularly wine and dine gov't officials and offer them gifts, despite the law specifically forbids such a practice. They are not doing this to bribe the officials, but in practice, if you don't offer them gifts, they will use their authority to send wave after wave of inspectors after your company to hand pick problems out of you. In essence, they treat this as paying a license fee to operate business in China.

Google simply doesnt get this, if you want to operate there, you gotta live by their rules. Search providers are required to censor results long before Google.cn was active, Google simply walked into a wall.

On March 15 2010 14:37 dybydx wrote:
Mgmt in google simply doesnt know how to do business in China. Most Wall Street businesses operate like how you would file a tax return - very systematic and plainly laid out. That model simply doesnt work in China.

A friend of mine works for a listed company that has operations in China. They regularly wine and dine gov't officials and offer them gifts, despite the law specifically forbids such a practice. They are not doing this to bribe the officials, but in practice, if you don't offer them gifts, they will use their authority to send wave after wave of inspectors after your company to hand pick problems out of you. In essence, they treat this as paying a license fee to operate business in China.

Google simply doesnt get this, if you want to operate there, you gotta live by their rules. Search providers are required to censor results long before Google.cn was active, Google simply walked into a wall.