“We hope to make books and movies available again to our customers in China as soon as possible,” an Apple spokeswoman said in a statement to the New York Times. It’s believed Apple’s services were banned because they directly compete with similar offerings from Chinese companies.
We know China’s economy has been losing steam for several years now, with the typical 10% growth goals lowered steadily each year. There has long been suspicion that the cited numbers are inflated significantly. Which means they are probably in deeper problems than anybody dares admit so they circle the wagons and, like Putin’s Russia, fall back on nationalism and xenophobia.
Update: The Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post has linked the store closures to the release of controversial independent movie Ten Years, which won best picture prize at this month’s Hong Kong Film Awards, despite being banned in China. News of the store closures broke shortly before the movie became available on iTunes in Hong Kong. The dystopian film imagines Hong Kong in 2025 with language police, mini Red Guards, radical protest and social alienation rife.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
