Comments by "Siana Gearz" (@SianaGearz) on "Toshiba’s Big Technology Export Scandal" video.

There isn't anyting particular about Toshiba laptop is there? Last i looked they were mostly Compal machines like many others, basically every brand carries somewhat customised macines made by Taiwanese ODMs. Which is a story in and of itself, since back then i expect Compaq was one of the major benefactors of Toshiba business being shunned. And guess what Taiwanese company they spun off.
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SanDisk is Toshiba. When you need good flash semiconductors, they were an unavoidable supplier for a long time, now spun off as Kioxia, and also they have a long running partnership with Western Digital. Another big Toshiba field used to be power semiconductors. But also in some crucial ways it's not the same company that did this, hasn't been for a while.
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It's a question of time and cost. You buy a tool, you jump easily 5 years ahead in the process, and if you think about the other tools involved, it can compound to more years. Tools are relatively inexpensive like that since you need a handful to make for a lot of progress. You can build a tool in months but to refine it and to iron out the niggles can take an arbitrary amount of time, the time and effort that then takes away from achieving the end goal. It's the work that someone else has done and that desn't need to be repeated.
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They say, hitory knows no subjunctive case; for a reason. The way things played out isn't ideal, but the world is largely alive, and you don't have predictive powers as to what would have happened, you're suggesting a little more than a mere flap of a butterfly. At best a curious thought experiment, a false nostalgia for something that never would be.
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Soviet Union was a threat. Its governance was unpredictable and often times irrational, and it had submarines with missiles and nuclear warheads. But for a company from a smaller country, the profit from trade is all their own, while the resulting threat is distributed across the whole world, it's an externalised cost/risk. Also F U, favourable terms for Ukraine? like Ukraine not existing? There was no "Ukraine crisis" until you and your operatives like Girkin, Borodai and Aksyonov snagged Crimea and part of Donbas. If you wanted to not be perceived as a threat, you lot should have learned where your borders are and stayed within them.
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You don't think Soviet Union has top notch engineers and mathematicians who can throw together a program that spits out specialised G-code, or even hand write G-code with logarithmic rulers and punch cards? I saw the tail end of that era first hand there. Things they could develop on paper were well far ahead of things they could actually manufacture. Getting from quantity of 1 to quantity of 100 or more was a problem. I don't have any particular rebuttal to your conjecture that they would have achieved this result with French made machines, i don't know about that. But by all reason you do need more axis for the surface quality, not suitable for simple copy milling.
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There really isn't much of Japanese electronics industry left, not like it used to be. Engineering subcontracted to Taiwan, manufacturing anywhere abroad. I don't know if they can rebuild it like that. Automotive and heavy are holding on. Foremost if they were to become a military power like that, it would be weak to sanctions if they were to choose the wrong enemy, not necessarily threatening. But i do expect that militarization of Japan is potentially starting soon, in order to have defensive capability against China.
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We know they're scrambling to upgrade from 130-200nm to 28nm. But there is such a thing as next generationn of weapons to come eventually. 5G peer-to-peer, loitering munitions, smart stuff incorporating AI, lower cost based on phone chipsets just temperature and vibration hardened, 4K cameras. It would be inconceivable that China isn't moving in this direction, it's just so obvious given their tech trajectory. But US and EU have slept right through, they will have nothing to counter that. So yeah maybe it's not fair but it makes sense.
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He covers the whole world actually. All of it. He has an inside perspective on Taiwan.
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