Quick Luddite Notes

🇺🇸 🇨🇳 America doesn’t even know what to ban from China!

The US just banned DeepSeek from government agency systems:

Notice of Order Regarding Exclusion and Removal of DeepSeek Products From Federal Civilian Executive Branch Information Technology Systems and Procurements [Docket No. DHS-2026-0628]

SUMMARY:
The Department of Homeland Security is publishing notice of the Secretary of Homeland Security’s issuance of an order (1) excluding information technology products and services developed by Hangzhou DeepSeek Artificial Intelligence Co., Ltd (DeepSeek), to include affiliated entities as defined in applicable regulations, from federal civilian agency procurements; and, (2) removing all DeepSeek and DeepSeek-affiliate products, and third-party products and services developed using DeepSeek implementations, from civilian agency information technology.

What I don’t understand is this: why didn’t the DoHS ban Alibaba’s Qwen, a family of open-weight models that can run locally and are even more popular than DeepSeek?

In the same line of American illogical logic, how come they banned Huawei for both communication infrastructure and personal devices, but didn’t ban ZTE, Xiaomi, and Oppo? Huawei is banned from the Google Play Store, but the other Chinese brands aren’t.

I asked Gemini 4 Argon about that. Its first answer was mostly bogus, so I will not include it here, but you can read it here.

I fought back:

Your explanations are not sensible.

  1. Nobody used the words “blanket ban.” Banning the use of Qwen models would have been straightforward without banning the entire Alibaba Corporation. For comparison, the FDA bans Kinder eggs in the US (only the US does that), but its producer, Ferrero, is not.

  2. Prohibiting Google from licensing GMS (hence the Play Store) has nothing to do with the manufacturing or non-manufacturing of telecom carrier infrastructure. Why are Xiaomi and Oppo allowed to use Google’s Play Store, but not Huawei?

It’s still a huge mess that you’re trying to whitewash.

This time, Gemini came to its senses:

You are right to call those two points out. My previous explanation muddied the waters by conflating bureaucratic excuses with what the law actually allows, and by mixing up telecom infrastructure bans with the Play Store ban. Let’s strip away the excuses and look at both points directly.

1. The Kinder Egg Analogy: Could DHS Have Banned Just Qwen Without Banning All of Alibaba?

Yes, 100%. Your Ferrero / Kinder Surprise analogy is completely accurate, and the law DHS used—the Federal Acquisition Supply Chain Security Act (41 U.S.C. § 1323)—explicitly allows product-specific bans.

Under the statute, DHS can issue an exclusion order for "covered articles" (a specific product or family of models like Qwen) without banning the entire "source" (Alibaba Group). Just as the U.S. bans Kinder Surprise eggs under the 1938 Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (which prohibits confectioneries containing "non-nutritive objects") while allowing Ferrero Rocher and Nutella on every grocery shelf, DHS had the exact legal authority to ban Qwen weights and APIs while leaving the rest of Alibaba alone.

So why didn't they ban Qwen alongside DeepSeek? Because U.S. tech regulation is reactive and politically driven, not proactive or technical:

2. Why Huawei Lost the Google Play Store, While Xiaomi and Oppo Kept It

You are also completely right here: whether a company makes 5G cell towers has zero direct legal connection to whether its phones can run the Google Play Store.

The reason Huawei lost Google Mobile Services (GMS) while Xiaomi and Oppo kept it comes down to who got placed on the U.S. Commerce Department's "Entity List"—and the geopolitical reality behind why Huawei was singled out.

The Mechanism: How the Play Store Gets Blocked

The U.S. government does not have a "Google Play Store Ban" list. Instead, the Department of Commerce maintains the Entity List, an export-control blacklist. Once a foreign company is placed on the Entity List, U.S. companies are forbidden from exporting or licensing any non-public U.S. technology (whether jet engine parts, Qualcomm chips, or proprietary software like Google's Play Store) to that company without a special license.

Why Was Huawei Put on the Entity List, But Not Xiaomi or Oppo?

There is the official legal pretext and the real-world economic/geopolitical reason:

  1. The Official Legal Pretext (Iran Sanctions & Criminal Indictment): In January 2019, the U.S. Department of Justice unsealed a 13-count criminal indictment against Huawei and its CFO, Meng Wanzhou. They accused Huawei of using a hidden Hong Kong shell company (Skycom) to sell U.S.-origin equipment to Iran in violation of U.S. trade sanctions, and committing bank fraud by lying to HSBC about it. In May 2019, Commerce used that indictment—alongside allegations of corporate espionage—as the legal justification to drop Huawei onto the Entity List, instantly cutting off Google Play. Xiaomi and Oppo never got caught selling U.S. tech to Iran, so the Commerce Department never had a similar criminal indictment to slap them onto the Entity List.
  2. The Real Geopolitical Reason (Technological Self-Sufficiency vs. Buying American): If you look past the legal filings, the U.S. targeted Huawei's smartphone division for two reasons that didn't apply to Xiaomi or Oppo:

It is a disjointed mess. A consumer buying a Xiaomi or Oppo phone in Europe gets full Google apps, while a Huawei phone right next to it on the shelf is blocked—not because a Xiaomi phone is inherently "safer" for a consumer's data than a Huawei phone, but because Huawei broke Iran sanctions, threatened U.S. chip dominance, and became the primary target of a geopolitical trade war.

Sometimes, buying enough Snapdragon chips from Qualcomm keeps you safe. As for Qwen still not being officially banned and Kimi still under the US Administration’s radar, what else can you say? Sheer incompetence.