I took an Exnet car and he had that Pi Pay or whatever it was. Had an impressive looking PDA type thing too.

I do think these new taxi drivers are not ex TukTuk but new drivers who, as I said earlier, have seen an opportunity to earn. Hardly any of them speak English, unlike those Tukkers.

Pass app works well for me since you can call 086 51 51 21 if you don't have a smartphone. Tuk-tuks and taxis available, limited English spoken.

ali baba wrote: ↑Sun Oct 01, 2017 1:07 pmI don't see the relevance of restaurants here. The infant industry argument is about manufacturing and since you cannot patent an ingredient or copyright a recipe there's very little restaurants can do to suppress competitors and competitors are plentiful because almost everyone learns to cook when they're kids.

In the tech age network effects, economies of scale and the huge quantity of data gathered by incumbents create barriers to entry and exit. I have a facebook page because everyone else is on facebook even though I'm not a fan of the layout or privacy policy.

I know very well infant industry is related, but it's still a flawed argument. There's a huge import tax on cars here, yet zero car industry. You also didn't magically get a Facebook page, you have a Facebook page because Myspace and other predecessors sucked and were eventually beat by a better product i]that came later and had to deal with very similar entry barriers[/i]. The tech age is litered with hundreds of mini booms and busts. When people had myspace or Netscape navigator, they never dreamed that they'd be gone and forgotten a few years later.

monomial wrote: ↑Sun Oct 01, 2017 12:42 pmThere is a critical piece you are missing here though, which is that a brick and mortar store is highly dependent on location, whereas that does not apply to an app.

For example, I would never eat at any other burger joint if I was close enough to go to My Burger Lab on Norodom. But if I'm across town I'm sure not going to go an hour out of my way to eat there. I'll probably eat at Lucky Burger instead, despite that fact that Lucky Burgers taste like cardboard and don't really deserve to be called food. Location is so important in brick and mortar retail, that even a horrible quality store can still outcompete the better one if they happen to be better located.

Apps don't have that built in protection. If you build a better app and people know about it, then the other guy will just get shut out. The online space is so much more competitive than the real world, and it is much easier for a foreign competitor to completely obliterate the local competition.

I will personally go out of my way to get a product or service I prefer. Either way, I think you actually agree with me but don't know it. As for the part about a better app being available and people switching: that's the whole point. Why would you NOT want what's best? It's mutually beneficial for both the consumer and the creators that the better product be chosen. An inferior product being propped up by the state stifles competition both outside and inside said country. Think of the car manufacturers in the DDR that had thousands of employees to do what only really required three hundred. Why should I strive to better my product or create something new if a company gets subsidies but I don't? There are many cases of this happening, even in the tech or gaming industry where subsidies actually hurt the other competing businesses in the same industry in the home country (Ubisoft comes to mind).

jmagic wrote: ↑Sun Oct 01, 2017 2:14 pm There is no way to justify stealing from local consumers in order to prop up local producers.

That's basically my view as well. If someone makes a better product than I/you/we/they do, I want it. Propping up failing brands, companies or whole industries is a waste of resources.

ali baba wrote: ↑Mon Oct 02, 2017 8:25 amPretty much every gov't in the world provides some subsidies for some industry and pretty much every gov't has some form of sales tax and import tariff. So you're the only person on the world who believes this.

Because bloated governments always know/do what's best for their citizens...

Listen, I'm all for helping create and nurture local talent and it can sometimes be good to protect an industry that employs tons of citizens. However, at the end of the day it's about remaining competitive and adjusting when you need to. I personally question how many jobs would be gained by either Uber or a local alternative, but you seem insistent it's important. So listen, Uber will likely create jobs here. Most of what are considered big evil companies today were small start-ups by people who worked at other behemoths we're talking about. A Cambodian who works for Uber will gain valuable knowledge, expertise and hone his IT skills. He's then way more likely to move on after a while to start his own company based on a fresh idea he had while he was working there. Think about it: Youtube, Twitter, Electronic Arts, LinkedIn, Instagram and even Android OS all started by people who worked at big companies like Apple/Google etc. Thinking that Cambodia will suddenly become a tech hub overnight without the expertise and employment of big players is misleading if not downright foolish.

ali baba wrote: ↑Mon Oct 02, 2017 8:25 am

jmagic wrote: ↑Sun Oct 01, 2017 2:14 pmThere is no way to justify stealing from local consumers in order to prop up local producers.

Pretty much every gov't in the world provides some subsidies for some industry and pretty much every gov't has some form of sales tax and import tariff. So you're the only person on the world who believes this.

Saying that most governments do it is not a moral defense.

Because bloated governments always know/do what's best for their citizens...

Because the invisible hand always delivers...

Also an import tariff is one of the easiest taxes to collect and is a great source of revenue for poor gov'ts that don't have access to lots of auditors or forensic accountants.

ali baba wrote: ↑Tue Oct 03, 2017 10:07 am

Because bloated governments always know/do what's best for their citizens...

Because the invisible hand always delivers...

Also an import tariff is one of the easiest taxes to collect and is a great source of revenue for poor gov'ts that don't have access to lots of auditors or forensic accountants.

Or " I can help you save money on this. just pay me half the amount and I will sign it off"

ali baba wrote: ↑Tue Oct 03, 2017 10:07 am

Because bloated governments always know/do what's best for their citizens...

Because the invisible hand always delivers...

Also an import tariff is one of the easiest taxes to collect and is a great source of revenue for poor gov'ts that don't have access to lots of auditors or forensic accountants.

I thought about mentioning that it can provide a source of revenue in my previous post, but we all know in the long run where a lot of that money has ended(s) up don't we? Again, governments knowing/doing what's best for their citizens... The main thing that a government should really be on top of economy-wise is corporate social responsibility issues such as pollution and the environment and taxation.

Anyways, you conveniently haven't addressed any of the issues I mentioned above. Do you really think that by implementing a tax of some sort on foreign tech companies will magically create some sort of Silicone Valley tech hub in Kompong Speu which creates superior products and services? Anyways, I know this is a bit of a fruitless discussion as you have your views and I have mine and I doubt they'll ever intersect on this issue.

If you read the links I posted you'll see there's more to the policy than just tariffs and magic. Subsidies, technology transfers and capital controls are pretty popular, too.

These policies have been proven to be effective in dozens of countries over hundreds of years so I don't really feel the need to convince anyone.