₦airaland Forum

RodgersAkpafu:
But the Chinese will be VERY STUPID to run such an operation on UK soil though, because the scandal WHEN discovered will be something
But again, like I said, let's be watching and see how it plays out

Zahra29:
The US and China are the world leaders in military spending and capability.

However the UK and France have nuclear deterrents (others like India, Russia etc) so we're not exactly powerless, although the prayer is to not get to a point where this option is even remotely considered.

HustlaOfLagos:
I think a lot of EUs problem has to do with welfare spending and encouraging people to not be productive enough. A 2nd problem is over taxation which removes the incentive for people who aspire to do more to be productive.
Third issue is what I will call EU risk transference syndrome where they transfer all their problems and risk to the US to solve which tethers them to the US and makes them go along with whatever bad decision the US makes so as to enjoy the benefits of the transference syndrome. The risk transference approach is a pretty bad one and is made pretty obvious under DJT.

UK having left the EU also does not help things .. Also, why mention Russia? I thought they were lumped together with China?

Zahra29:
Agree, in the peaceful (in western Europe) years following WW2, many EU countries redirected a lot of their spending from defence to welfare. For example the NHS was built in 1948. Our spending ratio needs to be rebalanced as we are now in a different world era.

I mentioned Russia simply because they also have nuclear weapons. However they are reliant on their allies like China, Iran and NK to boost their military capability.

HustlaOfLagos:
The whole thing is ridiculous to me sha.

if I want to spy on you, why would I build in your country, under your very nose when I know you can easily catch me? It's the same as the EV listening on people kini. Guess who was actually asked to pay fines for listening in on people and guess which country the coy is resident in? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr4rvr495rgo

Look at how this one was rambling when asked about listening EVs

WATCH - Premier Ford today said Chinese made EV’s will be listening to your calls. “When you get on your cell phone, it’s the Chinese that are going to be listening”

I ask Ford to back up those claims, & ask if he’s concerned about his Chinese made iPhone spying on him. pic.twitter.com/MT0D3QUfkB

— Richard Southern (@RichardCityNews) January 19, 2026

If you are concerned, what about iPhones / Android devices that are made in China? Our Google / Amazon home speakers? laptops? bluetooth headphones?

jedisco:
1. A place of paranoia. If these clandestine operations have been done by you to others, every moving cockroach becomes a suspect.

Goodenoch:
Also: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jan/18/chinese-mega-embassy-london-british-spies-mi5-analysis

And this: https://www.chathamhouse.org/2025/07/what-uk-must-get-right-its-china-strategy A very clear-eyed assessment of the UK-China relationship from Chatham House, unlike the hysteria from the Daily Heil, Torygraph et al.

jedisco:
With the much of the UK I know, I doubt this would have been approved if there was a demonstrable security concern that could not be easily achieved elsewhere. It's manytimes just a smokescreen to drive a political narrative. Similar to the Huawei issue where the UK didn't see any concern after checks but went ahead to kowtow to the U.S and restrict a budding Chinese company. Remember 'dem migrants are eating our cats'? Similar talk here

4ever1:
Very soon this people will look for another set of riff raffls to come and defend their country
Used and discard country

RodgersAkpafu:
And the China caping continues on this thread lmaooo.

Make we dey look and observe as things dey unfold sha

People implying that China is not an adversary to keep at bay and calling it media "frenzy"

🤡 🤡 🤡
Na so

RodgersAkpafu:
I keep saying it though
..... Man sometimes I just wonder how the US thought, that of all people to elect, it is this clown and joke
Well the silver lining is that at least UK can see a prelude to what a Reform govt will likely look like....
And the administration will be done before GE 2029

Zahra29:
MI5 to move cables away from China mega-embassy over spy fears

The security services have drawn up plans to relocate critical internet cables away from China’s new mega-embassy in London as part of measures to reduce the risk of espionage....

...This is expected to include the supervised relocation of fibre-optic cables that carry financial and internet data between the City of London and Canary Wharf.

https://archive.ph/20260120200543/https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/china-embassy-internet-cables-london-cpg8gqdg5

Shows that national security concerns were valid and not just manufactured hysteria, and fortunately it appears that the government is prepared to act.

Win- win for the UK....we can press forward with expanding our trading relationship with China, without compromising our sensitive assets.

And now let's wait and see how long it takes China to approve the UK's planning application for a larger embassy in Beijing 😄

Zahra29:
MI5 to move cables away from China mega-embassy over spy fears

The security services have drawn up plans to relocate critical internet cables away from China’s new mega-embassy in London as part of measures to reduce the risk of espionage....

...This is expected to include the supervised relocation of fibre-optic cables that carry financial and internet data between the City of London and Canary Wharf.

https://archive.ph/20260120200543/https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/china-embassy-internet-cables-london-cpg8gqdg5

Shows that national security concerns were valid and not just manufactured hysteria, and fortunately it appears that the government is prepared to act.

Win- win for the UK....we can press forward with expanding our trading relationship with China, without compromising our sensitive assets.

And now let's wait and see how long it takes China to approve the UK's planning application for a larger embassy in Beijing 😄

jedisco:
You sound quite similar to a cousin who told me all ladies who wear trousers will go to hell. I asked him why and he mumbled something similar to the above. Finally told him if that was his vision of heaven, I don't want to be part of his heaven.



Hehe... I thought Trump was your favourite- the one who'd help you fight Indians... Well, seems he didn't just stop with Indians as every sensible person thought.

I told you this was what they will face, and they are bearing the huge brunt of the seeds they sowed, (by claiming assistant white supremacist and supporting a wicked supremacist) thinking they were the "special migrants" and the rest were inferior migrants
How market now? lmao
Give Vivek a hug when you see him
He is going through a lot

Diplomacy2020:
Can you imagine how inhumane Nigerians are? They are killing people but someone is interested in dirty December.
Omo Thoma Hobbes was referring to Nigerians I believe.

So we should keep quite and pretend that all is well and terrorists will continue killing people because you want to still be coming back for dirty December.

Nigerians are impossible

justwise:
Listen to Trump here

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/VPUS6onYVCE

jedisco:
You sound quite similar to a cousin who told me all ladies who wear trousers will go to hell. I asked him why and he mumbled something similar to the above. Finally told him if that was his vision of heaven, I don't want to be part of his heaven.



Hehe... I thought Trump was your favourite- the one who'd help you fight Indians... Well, seems he didn't just stop with Indians as every sensible person thought.

Goke7:
wahala America don buy market no be small

dem go feel am!

Goodenoch:
Yes this was in the article I posted as well:

‘It is understood that the full plans were well known to the security services as part of the planning process, now led by the communities secretary, Steve Reed. Insiders add that even though the Royal Mint Court site is roughly between London’s two financial districts in the City and Canary Wharf, the concerns about cabling are exaggerated. “Traffic can be re-rerouted and, if necessary, cabling removed,” an official said.’

Which is why all my comments referenced risks being identified and mitigated. The idea that such an obvious thing was visible to everyone and their granny but the government still went ahead and granted approval without assessing it was not a real risk or could be mitigated effectively, is what was and continues to be, hysteria.

Cyberknight:
At the bolded, hopefully someone with a pulse within the UK government made it clear to China that this should come almost immediately after the UK's own approval or else they'll withdraw the UK one.

justwise:
He will desperately start one so as to avoid election…giving him longer time to stay in office.

RodgersAkpafu:
But the Chinese will be VERY STUPID to run such an operation on UK soil though, because the scandal WHEN discovered will be something
But again, like I said, let's be watching and see how it plays out

HustlaOfLagos:
I think a lot of EUs problem has to do with welfare spending and encouraging people to not be productive enough. A 2nd problem is over taxation which removes the incentive for people who aspire to do more to be productive.
Third issue is what I will call EU risk transference syndrome where they transfer all their problems and risk to the US to solve which tethers them to the US and makes them go along with whatever bad decision the US makes so as to enjoy the benefits of the transference syndrome. The risk transference approach is a pretty bad one and is made pretty obvious under DJT.

UK having left the EU also does not help things .. Also, why mention Russia? I thought they were lumped together with China?

WanderingChild:
Some Crazy Observations

Introduction
We had an interesting discussion today with our patent attorney who stylishly revealed to us the long-term goal of patents.

A few years ago, I read the book titled Capitalism Without Capital: the rise of the intangible economy by Stian Westlake and Jonathan Haskel and the summary was humbling – wealth is no longer tangible but intangible. Basically, the way to generate wealth in today’s world and in the future is by IP and owning a business.

Via IP you can build a defensible and an attack mechanism over a product, process or name which enables you to extract rent from anyone who wants to leverage the IP. What was shocking from our discussion was that Howard Lutnick, the current US Commerce Secretary holds over 400 patents. Yes, you heard me. The guy working on those tariffs and responsible for trade within and without the US holds a staggering number of patents. Holding this amount of patent is not the end, there is an end game and that is IP-Feudalism. Having this number of patents means Lutnick can rent the patent collection to a hedge fund or PE or some other boutique businesses focused on IP infringements. These businesses then go on the offensive looking for anyone who has infringed and sue them to bankruptcy. This is the future that is being built. Lutnick does not want to compete with Google and Apple and Nvidia and Amazon who are playing the game of Techno-Feudalism (credit to Yanis Varoufakis), rather, he wants to play the game of IP-Feudalism. What is even humbling is that you do not need to build or design the product for which the patent is being filed for (I know this for utility patents, not sure of others).

What is the implication? Most US patents (utility and plant based) give you exclusivity for 20 years (e.g. 2020 – 2040) and 15 years for design patents. This means that no one can wake up and just implement some design or concept that infringes on a patent within its validity period and think they can sell into the US markets – you will be sued to bankruptcy.

Via owning a business, the game being played is the game of valuation. When you approach investors to raise $X, investors depending on the round get greedy and want to put your pre-raise valuation at say $2X - $5X. This implies that for a $10M raise, the business has a post raise valuation of $30M - $60M. When will this business become a unicorn? However, imagine raising $100M at $1B pre-raise (or $10M at $100M - $150M pre-raise), that automatically puts that business at the unicorn status opening crazy opportunities for it. Revenue will come but valuation now matters more at the beginning. That unicorn status gives you access to any tech major for partnerships. It gives you crazy access to cheap credit and makes it easier for you to scale and become a monopoly. There is no doubt that the next subsequent raises will be $0.5B - $1B at $10B, $1B - $5B at $150B and $5B - $10B at $1T and then IPO where access to funds becomes “unlimited”. As crazy as this sounds that is the game being played by all the majors. OpenAI is over $0.5T, SpaceX is estimated at $0.8T, etc. The investments put in by VCs early on are now worth crazy sums because the valuation is at a crazy level. This is why Tesla, Apple, Nvidia, etc with their appalling book value and revenue are worth trillions. The game is valuation.

The implication?
Unfortunately, raising crazy amounts today is only possible in the US and is a network thing. The easiest network is via an MBA at one of the “legacy or elite” universities - M7, T10 or T15. These are schools where family office operators are coming to get the stamp of the school and go on to inherit family businesses. These are the places where networks can be built with crazy RoI. These are the places that give you direct access to Silicon Valley or New York finance players.

Underlying factors
The current administration despite their crazy display is very friendly towards software-based patents because both the commerce secretary and the US PTO administrator (undersecretary for commerce) both worked together professionally, are friends and are building a crazy portfolio of patents. In fact, the Inter Parties Review (IPR) that big companies regularly used to kill patents at the US PTO has essentially been killed by the new administrator. Previously, big companies like Microsoft and hedge funds could spend $250K litigating against your patent to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) where such litigation is meant to just kill the patent progress. The current US PTO administrator, John Squires has now killed that. In fact, he adjudicates on appeals and by the wordings of the law, his opinion on whether to take a case forward or not cannot be litigated against. He has rejected all the last six of such filings.

Another worrying factor is China. They have the largest trove of AI and software patents in the world and the gap between China and the US in patent ownership is widening at an alarming rate. To limit this, US PTO is being primed to be more favourably disposed to software-based patents. Recent appeal rulings against 101 rejections from examiners have evidenced this.

Summary
It is an interesting time, but it is crucial to understand how the game is being played right before our very eyes. We cannot idly watch another wealth bifurcation happen again (Covid was one, the 2008 financial crisis recovery was another, etc.) simply because we claim to be over worked or poor or unable to access what needs to be done. We must also note that the wealth bifurcation happening now is at orders of magnitude that excessively increase wealth for the already rich and will make it very difficult for the poor to even survive. This is because valuations generate crazy wealth which allows these wealthy folks to put huge pressure on the cost of living making it almost impossible for previously ok people to survive leading to gentrification. We must have a game plan to escape.

lavida001:
The level of espionage China will carry out will be shocking and out of this world to them.

Nothing will happen after the scandal uk is an ant compare to modern day elephant china.

Zahra29:
Previously there were only oblique mentions of possible measures, including potentially moving the cables "if necessary" - and given the significant cost and disruption involved, this wasn't guaranteed. Reed, Jarvis et co (understandably) didn't want to be drawn into the details of any plans.

This is the first time there has been confirmation that the government will go ahead with moving the cables - perhaps disclosed now to allay public concern and stave off impending legal challenges on the decision.

RodgersAkpafu:
I keep saying it though

An armed to the teeth Europe is dangerous for the world and we have long documented history to that effect
Successive US administrators have been managing the Bretton Woods order with sense, e get why
Agreement is agreement and as long as it is mutually beneficial, why dramatically rock the boat

Man sometimes I just wonder how the US thought, that of all people to elect, it is this clown and joke

Well the silver lining is that at least UK can see a prelude to what a Reform govt will likely look like....
And the administration will be done before GE 2029