Good lord, the racism. I can see being a bit suspect of a foreigner harboring love for their mother nation, but existing in a world in which you literally cannot concieve of a foreigner not being a agent?
How paranoid do you have to be to get to "I cannot possibly believe that she is not a spy based solely on the fact that she's chinese."
Like, maybe she is or isn't, but to go on record saying that her innocence is literally beyond belief (or perhaps merely only hard to believe if it only 'strains' credulity) because of her heritage? That cannot be anything but racism.
The first layer is friendly - money, gifts, favors. The second is threatening. The third is no holds barred. They will jail your family members[1] if they're still mainland. Stalk and harass your family even if you live in the US[2]. Weibo is generally the main conduit.
Given we've seen this playbook first hand executed for seemingly minor offenses to the state it isn't at all unreasonable to conclude Alice was under CCP influence in some way and probably significantly given Jensen's significance.
[1] Ex-FAANG employee had one of their parents jailed for nearly a decade for non-CCP aligned views
[2] Ex-FAANG employee, after sending nearly all their salary back to China for 5+ years to secure their parent's release reported stalking incidents from CCP agents in mainland USA. Same type of CCP agents that operate out of the 18+ Chinese Police Stations recently discovered in Canada.
The whole thing went from NYT’s shocking article of “Jensen was sleeping with a Chinese spy” to “We don’t know if she’s a spy, but she could be because she’s… you know… Chinese”.
And the way and timing the 2nd and 3rd affair stories broke by the NYT, this really looks like a concerted effort to oust Jensen using the NYT as an instrument.
We can only speculate who’s behind this, but multiple parties benefit from removing the biggest advocate in Silicon Valley for open-weight models and more competition.
It doesn't escape me that as a nice bonus the most valuable US company is now out of the hands of a 'Chinese' CEO too.
A_D_E_P_T•18h ago
In this narrow case, it's highly likely that she took money from the Chinese government -- which is not to say their intelligence agencies, but rather the tech funds and other national/regional government bodies that directly invest in important/strategic ventures. Almost all Chinese tech and manufacturing firms take .gov money. The Chinese government is very very good at supporting development.
What's indeed far from clear is whether she was working for any Chinese intelligence agency directly. Jensen was a China dove, and his fall from grace hurts China in the near term. It'll be interesting to see what shakes out.
stickfigure•8m ago
...a normal human with normal human drives. Let's not forget that possibility.