Thursday, June 18, 2026

China & "The Tribute System" by Ray Dalio

A very elaborate, and well informed, article. 

Unfortunately, both individuals, groups, and nations, are using past as explanation for assertive behavior or even worse. It is part of "natural spirit" of need to show and dominate. May be true, but sad. 

The only way to "rectify" anything is internally. Everything else is just competing for more power.

The Tribute System: The New World Order | LinkedIn

  • Shift in Global Power: Global leaders (especially in Asia) perceive that the US lacks the public will and resources to fight multi-front wars, specifically regarding Taiwan. This has accelerated a shift toward China as a regional anchor.
  • Economic Rise of China: Chinese exports have generated massive capital surpluses and boosted the global use of the renminbi, allowing China to rapidly expand its economic and financial influence.
  • The Tribute System Model: Dalio predicts a modern emergence of a hierarchical "tribute-system-type order," where nations build cooperative, subordinate relationships with China to secure deals and maintain harmony without direct conflict.
  • Cultural Influence: Unlike Western bottom-up, individualistic systems, Chinese strategy relies on Confucian hierarchy (order and obedience) and The Art of War principles (winning through behind-the-scenes pressure and deception rather than violent conflict).
  • The Goal: President Xi aims to rectify China's historical "100 Years of Humiliation" by achieving self-sufficiency and gradually exerting sovereign authority over Taiwan.


Vercel Eve, AI Agents framework

 Eve - Vercel

Like Next.js for web apps, but for agents.
Markdown for instructions and skills,
TypeScript for tools.
Durable by default.


Define instructions and skills in markdown, tools in TypeScript, and deploy. The framework compiles the directory, wires up durable workflows, and connects channels.


my-agent/
├── package.json
└── agent/
    ├── agent.ts
    ├── instructions.md
    ├── tools/
    │   └── get_weather.ts
    ├── skills/
    │   └── plan_a_trip.md
    └── channels/
        └── slack.ts

  • instructions.md tells the agent who it is and how it should behave.
  • agent.ts chooses the model and configures runtime options.
  • tools/ holds typed functions the model can call.
  • skills/ holds longer procedures the model loads only when they are useful.
  • channels/ connect the agent to HTTP clients, Slack, Discord, and the other places people talk to it.

mini PaaS: Docker orchestration tools

K8s and Docker Desktop are not the only way to manage docker containers.

a single "brain" app orchestrating a bundle of off-the-shelf containers (Caddy, DBs, Auth) on a single server—is exactly how wildly popular tools like Dokku, CapRover, Coolify, and CasaOS work.




Docker powered mini-Heroku. The smallest PaaS implementation you've ever seen.

Shell + Go, MIT

By default, Dokku does not use or include any database. Instead, it uses an extensible plugin system to provision and manage the specific datastores your application requires.





CapRover is an extremely easy to use app/database deployment & web server manager for your NodeJS, Python, PHP, ASP.NET, Ruby, MySQL, MongoDB, Postgres, WordPress (and etc...) applications!

TS, Apache



An open-source & self-hostable alternative to Vercel, Heroku, Netlify and Railway for easily deploying websites, databases, web applications and 280+ one-click services to your own server.


PHP




CasaOS - A simple, easy-to-use, elegant open-source Personal Cloud system.

Go, Apache

...upgraded CasaOS to ZimaOS, the next-generation NAS OS ?