By the media? It's easy to point fingers at a blackhole.
> Meta is a social media company, not an AI company,
Alibaba (the discussion here) is not an AI company too (by your definition).
> Also if a US company were caught distilling, I think Anthropic could actually take them to court, and I'd guess they don't want that kind of PR.
Meta has been to congress. Microsoft, Google etc have been in lots of court cases and continue to do so. Do you really think that is what stops them?
> Is China not Asian? Are Asians not generally collective/cooperative, as opposed to individualistic/competitive?
This is exactly the "media" view you get. It's just stereotypes and generalization.
And yes, that is wrong by the way. Evident in real data. "China" as a whole wins market share in many areas but no 1 company has as much of a monopoly as US companies do. Why? There's so much competition that it is scary. So are you sure they don't compete?
> but in a way Japan is a US colony in all but name
Again, I almost give up seeing this. Clearly, not. If a whole country, the world's top 5 in GDP is only that to you something is wrong with what you're seeing - not with the country.
> Both are very much politically intertwined with the West (along with RoC/Taiwan), which means nothing major that may be against US interest happens
On the table? You do know that China is a top trading partner with all of these on your list. Despite whatever spat you might see in the media.
> The reality is that China and the US are essentially in a trade war
No. That's what the US government wants you to believe. It was even documented that in his 1st term, Trump, wanting a grand policy asked Krushner, whom then suggested China (pretty randomly) and so they went with it. Trump has now done less "China" related things lately due to all the backlash that you'd think he has moved on and found new toys.
Until very recently, the export ban GPUs had such a loophole that Chinese companies were able to use subsidiaries outside of China to buy and train that the whole thing was meaningless.
i.e. conclusion: stop getting brainwashed by media articles. It's all a show to get someone like you riled up.