Quote Originally Posted by Bill Moore View Post
It is already used a population control mechanism. It is amazing how dominate it is throughout the parts of China I visited. I know futurists envision a cashless society, which is a way to empower state control over the individual. Arguably the CPC wages two wars, one internal against the perceived enemies of the party, and one external against Taiwan, Japan, and numerous Southeast Asian nations.
WeChat is absolutely dominant in people's lives within China.

As well as having an estimated external user base of 100-200 million.

I believe (One Belt One Road)OBOR will continue virtually unimpeded for the following reasons:

1)US retrenchment into Fortress America combined with declining social and financial capacity(and national WILL) to fund a long term integrated strategic diplomatic effort.

2)EU distractions of BREXIT and increasing political fractures

3)Russia lacks the financial capacity to realistically compete

4)India may be able to compete in the future as it's GDP expands, but weighed against internal development.

I see that leaving China to execute debt/trade deals to shape global users onto the WeChat platform.

One Platform, One Network(OPON).

I don't see it as a single global platform/network default standard

But I definitely see it as one of several global platforms/networks of globally strategic importance.

Despite artificial barriers such as Great Firewall and aligned western opposition to Huawei, ultimately Metcalfe's Law and Zipf's Law will come into effect in a global battle between competing platforms.

My initial thoughts are:

We see growing geopolitical friction between competing "superplatforms" and their superpower sponsors

We see increasing recognition that it's not just the means of exchange that matters, but the platform on which the exchange occurs as well as the network participants using it.

We see developing world "land grabs" for increasing platform/network "lock in".

We see increasing political/regulatory friction between nations when trans-national and global superplatform potential is recognised.

We see WeChat's superplatform better positioned for strategic advantage due to:

1)Single 100% integrated platform/network

2)Government integration

3)Mobile DNA

The incumbent Western superplatform is a FAANG patchwork in comparison and at frequent odds against government.

So in comparison, while the western superplatform has greater global reach it is neither operationally nor politically integrated to maximise geopolitical expansion, influence, and long-term future exploitation.

When you look at future focused efforts such as Estonian e-residency, it's not a stretch of the imagination to see digital residency features and benefits only available to "locked in" users of full integrated superplatforms becoming a natural progression.

WeChat platform lock-in within China is nearly universal and increasingly difficult to exist without for a domestic user base of 1 billion monthly active users.

With 100-200 million users outside of China, the expansion of a fully integrated superplatform has very real potential and represents a considerable threat to the status quo.

The Cold War was a battle between ideologies.

Perhaps Cold War Redux will be a non kinetic battle between competing sovereign integrated platforms?

If I was asked to make a binary choice between:
A)global reserve currency
B)superplatform global standard

I would pick "B", because "B" could subvert "A", but "A" would not necessarily be able to subvert "B".

Do you think a quiet "One Platform, One Network" doctrine as a shadow under One Belt, One Road is worthy of further exploration?

Same with Superplatform(fully integrated with government) as the new Superpower.

Thoughts?