Last week, China’s Ministry of Commerce published a document that went by the name of “announcement No. 62 of 2025”.
But this wasn’t just any bureaucratic missive. It has rocked the fragile tariffs truce with the US.
The announcement detailed sweeping new curbs on its rare earth exports, in a move that tightens Beijing’s grip on the global supply of the critical minerals - and reminded Donald Trump just how much leverage China holds in the trade war.
China has a near-monopoly in the processing of rare earths - crucial for the production of everything from smartphones to fighter jets.
Where my holodecks at?
No it just the ever growing feeling of sameness and nothing new coming up.
As a young kid in the late 80s and early 90s I saw shit just go from big to bigger in only a few years. Jokes about computers becoming obsolete the moment they are shipped were everywhere. Graphics and computing power exploded in the 90s and all the way until the 2010s and… things didn’t seem to be that much different. A computer I would have had in 2000 would be aching for a replacement in 2005, and the same from 2005 to 2010 and so on. But now I feel like a computer I would have had from 2015 or 2018 would not be too far behind today.
Maybe things got more efficient. But it just seemed like things haven’t changed that much. I mean they did. Cloud computing has gotten huge, but in terms of users and usability things haven’t budged.