To ALLY countries!

Argentina isn't an ally of the US. And, of course, that means Argentina is an enemy of the US. The US has "allies" and several levels of enemies. The US doesn't have "neutral" relationships with any country. Either you do what they say or they pretend not to care, but screw you later on.

Assange says Argentina's problem with holdouts is because of our "agreement" with Iran (to investigate the bombing of AMIA). Initially the US said they would support Argentina's cause, but now they've changed completely and trying to push us into bankruptcy.

You can send as many Teslas as you like to the UK or Canada. To south america? No chance. Too dangerous. These jungle monkeys are actually smart and they might use this to build an ICBM. (See: Condor project. Argentina's missile, shut down by US pressures).

Try Lazarus Form Recovery.

As for "guerrilla" shows, that's pretty much how it works. Other countries resort to "content", but American shows can have content AND be super-productions (HBO shows), so it's hard to compete.

Argentina is able to give you a high profile movie, for example. See "The secret in their eyes" by Juan Jose Campanella. Fantastic movie, and rare as it had VFX and shots from an helicopter, something rarely seen in low budget stuff like what we're used to. (Disclaimer: Campanella worked in Hollywood. He directed several "House" episodes. So he does things "hollywood style")

Governments offer subsidies to local productions but it's still a hard sell.

The only way to really regulate is being in a position of power AND pass laws. It's worked great for Canada: they require a certain quota of local production and they've "forced" many US TV shows to be shot there. Also, they managed to sneak canadian actors into US shows too (since Canada is a large enough market for US to care about pleasing them).

I'm talking about international taxes (Import tariffs)

You still have to go through customs. 10 teslas is a lot of money (you can't walk into a country with $50K in cash).

Texas Instruments sends me free samples sometimes. Last time I tried to order a DAC (Analog to digital converter) for AUDIO. Since it was considered, by US customs, a "data processing" device, i had to sign a statement swearing I'm not a military entity and it wasn't going to be used for military purposes.

Getting INTO the US is a whole different story. Read up on the VISA application program and you'll see. (it starts with $180 that you don't get back if you're rejected).

Yeah, that's not how the world works. Sorry.

You see, you live in the USA. Your country is the biggest piece of shit when it comes to fair trade.

Why? Because you CANNOT compete. So you create bullshit regulations and trade barriers. But you go around the world bullying other countries to sign free trade agreements with you. So you can dump our countries with your crap - but we can't sell to you.

I'm from Argentina. We can't sell lemons to you (even though our lemons are cheaper than yours), and we can't sell beef to you (even though or beef is perfectly healthy). The US claims our beef is contaminated with Foot-and-mouth disease, so they won't accept it. All it takes is ONE case in my country for you to completely block us for years. Think about it for a little and figure it out. Have you? Let me explain: all it takes is for someone from the US to infect ONE of our cows - for the US to completely block trade for one of our main industries.

And the US works ACTIVELY so other countries CANNOT develop. For example, when Argentina was working on a 4K video codec, the US government, by way of "export controls" didn't allow nVidia to sell us more than 4 (four) Tesla units - for the whole country.

See? THAT is how the world works. Not with your libertarian free market theory.

Actually Buenos Aires is trying to get Netflix to pay a 3% tax.

Argentinian netflix does have local movies. I watched Nueve Reinas (Nine Queens) there (if you're a netflix subscriber, would you please check for me if that's available in your region? If so, I'd also suggest you watch it).

The problem, as you say, if you buy a car and have it shipped, you pay tax. But services aren't taxed (I'm not saying they should or shouldn't, i'm just stating a fact). And, as you say, if they don't have offices, they shouldn't pay anything. And this is where it gets interesting: why should any american company have offices outside the US? Everything they do is online or over the phone. You don't go to a netflix office.

As for the quota of local content: yes, I don't want to see crap shows on TV to meet a quota, but, as you say, the production value is different. The US has a huge advantage: they have their own market, which is gigantic. And they own the distribution too. They don't make their shows to "export", they do because it doesn't cost them more money.

But other countries don't have that advantage, and they have to play in a completely unfair game. How do you expect your country's productions to get better if they just simply can't because they have to compete with TV shows?

A TV show in the US has a budget of millions of dollar per episode. High profile shows even have millions of dollars in salaries, per actor, per episode. You can't really expect a TV show made in Suriname to have a $2M budget per episode. Not even for a whole season. No other country shoots their TV shows on FILM like the US does (or used to do - probably now it's all 4K video). All other countries shoot on SD video - that should give you an idea of how much the americans can spend for production - and also: now they can re-release all their old shows in HD (because their source material is able to give you that resolution). Try that with European shows - oopsie: they were shot on video. Good luck competing with that.

Read that as: So, Canada tries to regulate Netflix, since Netflix, being a US company, pay taxes in the US. So, why should the Canadian government defend netflix?

Not only culture. There are economic interests too.

You see, every country sells goods and services to other countries. For this, they receive (gasp!) money, which goes into their reserves. These reserves are what makes that country's moneys worth something.

So, it's not in the best interest of Canadians to be funneling money into the US for something like a streaming service. It is, though, in the best interest of Americans that they do.

So, Canada tries to regulate Netflix, since Netflix, not being a US company, does not pay taxes in the US. So, why should the Canadian government defend netflix? They don't pay any taxes there. And they don't leave any money there. They don't even hire people there. Canada, in fact, loses money because Canada needs to pay Netflix off their own reserves.

Netflix doesn't do anything for Canada. Why should Canada do any favors to them?

Your libertarian, free market theory says if they do, someone else will start a thriving business because of that.

they'd get their ass handed to them in front of a WTO panel.

So? who gives a fuck ? Do you know what country has the most rulings AGAINST them by the WTO? Find out and let me know. (I'll give you a hint: its name starts with UNITED).

Eh, can you blame them for wanting to "keep jobs in their country"? I mean, you americans (if you aren't american just ignore that part) just don't get it. The problem with Netflix is that they are US based. And their servers too. Netflix, for example, is available here in Argentina. But they don't have any local servers. They just stream straight from the US. The service sucks (international bandwidth is not the same as national. Or even local, as Netflix does in the US with hundreds of caches across the USA).

Netflix collects money from Argentinians and pays zero taxes in Argentina. They also don't invest here. And they effectively block the competition by making it economically impossible for a company to sell here since they won't be able to match their price (capital cost and taxes). This is the same for every other country that's not the US.

Canada has successfully regulated the TV industry, requiring a certain amount of local productions. This is why a LOT of US shows are actually shot in vancouver with canadian actors. Without this, the TV industry in Canada would be tiny. This is the same thing that happens here in south america: dozens of cable channels broadcasting only US shows.

Unfortunately, capitalism tends to centralize things to make it more efficient. The only way to force things to change is by legislation.

I don't like paying taxes either, but I would like if there was an industry of things, not just "arrogance" like "you don't have a right to collect taxes from me, I don't pay taxes in your country. Yes, i sell millions of my product there but i owe you nothing. And you better have a good infrastructure for me to be able to sell"

OK, OK, let's just say that CIA is the training agency behind the School of the Americas, the masters of torture used in the 70s in Latin America.

Langley.

Also training ground for Hamas, Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda...

And Europeans know very well about slavery and exploitation. They were the masters of it at the time.

As an Argentinian (if you know our recent history): No, people tolerate everything. People don't "uprise" spontaneously. People don't go out and protest.

They don't.

I've learned that ALL protests are organized by someone with a political motivation. Nothing more.

We're in a situation worse than what we were in 2001. And people just carry on with their lives every day. Humans are tame criatures, they will take absolutely everything and accept it. Look at the life in the Middle East for example. Iran, once a westernized, modern country, taken back to the middle ages by the muslims. And people didn't protest.
The Khmer Rouge killing everything and everyone. People didn't protest.
You'll see people oppressed all over the world. In third world nations, and in the US too. And guess what? People don't do anything. The ones in power take it all.